Direitos humanos das crianças e dos adolescentes: as contribuições do Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente para a efetivação dos direitos humanos infanto-juvenis

Abstract

The rights of the child, or rights specifically directed to children and adolescents, are relatively recent in the Brazilian legal system and on the international level, and they have gained greater visibility as from the twentieth century. For this reason, much is still discussed about the efficiency of these rights for a special social class, which lacks special care because they are individuals in peculiar conditions of development. The lack of efficiency often generates a feeling of disbelief on the part of common sense as to the application of special legislation. Thus, the present work addresses the historical evolution of the human rights of the child which have in fact been codified in Brazil only with the promulgation of the 1988 Federal Constitution and the 1990 Statute of the Child and the Adolescent. This legal framework is extremely avant-garde and needs to be effectively enforced. This will only be achieved through a joint effort of civil society and the State, and mainly through human rights education, the only truly legitimate way to ensure full training of the individual to exercise citizenship.