Abstract
When unaccompanied minors or families with minor children obtain a negative decision on their asylum application in Belgium, they can appeal at the Council for Alien Law Litigation (CALL). Each year, several hundreds of children and young people visit the CALL premises in Brussels for an oral hearing with the judge. Some children merely accompany their parents without taking up an active role in the procedure, others are also heard by the judge. This chapter aims to inspire legal institutions worldwide to install a system of child-friendly justice in appellate asylum cases involving minors. To that end, empirical data from a legal ethnography at the CALL are critically analysed through the lens of children’s human rights. The reader is taken on a virtual guided tour of the CALL premises, with a focus on the spatial aspects of courtrooms and waiting areas. During the tour, the reader meets seven young people between 11 and 15 years old who have recently navigated an appeal procedure at the CALL and share their experiences. Based on these observations, the chapter concludes with a set of recommendations that could help reconcile the spatial and communicative experiences of migrant children with their human rights in legal procedures.
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Notes
- 1.
These are all pseudonyms. All references to the details of actual cases, dates and individuals involved have been omitted.
- 2.
I progressed with fieldwork in two phases. Between August 2021 and March 2022, COVID restrictions were in place during hearings and behind the scenes. Initially, these measures restricted my physical presence on the CALL premises and slowed down the development of relationships of trust and cooperation. I was granted access only once a week, not for all public hearings and only when wearing a face mask. In addition, CALL staff, including judges, were encouraged to work from home as much as possible. As the pandemic progressed, restrictions loosened and allowed for more flexibility in collecting relevant data. In the second phase (February–April 2023), all COVID-related restrictions had been waived.
- 3.
In the other 21 cases, minors were present during the hearing but not heard by the judge. In most cases, these were young children accompanied by their parents.
- 4.
Two of these took place via Teams and Zoom, all other interactions took place in person.
- 5.
Data collection through interviews is still ongoing at the time of writing.
- 6.
The Ethics Commission of the Faculty of Law and Criminology at Ghent University granted ethical clearance for all these activities.
- 7.
As an observer, I could take any free seat in the room (10) or remain standing at the doorway. I was not the only outsider observing hearings: in several cases, newly hired attachés, students or migration professionals were also present. In one hearing, a group of 17 social workers attended to learn about the CALL dynamics (fieldnote April 2023).
- 8.
The judge explained the purpose of my research and asked the applicant’s permission for me to stay as an observer. The applicant, the applicant’s mother and the lawyer agreed to my presence. As in all hearings, but especially in this case where my presence was made explicit, it cannot be excluded that my role as an observer might have had an impact on the course of the hearing (fieldnote, April 2023).
- 9.
The difference in English may be futile, but in the procedural languages at the CALL—French (tu/vous) and Dutch (jij/u)—this is a meaningful nuance.
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Acknowledgments
This chapter is based on findings collected during my ongoing doctoral research project (2020–2025), funded by the FWO, project file number G015520N.
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Lembrechts, S. (2023). Towards Child-Friendly Asylum Justice. In: Flower, L., Klosterkamp, S. (eds) Courtroom Ethnography. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37985-7_10
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