What matters for child participation - The role of valuation-based dialogical participation for children living in kinship care in England

Abstract

According to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child a child has the right to be heard and included in all matters that affect them. Child participation in child welfare research, policy and practice also has instrumental and intrinsic value. However, participation and voice, especially with children, remain contested in how they are applied and theorised. This paper is an extract from research on what matters to 19 children living in kinship care in England. It focusses on the children’s reflections on what child participation means for research, for child welfare services, and for family life. This was the first study to combine a dialogical participative approach with critical realism. Multiple methods such as child-led tours, photo-elicitation, and visual methods were used to capture the children's valuations of their lives and participation. Theory-building alongside the child participants provided empirical certainty with an interpretivist awareness of subjectivities. Analysis of the children’s reflections reveal that voice and agency must be theorised as relational. Furthermore, the children desire inter-generational dialogical spaces to contemplate different views, explore what matters, and out their inner conversations. The children wish for discussions that listen to tensions rather than try to resolve them. Also, appropriate discussions that acknowledged interdependence aligned with the children feeling safe and cared for.