The Promise of Citizenship for Brazilian Children: What Has Changed?

Abstract

This article explores the ideas behind the promise of citizenship to children in Brazil. The human rights of children has become a very important issue in Brazil. This has been especially true since the inclusion of Article 227 in the 1988 Constitution referring to children’s rights and the approval of the Statute on the Child and the Adolescent in 1990, less than a year after the ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The article examines the changing discourse connected to what was promised and what the law actually accomplished. The conclusion focuses on some of the most relevant improvements affecting children’s lives and some of the remaining challenges Brazilians face in the attempt to keep the promises made in the Constitution and the statute.