Blood-ties and Best Interests in Social Kinship: Origin Deprivation via International Law?

alice r. diver mrs, ulster university

Abstract

Abstract Blood-ties and Best Interests in Social Kinship: Origin Deprivation via International Law? Under the clean-break model of created or social kinship, many triad children can suffer discrimination at national level: as ‘veto victims’ of closed records policies, they may be permanently ‘infantilised’ by the hierarchy of rights that currently exists in relation to the social kinship triad. A wide range of international law provisions are relevant however to the issue of the ‘right’ to have one’s blood-ties restored or maintained. As such, there may be some scope for inverting the current frameworks of absolute secrecy that predominate in many jurisdictions. By framing the loss of genetic kinship as a ‘first generation’ rights infringement (identity, nationality) rather than as a corollary of socio-economic entitlements (family life, privacy) it may be argued that a highly persuasive ‘law of the blood-tie’ is to be found within a number of international law documents. Contents 1. Introduction 2. The psycho-social harms of being deemed genetically kinless 3. A ‘right’ to blood-tied kinship in International Law? 4. Committee Guidance? 5. A Civil or Political Right to avoid Origin Deprivation? 6. Best interests under the Hague Conventions? 7. Domestic Discretion and Regional Charters: Lessons from Quebec? 8. Conclusion