Convention on the Rights of the Child

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (commonly abbreviated as the CRC, CROC, or UNCRC) is a human rights treaty which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. The Convention defines a child as any human being under the age of eighteen, unless the age of majority is attained earlier under a state's own domestic legislation. There is an optional protocol to the Convention on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.

Julia O'Connell Davidson notes, "The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) defines children as persons below the age of 18. The term child thus spans what is inevitably a condition of complete and absolute dependence on older carers through to what may be a state of partial or complete independence from such carers, or indeed a state in which the person has acquired responsibilities toward older or younger dependants."