Topic: Children - CIAO Search Results

1. Examining Child Deprivation Across California and How It Could Be Addressed with Early Childhood Education

Author:: Jamshid Damooei and Ruslan Korchagin
Publication Date:: 01-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: California Journal of Politics and Policy
Institution:: Institute of Governmental Studies, UC Berkeley
Abstract:: Socioeconomic deprivation can create adverse conditions with direct impacts on the development of children. The Early Childhood Deprivation Index (ECDI) shows that there are significant differences in the extent of deprivation of young children (aged 0 to 5 years) among the counties in California. Our research shows that the cost of childcare forms a significant proportion of family income among low- and middle-income families. It indicates that families can pay for a high proportion of such costs if they could access the available federal and state government entitlements. A universal high-quality early childhood education system brings about an efficient way of providing the childcare without the unnecessary cost of employing a means-tested entitlement mechanism. However, even with universal early childhood education, families need support to be able to take advantage of the program, since pre-schooling will be on a voluntary basis. It is therefore important that in addition to providing education universally- communities, and the state make every effort to increase the ability of California families to benefit from this important opportunity.
Topic:: Education, Poverty, Children, Inequality, and Child Care
Political Geography:: California, North America, and United States of America

2. Conceptualization and Operationalization of Ambiguous Loss Among Left Behind Children in Rural China

Author:: Xiaojin Chen and Yao Lu
Publication Date:: 04-2023
Content Type:: Video
Institution:: Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:: This lecture explores the effects of rural-to-urban migration on children’s development, including child abuse, victimization, and mental health problems.
Topic:: Development, Migration, Children, Mental Health, Urban, Rural, Abuse, and Victimization
Political Geography:: China and Asia

3. Budget Brief: Mission Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0

Author:: Avani Kapur, Tanya Rana, and Ritwik Shukla
Publication Date:: 02-2023
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: In Financial Year (FY) 2021-22, the Government of India (GoI) restructured the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), POSHAN (Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment) Abhiyaan, and the Scheme for Adolescent Girls (SAG) into Mission Saksham Anganwadi and Poshan 2.0, also known as Poshan 2.0. This brief uses government data to analyse: ■ Required funds, allocations, and releases; ■ Governance, including human resources; ■ Changes in coverage; and ■ Outcomes.
Topic:: Development, Governance, Budget, Children, and Public Spending
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

4. What are the Drivers of Child Marriage: A Case of Azerbaijan

Author:: Farid Rahimli
Publication Date:: 01-2023
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Economic and Social Development (CESD)
Abstract:: This paper analyzes early marriages by gender group of regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan. Which factors cause early Marriages, and how early marriages lead to other problems. Districts in Azerbaijan have a higher rate of early marriages than cities. The Article considers the population distribution by sex, number and total ratios of officially registered marriages and divorces. 2005–2021 number of marriages by age groups of bride and groom, 2021, the number of marriages by age group of the bride and groom in the economic regions and administrative-territorial units Azerbaijan. This assessment identified more of the initial effects of early marriages and gender equality...
Topic:: Development, Children, Child Marriage, and Society
Political Geography:: Caucasus and Azerbaijan

5. Çocuk Yoksulluğunun Genel Görünümü ve Türkiye’de Çocuk Yoksulluğunun Son Hali

Author:: Ruhal Samanlı
Publication Date:: 05-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Bilgi
Institution:: Sakarya University (SAU)
Abstract:: Amaç Bu çalışmada bir ağ gibi insanlığı sarmış olan yoksulluk ve yoksulluğun boyutları, çocuk yoksulluğunun görünümü, çocuk yoksulluğunun etkileyenleri, çocuk yoksulların yaşam alanlarındaki halleri, çocuk yoksulluğunu azaltmaya yönelik yatırım teorileri ve Türkiye’de çocuk yoksulların durumu anlatılacaktır. Yöntem/Metodoloji/Dizayn-. Çocuklar neden yoksuldur? Sorusuna cevap bulmak için çalışmada öncelikle konu ile ilişkili dokümanlar analiz edilecektir. Amaçları ve sonuçları bağlamında incelenen dokümanlardan bir değerlendirmeye varılacaktır. Sonuçlar-- Bu çalışmada çocuk yoksulluğunun ailenin yoksulluğu ile ilişkili olduğu sonucuna varılmıştır. İyi eğitim almış çocukların yetişkinlikte yoksulluk içinde olmayacakları ve onların çocuklarının da yoksul olmayacağını söylemek gerekmektedir. Katkı/Farklılıklar- Bu çalışmada çocuk yoksulluğuna çok boyutlu yoksulluk yaklaşımı ile bakılarak bütünsel bir bakış sağlanacaktır.
Topic:: Children, Inequality, and Child Poverty
Political Geography:: Turkey and Middle East

6. Framework to Decolonize Child & Youth Philanthropy

Author:: DA Global
Publication Date:: 06-2023
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: In 2022, ECFG commissioned Degan Ali and her team to lead us through a decolonizing grantmaking journey that included learning webinars, collective learning and reflection, the identification of promising practices, and the development of a framework that funders could use to elevate equitable grantmaking. After developing an understanding of our network’s needs and goals, our decolonizing philanthropy working group engaged in deep partnership design with DA Global to create The Decolonizing Child and Youth Philanthropy Framework. This framework recognizes that our members and partners are at different stages of their journey in tackling colonialism within their organizations and grantmaking. While there are universally relevant lessons gained from existing decolonization efforts in the philanthropic and charity sectors, this framework is designed to support the different types, sizes and needs of the funders who belong to this group. This is not a magic solution, but a tool in our decolonizing child and youth philanthropy toolbox. This tool is intentionally focused on supporting those who have embarked on a change process within their organizations, those who want to make additional adjustments, and those who are grappling with how to get started.
Topic:: Children, Youth, Decolonization, and Philanthropy
Political Geography:: Global Focus

