This is the first volume in the three volume collection entitled Children and the Law. Volume one, The State as Child Protector , focuses on the obligations of the state to ensure the protection of children. It treats the obligation of the state to intervene on behalf of a child. Issues include the rights of parents to educate children, to retain custody of children, and to inflict corporal and noncorporal punishment on children. Volume one also covers the state's lack of obligation to intervene in the private sphere of the family, i.e. the right of the state to remain neutral in cases of abuse, threat, or in cases where decisions made by the head of a household might appear to compromise the welfare or best interest of a child.