In the year 2001, Save the Children Sweden publicly committed itself to stepping up efforts to secure the worldwide eradication of all physical and psychological punishment of children. Sweden was, in 1979, the first country to abolish from its national legislation all forms of Corporal Punishment of children. More than 25 years later, this decision has proven to be a good one: major indicators relating to domestic violence against children in Sweden have been declining ever since.

Save the Children Sweden takes the Convention on the Rights of the Child as the basis for its work and agrees with the interpretation of Article 19 by the Committee on the Rights of the Child as one that protects children from all forms of violence, including physical and psychological punishment. Save the Children Sweden has thus made it one of its goals to work across the world towards eradicating physical and psychological punishment of children.

In Latin America today, a number of the Save the Children Alliance members and partner organisations in more than ten countries are carrying out awareness, training, and advocacy programmes. All the initiatives are founded on the basic principle that no child should be subject to any form of violence, even when adults believe that what they are doing is for the wellbeing of the child. All these initiatives share the belief that children should be raised and educated in a loving, protective, and safe environment, where they do not fear being beaten by their elders when they commit an error or when they do not live up to the expectations of adults.

Save the Children Sweden believes that in order to achieve genuine and long-lasting change in the lives of children, legislation should send a clear message to society, completely eliminating any acceptance of physical punishment, and degrading and humiliating treatment of children. Save the Children Sweden commissioned the research you are about to read with the goal of supporting public initiatives towards legal reform.

For over two years, the Andean Commission of Jurists has been investigating the existing Latin American legislation on violence against children, especially in the home, in schools, in the criminal system, and in alternate care institutions in order to identify the positions of different countries on the physical and psychological punishment of children. The result is a highly detailed analysis of the existing legal frameworks in 20 states within the region, accompanied by recommendations for those states that seek to further the process of protecting their children from all forms of violence.

Save the Children Sweden’s Regional Programme for Latin America and the Caribbean is very grateful to the Andean Commission of Jurists for its commitment to this initiative, and to all the organisations that have provided valuable input for this study. We are particularly grateful to the Global Initiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children, who generously shared their expertise, guiding us through different parts of the process.

We hope this study will become a useful tool for all of those committed to making Children’s Human Rights a reality.

Save the Children Sweden
Regional Programme for Latin America and the Caribbean
May 2005