Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T04:04:40.289Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Children as Actors: How Does the Child Perspectives Literature Treat Agency in the Context of Poverty?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 2009

Gerry Redmond
Gerry Redmond*
Affiliation:
Social Policy Research Centre, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia E-mail: g.redmond@unsw.edu.au
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The purpose of this review is to examine agency in the worldwide literature on children's perspectives on poverty. By definition, asking children about their lives and responses to living in poverty assumes that they are competent actors – this is one of the positive features of the new and burgeoning literature on children's perspectives. Findings from research in poorer and richer countries are summarised and compared, and children's agency is categorised using frameworks proposed by Ruth Lister and John Micklewright into a number of different types, including self-exclusion, exclusion of children by other children, ‘getting by’, ‘getting (back) at’, ‘getting out’, and ‘getting organised’. The review concludes with suggestions on where more research is needed on children's agency in the context of 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. 541 - 550
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

Ablezova, M., Botoeva, G., Jukusheva, T., Marcus, R. and Satybaldieva, E. (2004), A Generation at Risk? Childhood poverty in Kyrgyzstan, CHIP Report No. 15, London: Childhood Poverty Research and Policy Centre.Google Scholar
Atkinson, A. B. (1998), ‘Social exclusion, poverty and unemployment’, in Atkinson, A.B. and Hills, J. (eds.), Exclusion, Employment and Opportunity, Centre for the Analysis of Social Exclusion, London School of Economics, pp. 1–20.Google Scholar
Attree, P. (2006), ‘The social costs of child poverty: a systematic review of the qualitative evidence’, Children and Society, 20, 54–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Backett-Milburn, K., Cunningham-Burley, S. and Davis, J. (2003), ‘Contrasting lives, contrasting views? Understandings of health inequalities from children in differing social circumstances’, Social Science and Medicine, 57, 613–23.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Biggeri, M., Libanora, R., Mariani, S. and Menchini, L. (2006), ‘Children conceptualising their capabilities: results of a survey conducted during the first Children's World Congress on Child Labour’, Journal of Human Development, 7, 59–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyden, J., Eyber, C., Feeny, T. and Scott, C. (2003), Children and Poverty: Experiences and Perceptions from Belarus, Bolivia, India, Kenya and Sierra Leone, Children and Poverty Series, Part II, Richmond, VA: Christian Children's Fund.Google Scholar
Crowley, A. and Vulliamy, C. (2007), Listen Up! Children and Young People Talk: About Poverty, Save the Children.Google Scholar
Daly, M. and Leonard, M. (2002), Against All Odds: Family Life on a Low Income in Ireland, Dublin: Combat Poverty Agency.Google Scholar
Davies, D., Davis, E., Cook, K. and Waters, E. (2008), ‘Getting the complete picture: combining parental and child data to identify the barriers to social inclusion for children living in low socio-economic areas’, Child: Care, Health and Development, 34, 214–22.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Finch, J. (1989), Family Obligations and Social Change, Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Frederiksen, L. (1999), ‘Child and youth employment in denmark: comments on children's work from their own perspective’, Childhood, 6, 101–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galinsky, E. (1999), Ask the Children: What America's Children Really Think About Working Parents, New York: William Morrow & Company.Google Scholar
Gallina, A. and Masina, P. (2002), ‘Street children in Vietnam: an inquiry into the roots of poverty and survival livelihood strategies’, Federico Caffè Centre Research Report n. 3/2002, Roskilde, Federico Caffè Centre, Department of Social Sciences, Roskilde University.Google Scholar
Giddens, A. (1984), The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration, Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Harpham, T., Huong, N. T., Long, T. T. and Tuan, T. (2005), ‘Participatory child poverty assessment in rural Vietnam’, Children and Society, 19, 27–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horgan, G. (2007), The Impact of Poverty on Young Children's Experience of School, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.Google Scholar
Iversen, V. (2002), ‘Autonomy in child labour migrants’, World Development, 30, 817–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leonard, M. (2002), ‘Working on your doorstep – child newspaper deliverers in Belfast’, Childhood – A Global Journal of Child Research, 9, 190–204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lister, R. (2004), Poverty, Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Micklewright, J. (2002), Social Exclusion and Children: A European View for a US Debate, Innocenti Working Paper No. 90, Florence: UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre.Google Scholar
Middleton, S., Ashworth, K. and Walker, R. (1994), Family Fortunes: Pressures on Parents and Children in the 1990s, London: Child Poverty Action Group.Google Scholar
Narayan-Parker, D. and Patel, R. (2000), Voices of the Poor: Can Anyone Hear Us?, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (2004), Human Rights and Poverty Reduction: A Conceptual Framework, HR/PUB/04/1, Geneva and New York: United Nations.Google Scholar
Plummer, M. L., Kudrati, M. and Dafalla El Hag Yousif, N. (2007), ‘Beginning street life: factors contributing to children working and living on the streets of Khartoum, Sudan’, Children and Youth Services Review, 29, 1520–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pocock, B. (2006), The Labour Market Ate My Babies: Work, Children and a Sustainable Future, Sydney: Federation Press.Google Scholar
Reay, D. and Lucey, H. (2000), “I don't really like it here but i don't want to be anywhere else’: children and inner city council estates’, Antipode, 32, 410–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ridge, T. (2002), Childhood Poverty and Social Exclusion: From a Child's Perspective, Bristol: Policy Press.Google Scholar
Ridge, T. (2007a), ‘Children and poverty across Europe – the challenge of developing child centred policies’, Zeitschrift Fur Soziologie Der Erziehung Und Sozialisation, 27, 28–42.Google Scholar
Ridge, T. (2007b), ‘It's a family affair: low-income children's perspectives on maternal work’, Journal of Social Policy, 36, 399–416.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roker, D. (1998), Worth More Than this: Young People Growing Up in Family Poverty, London: The Children's Society.Google Scholar
Saunders, P. G., Naidoo, Y. and Griffiths, M. (2007), Towards New Indicators of Disadvantage: Deprivation and Social Exclusion in Australia, Sydney: Social Policy Research Centre, University of NSW.Google Scholar
Shropshire, J. and Middleton, S. (1999), Small Expectations: Learning to be Poor?, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.Google Scholar
Sutton, L. (2008), ‘The state of play: disadvantage, play and children's well-being’, Social Policy and Society, 7, 537–49.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sutton, L., Smith, N., Dearden, C. and Middleton, S. (2007), A Child's Eye-View of Social Difference, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.Google Scholar
Taylor, J. and Fraser, A. (2003), Eleven Plus: Life Chances and Family Income, Melbourne: Brotherhood of St Laurence.Google Scholar
Taylor, J. and Nelms, L. (2006), School Engagement and Life Chances: 15 Year Olds in Transition – Life Chances Study Stage 7, Melbourne: Brotherhood of St Laurence.Google Scholar
United Nations (1989), ‘Convention on the Rights of the Child’, United Nations.Google Scholar
Van Der Hoek, T. (2005), Through Children's Eyes: An Initial Study of Children's Personal Experiences and Coping Strategies Growing Up Poor in an Affluent Netherlands, Innocenti Working Paper No.2005-06, Florence: UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre.Google Scholar
van Krieken, R. (1997), ‘Sociology and the reproductive self: demographic transitions and modernity’, Sociology, 31, 445–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walker, J., Crawford, K. and Taylor, F. (2008), ‘Listening to children: gaining a perspective of the experiences of poverty and social exclusion from children and young people of single-parent families’, Health and Social Care in the Community, 16, 429–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinger, S. (2000a), ‘Economic status: middle class and poor children's views’, Children and Society, 14, 135–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinger, S. (2000b), ‘Opportunities for career success: views of poor and middle-class children’, Children and Youth Services Review, 22, 13–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wikeley, F., Bullock, K., Muschamp, Y. and Ridge, T. (2007), Educational Relationships Outside School: Why Access is Important, York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation.Google Scholar
Williams, F., Popay, J. and Oakley, A. (1999), ‘Changing paradigms of welfare’, in Williams, F., Popay, J. and Oakley, A. (eds.), Welfare Research: A Critical Review, London: UCL Press.Google Scholar
Willow, C. (2001), Bread is Free: Children and Young People Talk about Poverty, London: Children's Rights Alliance for England.Google Scholar
Witter, S. (2002), The Silent Majority: Child Poverty in Uganda, London: Save the Children.Google Scholar