청소년의 자기결정권에 관한 연구

Abstract

This study examines how the youth’s right of self-determination is prescribed under the existing laws, especially in the case of when the youth’s right of self-determination is limited compared to the adults, to look closely to the contents and foundation of the principle of restriction and to examine whether there is a violation of youth human rights and to see if the legal point of view for the you this reasonable. To summarize the points above are as follows. First, there may not be any regulations clearly stated under the youth’s right of self-determination however this right should be in connection with ‘Privacy’, ‘Right to pursue one’s happiness’ and should be acknowledged as the constitutional rights. Second, the principle of ‘incompetency’, which is to restrict youth’s right of self-determination because it is considered that youth lack competence compared to adults, has a great probability to wrongfully violate youth’s right of self-determination since the scientific basis to this principle is hard to find. Third, to sort the rights between the youth and adults according to the ‘age’ standard is a uniformed and arbitrarily way to settle a standard and will unreasonably limit the youth right of self-determination since it doesn't consider the developmental stage of the youth and the difference among individuals, historical·cultural change and social context. Based on these results, the permissible bound and limits of the youth’s right of self-determination should take into consideration on the youth’s developmental stage, case by cases and change of era and adjust with variation and flexibility. In addition to that, the legal point of view on the protection of the youth, which has been heavily biased on parenting point of view, should be adjusted in equilibrium way and expand in the direction for the youth’s right of self-determination.