7. The Influence of Political Processes and the War in Ukraine on the Formation of Generation Alpha and the iGeneration (Z): Defining Specific Features

Author:: Liudmyla Kryvachuk
Publication Date:: 06-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Nowa Polityka Wschodnia
Institution:: Faculty of Political Science and International Studies, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń
Abstract:: The article attempts to analyse and define the specific features of the iGeneration (Z) and Generation Alpha in Ukraine in the context of the political processes and the war taking place in Ukrainian society. The article discusses the generation issues, taking into account the characteristics of the iGeneration (Z) and Generation Alpha. Assuming that a generation is an identifiable group of people who share a similar time of birth and significant events at critical stages of development, the article presents an original approach to determining the specific features of the iGeneration (Z) and Generation Alpha in Ukraine. The Orange Revolution (2004), the Revolution of Dignity (2014) and the hybrid war (2014-2022) and Russian-Ukrainian war (from 24.02.2022) had a significant impact on the formation of the iGeneration (Z) and Generation Alpha in Ukraine.
Topic:: Children, Geopolitics, Youth, Social Policy, Hybrid Warfare, Generation, Generation Z, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

8. Bringing child immigration detention to an end: The case of EU return procedures

Author:: Anastasia Karatzas
Publication Date:: 11-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: European Policy Centre (EPC)
Abstract:: The harmful consequences of child immigration detention are, by now, increasingly well-documented. Evidence attests to the long-lasting and negative impact of the practice on children’s health, well-being and development, and has given rise to an international consensus firmly against its continued use. However, the European Union’s policies fail to reflect any such agreement, which is evident not least in the context of the Return Directive and member states’ continued use of the practice. As it stands, the detention of minors is permitted by the Directive and remains a plausible option both according to the European Commission’s proposal to recast it and the Council of the EU’s position on the matter. Furthermore, although the Directive mandates member states to explore all plausible alternatives and use child immigration detention only as a measure of last resort, evidence suggests that detention is prolific and other measures underused. In the recast proposal, little looks set to change on this front either, with the use of alternatives having fallen mostly by the wayside. In this context, this paper argues that, with negotiations on the file ongoing, the time for the EU to shift gears, ban the practice, and mandate member states to implement alternatives is now opportune.
Topic:: Immigration, Children, European Union, and Detention
Political Geography:: Europe

9. Prioritizing Public Spending on Health in Lower-Income Countries: The Role of the Global Financing Facility for Women, Children and Adolescents

Author:: Janeen Madan Keller, Rachel Silverman, Julia Kaufman, and Amanda Glassman
Publication Date:: 12-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: The Global Financing Facility (GFF), launched in 2015, is a partnership backed by a multi-donor World Bank trust fund that aims to “prioritize and scale-up evidence-driven investments to improve reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and nutrition (RMNCAH-N) interventions” in low- and lower middle-income countries. A major component of the GFF’s operational model is centered around the investment case, described by the GFF as “a description of the changes that a country wants to see with regard to reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health (RMNCAH) and a prioritized set of investments required to achieve these results.” Looking retrospectively at investment cases and associated ongoing World Bank operations, this paper aims to shed light on specific aspects of the GFF’s operating model, approach, theory of change, and results to date related to the “development of a costed and prioritized investment case,” and whether the investment case helps to prioritize public spending on health in the real world. The portfolio-wide findings suggest that the GFF delivers a clear value-add within the global health architecture by directing more funding to flow directly through governments via increased World Bank lending for RMNCAH-N (especially in the context of COVID-19-related service disruptions and fiscal contractions). The role of the investment case in aligning and prioritizing resources behind a consensus set of highest-value RMNCAH-N interventions within a specific funding envelope is less well documented in the public domain; GFF efforts to directly influence government RMNCAH-N spending decisions and their efficiency seem to occur primarily through follow-on resource mapping and expenditure tracking. The paper concludes with three recommendations for the GFF and its donors: (1) pursue a deliberate strategy for prioritization of RMNCAH-N services and products within the realistic budget constraint to advance evidence-based decisions on certain trade-offs; (2) increase transparency and public visibility into GFF-supported activities and funding, especially related to RMNCAH-N product procurement and overall resource tracking; and (3) explore incentives for increased donor co-financing within the framework of World Bank projects as a strategy to pool and channel more resources through government coffers.
Topic:: Health, Children, Women, Public Spending, and Gender
Political Geography:: Global Focus

10. Anne Baba Eğitim Düzeylerine Göre Okul Öncesi Dönem Çocuklarının Sosyal-Duygusal Yeterliliği (Social-Emotional Competence of Pre-School Children by Their Parents' Educational Level)

Author:: Hülya Gülay Ogelman, Yüce Gülşah, and Ahmet Yüce
Publication Date:: 12-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: AURUM Journal of Social Sciences
Institution:: Altinbas University
Abstract:: Bu araştırmanın amacı, anne baba eğitim düzeyine göre okul öncesi dönem çocuklarının sosyal-duygusal yeterliliğinin incelenmesidir. Araştırmada genel tarama modeli kullanılmıştır. Araştırmanın örneklemini Manisa ili Soma İlçesi’nde okul öncesi eğitime devam eden 188 çocuk, 188 anne ve 188 baba oluşturmuştur. Araştırmada veri toplama araçları olarak Kişisel Bilgi Formu ve Okul Öncesi Çocuklar İçin Sosyal-Duygusal Beceriler ve Psikolojik Dayanıklılık Ölçeği (SDBPDÖ-Okul Öncesi) kullanılmıştır. Veri toplama araçları, her bir çocuk için okul öncesi öğretmenleri tarafından yaklaşık 7 aylık gözleme dayalı olarak doldurulmuştur. Normal dağılımla ilgili bulgulardan yola çıkarak parametrik olan Tek Yönlü Varyans Analizi (ANOVA) tekniği ile analizler gerçekleştirilmiştir. Gruplar arasındaki farklılıkların belirlenmesine ilişkin eğitim seviyeleri için post-hoc tekniklerinden Bonferroni uygulanmıştır. Araştırmanın bulgularına göre okul öncesi dönem çocuklarının duygu bilgisi/duygu ifadesi, empati, öz düzenleme, sosyal yetkinlik alt boyutlarının ve SDBPDÖOkul Öncesi düzeyinin, anne-babaların eğitim seviyesine göre istatistiksel olarak anlamlı farklılık gösterdiği görülmüştür. Bu sonuca göre okul öncesi dönem çocuğu olan anne-babaların eğitim seviyeleri, çocuklarının sosyal-duygusal yeterliliği ile ilişkilidir.
Topic:: Education, Children, Parenting, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

