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Deinstitutionalization, Family Reunification, And The "Best Interests Of The Child": An Examination Of Armenia's Child Protection Obligations Under Conventional International Law, George S. Yacoubian Jr., Esq.

Pace International Law Review

For nearly a century, the global community has sought to afford children legal protections, abandoning widely held views that children were pecuniary assets. In the United States and globally, a nascent children’s rights movement culminated in broad child welfare reform. Whether adoption, armed conflict, child labor, education, human trafficking, or deinstitutionalization, the post-war 20th century witnessed an evolution of international child protections. The prevailing standard of “best interests of the child” (BIC) has been incorporated into domestic and international law doctrine and, not surprisingly, has been operationalized in a variety of ways. In recent years, the standard has been explored …