(2 minutes read) Child Protection primarily involves two tasks. Giving justice to [[Children|children]] and giving security to children. --- ### Security Security is best described in terms of its original meaning. It comes from 'se' plus 'cura', roughly meaning "without a worry". Imagine a little child who walks to her school without any worry whatsoever, talking to the flowers and birds on the way, wishing a cat on the sidewalk, and chattering and laughing and giggling all the way, with her friends. This simple meaning of Security is a more meaningful meaning than the more complex ones, one would say. --- ### Justice Justice at its simplest is "giving everyone their due". This is a useful definition in that it brings clarity required for practical purposes of those engaged in giving justice to children. Let's take the following example. A gold chain has been snatched away from a child by an elderly man . What are the dues to the child here? Obviously, the gold chain has to be returned. Also, the child needs the reassurance that this will not happen again and the shaken confidence of the child in the world around her is restored. Now, what are the dues to the chain snatcher here? He needs a certain treatment that ensures he is reformed, deterred, and if required taken away from the surroundings where the child lives. What we call punishment. There is perhaps a third actor here. The society that witnesses this crime. It consists of the friends of the child at the time of the offence, the parents of the child, the neighbourhood or whoever comes to know of this. Their sense of security is shaken and in the scheme of the State, it is necessary that their confidence in the public order is restored. Recovering the stolen item and punishment to the snatcher serve to satisfy this important concern as well. --- However, giving justice to a child may not be exactly the same as giving justice to an adult. If you wish to explore the nuances of this distinction, read more about [[Paedojurisprudence]], [here](https://osf.io/preprints/lawarchive/th49y_v1). --- ### A Framework Let's now think about a possible framework that can cover the entire gamut of Child Protection activities. A framework helps us to visualise and arrange the probable set of activities one can undertake in Child Protection. The framework being proposed here consists of 1. [[The Larger Goals of Child Protection]] 2. [[Challenges to Security of Children]] 3. [[Range of Responses Available for Child Protection]] Each of them are addressed separately. To read about each of them, click on the links. Texts in violet are links to a new page. As a fourth dimension, we will also include [[Childhood Studies]], the academic study of children and childhoods, which among other things include comparative study of Child Protection systems.