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.

Displaying 211 - 220 of 498

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Successful Models for Recruitment and Retention of African American Adoptive Families

Kathleen Belanger, Ruth Mcroy, Joe Haynes - The Future of Adoption: Beyond Safety to Well-Being, 2019

This paper describes two successful models in which African American families both self-recruited, and were recruited by agencies seeking to place African American children.

All Children – All Families 2019 Report: Celebrating Everyday Change-Makers in Child Welfare

The Human Rights Campaign Foundation, 2019

This report highlights more than 70 child welfare agencies across the United States that partnered with the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s All Children - All Families project to improve the services they provide to the LGBTQ community, including children in foster care and prospective foster and adoptive parents.

Poverty and the State of Orphans in Owerri, Imo State

Robert C. Odoemene, Orizu Ideobodo Nwafor & James Anekwe - African Journal of Social and Behavioural Sciences (AJSBS) , 2019

This study investigates and assesses the experiences of orphaned and vulnerable children (OVC) who live with poverty, insecurity and social stigmatization in Owerri due largely to reasons of loss of parent(s) or being born by parents who are not there to take responsibilities for them. The purpose of the study is to inform and reform social policy by providing a better understanding of the suffering of orphans in our society.

Socioeconomic Resource Environments in Biological and Alternative Family Care and Children's Cognitive Performance

Sarah Font & Marina H. Potter - Sociological Inquiry, 07 Dec 2018

The authors of this article examined social and economic resources in the environments of children involved with child protective services and their associations with children's cognitive performance.

Child Protection and Education Needs for the Children and Adolescents of Phnom Penh’s Urban Poor Communities

UNICEF Cambodia, 01 Dec 2018

This study examines child protection risks faced by preschool age children (3-5 years old) and adolescents (10-14 years old) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and determines the interconnectivity between such risks and education.

Khmer Language Version: Child Protection and Education Needs for the Children and Adolescents of Phnom Penh’s Urban Poor Communities

UNICEF Cambodia, 01 Dec 2018

Income poverty, unemployment and social grants

Katharine Hall and Winnie Sambu - South African Child Gauge 2018, 20 Nov 2018

This chapter from the South African Child Gauge 2018 provides an overview of children living in poverty in South Africa, highlighting those living in households without an employed adult.

The Family Matters Report 2018

SNAICC – National Voice for our Children, 20 Nov 2018

Family Matters reports set out what governments are doing to turn the tide on the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in out of-home care, and the outcomes for children and their families.

Foster care from the perspective of Roma foster parents in Roma settlements in Međimurje county

Mateja Krčar & Maja Laklija - Criminology & Social Integration, 05 Nov 2018

The aim of this research was to gain an insight into experiences of Roma foster parents with providing foster care in Roma settlements in Croatia.

The African Report on Child Wellbeing 2018: Progress in the child-friendliness of African governments

African Child Policy Forum (ACPF), 02 Nov 2018

This report has two aims: (1) examine how well African governments are delivering on their promises and commitments to children and (2) provide a comprehensive, quantitative and qualitative view of the current realities and trends in the state of child wellbeing in Africa, and their implications for the future.

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