Erskine Barton Childers (11 March 1929 – 25 August 1996) was an Irish writer, BBC correspondent and United Nations senior civil servant.

He was distinguished as one of the first mainstream writers in the West to systematically challenge the contention that Palestinian Arab refugees of the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine and the 1948 Arab–Israeli War (see 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight) fled their homes primarily from Arab broadcast evacuation orders (see Broadcasts for Christopher Hitchens' article about same), rather than from the use of force and terror by armed forces of the newly forming state of Israel.

In 1967, under the leadership of Henry Richardson Labouisse Jr.; Childers was hired to lead a United Nations, UNICEF & UNDP programme called Development Support Communication; or DSCS.

In 1968, Childers co-authored a paper with United Nations colleague Mallica Vajrathon called "Project Support Communication," later published in an important anthology about social change.

By his retirement in 1989 as Senior Advisor to the UN Director General for Development and International Economic Co-operation, after 22 years of service; Childers had worked with most of the organisations of the UN system, at all levels and in all regions.

He continued writing on United Nations matters whilst travelling constantly; lecturing on the Organisation and the many challenges confronting it, such as globalisation and democracy, conflict prevention and peace-keeping, humanitarian assistance, human rights, famine, ageing and development, health, financial arrangement of the United Nations, citizen's rights, female participation, design and perceptions, education, the North-South divide and world economy.