為什麼要保護未成年人？兒少福利、法律與歷史的分析

Why Do We Protect Children?:Children’s Welfare and an Analysis of History and the Law in Postwar Taiwan

Since the 1990s, Taiwan has witnessed a flood of child-centered legislation which includes the enactment of Juvenile Welfare Act, the amendment of Child Welfare Act, the establishment of Child Welfare Bureau, and an overhaul of the Protection of Children and Youths Welfare and Rights Act., All these child-centered laws demonstrate a changed attitude towards the protection of children over the past 20 years. This paper aims at contextualizing the socio-legal history of the child-centered legislation and policies in Taiwan since the 1990s. It is argued that owing to the extension of the universal education, generations of children have spent more time in school gradually ever since the post-war peacetime. As a result, the childhood experience of most people has become more unitary and homogenous. The separation of childhood and adulthood has also been reinforced. In addition, the family structure has changed and transformed into a smaller size because of a successful family planning from the 1960s to 1990s. The fact that there are fewer children in a family gives parents impetus to place greater material and emotional investments in the family’s existing children. As a consequence, the family structure becomes more child-centered. Therefore, through the eyes of adults, children are dependent, innocent, vulnerable, immature, and need protection. The legal system then reflects these cultural shifts and produces a flood of child-centered laws and policies. Nonetheless, the child-centered jurisprudence based on a unitary image of children in fact could neglect the differential experiences of children and does harm to marginalized children.