Child Labour Abolition: Need for Holistic and Inclusive Approaches

Posted on the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) intranet, this paper explores advocacy, social mobilisation, and behaviour change communication (BCC) strategies for abolishing child labour in India. The need to address social norms as part of this task is addressed in the paper's opening sections; for example: "In societies like India, child labour is often not only allowed to stay but it also grows under various misnomers and misconceptions such as 'traditional crafts and trades which require people to initiate "learning skills at early age"'....These mind sets and theories have unduly strengthened social norms and justification for the continuation of evils like child labour. Unfortunately these ill-informed theories have gained legal sanctions too."

The paper argues for a holistic, inclusive, and comprehensive approach to the problem of child labour that involves committed implementation of existing laws, policies, and programmes meant to ensure full adult employment (because, "[w]ithout fully integrating full employment for adults in any approach for the prevention and abolition of child labour will not be successful, as poor employment for adults will always remain the main reason for...child labour"). Other aspects of this approach include focusing on education for children, and early marriage prevention. "Simultaneously, there is need for effective awareness generation and evidence-based focused community mobilisation for child labour prevention..." This mobilisation involves using BCC to help adults recognise and respect the developmental needs of children and the importance of education, especially amongst girls. It is also recommended that service providers at the school level (administrators, teachers, and support staff) are sensitised to the challenge of providing enabling learning environment for children who are pulled out of labour and put in schools.

The paper also stresses the need for well-designed advocacy and communication strategies that are designed to shift policymakers' beliefs and attitudes about the need for such inclusiveness and integration with regard to abolishing child labour. "The involvement of and support from trade unions and different labour forums is equally important for the prevention of child labour and full employment for adults." It is suggested here that guiding principles for the strategy be laid down through a process of state- and sub-state level consultations. The strategy might include creative message delivery for prompting dialogues to build social norms around abolition of child labour at the community and civil society levels - dialogues with content and tones like: it is important to ensure that children stay at home and go to proper schools rather than leave home to work full time. "There should be a statewide campaign to generate public awareness on this issue on sustainable basis."

The paper concludes by suggesting that UNICEF consider facilitating the planning, implementation, and monitoring of inclusive and holistic approaches in specified area/s of India on a pilot basis. "After a certain time period, say two years, of the pilot implementation, an evaluation report can be prepared and shared with all stakeholders to see as to how full adult employment has contributed to child labour reduction in the pilot area. Based on the evaluation report and discussions on the same by the stakeholders, the government may further scale up the strategy."

From the author: "The information in this piece includes my personal views and opinions and do not necessarily represent UNICEF’s position."

Click here for the 6-page paper in Word format.