11. Chicago's Racial Wealth Gap: Legacies of the Past, Challenges in the Present, Uncertain Futures

Author:: Fructoso M. Basaldua Jr., Maximilian Cuddy, Amanda E. Lewis, and Ivan Arenas
Publication Date:: 02-2022
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Institute for Research on Race and Public Policy (IRRPP), University of Illinois at Chicago
Abstract:: By the time they reach adulthood, Black and Latinx children born to middle income families in Chicago are far less likely than White children from families with the same income to remain in the middle class or to attain a college degree. These patterns in downward mobility among middle class Black and Latinx Chicagoans are much worse than national averages, raising important questions about the future of Black and Latinx communities in Chicago. In this report, we argue that we need an in-depth understanding of wealth inequality to comprehend why middle class families in Chicago seem to be on such different trajectories. The report centers the life experiences of middle class Black, Latinx, and White families to demonstrate that there is much work to be done to support our middle class families, many of whom are contending today not just with the legacies of past inequities, but also with the ongoing failures of public policy to address basic needs.
Topic:: Education, Children, Inequality, Class, Economic Inequality, and Middle Class
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

12. Second-generation immigrants and native attitudes toward immigrants in Europe

Author:: Oscar Barrera, Isabelle Bensidoun, and Anthony Edo
Publication Date:: 06-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre d'Etudes Prospectives et d'Informations Internationales (CEPII)
Abstract:: This paper investigates the role played by immigrants and their children in shaping native attitudes toward immigrants in the European Union. By exploiting the 2017 Special Eurobarometer on immigrant integration, we show that countries with a relatively high share of immigrants are more likely to believe that immigrants are a burden on the welfare system and worsen crime. In contrast, native opinions on the impact of immigration on culture and the labor market are unrelated to the presence of immigrants. We also find that the effects of second-generation immigrants on pro-immigrant attitudes toward security and fiscal concerns are positive (as opposed to first-generation immigrants). Finally, we find no impact of the immigrant share on the attitudes of natives supporting far-left or left political parties, while it is the most negative among respondents affiliated with far-right parties.
Topic:: Children, European Union, Immigrants, Ideology, Welfare, and Nativism
Political Geography:: Europe

13. Market Access and Quality Critical for Food Security in Periods of Stress

Author:: Anastasia Marshak
Publication Date:: 03-2022
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Feinstein International Center, Tufts University
Abstract:: This briefing paper describes how market access is associated with household food security and dietary diversity in the Karamoja region of Uganda in 2018 and 2019. In 2018, according to both the study’s primary data and secondary data, households experienced significantly worse conflict, climate, and economic shocks compared with 2019. These shocks in 2018 led to a decline in livestock production, increase in food prices, and declines in terms of trade. While the experience of shocks was worse according to many indicators in 2018, household food security and , dietary diversity data remained relatively similar across the two years. The data indicate that greater use of markets during the more stressful 2018 year might have mitigated the expected, but not observed reduction in food security. Better market quality and access was associated with using fewer short-term coping strategies and better food security and dietary diversity, but only in 2018, when households experienced more shocks. Thus, households are likely to be more reliant on markets during periods of greater stress. This analysis is part of the United States Agency for International Development/Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (USAID/BHA)-funded Apolou Activity, a consortium led by Mercy Corps. It was designed to help Mercy Corps and other national and international actors to address youth’s vulnerability and opportunities in the Karamoja sub-region. The findings are part of a four-year study carried out in four districts of the Karamoja sub-region. The analysis and findings in this report focus on the first and second round of quantitative data from November/December 2018 and 2019. The data come from a longitudinal two-stage randomized cluster sample of approximately 500 households across 52 villages. The same respondents were interviewed across both years.
Topic:: Agriculture, Development, Food, Children, Resilience, and Household
Political Geography:: Uganda and Africa

14. Child Maltreatment & Child Migration: Abuse Disclosures by Central American and Mexican Unaccompanied Migrant Children

Author:: Susan Schmit
Publication Date:: 02-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:: Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:: While gang violence, community violence, and domestic violence have been recognized as contributing factors to Central American migration, less is known about the intersection between child maltreatment and migration. This article uses secondary data from United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees interviews with unaccompanied minors from Central America and Mexico to examine child maltreatment. It provides information on the abused children, their abusers, and the questions that led to their disclosure of maltreatment. It finds that girls reported maltreatment at higher rates than boys; only girls in this sample reported sexual abuse and intimate partner violence; and boys experienced physical abuse more than any other form of maltreatment. Overall, girls experienced all forms of abuse at higher rates than boys. Fewer than half of this sample described maltreatment as an explicit reason for migration, even those who viewed it as a type of suffering, harm, or danger. In addition, some disclosures suggest that childhood transitions, such as in housing, schooling, or work status, warrant further inquiry as a potential consequence of or contributor to maltreatment. The article recommends that professionals engaged with migrant children in social services, legal services, or migration protection and status adjudications should inquire about maltreatment, recognizing that children may reveal abuse in complex and indirect ways. Protection risks within the home or family environment may provide the grounds for US legal immigration protections, such as Special Immigrant Juvenile Status (SIJS) or asylum. Practitioners working with unaccompanied migrant children should use varied approaches to inquire about home country maltreatment experiences. Maltreatment may be part of the context of child migration, whether or not it is explicitly mentioned by children as a reason for migration.
Topic:: Migration, Children, Humanitarian Crisis, and Child Mortality
Political Geography:: Central America and North America

