Children's Participation in Child Welfare: A Systematic Review of Systematic Reviews

Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) stipulates that children have the right to express their views and to participate in decisions that directly affect them. But the reality of successfully applying Article 12 has bedevilled legislators, policymakers and practitioners alike since the inception of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (the Convention) as they struggle to decipher and apply their Article 12 obligations to practice. Whilst research in the social work field may have been to some extent sluggish to explore children's participation, it has increased more recently in both quality and quantity with a growing number of scholars paying greater attention to this field of study. Collectively, they provide a large body of relevant evidence, one so large, however, that it is not easy to summarize the patterns in their findings. The time is right therefore to draw thirty-three years' worth of data into one study so we can take stock of where we are at in terms of our knowledge, drawing all the disparate systematic reviews into one place. The objective of this research was to conduct a systematic review of systematic reviews related to Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) as it relates to children and young people involved with child welfare agencies. This systematic review sought to comply with the guidance from the JBI Manual for Evidence Synthesis on umbrella reviews. Fourteen databases were searched using predefined terms. Six hundred seventy-four original hits were retrieved for title and abstract searching after independent searching by the authors. Of those, fourteen were included for full independent reads and all fourteen were selected after discussion. Each systematic review was appraised using an eleven-point quality checklist from JBI. A thematic review was conducted to ascertain the themes across all systematic reviews. Three themes emerged (i) children's voice is not taken seriously; (ii) relationships are an important determining factor in (un)successful participation; and (iii) the context of participation is important. Our conclusion is that despite mandated UNCRC requirements to involve children and young people within the child protection system, the possibilities for children and young people to express their views remain restricted.