The main objectives of the platform are essentially:
- The exchange and diffusion of information at an international level (Europe and countries of origin)
- At a later stage, planning lobbying actions based on collective or individual research results.
–> These objectives will be achieved by working with other existing organisations particuarly the SCEP (“Separated Children in Europe Programme”). The SCEP focuses on 4 main areas of work: Age determination, guardianship, the return of a child and Child trafficking.
Actions of the Platform
- Release of a biannual publication (April and October) with the aim of exchanging information, presenting research results or theoretical analysis, and fieldwork experiences. Each issue may be composed by 2-3 individual or collective articles, book reviews and other information (conference reports, events, news…) It will be published in English and French.
The provisional calendar for this action is:
- October 2014 : Release of issue nº 0 : Opening issue
- April 2015 : Release of issue nº 1 : Countries of origin
- October 2015 : Release of issue nº 2 : Policy and good practice in Europe
- April 2016 : Release of issue nº 3 : Countries of origin
→ Each issue could be opened to external contributions (invitations or launching a call for papers)
- Organise an annual meeting: These meetings are designed to deal with issues relating to the platform’s functioning and development but can also be the occasion to organise seminarswhere members or external participants are invited to present recent research results and fieldwork missions.
- Lobbying actions: Lobbying will be a latter-stage objective once the Platform gets consolidated.
- Other actions: Thematic seminars or workshops and conferences.