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Accepted Paper:
“Invisible children, untouchable cases? Diplomat children and Third Culture Kids – a child welfare perspective”
Ragnhild Bjornsen
(Inland Norway University)
Paper short abstract:
“Third Culture Kids” face possible barriers to their legal rights in cases of neglect or abuse within their family. Affluence and high mobility can cause them to be “invisible” and “unreachable” to Child Welfare Services. Legal immunity makes diplomat children "untouchable cases".
Paper long abstract:
“Third Culture Kids” (TCKs), children of middle-class or affluent families, who live overseas due to their parents’ globally mobile careers, have received little attention from a Child Welfare perspective. The article addresses this research gap by exploring what can be the barriers to how TCKs can realise their legal rights if they are subjected to neglect of care or abuse within their own family. The study is based on 43 retrospective autobiographies of former Norwegian Foreign Service children, as well as an analysis of two internationally known family child abuse cases of diplomat children. Despite TCKs being a diverse group of children, the results of our analysis show how the typical characteristics of affluence and high mobility can cause TCKs to be “invisible” to Child Welfare Services. In addition, the fact that TCKs live overseas make them “unreachable” to the Child Welfare Services in their country of citizenship. A specific paradox was identified for children whose parents have diplomat status. Although legal immunity may save the child from outside threat, it leaves cases of child neglect or abuse within diplomat families “untouchable” for local authorities and family courts. Preventive measures are presented both for TCKs in general, and for diplomat children in particular.