15. Role of Demographic Factors in Children’s Language Acquisition at Middle Level: A South Asian Countries’ Survey Study

Author:: Sana Nazir Ahmed, Mehwish Liaqat, Rabia Aslam, and Muhammad Suhaib Karamat
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: South Asian Studies
Institution:: Department of Political Science, University of the Punjab
Abstract:: Language is one of the most complex abilities, especially teaching in a formal learning environment and demography may help to comprehend social and economic issues and find viable answers. It engages in market research, labor market analysis, insurance forecasting, economic development, and social planning. People in South Asian countries work for private and public institutions at local, regional, national, and international levels. This research deals with the language learning of child acquisition and its influence on demographic elements, and the most crucial element in this discussion is the various implications on South Asia countries and the results of a research study conducted among private and government students (N=500) who are studying in different Muslim and nonMuslims schools of Lahore, Pakistan. This study investigates the effect of demographic factors on children's language acquisition at the middle level all over Asian countries. The researchers developed a questionnaire that contained 40 items, 37 are close-ended and 3 are open-ended. Quantitative and descriptive statistics with SPSS software are employed to investigate the effect of all demographic factors on the language learning process of children. The results indicate the pertinent findings against each major construct/theme such as age, gender, parents' (income, status, education, background, and occupation), social and economic context, rural and urban society, and cultural influence. It also shows that each factor has a deep influence on language acquisition among middle-level students, and Asian countries are affected a lot. This study investigates the short- and long-term effects of demographic variables on the language acquisition of South Asian children.
Topic:: Demographics, Education, Children, Language, and Students
Political Geography:: Pakistan and South Asia

16. Philanthropic Funding for Parent, Caregiver, and Family Support Programs in the Global South

Author:: Sweta Shah
Publication Date:: 01-2022
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: The evidence is clear that from the moment a child is conceived, they need their parents, caregivers, and/or families to survive, thrive, and meet their developmental potential. Earlier this year, the ECFG Parenting & Family Strengthening interest group identified the need to understand philanthropic investments that support the adults whose behaviors, skills, and well-being impact children’s development. ECFG commissioned this exercise to map foundation investments in parenting and caregiving across the Global South. This mapping explores the who, what, when, where, and how of these investments.
Topic:: Children, Investment, Family, Philanthropy, Funding, and Caregivers
Political Geography:: Global South

17. Universal Preschool: Lawmakers Should Approach with Caution

Author:: Colleen Hroncich
Publication Date:: 03-2022
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: The Cato Institute
Abstract:: Children are not widgets. What works well for one may not work for another. That is why education is not a one‐size‐fits‐all endeavor. When looking at preschool or K–12 education, having a diversity of options is essential.
Topic:: Education, Children, Legislation, Preschool, and Schools
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

18. Children at Risk of Statelessness in the Fight against Terrorism

Author:: Lavina Spieb and Louise Pyne-Jones
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: The departure of ‘foreign fighters’ to join terrorist groups in armed conflicts abroad has led many countries to adopt a policy of citizenship deprivation. This paper demonstrates that citizenship deprivation measures do not have the desired effect for national security, while increasing the risk of statelessness for the children of ‘foreign fighters’. Citizenship deprivation laws in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, France, the Netherlands and the UK and the Netherlands are discussed, in order to view them against international obligations. It concludes that current citizenship deprivation measures are mostly problematic regarding the prohibition of arbitrary citizenship deprivation, the principle of non-discrimination and relevant children’s rights.
Topic:: Terrorism, Children, Citizenship, and Child Soldiers
Political Geography:: Global Focus

19. Protecting Minorities from De Facto Statelessness: Birthright Citizenship in the United States

Author:: Michael Sullivan
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: Birthright citizenship is the subject of intense political debate in the United States because of its connection to the debate over unauthorised immigration and the inclusion of national minorities. Similar debates have taken place in other common law countries, leading to the restriction of jus soli birthright citizenship in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Ireland. The Supreme Court of the United States and United States Department of State’s interpretation of the Citizenship Clause in § 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment ensures that all ‘persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States’, including the children of unauthorised immigrants. This article argues that the rule of jus soli birthright citizenship in the United States is rooted in an older understanding of the birthright of native-born British subjects, and later, American citizens, to enjoy the birthright of protections and an ever-expanding set of rights based on where they were born, regardless of the status of their parents. Stated in a way that included the children of slaves and immigrants as citizens based on their birthplace alone, jus soli birthright citizenship in the United States remains a powerful tool of inclusion for marginalised minority groups.
Topic:: Minorities, Children, Citizenship, and Birthright Citizenship
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

20. Beyond Statelessness: 'Unchilding' and the Health of Palestinian Children in Jerusalem

Author:: Osama Tanous, Bram Wispelwey, and Rania Muhareb
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: Understanding the key determinants of health of Palestinian children in occupied East Jerusalem is enhanced by analyzing Jerusalem as a settler colonial frontier. Structural racism, prolonged occupation, and settler colonialism shape the social and political determinants of health in Jerusalem, generating ill health and insecurity for Palestinian children who are rendered stateless in their own city. They are “unchilded” and, in fact, treated like enemies of the settler state. Colonial violence penetrates their family stability, homes, classrooms, and targets their bodies and health. In providing a thorough analysis of the lived experience of indigenous Palestinian children in Jerusalem, a broadened understanding of the effects of statelessness on their health can begin to take shape.
Topic:: Health, Territorial Disputes, Children, Citizenship, Displacement, and Stateless Population
Political Geography:: Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

