Children and Childhoods Conference 2026

We are excited to announce the seventh biennial Children and Childhoods Conference!

About the Children and Childhoods Conference 

Building on a successful legacy, the Children and Childhoods Conference theoretically and empirically engages with children’s lives, across disciplines, to reflect the diverse nature of contemporary childhoods. We continue to uphold our inclusive ethos and aim to bring together academics, pedagogues, practitioners, policymakers, early career and postgraduate researchers and students. Places on the conference can be booked for one or both days. 

The Keynote Speaker for the Conference will be Professor Doris Bühler-Niederberger. 

Call for Papers 

We invite abstracts for the 7th biennial Children and Childhoods Conference taking place at the University of Suffolk 15-16 July 2026 (Wednesday and Thursday), focusing on Childhoods on the Edge of Justice.  

Focusing on the theme of social justice, we call for contributions that engage with broad and nuanced understandings of children’s wellbeing and welfare, examined through multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives. 

Taking place over two days, the conference will first focus on systematic and institutional issues, with Day One exploring how children and young people interact with and experience institutional criminal justice systems. 

Building on this, Day Two will expand the focus to take a global perspective examining the complex intersections between childhood, vulnerability, harm and responsibility in contemporary society.  

DAY 1 Crime, Risk, Safeguarding and Social Harm 

Day One focuses on how children and young people encounter, navigate, and are shaped by systems of crime, justice, safeguarding, and social regulation.  

We welcome theoretical, empirical and practice-based contributions that critically engage with issues such as but not limited to: youth justice, safeguarding and protection, children’s rights, social harm, marginalisation, family and community contexts, lived experiences of adversity, risk and resilience, and professional or institutional responses. 

Interdisciplinary approaches especially those drawing from criminology, childhood and youth studies, social work, education, sociology, psychology, and law are strongly encouraged. 
 

DAY 2 Childhoods at Crossroads: Navigating a changing world

Day Two situates childhoods on the edge in the global context, examining children's experiences shaped by growing childhood poverty, political instability, and rapid technological change.

Prolonged stagnation in global economic development has contributed to rising unemployment and a widening cost-of-living crisis, both of which have intensified childhood poverty in many regions. International, regional and domestic political instability—together with outbreaks of violence—has directly and often lethally affected children and young people, inflicting lasting harm on their families, physical safety, and psychological well-being. At the same time, rapid technological change, including the emergence of generative artificial intelligence (AI) and its varied local applications, is reshaping education and transforming future labour markets in ways that remain uncertain for decades to come. These economic, political, and technological forces, together with other forms of social harms, are deeply interconnected, placing contemporary childhoods at a critical and consequential crossroads. 

We welcome contributions centring around but not limited to intersections between childhood, vulnerability, harm and responsibility in contemporary society, children’s voices, experiences, rights, and those that challenge dominant narratives around childhood, crime and justice. 

Submit an abstract 

Please submit  

• 250-word abstracts for a 20-minute presentation 

• 500-word abstracts for panels and workshops 

• 150-word abstracts for posters or alternative/practitioner presentations 

Submit an abstract for the Children and Childhoods Conference 2026.

The deadline for abstract submissions in Tuesday 31 March 2026.