Children’s Rights’ Indexes: Measuring Norway’s Performance

Global indexes are commonly used to measure a country’s performance, including on the implementation of human rights conventions. Such audit-like tools project neutrality and avoid the charges of anecdotal evidence. However, indexes suffer from multiple challenges, from the selection of themes through to the accuracy and regularity of data and comparability across countries. In this chapter, the authors aim to identify indicators that better capture implementation of child rights in Norway. The result is a dashboard of 25 indicators, covering life quality, standard of living, education, health/security, protection, liberty, discrimination, participation, and accountability. In addition to identifying indicators that are comparable, it places emphasis on data that is regularly collected and disaggregated across the country. The chapter shows that Norway performs well on a general level but there are serious challenges for selected groups or regions. Moreover, there is an urgent need for improved data, particularly on children’s civil rights and right to participation and protection from discrimination.