This discussion paper is part of the first explorations of the worldwide phenomenon of children living in informal alternative care. As defined under the Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children (hereinafter the Guidelines), these children are without parental care and live with relatives or family friends without State involvement in selecting or monitoring those arrangements. They, like all children, are entitled to protection and care, but little is known about them.
In Section 1, this paper provides a conceptual placement of informal alternative care within the larger framework of the Guidelines. Section 2 explores different types of informal care with the prevalence, benefits and risks of each as illuminated by research or field observation. Section 3 follows with an expanded conceptualisation of informal care in the larger child protection system and in the continuum of child welfare. In Section 4, the rights of children in informal care are discussed, followed by a discussion about the ways to support and promote those rights, and a presentation of a basic policy framework consistent with the Guidelines that could be used, as appropriate, to establish national policy. Finally, in Section 5, a brief discussion focuses on current methods of collecting data, along with suggestions to extrapolate findings from existing data as well as improving the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) instruments to collect more relevant data.
Five appendices are attached to the paper. Appendix 1 lists sources for references. Appendix 2 is a compilation of available data related to children’s orphan status and living arrangements. Appendix 3 provides school enrolment ratios of orphans compared to their non-orphan peers. Appendix 4 is a selection of national laws regarding the care and guardianship of orphaned children, and Appendix 5 is a listing of some of the activities conducted around the world by governments, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and communities to protect and enhance the rights of vulnerable children, including those in informal care. There are several challenges in collecting data on children in informal care, beginning with the threshold issue of defining the parameters between informal “alternative” care and other forms of informal care living arrangements. This issue is compounded by the conflation in literature (both conceptual and data-based) on orphans, foster children and other groups of children who live away from their families for educational or employment purposes. Many of the data presented in the paper, therefore, focus not solely on children in informal care but also on studies on children in related categories.
Despite these challenges, both scholarly and professional literature were accessed to sift out the most relevant and reliable information, although most of them are using orphan status as proxy for informal care. The primary focus has been to review studies using nationally representative studies whenever available and relevant, e.g. those using Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) and MICS data sets and national census data as well as meta-analyses, controlled experimental studies and longitudinal studies. Some small-scale and qualitative studies, when they filled a gap, have also been used, with limitations noted. Legal literature and national laws were also surveyed to select the most relevant provisions and many practice examples were noted from the literature. UNICEF colleagues from New York Headquarters and regional offices provided relevant materials and input for this report.
This brief review has pointed out two urgent needs related to children in informal care: targeted research; and the establishment of national policies. Regarding research, existing data could be utilised to yield more information about children in informal care and new questions could be incorporated into existing data collection systems, such as DHS and MICS, to target data directly relevant to informal care. In terms of policy, the Guidelines provide a set of foundational concepts in establishing national policies for children in informal alternative care. They and other provisions will need to be examined for appropriateness for each national context, which will be largely informed by the data gathered through research.
