Abstract
The impact on children's identity from relocation (a lawful move) and international child abduction (a wrongful removal or retention) is discussed in this chapter. The similarities between relocation and abduction are first set out, before the particular features, legal approaches, and research insights of relocation and international child abduction are separately discussed. It is argued that there are special features of international child abduction, at the time of the event and during its aftermath, that are more likely than a relocation dispute to disrupt a child's identity development and potentially cause lifelong challenges, maladjustment or psychopathology. Children's identity has not yet been widely recognised in the context of the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, nor in social science and socio-legal mobility and relocation research. The nexus between children's identity, relocation and international child abduction is therefore ripe for further scientific inquiry.