Sociology

What would it look like
 A world fit for children is one that protects all children regardless of race, background, religion or any other form of affiliation from adversities that may result from these affiliation. However, the intent should not be to achieve total equality because that would be too ideal, the major focus would be to make sure that the children grow up in a world where their potentials are not inhibited or limited by problems that discriminate on them because they are of a certain religion, societal class or race.

Creating such a world requires a multidimensional approach, notably, through legislation and persuasion. It is impossible, for example to legislate on love, that is, the state cannot make laws forcing citizens to love and treat all children equally. On the contrary however, the state may use community groups and other social movements to achieve the objective.  (Caledon institute of social policy, 2005) suggests two broad based approaches, support for family and use of the school as the nucleus of social activities. The proponent of these clearly appreciates a very crucial point the family units potential of incubating the inequities propagated by the differences in the affiliations.

A focus on the family does not necessarily mean that the policymakers have to focus on resource allocation and distribution alone, the focus has to be wider so that issues such as child rights are also enforced. There are some parents or families for example, who may limit their childrens experience of life to the basic rights provided for in the constitution. These children will then live a very basic life, which is not part of the world that was supposed to be created for the child. A focus on the family unit will mean that children are guaranteed more than the basic rights by the society, not necessarily by legal enforcement.

A world fit for children would have a broader understanding of the school system, different from the current application whereby the only thing that comes to mind when one thinks of a school is education. One feature that distinguishes education from any other social activity is that all are equal before it, and naturally the school environment, even when not used for educational purposes, retains the same feature to an extent. That makes the school premises a place suitable for socialization that cuts across the class strata because of this inherent characteristic. Over the weekend therefore, it would usual to find children from all works of life trooping to the school compound for a sports tournament or any other form of social activity.

What would it consist of
As noted earlier, the process of creating a world fit for children is both persuasive and legislative.  (Bayer  Brown, 2002) details a number of principles and objectives that the United Nations assembly committed itself to, in an attempt to improve the lives of the worlds children. The most important, and one that seems to sum up all the other points, is the one that puts children ahead of everyone else. The most important component of the children friendly world will be policies and policy makers that put the interests of the children first.

The world being referred to here will not at any point have a policy that will go against the spirit and letter of this principle. To enforce this for example, there will be a permanent secretariat that will examine policy at its initial stages to ensure that it does not go against this principle. For instance, if the government wants to draft legislation for the introduction of subsidies for the local carmakers, it will have to consult the permanent secretariat before setting the policy agenda to ensure that the subsidies will not in any way interfere with money meant for children. Currently, no such structures exist, and in fact, this function is mostly left to social movements, most of which lack comprehensive legal provisions to check against any form of intrusion in to the realms of the childrens affairs.

The school system, as it is currently understood and applied will change. The school system that will exist in the world will allow for far more activities than the current system will allows. As (Caledon institute of social policy, 2005) notes, the current school system has been applied very narrowly to only mean a place where a children go to get education. The author further intimates that most of the school administrators are currently reluctant to take in more responsibilities than those of education, but that will change in the world fit for children because the school will be used for much more purposes than education. The schools will be more equipped, consisting of things such as theme parks, amusement parks and so on. In addition to having the many added features, there will be a higher level of uniformity in terms of facilities and staff.

Fulfillment of the childs basic rights will be guaranteed, but there will be a system in place to check on the quality of the life the children live. The welfare system may have its mandate expanded to include this function, so that as welfare officers go round collecting other data, they also find out the type or quality the children live. There will be a system in place through which the officers can ensure a certain minimum as far as quality of life is concerned, the assumption being that the fulfillment of basic rights will not need any form of enforcement.

What must be done to accomplish this vision
The first step towards this world will be in establishing the gap that exists between the fit world as defined and the current world. This can be done by collecting vital data and examining the theories that exist on the subject. The best place to start from would be from the family unit because it is the most basic foundation for the child, and therefore, any positive change for the childrens life has to start from it. Parenting skills is one of the important aspects that have to be looked in to while assessing the family unit. One indispensible facet of childhood is parenting, which implies that improving the quality childhood has to go hand in hand with improvement of parenting skills. It may not be possible to standardize parenting, but it is possible to generate some generally accepted principles that will guide parenting, which will be kept at the local welfare office from where the parents will be educated on them.

The community as well needs a form of civic education to enlighten all the members in the community on the rights of children and benefits of good upbringing of these children. The objective of the approach will be to raise awareness on matters affecting the lives of children and consequently, promote collective responsibility on all matters regarding matters of childrens rights. The community is second to family in terms of impacting on a childs rights, and cannot be ignored. Help may be availed to the family unit, but if the same is not extended to the wider community, the reforms may become futile.

The community and family reforms have to be followed by reforms in the school sector, starting from an attempt to address the gaps that exist within the system. The current gaps that exist in the school system have to be addressed, and thereafter, new improvements carried out to give the school system as more versatility. This will mean more funds and attention to the system. Paying attention to the system means allocating more planners, architects and such other personnel, who will create the multipurpose school system needed for the realization of the objectives of the new world.

In addition to these, it may be necessary to pursue a legislative option so as to enforce some of the requirements. For instance, it may be necessary to amend the education legislation to compel educationists to allow the utilization of the school facilities for purposes other than education as they have been used to.