Child abuse and neglect can be thought of as violations of children's rights. Declarations of children's rights have been formulated by adults; they are intended to be internationally valid, but little attempt has been made to find out what children themselves think about their rights, in any country.

This study compared the views of Malaysian children and young adults with those of Australians. In both countries the right to love, affection and understanding ranked highly. Few children ranked highly their rights to freedom from fear of harm, or to protection; young adults ranked them more highly than the children. Most young people perceived schools as holding views very different from their own on children's rights. If schools are to perform a useful function in preventing abuse and neglect, children's views of schools may need to change, perhaps through changes in the schools.

In 1972, Dr. Wolf Wolfensberger, a renowned American social scientist produced his classic work The principle of normalisation in human services. The principle has become a cornerstone of Government funded services to intellectually disabled children in Victoria. This article presents developments in Wolfensberger's most recent thoughts on normalisation.

This paper was first presented at the International Association for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions. 11th International Congress Paris, July 1986.

Baron Karl Frederick Van Munchausen was famous throughout Europe in the 18th century for tales of his adventures which were of doubtful authenticity. In 1951 the term Munchausen syndrome was coined to describe adults who fabricated histories of illness, produced false physical signs and laboratory findings to deceive doctors and receive unwarranted medical treatment and operations. Munchausen syndrome by proxy was first described by Dr. Roy Meadow (1977) as a form of child abuse in which an illness is fabricated in a child by a parent.

Parental involvement has become a cornerstone of the movement to promote permanency planning for children and youth who are placed - or at risk of placement - out of their homes. Foster family care in particular provides many opportunities for effective involvement of biological parents in child welfare practice. Following consideration of the rationale and purposes of parental involvement, this article focuses on implications and guidelines for promoting optimal participation of biological parents.