Children Affected by Poverty and Social Exclusion

Around the world, poverty and social exclusion are driving factors behind the placement of children into alternative care. Families give up their children because they are too poor to care for them, or they feel that it is the best way to help them to access basic services such as education and health care. Discrimination and cultural taboos mean that girls, children with disabilities, ethnic minorities, children with HIV/AIDS and children born out of wedlock, make up a disproportionate number of children abandoned into alternative care.

Poor-quality alternative care leads to a vicious cycle of poverty and inequality. With limited family-based alternative care options in many countries, children often end up in institutional care. Already marginalized by poverty or stigmatization, they risk becoming further excluded from society, as they grow up separated from their families and communities. In the worst cases, inadequate or unsafe care standards expose them to neglect, violence and abuse. When they eventually leave institutional care, young adults may then struggle to reintegrate into their communities and face high rates of homelessness, unemployment, chronic poverty, depression and even suicide.

Greater political and financial commitment is needed to tackle the poverty and social exclusion that drives families to give up their children. This includes wide-ranging measures to combat poverty, discrimination and stigmatization, to change attitudes towards single parenthood and disability, and to adopt social policies promoting family empowerment and parenting skills. Greater priority must also be given to developing good-quality family-based care options, such as foster care and adoption, for the girls and boys who need alternative families.

The documents in this section examine the relationship between poverty, social exclusion and placement of children in alternative care.

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upEND Movement

Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP) and the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, 2020

The Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP) and the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work have collaborated to create the upEND movement, a grassroots advocacy network designed to tap into work already being done and spark new work that will ultimately create a society in which the forcible separation of children from their families is no longer an acceptable solution for families in need.

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African American Grandfamilies: Helping Children Thrive Through Connection to Family and Culture

Generations United, 2020

This toolkit is designed to give resources and tips to child welfare agencies, other government agencies and nonprofit organizations, so they can better serve all African American grandfamilies.

Parenting Practices and Socioeconomic Gaps in Childhood Outcomes

Ariel Kalil and Rebecca Ryan - The Future of Children, 2020

In this article, developmental psychologists Ariel Kalil and Rebecca Ryan examine the relation between parenting practices and socioeconomic gaps in child outcomes.

Redistribution and recognition in social work practice: Lessons learned from providing material assistance in child protection settings

Saar-Heiman, Yuval Krumer-Nevo, Michal - American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 2020

The provision of material assistance, which is widespread in child protection settings, has received negligible scholarly attention. This article aims to describe and conceptualize this underresearched practice and to explore the challenges workers face when implementing it. The study described here included 20 in-depth interviews conducted with social workers working in an innovative Israeli child protection program called Families on the Path to Growth.

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Intervention Measures in Addressing the Needs of Orphans and Vulnerable Children in Marondera, Zimbabwe

Tendayi Garutsa & Mfundo Mandla Masuku - e-Bangi Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, 2020

To investigate the challenges faced in addressing the needs of orphans and vulnerable children in Marondera, focus group discussions and interviews were utilised. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data in this study and the data was presented in themes.

Familial Attendance at Indian Residential School and Subsequent Involvement in the Child Welfare System Among Indigenous Adults Born During the Sixties Scoop Era

Amy Bombay, Robyn J. McQuaid, Janelle Young, Vandna Sinha, Vanessa Currie, Hymie Anisman, and Kim Matheson - First Peoples Child & Family Review, 2020

Through an online study, the authors of this paper explored the links between familial (parents/grandparents) Indian Residential School (IRS) attendance and subsequent involvement in the child welfare system (CWS) in a non-representative sample of Indigenous adults in Canada born during the Sixties Scoop era.

Executive Summary: A Foundation to End Child Poverty: How universal child benefits can build a fairer, more inclusive and resilient future

Save the Children, 2020

This report from Save the Children calls upon governments, donors and other development partners to urgently support an expansion in social protection coverage of children and their caregivers (predominantly women).

A Foundation to End Child Poverty: How universal child benefits can build a fairer, more inclusive and resilient future

Save the Children, 2020

The association of a paraprofessional home visiting intervention with lower child maltreatment rates in First Nation families in Canada: A population-based retrospective cohort study

Mariette Chartier, et al - Children and Youth Services Review, 09 Dec 2019

This article investigates the efficacy of the Families First Home Visiting (FFHV) program, which aims to enhance parenting skills and strengthen relationships between parents and their children.

Pathways of resilience for children facing socio-economic adversities: Experiences from Future Families’ OVC Programmes in South Africa

Pamhidzayi Berejena Mhongera & Antoinette Lombard - Children and Youth Services Review, 28 Nov 2019

This qualitative, phenomenological study explores experiences of resilience among OVC benefiting from programmes implemented by Future Families (a non-profit organisation) in the Gauteng Province of South Africa.