What factors retreat Hong Kong children from active participation in society? A qualitative research on child participation Cheng Po Yan City University of Hong Kong 10 July 2012 Joint World Conference on Social Work and Social Development: Action and Impact

Article 12 to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child “States Parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.”

Child Participation in HK context

1 st Concluding Observation in nd Concluding Observation in 2005

NGO Report of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region under the Convention on the Rights of the Child” 2005

Methodology

In-depth interview Content analysis Key questions asked: Government performance Reason for participating/n ot participating Child rights education

MaleFemaleTotal Children aged 12 – Young people who have at least 3 years of community engagement before Total358 MaleFemaleTotal Social worker112 Professor of educational institution11 Child rights advocate112 Total325

Findings

Poor child rights education “We are never taught about child rights and human rights. I only came to know after learning from the [child rights education] programme.” (16 years old, male) “There is a very little part talking about human rights in Liberal Studies but there is nothing about child rights.” (16 years old, female) “What I think about my school is that they know nothing about CR at all. From principals to teachers to students, all of them are not aware of CR.” (17 years old, male)

Inactive government “Um…they are not really active…but anyway the officers are just influenced by the macro environment. The environment…as the government are not taking it seriously, it’s hard do anything.” (15 years old, female) “the answer is simple - why should I listen to you when you have no vote? There are a lot of influential groups and people in society, but not the children.” (17 years old, female)

“There are too many things relevant to us! My priority must be studying. We really don’t have enough time to study. As well as for my classmates, they all talk about tutorial classes, sports and music. It’s a strange thing to talk about public affairs.”(16 years old, female) “I didn’t engage much in other public affairs cos I’m too busy. I don’t have much time to engage in lot of event. (16 years old, male) Frankly, I seldom take part in social events if they are not rewarding. Once I joined a programme related to public affairs but that was just for earning academic credits. Academic performance as the paramount consideration

Implication and Discussion

HK under Residual Welfare Model Government’s role: Enabler VS Duty-bearer Children’s role: Service user VS Rights-holder

Cultural factors in Chinese society CollectivismIndividualismVS Hierarchical relationship

The way forward