Saving more than the children: the role of child-focussed NGOs in the creation of southern security norms

The past decade has seen the emergence of 'new critical discourses' on security that argue for a widening of the term. This article hopes to add to such discussions by specifically examining the position of children and of the NGOs that champion their rights in relation to the evolving security discourse in Southern societies. With this in mind, the first section of the article outlines the role of NGOs in the contemporary practice of security. This will serve as an introduction to section two, where the activity of NGOs vis-a-vis children will be considered. Such activity raises a number of questions with regard to the usefulness of incorporating children into the security discourse specifically, and to the social construction of 'children' generally. These will be outlined in section three. Section four argues for children to be considered as inherent to the creation of Southern security norms, while the final section concludes.