ABSTRACT
Over the past few decades there has been an increasing emphasis on children’s participation. This has been described as part of the two related global social trends of ‘democratisation’ and individualisation (Fairclough 1992; Prout 2000 citing Beck 1992). These trends, as Prout (2000) has pointed out, have facilitated the contemporary understanding of children as ‘persons in their own right’ (p. 308), as having agency and the right to have their voices heard. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) is generally seen as contributing to the global impetus on child participation and as the benchmark for a change in adult-child relations (e.g. John 1996).
