Unaccompanied Child Migrants and Family Relationships

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Willis, Katie; Clayton, Susan and Gupta, Anna. 2023. Unaccompanied Child Migrants and Family Relationships. In: Johanna Waters and Brenda Yeoh, eds. Handbook on Migration and the Family. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, pp. 184-198. [Book Section]

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Official URL: https://www.elgaronline.com/edcollbook/book/978178...

Abstract or Description

The definition of ‘unaccompanied child migrants’ implies that family members have been left behind in their country of origin. In this chapter, we use the case of unaccompanied children who have travelled to Europe to consider the relationships with distant family members, as well as the creation of other forms of family by the migrants themselves, such as with other young asylum seekers, or through foster families arranged by welfare services. The chapter also considers how notions of ‘the family’ and ‘family life’ become mobilised in both national and international law and protocol to either facilitate or police migration. Tensions around these differing readings and outcomes, can be clearly see in, for instance, EU legislation around family reunification (Dublin III regulation), and claims under the European Human Rights Convention for the right to a private and family life, a convention which has been used by unaccompanied young migrants to challenge forcible removal when they reach the age of 18. While the focus of the chapter is on the unaccompanied young migrants themselves, it also considers the experiences of other family members, such as parents in the country of origin, and foster families.

Item Type:

Book Section

Identification Number (DOI):

https://doi.org/10.4337/9781789908732.00018

Additional Information:

This is a draft chapter. The final version is available in ‘Handbook on Migration and the Family’ edited by Johanna Waters and Brenda Yeoh, published in 2023, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd
http://dx.doi.org/10.4337/10.4337/9781789908732.00018.

It is deposited under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.

Keywords:

Asylum-seeking; Family; Fostering; Human rights; Unaccompanied children; Young people

Departments, Centres and Research Units:

Media, Communications and Cultural Studies

Dates: