violence against children WORLD REPORT ON - CRIN

“They take their childhood away from them when they make them work from an early age, strugglingin the streets, they never have time for their own lives. When they should be at school, they must go towork, they can’t play and are traumatized by the insults and the aggressions they suffer everywhere.”Adolescent boys, Latin America, 2005 IV6indications from anecdotal reports that theseare widespread and mainly negative. Theincreasing informalisation of labour in mostregions of the world has seen the growing presenceof all unskilled working people, especiallyyoung female workers, in precarious, vulnerableand low-earning activities. 23 Organisationsinvolved with children working on the streetsreport that numbers are rising, although reliablestatistics are few. 24Economic crises, such as those facing theCommonwealth of Independent States (CIS)in their transition to market economies, areforcing many children into street work andsexual exploitation as a means of survival, andfuelling a growing trafficking industry thatoften brutalises its victims. This picture isrepeated in a number of regions, notably Eastand South Asia and Europe. However, dataspecifically on violence are difficult to find.The importance of a child-centredperspectiveSince the adoption of the CRC, the importanceof a rights-based child-centred perspective onthe phenomenon of working children is nowmore widely recognised and its implicationsbetter understood. The views of children as aninput to projects for the elimination of childlabour have been more actively and systematicallysought. This not only meets their rightto participation, but has a practical purposein that programmes which respect the viewsof working children and acknowledge choicesthey have made in their lives are more likelyto attain their objectives than those wherechildren and their families are seen as passiverecipients of interventions. 25 Greater familiaritywith children’s working environments hasprovided a window onto the brutality and callousnessmany young workers face.As a consequence of their life experience, workingchildren often have a powerful sense of theirown will and capacities; hence the existenceof working children’s organisations in Africa,Asia and Latin America, which undertakeprogramming and advocacy activity to fulfiltheir own agendas, including leaving exploitativeand violent work. Other programmes toend child labour have helped develop groupsin which working children participate, andwhich support their efforts to leave the workplaceand gain education. The views of workingchildren on harmful work tend to coincidewith those of adults, and with those expressedin international conventions. They oppose theexploitation of children, work that inhibitseducation, work that involves long hours forlittle pay, forced labour, and work that endangershealth or morals. They strongly opposephysical, sexual and psychological abuse ofchildren in the workplace. 26Nature and extent ofthe problemMuch of what is known about violence in theorganised workplace is derived from studies inindustrialised countries and among adult workers,where the phenomenon appears to be on theincrease. There has been a tendency to focus onphysical violence. Only recently has the analyticalperspective been extended to embrace verbal,psychological and sexual violence, including241Violence against children in places of work