Children and COVID-19 Research Library

The COVID-19 pandemic and the rejuvenated movement for racial justice in 2020 have presented an opportunity to reimagine the roles, practices, and policies of juvenile and family court systems actors. In order to capture contemporary ideas about judicial practice and policy reforms, semi-structured interviews were conducted with Hon. Edwina Mendelson, Deputy Chief Administrative Judge for the Office of Justice Initiatives in New York State, and Hon. Steven Teske, Chief Judge of the Juvenile Court of Clayton County, Georgia. These interviews yielded several recommendations for judicial reform in youth justice (e.g., implement court-wide procedural justice practices, improve accessibility using technology). These recommendations can be used by systems actors across the country, particularly those interested in adapting their courtroom practices for a post-pandemic world.

The experience of Covid-19 in Aotearoa New Zealand in 2020 has been strongly shaped by a narrative emanating from a robust partnership between politicians and public health experts. This narrative treads a careful line between hard and soft responses. To elaborate, enacting policy such as closing borders and requiring ‘lockdown’ was swift and firm but was accompanied by an attempt to develop a disposition of care and empathy towards the public. While there has been hardship for some families, the soft messaging has, we argue, led to aspects of the response that have been decidedly child-friendly. At the regional scale, border closures have impacted heavily on Pacific Island families, separating families as parents have been unable to return to their home islands and through the loss of economic opportunities associated with seasonal work and in local - often tourism dominated economies. In a COVID-era the future looks uncertain for children both within New Zealand and in the wider Pacific realm.

Evidence and objective assessment are needed more than ever to help enhance the rights and well-being of the world’s children. Researching the changing world around us and evaluating progress are two sides of the same coin, both critical to reimagining a better future for children. In recognition of this, UNICEF celebrates and showcases innovative and influential research and evaluations from our offices around the world every year. For 2020, Innocenti and the Evaluation Office joined forces to find the most rigorous UNICEF studies with greatest influence on policies and programmes that benefit children.