Children’s rights are human rights. They protect the child as a human being.

As human
rights, children’s rights are constituted by fundamental guarantees and essential human
rights:

Children’s rights recognize fundamental guarantees to all human beings: the right to life, the
non-discrimination principle, the right to dignity through the protection of physical and
mental integrity (protection against slavery, torture and bad treatments, etc.)

Children’s rights are civil and political rights, such as the right to identity, the right to a
nationality, etc.

Children’s rights are economic, social and cultural rights, such as the right to education, the
right to a decent standard of living, the right to health, etc.

Children’s rights include individual rights: the right to live with his or her parents, the right
to education, the right to benefit from protection, etc.

Children’s rights include collective rights: rights of refugee and disabled children, of
minority children or from autochthonous groups.

As well as the human rights that are laid out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
children and young people are entitled to additional rights which recognise that young
people have special needs to help them survive and develop to their full potential. Children
also have the right to special protection because of their vulnerability to exploitation and
abuse. The specific rights of children are laid out in the Convention on the Rights of the
Child.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child is an international human rights agreement (also
known as a human rights treaty) that outlines the specific rights that children and young
people can claim.

By signing up to the Convention, national governments commit to protecting these rights in

their countries. Nearly every country in the world has committed to the Convention, making
it the most widely supported human rights treaty.

The Convention was agreed to by the United Nations General Assembly and came into
force in September 1990. Australia ratified the Convention in December 1990. By ratifying
- or in other words, formally approving - the Convention, Australia committed to ensuring
that all children in Australia enjoy the rights set out in the treaty.

To make sure that nations are upholding their responsibilities to children under the
Convention, the United Nations also created the Committee on the Rights of the Child. The
Committee is a group of 18 independent experts who review the performance of countries
who have signed the Convention every 5 years.