21. Customary International Law Requiring States to Grant Nationality to Stateless Children Born in Their Territory

Author:: William Thomas Worster
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: In the most recent few years, state practice and opinio juris are increasingly converging to affirm that states must grant nationality to children born in their territory if they would otherwise be stateless. In prior scholarship, this author has argued that there is a customary international law norm requiring states to grant nationality in such cases. Certainly, UNHCR’s #IBelong campaign is a significant part of this development, placing statelessness back on the international agenda, as well as encouraging states to adhere to the statelessness conventions, adopt birth registration and statelessness determination procedures and revise domestic law. Partly due to this campaign, states are increasingly adopting practice and domestic law that provides for nationality from birth for stateless children but are also increasingly stating their opinion that such an approach is desirable, necessary and morally compelling. In fact, it is effectively impossible to identify any state that claims it has the unfettered right to refuse to grant nationality to a stateless child born in its territory. This article will complete a brief survey of recent practice and expressions of opinion, mostly as documented by UNHCR as a part of the #IBelong Campaign to End Statelessness, to confirm that this norm continues to strengthen under customary international law.
Topic:: International Law, Law, Children, Citizenship, and Nationality
Political Geography:: Global Focus

22. Undocumented Children in Iran

Author:: Zahra Abtahi, Keyvan Zamani, and Miriam Potocky
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: Children are among the most vulnerable groups to suffer the consequences of a lack of documentation. A lack of legal documentation identifying citizenship precludes children from rights and privileges accorded to their documented peers. While a lack of documentation is usuallythe result ofimmigrants or asylum seekers enteringanother country without legal documentation or not renewingtheir visas after entry, it may also occur when a female national of a country cannot pass her nationality to her child because she is married to a non-national without valid documentation. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, as of March 2021, equality between men and women relating totheconferral of nationality upon children has not yet been attained in 25 countries worldwide, including Iran.1Thiscommentaryaims to provide brief explanationsof the legal procedures regarding nationality in Iran, the different undocumented groupsandthelegal advocacy to address the issue of lack of documentation, in light of new progress addressingthe inequality in conferring nationality between men and women.
Topic:: Law, Children, Stateless Population, and Undocumented Population
Political Geography:: Iran and Middle East

23. Statelessness and Young Children

Author:: Aisha K Yousafzai, Joan Lombardi, Erum Mariam, Tina Hyder, and Zarlasht Halaimzai
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: All children deserve to be born with a nationality and identity that protects their rights. Unfortunately, at least 70,000 childrenwho areborn in the 20 major reported non-refugee stateless situations are unable to acquire any nationalityeach year.1These numbers mask the reality that many more children are impacted by conditions that render them effectively stateless(ie, individuals who have a legal nationality, a stateto whichthey can turn, but no documentation of birth)—a term this commentaryhas adopted.2Statelessnessin these contextsstemsfrom a range of conditions including, among others, alack of birth registration, displacement from place of birth or the denial ofthe right to a national identitywheretheparents have a different nationalityfrom the place of birth. The number of young children affected by these, and related,conditions is alarming. For example, the United Nations Children’s Fund (‘UNICEF’) reports that one out of four children who are less than five years of age ‘donot officially exist’ because their births have never been officially recorded
Topic:: United Nations, Children, Displacement, Identity, and Stateless Population
Political Geography:: Global Focus

24. R (Begum) v Special Immigration Appeals Commission; R (Begum) v Secretary of State for the Home Department; Begum v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] UKSC 7, [2021] AC 765

Author:: Eric Fripp
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: The decision of the Supreme Court represents yet another prompt to reflection asto the very wide provision for deprivation of British citizenship bytheSSHD undertheBNA 1981s 40(2). By making clear the paucity of domestic law restraints upon the SSHD, the decision may ultimately have the effect of moving attention to the question—which the Supreme Court did not address —of whether domestic law safeguards, if not reformed, might be found so insufficient as to fall short of the international law norm prohibiting arbitrary deprivation of nationality, which the European Court of Human Rights in recent cases has been willing to find applicable through the broader art 8 ECHRrights. That question looms over the future but will,for the moment,remain unresolved. It also raises important questions concerning the absence of protection from serious harms which may, given the technical nature of the statelessness definition, not be alleviated by protection from statelessness, and leaves to be resolved on the facts of future cases important issues of child law, including the international human rights protections of the CRC89.
Topic:: Law, Children, Citizenship, Courts, and Stateless Population
Political Geography:: United Kingdom and Europe

25. The South African Constitutional Court Decides Against Statelessness and in Favour of Children

Author:: Mihloti Basil Sherinda and Jonathan Klaaren
Publication Date:: 07-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Statelessness & Citizenship Review
Institution:: Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness, Melbourne Law School
Abstract:: Shrinking citizenship is of great concern for those facing the prospect of reduction in citizenship statuses,not from two to one but from some to none—ieto the status of statelessness. Research in South Africa has only recently begun to pay increased attention to the problem of childhood statelessness, itself only seeing sustained interest at the global level for just over a decade.39The DHA does not keep official statistics on statelessness, not mentioning the topic in its annual reports through 2015.40In 2017, one of the leading NGOs addressing the issue provided legal assistance to 92 children (half born in South Africa) with problems of statelessness or at risk of statelessness.41Following a wider human rights definition,rather than the narrower UNHCR approach, South African legislation is mostly in line with international legal standards on the prevention and reduction of statelessness, including for children.42However, the implementation of those laws leaves much to be desired due to the DHA’s tendency to support restrictive interpretations of the provisions in its regulations and policies.43Chisuseclarifies the principle of the statutory interpretive presumption against retrospectivity and its application to legislation in a complex regulatory framework,which could also beinterpreted to extinguish existing citizenship rights. When read in its fullness, the historical approach adopted by the Constitutional Court led to a persuasive decision, handing success to public interest litigants acting on behalf of those faced with adegree of statelessness. Especially when seen in the context of a shrinking bureaucratic regard for citizenship applicants, the Constitutional Court continues to place itself at the centre of the rights-regarding movement within South African citizenship law.44The decision confirms the trend in childhood statelessness cases wherein the lower courts have found against the DHA,45including that of a child born to two Cuban parents where Cuba refused to extend citizenship to the child (instructing the DHA toissue citizenship to the child); a child born to refugees and reaching the age of 18(holding that the DHA’s delay in formulating guidelines for applications was not a sufficient basis to deny children the opportunity for naturalisation); and children with an unmarried South African father and a foreign national mother (ruling that the children should be properly registered so that they could access South African citizenship)
Topic:: Children, Citizenship, Courts, and Stateless Population
Political Geography:: Africa and South Africa

