IGF 2019 WS #23 How and why to involve perspectives of children effectively

Relevance to Theme: Protecting children and young people from the risks and harm that the Internet and digital media can cause is indisputably important. However, to allow them to participate/engage in an age-appropriate and child-friendly way in developments and decisions that open up safe, creative and protected possibilities of using the Internet, is an approach that is still under-represented. Governments, public authorities and businesses make decisions about conditions, rules and opportunities for using the Internet and digital media and content that must also take into account the best interests of children and young people. Today, children are not only subjects to be protected from risks and harmful contents or experiences. They are not only consumers of media and devices. They are producers, readers, gamers and influencers, they have expertise, impact and power which can help understanding their views and changing policies in a human rights based and child-friendly way. Perspectives of children and youth are of course as different as the regions and cultures as well as the living conditions and chances of human beings. But children have the right to be heard in every issue they are affected of. That’s what the UN-Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) stands for and what has to be realised from the duty-bearers of the Convention – the States parties, the companies and all adult persons. The respect for and implementation of Children's Rights has an essential dimension particular in digital contexts. At the same time, digitization offers a high potential for realizing to a greater extent the previously unrealized or under-implemented rights of children. The right to access to mass media (Art. 17 CRC) , the right to privacy (Art. 16 CRC), the right to freedom of expression (Art. 13 CRC), the right to be protected from violence (Art. 19 CRC)– these are only a few dimensions, which open the view for discussions on this issue.

Relevance to Internet Governance: Mediatisation and digitization has led to a serious change in childhood and adolescent environments in recent years. The fact that digital media such as smartphones and tablets as well as the use of the Internet would soon find its way into many children’s hands or class rooms, was not foreseeable at the time of the resolution of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989. Nonetheless, Article 17 UN CRC makes it clear that States parties must allow children access to mass media and thus to "information and material from a variety of sources". Children's rights must accordingly come to their full development in the digital world. This means to take the views and experiences of children into account when discussing, developing and regulating the Internet in a worldwide context. But participation is not only a question of how to include perspectives in an equal and justice way but also how to guarantee fair and equal access to mass media at all.