Introduction; A.Twum-Danso Imoh & R.Ame The Convention on the Rights of the Child: A Product and Facilitator of a Global Childhood; A.Twum-Danso Imoh Universalizing Early Childhood: History, Forms, and Logics; M.Tag Early Child Development Policy: The Colonization of the World's Childrearing Practices?; K.Monaghan The Rhetoric and Realities of Early Childhood Programmes Promoted by the World Bank; H.Penn The Construction of the Child in Ghanaian Welfare Policy; S.Laird 'This is how we do it here'. The Persistence of the Physical Punishment of Children in Ghana in the Face of Globalizing Ideals; A.Twum-Danso Imoh Making Gender and Generation: Between the Local and the Global in Africa; K.Wells Caught up in Between Change and Continuity: Challenging Contemporary Childhood in Saudi Arabia; H.Khalifa The Rites of the Child: Global discourses of Youth and Reintegrating Child soldiers in Sierra Leone; S.Shepler Conclusion; R.Ame & A.Twum-Danso Imoh