Politics of Child Labour

Paper Summary:

Media portrayals of third world children making shoes, shirts, or rugs for sale in their homelands have provoked calls for trade sanctions and boycotts against companies and countries that use children as their cheap labour source. This paper argues that the simple abolition of child labour in a third world nation is not the best way of helping third world children. It looks at how one has to understand the complex relationship between child labour and the rights of children and their unique social, economic and cultural backgrounds and norms if one is to help improve living conditions of the marginalized group of children in third world nations.

From the Paper:

"According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), there were some 211 million children ages five to fourteen at work in economic activity in the world in 2000, which is a little less than one-fifth of all children in this age group. Over one hundred and twenty million are employed full-time and one hundred and thirty million combine their works with non-economic activities, such as helping chores, running errands, or babysitting their younger siblings. In the Asia and Pacific region, nineteen per cent of children ages five to fourteen are economically active, Latin America and Caribbean sixteen per cent, and Sub-Saharan Africa twenty nine per cent. "

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