REVIEW article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Pediatric Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1629843
This article is part of the Research TopicThe Rights and Needs of Children During Times of War and ConflictView all 9 articles
Legal Frameworks and Practical Challenges: A Review of the Enduring Failure to Prevent Family Separations in Armed Conflicts
Provisionally accepted
- University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, United States
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The separation of families during armed conflicts remains a persistent tragedy, inflicting suffering on individuals and tearing apart the social fabric of communities. Despite the existence of international laws and conventions designed to protect families and ensure their reunification, the international community continues to fall short in preventing these separations. This review seeks to analyze the multifaceted reasons behind this ongoing challenge by examining the relevant international legal frameworks and the limitations and practical challenges faced by local, national, and international actors. It further seeks to explore the underlying causes of separation, and unintended consequences of humanitarian responses, drawing on lessons learned from past and present conflicts, in an effort to illuminate potential pathways to more effective actions.
Keywords: Separated children, Unaccompanied children, Armed conflict, Humanitarian response, child rights, International humanitarian law
Received: 11 Jun 2025; Accepted: 14 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Boothby. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Neil Boothby, nboothby@nd.edu
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.