Institut Universitaire Kurt Bösch

The historical developments of infant schools in Great Britain and salles d’asile in France – both precursors of present-day preschools – were interconnected. However, historians have not yet analysed specifically how transnational exchange influenced the growth and nature of these institutions. Drawing on archival data and secondary sources, and using a combined comparative and transnational approach, this study aims to remedy this omission. It traces the evolution of British infant schools and French salles d’asile from their beginnings to their affiliation with the education systems in their respective countries – i.e. from 1816, when Robert Owen founded the first infant school in Britain, to 1881, when the salle d’asile was incorporated as an integral part of the French education system (renamed école maternelle). The study also shows how ideas about infant education and the motives and experiences of educators and social reformers spread across British borders and influenced the development of salles d’asile.

The capability approach and international children’s rights share a normative ambition as they both aim to evaluate the degree of respect for a person’s dignity and well-being, and also to prescribe sets of particular social arrangements and policies in order to enhance the said respect. We discuss distinctions and overlaps between these normative ambitions with empirical concerns in the study of childhood and children’s rights. In order to do so, we situate recent developments and critical enquiries in children’s rights studies, and look at links between rights, emancipation and interdisciplinarity. After an examination of discussions on child participation, we present the notions of living rights and translations, two theoretical underpinnings that were developed in an interdisciplinary research project on priorities in international children’s rights advocacy which lies as a background for this chapter. Using some examples from recent children’s rights research, we further explore the links between our insights obtained from children’s rights research with the capability approach.

The authors introduce the extent and longevity of non-domiciled children and youth. While multiple definitions are presented, the authors divide the current status of non domiciled youth by homeless youth in the developed world and street children in the developing world. The origins of homeless youth are related to abuse. They are older than street children, more likely to come from middle class families, and equal in gender. A necessary condition of street children is poverty; several other factors are important including abuse, neglect, and historical and cultural context. Nor are all street children are on the street solely because of psychological reasons. Many are there because they are poor and being on the street is one way of coping with poverty by finding income generating sources. Many other street children are victims of war and natural disasters. Others are stateless. Comparisons and differences between street children and working children are introduced. For example, street children and homeless youth often rebel against authoritarian parents.

In the past two decades, the iconography of victimhood mobilized by child rights advocates has changed significantly. In particular, the child victim of violence has replaced the street child as the dominant icon on the international agenda. Based on data from more than 300 documents produced between 1989 and 2009 and interviews with leading advocates, this article explores the diverging trajectories of iconic child victims. It follows the traces of the successive translations of the idea of ‘stolen childhood’ and locates them against the backdrop of evolutions in the children’s rights field.

This article develops the concept of “Functional Regulatory Space” (FRS) in order to analyze the new forms of State action addressing (super) wicked problems. A FRS simultaneously spans several policy sectors, institutional territories and levels of government. It suggests integrating previous policy theories that focused on “boundary-spanning regime,” “territorial institutionalism” or multi-level governance. The FRS concept is envisaged as a Weberian “ideal-type” of State action and is applied to the empirical study of two European cases of potential FRS: the integrated management of water basins and the regulation of the European sky through functional airspace blocks. It will be concluded that the current airspace regulation does match the ideal-type of FRS any better than the water resource regulation does. The next research step consists in analyzing the genesis and institutionalization of potential FRS addressing other (super) wicked problems such as climate change and economic, security, health and immigration issues in different institutional contexts as well as at various levels of governance.

This book presents an integral, cross-cultural reflection on the social reality of children's rights and citizenship, giving an insight into new perspectives on the history and different concepts of c

La Convention relative aux droits de l’enfant lui confère le droit d’être entendu, sous certaines conditions, lorsqu’est prise une décision l’affectant. Les méthodes de prise en compte de son opinion doivent donc être adaptées à ses capacités évolutives. À travers la comparaison de deux modèles systémiques sous l’angle de la réflexivité qu’ils favorisent chez des adolescents, l’article contribue à la théorie de l’acteur social et à l’intervention participative.

Abstract This paper contributes to the study of permafrost in the Pyrenees by reporting geoelectrical investigations and thermal measurement on the Little Ice Age (LIA) forefields of two glaciers. The aim was to assess the internal composition of sedimentary bodies (debris rock glaciers and moraine deposits) located in this proglacial environment. Ground ice was prospected using two DC resistivity techniques: vertical electrical soundings and resistivity mapping at a fixed pseudo‐depth. Extreme specific resistivities ranging between 1 and 25 MΩ m were detected under a thin (1–2 m) unfrozen layer, indicating the presence of a massive ice layer, certainly buried glacier ice. This ice of glacial origin probably covers former permafrost bodies, i.e. a much thicker layer of perennially frozen sediments. Low subsurface temperatures measured on the deposits indicate that buried glacier ice could have been preserved on top of permafrost since the end of the LIA or earlier Holocene glacier advances. This stratigraphy demonstrates that glaciers and pre‐existing perennially frozen sediments (permafrost) were in contact during the LIA. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.