26. China's Colonial Boarding Schools in Tibet

Author:: Lhadon Tethong, Freya Putt, Jia Luo, Tenzin Dorjee, and Andy Nathan
Publication Date:: 04-2022
Content Type:: Video
Institution:: Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Abstract:: Chinese government policies are forcing three out of every four Tibetan students into a vast network of colonial boarding schools, separating children as young as four from their parents. According to a recent report by Tibet Action Institute, the schools are a cornerstone of Xi Jinping’s campaign to supplant Tibetan identity with a homogenous Chinese identity in order to neutralize potential resistance to Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rule. The report, “Separated From Their Families, Hidden From the World: China’s Vast System of Colonial Boarding Schools Inside Tibet,” finds that an estimated 800,000 to 900,000 Tibetan students aged six to 18, as well as an unknown number of four and five-year olds, are in these state-run schools. This panel will discuss how the schools function as sites for remolding children into Chinese nationals loyal to the CCP.
Topic:: Education, Culture, Children, Colonialism, and Boarding Schools
Political Geography:: China, Asia, and Tibet

27. A case for differentiated legal responses to child, early and forced marriage and unions: Lessons from India for a Global Audience.

Author:: Katherine Watson
Publication Date:: 01-2022
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: American Jewish World Service (AJWS)
Abstract:: Around the world, gender inequality continues to harm women and girls. Systemic discrimination and entrenched social norms limit their opportunities and freedom, while increasing their risk for a host of bad outcomes.
Topic:: Children, Child Marriage, Marriage, and Legal Aid
Political Geography:: India and Asia

28. Food Insecurity and its Discontents in the Middle East and North Africa

Author:: Salma Al-Shami
Publication Date:: 09-2022
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Arab Barometer
Abstract:: Food insecurity plagues majorities of citizens in six out of 10 countries surveyed as part of Arab Barometer’s seventh wave (2021-2022). Majorities from 53 percent in Libya to 68 percent in Egypt report that they ran out of food before they had money to buy more. And in nine out of 10 countries, more than half of all citizens express concern about running out of food before being able to get more. These findings reiterate a long-standing and often observed quagmire in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA): the high proportion of food insecure citizens in middle income countries with otherwise medium or high levels of human development is staggering. Beyond affirming this quagmire, Arab Barometer’s newest data show that looking at region through the lens of food insecurity and its web of discontents emphasizes seven key challenges facing MENA: “Democracy fatigue” is highest among the food insecure, though they still prefer democracy to its alternatives. Gender gaps in reports of food insecurity reiterate the consequences of extreme gender imbalances in labor force participation. Urban-rural cleavages in food insecurity are a reminder that food scarcity can be higher in rural areas on account of decreased access to credit, reliance on import substitution strategies, shrinking agricultural lands, and climate change. Despite the documented effects of the latter on food availability, food insecure citizens are less likely to want government intervention to address climate challenges. Differences between food secure and insecure citizens on evaluations of the economy are more muted than expected, perhaps because broadly defined economic challenges loom heavily on all. Still, those suffering from food insecurity express a higher desire to emigrate. And finally, food insecurity has devastating effects on present and future outlooks, with food insecure citizens—particularly youth—less likely to say both that their lives are better than their parents’ and their children’s lives will be better than their own.
Topic:: Security, Children, Food Security, and Food Safety
Political Geography:: Africa, Middle East, North Africa, and MENA

29. Democracy, Demography, and the Future of the European Union

Author:: Dubravka Šuica and William Kattrup
Publication Date:: 09-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Brown Journal of World Affairs
Institution:: Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:: Dubravka Šuica is the European Commission Vice President for Democracy and Demography. She is leading the Commission’s work on deliberative democracy, the Conference on the Future of Europe (CoFoE), demography, children’s rights, and child protection.
Topic:: Demographics, Children, European Union, Democracy, and Protection
Political Geography:: Europe

30. Sexual Abuse, Violence, and Prostitution Toward Children in Mexico

Author:: César Niño
Publication Date:: 09-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Brown Journal of World Affairs
Institution:: Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:: Oscar was born in an illegal prostitution center where his mother was a sex worker (we are not certain if she worked there voluntarily). Oscar was first prostituted at age four, serving up to six “clients” daily at the same center where his mother worked. Both he and his mother were constant victims of rape and physical violence. This was the environment in which he was raised. In recent decades, according to a Reinserta study, violence against children in Mexico has intensi7ed nationwide.1 From 2006 to 2018, there were 325,699 homicides, according to data from Mexico’s National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI). Of these victims, 23,420 were men under the age of 19, a little over 7 percent of the total, and 6,022 were women under the age of 19, about 2 percent of the total.2 Children represent a particularly vulnerable group, as they are immersed in practices that violate their human rights and make it impossible for them to develop physically and psychologically in an adequate manner and according to their age. They experience physical violence, sexual abuse, domestic violence, and other forms of violence that are normalized from an early age.
Topic:: Human Rights, Children, Sexual Violence, Abuse, and Prostitution
Political Geography:: North America and Mexico

