Children’s Rights Implementation as a Multi-Level Governance Process

In this article, I suggest to view children’s rights implementation as a multi-level governance process. I argue a multi-level framework usefully integrates earlier work on norm compliance from International Relations (IR) scholarship and on norm vernacularization brought forward in Anthropology. Governance concepts move a step forward because they horizontally and vertically broaden the state-centric IR literature. After developing this multi-level analytical framework, I introduce an in-depth case study on children’s rights implementation in Bangladesh. This case demonstrates that, particularly in weak states where capacities are lacking, multi-level activities are relevant for transporting global norms to the societal local rights-holders.