ABSTRACT
This chapter responds to concerns that recognising and respecting children’s right to decisional privacy will incite conflict between children and their parents, fracture family relationships and undermine parental authority, thereby justifying state intervention in the family. The response to these concerns is twofold. First, the notion of ‘conflict’ in the family context is conceptualised through a relational approach to autonomy. Second, the scope of children’s right to decisional privacy is addressed, allowing for children’s views to be determinative of their best interests in certain circumstances. This chapter also articulates the social value of children’s right to decisional privacy, proposing two interrelated processes for translating the theory developed in this book into policy and practice. This chapter demonstrates that recognising and respecting children’s right to decisional privacy reconfigures the relationships between children and their parents, children and the state, and parents and the state. It also provides opportunities for children’s perspectives, views and experiences to shape policy and practice.