31. Children of War: The Ukrainian Case

Author:: Isabella Martin
Publication Date:: 12-2022
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Centre for Defence and Security - ICDS
Abstract:: The war in Ukraine has imposed considerable physical, mental, and emotional damage on children. It is critical to provide mental health and psychosocial support (MPHSS), as well as to reinforce psychological and social infrastructure—in Ukraine and countries hosting refugees—to help them cope with the immediate trauma of war and promote resilience for future reconstruction efforts. Severe damage to civilian infrastructure has left many children without access to schools, healthcare resources, and support networks within care facilities, while those who have fled Ukraine risk falling victim to human trafficking and exploitation. Moreover, children are targets of the Kremlin’s efforts to erase the Ukrainian identity, brutally executed through oppressive policies such as forced school curriculum in the occupied territories and atrocious practice of ’filtration’, with children separated, abducted, and then put up for adoption in Russia. Inside and outside of the country, Ukraine’s youth are left extremely vulnerable to abuse, with the consequences to their mental health to last for generations—and to affect the nation’s post-war recovery—if not taken care of already today. Without developing proper coping mechanisms in children and adolescents now, the trauma imposed on the young generation will hinder rebuilding efforts and undermine societal institutions. It is thus imperative to support MHPSS initiatives and contribute to a resilient society in post-war Ukraine.
Topic:: Security, Civil Society, Education, Health, War, Children, Resilience, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:: Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

32. Child Sexual Abuse in Botswana: An Evaluation of The Effectiveness of Child Protection Institutions in selected villages

Author:: Thabile A. Samboma
Publication Date:: 11-2022
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Botswana Institute for Development Policy Analysis
Abstract:: Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) in Botswana is a big social problem with proven lifelong effects on the victims. Botswana has established various child protection institutions (CPI) and amended children’s protection laws to ensure that children are safe from all harm. However, despite this development, Botswana CSA cases are still rising. This study provides the first attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of child protection institutions in Botswana. A case study method was used in Old Naledi and Letlhakeng through an indepth interview with twenty-two (22) participants. The findings of the study revealed that there is;(i) the absence of a national child strategy, (ii) poor coordination of child protection institutions, (iii) weak child legislation framework, (iv) lack of capacity, (v) inadequately financed child protection, (vi) lack of systematic data collection, (vii) lack of evidence-based research, (viii) Decline of family structure and (iv) lack of public awareness. All these combined hinder the effectiveness of child protection institutions in Botswana. The study recommends as follows: reviewing the Children’s Act of 2009, developing a national child protection strategy, strengthening coordination of CPI, increasing resource allocation, creating a centralised database on CSA and strengthening evidence-based research on CSA in Botswana.
Topic:: Children, Institutions, Protection, and Child Sexual Abuse (CSA)
Political Geography:: Africa and Botswana

33. Addressing the COVID-19 Crisis’s Indirect Health Impacts for Women and Girls

Author:: Carleigh Krubiner, Megan O'Donnell, Julia Kaufman, and Shelby Bourgault
Publication Date:: 04-2021
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: As donor institutions and governments seek to provide relief and support recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and global recession, CGD’s COVID-19 Gender and Development Initiative aims to ensure that their policy and investment decisions equitably benefit women and girls. We seek to support decision-makers in understanding the gendered impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic; assess health, economic, and social policy response measures with a gender lens; and propose evidence-based solutions for an inclusive recovery. Recognizing that the dialogue to date has largely emphasized challenges facing women and girls in high-income settings, our analysis centers on women and girls in low- and middle-income countries. In this policy brief, we summarize the findings of a CGD working paper, Addressing the COVID-19 Crisis’s Indirect Health Impacts for Women and Girls. We examine how the pandemic is affecting women’s and girl’s health, including their sexual and reproductive health; some of the ways national governments and donor institutions have sought to maintain the provision of essential health services; and existing gaps, opportunities, and promising strategies donors and governments should pursue to address indirect harms to women’s and girl’s health during and beyond the COVID-19 crisis.
Topic:: Health, Children, Women, Pandemic, COVID-19, and Health Crisis
Political Geography:: Global Focus

34. Paving the way to the Security Council: NGOs’ activism on women’s and children’s issues

Author:: Yamya Rocha Rebelo
Publication Date:: 12-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional (RBPI)
Institution:: Instituto Brasileiro de Relações Internacionais (IBRI)
Abstract:: The relationship between the United Nations Security Council and Non- Governmental Organizations has scarcely been considered in scholarship on international security. This lack of academic interest contrasts with accounts on the engagement of NGOs in the production and advancement of UNSC discussions on women and children. By drawing on international relations and social movements’ theoretical contributions, the paper traces NGOs’ strategies to participate in UNSC thematic debates. By looking at the actions of the Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict and the NGO Working Group on Women, Peace, and Security, the analysis finds that NGOs have built coalitions among themselves and maintained networks with friendly countries and UN specialized agencies to capitalize on favorable political and institutional opportunities and expand the access to the security sector.
Topic:: Security, Gender Issues, United Nations, Children, Women, and NGOs
Political Geography:: Global Focus

35. Women and Children First

Author:: Elena Habersky
Publication Date:: 04-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Cairo Review of Global Affairs
Institution:: School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, American University in Cairo
Abstract:: Women and children migrant voices, especially after the pandemic, must be amplified in discussions around the Global Compact, which aims to bring world governments in line with good and safe migration governance.
Topic:: Migration, Governance, Children, Women, Humanitarian Crisis, and Gender
Political Geography:: Global Focus

36. Birth Order, Sibling Sex Composition, and Quantity–Quality Trade-offs – Evidence from India

Author:: Ilke Onur and Malathi Velamuri
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)
Abstract:: We use two waves of data from the India Human Development Survey to investigate the effect of family size on (i) parental expenditures on children’s education; and (ii) test scores of proficiency in reading, writing, and maths for 8–11-year-old children. We investigate whether these effects vary by gender, birth order of children, and sibling sex composition. We address the endogeneity of family size, using an instrumental variable approach. Our ordinary least squares estimates provide evidence of quantity–quality trade-offs in children’s educational expenditures, the existence of birth-order effects, and a sizeable pro-son bias. For test scores as well, ordinary least squares estimates indicate negative spillovers from additional children. The instrumental variable estimates, in contrast, find no evidence of quantity–quality trade-offs, birth order, or sibling sex composition effects in either expenditures or test scores. However, instrumental variable estimates of the male premium are bigger than ordinary least squares estimates. They also suggest that children enrolled in private schools do no better than those in government schools. Moreover, the advantage that boys appear to have over girls in maths is largely reversed in private schools.
Topic:: Education, Gender Issues, Children, and Family
Political Geography:: India and Asia

