Keynote
Childhood at War: 100 Years of Children’s (Violated) Rights

In 2024 children are experiencing again the everyday brutality of war, be it in Gaza or Ukraine. Children become once again orphans, children are evacuated, children lose their homes and friends, children miss school and education. When war erupts children hardly matter and their rights are violated in so many different ways. While the UN demands with its 16th Sustainable Development Goal that “no child should be exposed to violence, abuse or neglect”, children continue to be particularly vulnerable in times of violent conflicts. Their bodies and souls are exposed to physical violence as well as to the emotional traumas of separation, loss, and neglect. It is in this year one hundred years ago that the Geneva Declaration formulated for the first time in history the need to–publicly and internationally–recognize children’s most basic rights. Back then the declaration’s 3rd principle demanded that “the child must be the first to receive relief in times of distress”. Between the UN’s most recent endeavour to protect children and the demands of the Geneva Declaration back then, a series of conventions were formulated and signed throughout the 20th century, hoping to change children’s fate in times of war and conflict. Pursuing a historical perspective, this lecture surveys the history of children’s conventions from 1924 up to today while sheding light on children’s everyday experiences of war and its aftermath. It attempts to tackles the complicated relationship between the violation of children’s rights in wartimes and the often only then formulated public call for the defense and protection of children’s fundamental rights.