All Sides of the Story Reporting on Children: A Journalist’s Handbook

South Africa is signatory to a range of international treaties which deal with children’s rights, including the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The South African Constitution, one of the world’s most progressive, gives even more protection to children as a special category than the Convention. We have an office on the Rights of the Child in the Presidency, a National Plan of Action for Children, and laws and regulations that are aimed at children’s protection.

To explore how media workers may report on children in a way that balances the rights of the public, media and children, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) South Africa and the Media Monitoring Project (MMP) hosted a seminar in Johannesburg in 2002.This handbook presents the complex questions around reporting on children raised and debated at the seminar. One of the aims of this handbook is to promote a human rights – based approach to reporting on children. It provides a solid ethical framework for balancing some of the most complex ethical problems any media worker is likely to face.

Publisher: UNICEF & MMP
Year of Publication: 2003