Dealing with Child Maltreatment Through Child Participation

A great deal of attention has been devoted to developing methods of coping with child maltreatment, however, much or even all of this knowledge has been based upon perceptions and concepts of adults, while the voice of children, has yet to be fully heard. This chapter argues for the importance of giving children a voice in the process of developing knowledge and addressing child maltreatment. We discuss and present support for the existence of a link between raising children’s involvement in the process and improving coping abilities with the phenomenon of child abuse and neglect. Thus children should participate across the full spectrum of coping with child maltreatment, beginning with prevention efforts, through defining, detecting and identifying, policy-making, service-shaping, and eventually decision-making related to children’s lives and care procedures. It is our belief that giving children significant grounds to express their positions in these dimensions is essential to improve well-being of children worldwide and to better handle the complex phenomenon of child maltreatment.