Your Competent Child

In this important book, Jesper Juul argues that today's families are at an exciting crossroads. The destructive values--obedience, physical & emotional violence, & conformity--that governed traditional hierarchical, authoritarian families are being transformed. Instead we can choose to embrace a new set of values based on the assumption that families must be built not on authoritarian force or democratic tyranny but on dignity & reciprocity between parent & child. Children are...
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In this important book, Jesper Juul argues that today's families are at an exciting crossroads. The destructive values--obedience, physical & emotional violence, & conformity--that governed traditional hierarchical, authoritarian families are being transformed. Instead we can choose to embrace a new set of values based on the assumption that families must be built not on authoritarian force or democratic tyranny but on dignity & reciprocity between parent & child. Children are competent to express their feelings from birth, & they are eager to cooperate. It is parents who must work to listen to & learn from their children. When our children's behavior makes us feel less than valuable, then it is almost always because we are. That is, prior to a conflict, we were unable to convert our loving feelings into loving behavior, our good intentions into fruitful interaction. Juul is a renowned international authority on family. Using examples from families in many different countries, he has written a book that challenges parents to see their years with their children as an exciting time of growth & development for the whole family.