Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-18T01:23:03.215Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Indonesian Children's Views and Experiences of Work and Poverty

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2009

Sharon Bessell
Sharon Bessell*
Affiliation:
Crawford School of Economics and Government, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

While the causes of child labour are multifaceted and complex, economic disadvantage is generally identified as an important contributing factor. Child labour is also cited as perpetuating poverty. The precise relationship between child labour and poverty is, however, contested. This paper aims to deepen understanding of the relationship between children's work and poverty by focusing on children's views and experiences. Drawing on research with children in Indonesia, this paper examines two questions. First, how do working children define and experience poverty? Second, how do working children view the relationship between their work and poverty?

Type
Themed section on Children's Perspectives on Poverty and Disadvantage in Rich and Developing Countries
Information
Social Policy and Society , Volume 8 , Issue 4 , October 2009 , pp. 527 - 540
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abebe, T. (2008), Ethiopian Childhoods: A Case Study of the Lives of Orphans and Working Children, Trondheim: Norwegian University of Science and Technology.Google Scholar
Anti-Slavery Society (2008), ‘Why do children work?’, http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/antislavery/childlabour.htm, 9 October.Google Scholar
Atkinson, A. B. 2003 ‘Multidimensional deprivation: contrasting social welfare and counting approaches’, Journal of Economic Inequality, 1, 1, 51–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bappenas Poverty Reduction Committee (2005), ‘Strategi Nasional Penanggulangan Kemiskinan’, ‘National Poverty Reduction Strategy’, Bappenas, Jakarta.Google Scholar
Beazley, H. (2003), ‘The construction and protection of individual and collective identified by street children and youth in Indonesia’, Children, Youth and Environments, 13, 1.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett, L. (2005), Maidenhood, Islam and Modernity: Single Women, Sexuality and Reproductive Health in Contemporary Indonesia, London/New York: Routledge/Curzon.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bessell, S. (1999), ‘The politics of child labour in Indonesia: global trends and domestic policy’, Pacific Affairs, 72, 3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bessell, S. (2005), ‘Women in Parliament in Indonesia: denied a share of power’, in Tremblay, Manon and Gallagher, Yvonne (eds.), Sharing in Power: Women in Parliaments in Transitional and Developing Counties, Aldershot: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Bessell, S. (2007), ‘Responsive policy and service delivery for children’, in Nevile, A., Bessell, S. and Moore, T. (eds.), Responsive Policy and Support Services for Children, Policy Brief 4, Crawford School of Economics and Government, Canberra: The Australian National University.Google Scholar
Bourguignon, F. and Chakravarty, S. R. (2003), ‘The measurement of multidimensional poverty’, Journal of Economic Inequality, 1, 1, 25–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyden, J. (1997), ‘Childhood and the policy makers: a comparative perspective on the globalization of childhood’, in James, A. and Prout, A. (eds.), Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood: Contemporary Issues in the Sociological Study of Childhood, London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Burr, R. (2004), ‘Children's rights: international policy and lived practice’, in Kehily, M. J. (ed.), An Introduction to Childhood Studies, Berkshire: McGraw-Hill International.Google Scholar
Burr, R. (2006), Vietnam's Children in a Changing World, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Conticini, A. and Hulme, D. (2007), ‘Escaping violence, seeking freedom: why children in bangladesh migrate to the street’, Development and Change, 38, 2, 201–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (1996), ‘No time to play: child workers in the global economy’, available at http://www.icftu.org/displaydocument.asp?Index=990916169&Language=EN&Printout=Yes, 30 September 2008.Google Scholar
International Labour Organization 1996 Child Labour: What is to be Done, Geneva: International Labour Office.Google Scholar
International Labour Organization (2004a), Child Labour in Offshore Fishing, North Sumatra: A Rapid Assessment, Jakarta: ILO.Google Scholar
International Labour Organization (2004b), Child Labour in the Informal Footwear Sector in West Java: A Rapid Assessment, Jakarta: ILO.Google Scholar
International Labour Organization (2004c), Child Labour in the Informal Mining Sector in East Kalimantan: A Rapid Assessment, Jakarta: ILO.Google Scholar
International Labour Organization (2006), ‘The end of child labour: within reach’, Global report under the follow-up to the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, Report of the Director-General, International Labour Office, Geneva.Google Scholar
International Working Group on Child Labour (IWGCL) (1998), ‘Forgotten on the Pyjama Trail: a case study of young garment workers in Menkes (Morocco) dismissed from their jobs following foreign media attention’, Defence for Children International and the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect, Geneva.Google Scholar
James, A. and James, A. L. (2001), ‘Childhood: towards a theory of continuity and change’, The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, 575, 25–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Levison, D. (2000), ‘Children as economic agents’, Feminist Economics, 6, 1, 125–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Liebel, Manfred (2003), ‘Working children as social subjects: the contribution of working children's organizations to social transformation’, Childhood, 10, 3, 265–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Montgomery, H. (2001), Modern Babylon? Prostituting Children in Thailand, Oxford: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Morrow, V. (1996), ‘Rethinking childhood dependency: children's contributions to the domestic economy’, Sociological Review, 44, 58–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nieuwenhuys, O. (1994), Children's Lifeworlds: Gender, Welfare and Labour in the Developing World, London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Punch, S. (2002), ‘Youth transitions and interdependent adult–child relations in rural Bolivia’, Journal of Rural Studies, 18, 2, 123–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ridge, T. (2002), Childhood Poverty and Social Exclusion, Bristol: The Policy Press.Google Scholar
Silvey, R. (2000), ‘Stigmatized Spaces: gender and mobility under crisis in South Sulawesi, Indonesia’, Gender, Place and Culture, 17, 2, 143–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UNICEF 2003 ‘Kondisi dan Situasi Pekerja Anak pada Beberapa Sektor di Tulungagung dan Probolinggo, Jawa Timur’, UNICEF, Jakarta.Google Scholar
Weiner, M. (1990), The Child and the State in India: Child Labor and Education Policy in Comparative Perspective, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
White, B. and Tjandraningsih, I. (1998), Child Workers in Indonesia, Bandung: AKATIGAGoogle Scholar
Wolf, D. L. (1992), Factory Daughters: Gender, Household Dynamics, and Rural Industrialization in Java, Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Woodhead, M. (1998), ‘Children's perspectives on their working lives: a participatory study in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, The Philippines, Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua’, Stockholm: Radda Barnen.Google Scholar
Woodhead, M. (1999), ‘Combatting child labour: listen to what the children say’, Childhood, 6, 1, 27–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Woodhead, M. (2001), ‘The value of work and school: a study of working children's perspectives’, in Lieten, Kristoffel and White, Ben (eds.), Child Labour: Policy Options, Amsterdam: Aksant.Google Scholar