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| Corporal punishment |
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| CFCYL v. Canada Ingraham v. Wright |
| Political |
| Campaigns against corporal punishment |
Campaigns against corporal punishment have been seen in a number of different countries at different times, and they have met with varying degrees of success.
Contents |
In the United Kingdom, one of the earliest organised campaigns was that of the Humanitarian League, with its regular magazine The Humanitarian, which campaigned for several years for the abolition of the chastisement of young seamen in the Royal Navy, a goal partially achieved in 1906 when naval birching was abandoned as a summary punishment.[1] However, it did not manage to get the Navy to abolish caning as a punishment, which continued at Naval training establishments until 1967.[2]
The Howard League for Penal Reform campaigned in the 1930s for, among many other things, the abolition of judicial corporal punishment by cat-o'-nine-tails or birching.[3] This was eventually achieved in the U.K. in 1948.[4]
The Society of Teachers Opposed to Physical Punishment (STOPP) was set up in the U.K. in 1968 to campaign for the abolition of corporal punishment in UK schools.[5]
STOPP was a very small pressure group that lobbied government, local authorities and other official institutions. It also investigated individual cases of corporal punishment and aided families wishing to pursue their cases through the UK and European courts.[6]
The UK Parliament abolished corporal punishment in state schools in 1986; there is no way of knowing how much part STOPP's campaigning played in this.[7] STOPP then wound itself up and ceased to exist, though some of the same individuals went on to form EPOCH to campaign to outlaw spanking, and spanking in the domestic setting, even by parents.
An early U.S. activist against corporal punishment was Horace Mann, who in the 19th century unsuccessfully opposed its use in schools.[8]
In the United States there are currently several different organisations advocating the abolition of paddling in schools, including:
An organisation called "Global Initiative To End All Corporal Punishment Of Children" (GITEACPOC) was set up in 2001 to campaign for the worldwide prohibition by law of all corporal punishment of children, whether by parents or schools. It seeks to monitor the legal situation in every country of the world.[9]
The UN Study on Violence against Children sets a target date of 2009 for universal prohibition, including in the home,[10] an aim described by The Economist as "the latest piece of Utopian dottiness from the UN".[11]
The following are either noted personalities who are anti-spanking, or individuals who are significantly involved within the anti-spanking movement.