Children: Rights and Childhood is widely regarded as the first book to offer a detailed philosophical examination of children's rights. Drawing on a wide variety of sources from law and literature to politics and psychology, David Archard provides a clear and accessible introduction to a topic that has assumed increasing relevance since the book's first publication. Divided clearly into three parts, Children: Rights and Childhood covers key topics such as John Locke's writings on children; Philippe Aries's Centuries of Childhood; key texts on children's liberation and rights; a child's right to vote and to sexual choice; the rights of parents and the state over children; defining and understanding child abuse. The second edition has been fully revised and updated including a new preface, a new chapter on children's moral and legal rights, taking into account the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.