Creative arts in the Irish youth justice system: A children’s rights approach?

Arts-based approaches are used as a means of working with young people in youth justice systems in many jurisdictions, and pursue a variety of aims. However, studies which evaluate these programmes rarely consider their outcomes with reference to the children’s rights standards under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Drawing on a study with young people and practitioners in Ireland, this article aims to examine how creative arts are used with young people within the Irish youth justice system, and to consider how these approaches create opportunities and challenges for the realisation of children’s rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.