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This paper aims to explore and develop a theoretical approach for children’s rights research in education formed through an encounter between the sociology of childhood and John Dewey’s educational theory. The interest is mainly methodological, in the sense that the primary ambition of the investigation is to suggest a fruitful and useful theoretical base for formulating research problems and undertaking research in children’s rights in education. The paper argues that, particularly in educational settings, research into children’s rights can and must be attributed to children both as full-status humans in a socio-politically contextual present, and as continually growing and changing, immature and dependent humans. From the theoretical encounter suggested in the paper, the much-used distinction of the child as either ‘being’ or ‘becoming’ can be reconsidered, and another point of departure for the study of children’s rights issues in education can be discerned.

Sociologists have long studied the ways people resist oppression but have devoted far less empirical attention to the ways people resign to it. As a result, researchers have neglected the mechanisms of resignation and how people narrate their lived experiences. Drawing on 81 interviews with parents with past child protective services cases, this article provides an empirical account of resignation in an institutional setting, documenting how parents understand relinquishing their rights as a process of personalization, calculation, or socialization. Phenomenologically, parents typically confronted multiple barriers and setbacks simultaneously, the combined weight of which pressured them to “give up,” interpreting structural and institutional pressures as individual choice. This article accordingly identifies resignation as a crucial feature of democratic governance.

Turkey's relationship with the European Union (EU) is dominated by issues of democratization and human rights and is best approached from a perspective which understands the nature of the cosmopolitan regimes which work to regulate the democratic practices of nation-states and animate citizens and minority groups striving to assert their rights. Cosmopolitan or transnational processes of democratization are frequently perceived by Turkey's Kemalist political elites as being contrary to the interests of domestic harmony and a threat to national integrity. It is argued that the apparent reluctance of the Kemalist elites to embrace greater pluralism and align with the EU's Copenhagen criteria is in fact an attempt to `remake' themselves through political choices framed by global opportunities. In this sense, the mobilization of nationalist resistance to outside `interference' is calculated to secure legitimacy in an increasingly uncertain political environment. In addition, Turkey is increasingly dependent upon the very global processes that are perceived as a threat to national sovereignty, and EU standards and norms offer the means by which Turkey can safeguard national integrity.

There is a wealth of evidence that disabled people experience far higher levels of unemployment and underemployment than non-disabled peers. Yet hitherto sociologists have paid scant attention to the structural causes of this issue. Drawing on a socio/political or social model of disability perspective this paper argues for a reconfiguration of the meaning of disability and work in order to address this problem. It is also suggested that such a strategy will make a significant contribution to the struggle for a fairer and equitable global society.

I examine the current movement for children's rights in the United States in terms of the history of child saving, and of the recent events concerning human rights. I stress the conflicts between the salvation and liberation of children, especially in the areas of education and justice. I also consider various approaches to children's rights to define the current movement, and review recent concerns so that I may clarify future needs and strategies.

This article looks critically at the human rights project as a damning three-dimensional metaphor that exposes multiple complexes. It argues that the grand narrative of human rights contains a subtext which depicts an epochal contest pitting savages, on the one hand, against victims and saviors, on the other. The savages-victims-saviors construction lays bare some of the hypocrisies of the human rights project and asks human rights thinkers and advocates to become more self-reflective. The piece questions the universality and cultural neutrality of the human rights project. It calls for the construction of a truly universal human rights corpus, one that is multicultural, inclusive, and deeply political.

Whilst a body of work exists that has engaged with and conceptualised transnational fields, and in particular for this paper, the transnational field of human rights, more work needs to be done to elaborate on the effects of transnational fields, at the national level. Using Bourdieu's field theory, and more recent scholarship that focuses on scalar aspects of fields, this research focuses on a human rights field at the national level in Bahrain. The paper addresses two levels/dimensions of the transnational field of human rights: the transnational level and the national level, focussing on the field's vertical autonomy. Based upon nineteen in‐depth interviews, the research retrieves the biographical trajectories of Bahraini human rights activists and activists from iNGOs with a specific remit that includes Bahrain. The paper argues that the vertical autonomy of the transnational field of human rights has demonstrable field effects at the national level, and that this has a number of implications. First, where transnational fields have greater vertical autonomy, the national level can operate with varying hierarchies, with actors adopting practices that diverge from those acting transnationally. Second, as a result of these scalar differences and the vertical autonomy of the transnational field, actors at the national level may have to adapt their practices, others can be side‐lined as a result of ‘symbolic pollution.’ Third, in order for local actors to engage with transnational advocacy networks, they must be the right type of actor.

Although the Refugee Convention and European asylum legislation state that decisions regarding asylum applications should be determined solely based on persecution and other human rights violations, the outcomes of asylum procedures may be subject to socioeconomic selectivity. This article is the first to analyse whether the human and social capital of asylum-seekers affect the results of decisions regarding their asylum applications and the length of asylum procedures based on a comprehensive longitudinal survey of 5,300 refugees in Germany. We find that socioeconomic and social capital resources increase the probability of approval of asylum applications and reduce the length of asylum procedures. Moreover, human capital is particularly rewarding for asylum-seekers from countries subject to severe political and civil rights violations, whereas social networks are more conducive when the case for protection is rather difficult to prove. Finally, asylum-seekers with a higher socioeconomic status before migration seem to be better positioned to efficiently instrumentalize social networks during the asylum process. Throughout the analysis, we control for variables that capture the violation of human rights and other forms of violence, changes in asylum policies and country-of-origin-specific fixed effects. The results are robust to different specifications and are representative for asylum-seekers arriving in Germany between 2013 and 2016. Altogether, similar to other claim-making processes, the asylum process seems to promote social inequality due to socioeconomic and social capital resources.

The tradition of thinking behind the idea of citizenship, which has become a key concept of modern social theory, has given insufficient attention to either gender or sexuality. In this paper it is argued that claims to citizenship status, at least in the West, are closely associated with the institutionalisation of hetero-sexual, as well as male, privilege. This is demonstrated when the association of certain forms of citizenship status with heterosexuality, national identity for example, is threatened or challenged. In discussing the relationship between sexuality and citizenship, attention is focused on the implications for the social inclusion and exclusion of lesbians and gay men. The analysis shows how sexualised notions of citizenship are connected to the public/private divide at both institutional and personal levels. Finally, the paper raises wider questions about the implications of the discussion for theorising citizenship.