Children’s Abilities, Freedom, and the Process of Capability-Formation

ABSTRACT

When thinking about children's entitlements, priority tends to be given to protecting their well-being achievements, while limiting their entitlement to exercise freedoms and agency. An assumption of “inability” is used as the grounding justification for limiting children's freedom and agency. Using the capability approach (CA) as a method to conceptualise what is owed to individuals, this article shows that the justifiability of restricting freedom to “unable” individuals is not as straightforward as assumed. Understanding the role that abilities play in justifiably limiting freedom requires an assessment of what being “(un)able” means, and how this “inability” may translate into particular privileges or restrictions. The article, thus, intends to give an answer to the following questions: first, how should the concept of “ability” be understood within the CA? And, second, how does ability bind our understanding of the legitimate restriction of freedom and agency? The article offers a response to the first question through an evolving and dynamic understanding of “ability.” It claims, moreover, that the process through which abilities develop (the process of capability-formation) ought to be taken into account when assessing what is owed to an individual as a matter of justice.

KEYWORDS:

• Children’s rights
• freedom
• agency
• capability approach
• ability

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Helder De Schutter and Caroline Sarojini Hart for their thorough comments. Special thanks to two anonymous reviewers for their suggestions. I would like to thank, as well, Morten Byskov, Lucía del Moral, André Folloni, Su-Ming Khoo, Eszter Kollar, Matthias Kramm, Raphael Ng, Katarina Pitasse, Ingrid Robeyns and Charlotte Vyt for their helpful suggestions. This paper was presented at the Human Development and Capabilities Association conference 2017 (Cape Town) and at the Foundational Issues of the Capability Approach workshop (Leuven 2019). This research was funded by the KU Leuven Research Council, Grant number PF10/001 and by the British Academy, Grant number NIFBA19\190492.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

About the Author

Nico Brando is a Newton International Fellow funded by the British Academy working at the Centre for Children’s Rights at Queen’s University Belfast. He specializes in moral and political philosophy, and is particularly interested in issues related to the political treatment of marginalised groups, children’s rights and the capability approach.

Notes

1 The article looks exclusively at how a re-evaluation of the concept of “ability” affects the way we understand the entitlements and freedoms that are owed to children. Although I believe that the argument works as well for re-examining the entitlements of other groups of individuals (for example individuals with disabilities), due to space constraints I do not address them here.

2 I thank an anonymous reviewer for pressing me to explore further the tension between the process and the opportunity aspects of freedom.

3 See for example Sadlowski (2010) defending the development of capabilities as the foundational claim of justice for children. See Peleg (2013) for a similar claim standing on a rights-based discourse.

4 Mhairi Cowden offers an account of children’s process of ability-formation, while not relying on the capability approach but on a Hohfeldian account of right holding. See Cowden (2016, Ch. 4)

5 On the importance of aspirations in this process, see Hart (2016).

6 Alternative terminologies exist in the literature for conceptualising the different level of ability. See, for example, Dowding (2006) or Cowden (2012, 2016). I do not take 'capacity' in its more moralised definitions within the philosophical literature (i.e. Ricoeur 2005, 2006); I follow its definition within the psychological literature, understood as “the potential to accomplish a particular physical, intellectual, or creative task” (Pam 2013).

7 For a thorough analysis of the distinction between capacity and competence, see Cowden (2012, 2016, Ch. 4).

8 This is in the same line of Schmidt’s (2016) Ability view of freedom, in which

To be able to J […] implies having both the internal ability (physical, cognitive, etc.) and the external resources and opportunities (absence of external restraint, monetary resources, etc.) to J. Being able to J is considered both a necessary and sufficient condition for being free to J. (Schmidt 2016, 187)

9 There is another factor that conditions the achievement of a functioning, which is not tied to the development of abilities (in the strict sense), but rather linked to the person’s character. It comprises the motivational features needed to achieve a function (i.e. willingness, aspirations, motivation). See on aspirations Hart (2013, 2016); on motivation and development see Deci et al. (1991). To a large extent, motivational features are tied to innate characteristics—the personality and genetic traits of the individual. There is abundant psychological evidence on the role that genetic endowments play in framing the character, overall personality traits of an individual and how this may condition her achievement vector. See Pinker (2002, 372–378).

10 It must be noted that the concept of 'experience' in Dewey diverges somewhat in his work on aesthetics (i.e. Art as Experience) and in his work on educational theory (i.e. Experience and Education). In his aesthetics Dewey develops a more phenomenological approximation to the concept, reflecting on the distinction between the sequential acquisition of experiences in day-to-day life from having an experience, such as those in aesthetic perception, which have a disruptive and conclusive effect on the individual (see Dewey 1934, Ch. 3, esp.35–46). As is explained in the following paragraphs, 'experience' in his educational theory, although not contrary, utilises the concept with a focus on its pedagogical implications as a way to emphasise the value of interaction and continuity in educational settings (see Dewey 1938, 25–31). I thank an anonymous reviewer for asking me to clarify my use of the term.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the KU Leuven Research Council, Grant number PF10/001 and by the British Academy, Grant number NIFBA19\190492.