Children’s Rights in Ghana

Robert Kwame Ame is assistant professor of human rights and criminology at Wilfrid Laurier University. DeBrenna LaFa Agbényiga is an assistant professor in the School of Social Work and assistant dean for equity, diverity, and inclusive academic affairs in the College of Social Science at Michigan State University. Nana Araba Apt is professor of sociology and dean of academic affairs at Ashesi University College in Accra, Ghana.

This is the first book that examines Ghana's compliance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). Ghana being the first country to ratify the Convention, it thus fills an important gap in the literature on Ghana. The book throws a searchlight on a wide range of rights issues including children's identity, violence against children and women, child exploitation and children in conflict with the law plus a host of other CRC related issues and further identifies and explains the main obstacles in the way of realizing children's rights in Ghana. A major strength of this book is that the contributors, Ghanaians and non-Ghanaians alike have vast experience in empirical research in Ghana and most importantly, come from diverse academic disciplines. Researchers, instructors, and students of Social Work, Sociology, Criminology Human Rights, Education and Law, are examples of a few academic disciplines that would find this book a welcome relief in their search for relevant and current data on children's issues in Ghana. It should also be of great interest to policy makers, human rights activists, Children's NGOs and international development partners interested in children's issues.

ForewordPart I. Childhood and IdentityChapter 1. Introduction: Confronting the Challenges: Optimizing Child Rights in GhanaChapter 2. Defining Childhood: A Historical Development PerspectiveChapter 3. Controversies in Paternity: Who Is a Child's Father under Ghanaian Law?Chapter 4. Bridging the Child Rights Gap in a Refugee Context: Survival Strategies and Impact on Inter-generational RelationsPart II. Chidren in Dangerous Circumstances: Exploitation and AbuseChapter 5. Corporal Punishment in GhanaChapter 6. Child Labor in Ghana: Global Concern and Local RealityChapter 7. Children's Rights, Mobility, and Transport in Ghana: Access to Education and Health ServicesPart III. Policies, Laws, and ProgramsChapter 8. Children's Rights, Controversial Traditional Practices, and the Trokosi System: A Critical Socio-legal PerspectiveChapter 9. Assessing the Progress of the 1998 Children's Act of Ghana:Achievements, Opportunities, and Challenges of the FirstTen YearsChapter 10. Situating CRC Implementation Processes in the Local Contextsof Correctional Institutions for Children in Conflict with the Law in GhanaChapter 11. Ghana's Education System: Where Rhetoric Meets ReformChapter 12. Conclusion: The Future of Children's Rights in Ghana