The Best Interests of Refugee Children in Migration Law

For asylum seeking children arriving in a host country a Best Interests of the Child assessment has to be performed before a decision can be taken about their request for protection. The Study Centre for Children, Migration and Law at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands conducts diagnostic assessments of which migration decision is in the best interests of the child. This Best Interests of the Child assessment is based on a of the child’s development and the quality of the child-rearing environment. In a PhD study the method for the Best Interests of Child assessments was tailored to the situation of recently arrived asylum-seeking children and practised with 27 of these children.

In a follow up study the asylum decisions of these 27 children were analysed on their reflections on the submitted behavioural Best Interests of the Child assessments. This study explores the gaps between children’s rights based obligations for States with regard to the best interests of the child, the interpretation of the child’s best interests in behavioural sciences, and the practice of migration law. These perspectives do not necessarily come to the same conclusions on what should be understood and result from the child’s best interests.