Ending Violence in Childhood is a report from the Know Violence Initiative addressing childhood violence around the world. The report compiles information from a series of global research papers commissioned by Know Violence, presenting the scale and scope of the issue globally. Examples of preventative efforts from governments, communities, and organizations are provided to illustrate the feasibility of preventing violence on local and national levels. This report underlines that childhood violence comes at a cost to not only the children experiencing it, but also for their countries. Ending violence in childhood is possible through the concerted efforts and collective action of families, communities, and governments.
Ending Violence in Childhood is split into six chapters:
Chapter 1: Time to end violence in childhood
This chapter provides a comprehensive definitition of violence against children as it is measured in the report and presents the scale of violence in childhood. Findings from this report suggest that three out of every four of the world's children have experienced at least one form of inter-personal violence in a previous year.
Chapter 2: Violence on a Global Scale
Chapter 2 discusses how violence is measured (and the reasons violence against children often goes unrecorded) and identifies the indicators used to measure inter-personal violence. The scale of the problem is also described in five categories: child homicide; corporal punishment at home; bullying in schools; physical fights in schools; and physical and sexual violence against girls. Finally, Chapter 2 presents the data illustrating the need for State action.
Chapter 3: Aggression and Fear in the Childhood Years
This chapter describes children's experiences of violence throughout the developmental stages of childhood as well as how children respond to violence.
Chapter 4: No Safe Place
This chapter describes the settings where childhood violence takes place: homes and families; institutional care; schools; online and cyberspace; communities and public spaces, including violence against street-connected youth; and society and culture.
Homes and families
Household data from 77 countries indicate that one out of ten children lives without either parent, although the majority of those children have living parents. One out of five children not living with both parents lives with a single parent. Most children without living parents, however, live in kinship-based arrangements, and a smaller proportion live in households outside of extended family care.
Children living in households affected by poverty are at a higher risk of experiencing violence, although violence against children occurs within all socioeconomic backgrounds. Physical and emotional violence against children are most common within family environments, and violence within the home is also impacted by alcohol and substance abuse, high stress, or parental mental illness.
Institutional care
While some children enter institutional care as a result of violence in the family, factors influencing placement in institutions include poverty and lack of access to services, family breakdown, child or caregiver disability or illness, displacement in emergencies, or epidemics such as HIV or Ebola. Most children living in institutional care environments have at least one living parent.
Although violence against children in institutional settings is largely under-researched, children researched in large institutions often show signs of cognitive impairments, stunting, or disordered attachment. Poor outcomes in institutional care are often attributed to "structural neglect," defined within care environments without the appropriate physical resources and caregiver-child interactions necessary for healthy development. Physical and sexual abuse are prevalent within institutions, and children with disabilities are disproportionally affected. Research also suggests that younger children in institutional care are at greater risk of impairment as a result of institutionalization.
National standards and guidelines for care within institutional care are lacking, as are systems for monitoring and accountability for those facilitating institutional care. "The harmful acts may be of omission rather than commission, but still constitute ill-treatment, especially when there is prolonged pain and suffering" (p. 57).
Street-connected youth
Young people living or working on the streets, deemed "street-connected youth," have significant rates of morbidity and mortality within the context of developing and developed countries. While many street-connected youth attribute leaving their homes because of abuse or conflict, they also experience numerous human rights violations while living on the streets.
Chapter 5: Strategies for Prevention
This chapter identifies strategies for preventing childhood violence at three levels: enhance individual capacities; embed violence-prevention in institutions and services; and eliminate the root causes of violence. All levels of prevention address the need for improving care environments. Ensuring that parents have the skills and resources to care for their children at home, preventing institutionalization and improving alternative care are all proposed as important proponents to ending violence against children. This chapter also addresses the benefits of investing in violence-prevention and provides principles for planning and implementing programs.
Chapter 6: Essential Public Action
This chapter serves as a call to action for public investments in ending violence against children. Actions for preventing childhood violence are broken down into three categories: break the silence, strengthen violence-prevention systems, and improve knowledge and evidence. Action within each category is necessary to effectively and comprehensively address violence in childhood.
To read this report, please click the image above, or for more information, please visit the Know Violence website by clicking here.
