THE EMERGENCE OF CHILDREN'S RIGHTS

Abstract

Until recently, social historians held the surprising consensus that parents of old felt little affection for their children.2 This opinion is sometimes thought to be derived from the thesis expounded by Philippe Aries that, in medieval times, there was no concept of childhood as a period with a character distinct from adulthood. While, as Aries himself admits, this fact (if fact it be) does not necessarily imply that there could be no affection for them, nevertheless his assumption is that it indicated actual indifference.3 But how do we define, and measure, affection? Aries argues that the growth of the idea of childhood was related to increasing perception of the importance of education as the agrarian economy declined, which, as then understood, imposed rigorous, often cruel, regimes upon children. To inquire whether parents in any period loved their children more, or less, than in another, is to examine the nature of love. This did not deter Lloyd de Mause, who claimed that 'it is, of course, not love which the parent of the past lacked, but rather the emotional maturity needed to see the child as a person separate from himself'.4