37. Education for All? Assessing the Impact of Socio-economic Disparity on Learning Engagement During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Indonesia

Author:: Samuel Nursamsu, Winsu Harto Adiwijoyo, and Anissa Rahmawati
Publication Date:: 10-2021
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)
Abstract:: This paper attempts to shed light on the impact of socio-economic disparity on learning engagement during the COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia. Utilising search intensity data from Google Trends, school data from Dapodik (Education Core Database), and socio-economic data from the National Socioeconomic Survey, we conduct descriptive analysis, an event study, and difference-in-difference estimations. First, school quality differs in terms of the regions’ development level, especially between western and eastern Indonesia. However, densely populated and well-developed areas generally have lower offline classroom availability. In addition, the quality of public schools is generally lower than private schools. Second, our estimation results show that only online-classroom related search intensity that increased significantly after school closures on 16 March 2020, not in self-learning related search intensity. Further the analysis shows that socio-economic disparity within provinces widens the gap in online learning engagement, albeit with weak evidence from per capita expenditure. Interestingly, provinces with a higher inequality and rural population tend to have higher self-learning related search intensity due to students’ necessity to compensate for low learning quality from schools. In addition, technology adoption does not seem to give much of an increase to online-classroom related search intensity but contributes to lower self-learning related search intensity due to increased academic distraction. Our study provides evidence for the Indonesian government to make more precise policy in improving learning quality during the pandemic.
Topic:: Education, Children, Inequality, Pandemic, COVID-19, Socioeconomics, and Public Schools
Political Geography:: Indonesia and Asia

38. Social Policy Programme “The Family 500+” – Assumptions, Results, and Costs of Functioning: Is It Worth?

Author:: Anna Owczarcyk
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Polish Political Science Yearbook
Institution:: Polish Political Science Association (PPSA)
Abstract:: The unfavorable demographic situation and the falling number of births resulted in an increased interest among Polish politicians in introducing tools to social policy that would reverse this negative trend. Implemented to social policy by Prawo i Sprawiedliwość Party in 2016, the “Family 500+” benefit has become such a tool. According to the government’s intention, this financial aid for families with children aims to reverse the decline in the number of births observed for many years and reduce the scale of poverty among families with the most complex financial situation. After several years of the “Family 500+” Program in force, it is difficult to clearly define whether the goals were achieved and whether the expenses for financing the program were adequate to the results. The aim of the article is an attempt at the assessment of the functioning of the Family 500+ Programme. Both the statutory assumptions of the programme, the costs of its functioning, and its results so far were analyzed. The central part of the analysis covered the period 2016–2019.
Topic:: Poverty, Children, Social Policy, and Welfare
Political Geography:: Europe and Poland

39. Tax Equality for Immigrants: The Indispensable Ingredient for Remedying Child Poverty in the United States

Author:: Roberto Suro and Hannah Findling
Publication Date:: 09-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:: Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:: Both at the federal and state levels, tax credits have proved effective policy instruments to combat poverty, and they are at the heart of President Biden’s massive initiative on childhood poverty. However, about one of every five children suffering poverty in the United States has an unauthorized immigrant parent and thus little or no access to tax credits. That is nearly two million children, and 85 percent of them are US citizens. Achieving historic reductions in childhood poverty thus will be impossible without remedying the eligibility exclusions and bureaucratic impediments that unauthorized immigrants face in the US tax system. All individuals who make money and reside in the United States are obliged to pay federal income taxes via a return filed with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). For unauthorized immigrants and others who do not qualify for a Social Security Number (SSN) that requires an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN). In this two-tier system, ITIN filers have the same income tax due as Social Security filers, but they do not receive the same credits. ITIN filers have never been eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and some of their children were excluded from the Child Tax Credit (CTC) in the Trump administration’s 2017 tax bill. Both credits are highly effective anti-poverty programs, providing immediate relief while also incentivizing work and earnings. The tax credits are the critical policy tool in Biden’s American Plan for reducing child poverty, and they would be funded through the budget reconicilation legislation devised by Congressional Democrats in the summer of 2021. As summer drew to a close, ITIN inclusion was beginning to enter the discussion among advocates and legislators about the bill’s detailed provisions. But eligibility is not the only barrier. Internal government monitors have repeatedly criticized the IRS for heavy-handed and inefficient practices that have placed undue burdens on ITIN taxpayers and that have hindered compliance with the law. The use of ITINs has plummeted in recent years from a high of 4.6 million returns in 2014 to 2.5 million in 2020. Prompted by the economic losses and the medical toll suffered by unauthorized immigrants during the pandemic and by their newly valued roles as “essential workers,” the federal government and several state governments have taken important steps to lessen the exclusion of ITIN taxpayers. The first federal stimulus package excluded not only ITIN holders but also their family members with SSNs. Congress extended eligibility to members of ITIN households with SSNs for the second and third stimulus checks. Meanwhile, California, Colorado, Maryland, New Mexico, Washington, Maine, and Oregon broke with the federal government and made ITIN filers fully eligible for their state EITCs, and as of July 2021 similar measures were under consideration in four other states. Early evidence from California and Colorado suggests that ITIN inclusion could prove a highly effective means of reaching poor children with the benefits of a state EITC.
Topic:: Children, Child Poverty, Immigrants, and Tax Systems
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

40. Promoting Voice and Agency Among Forcibly Displaced Children and Adolescents: Participatory Approaches to Practice in Conflict-Affected Settings

Author:: Michael Wessells
Publication Date:: 11-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:: Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:: Globally, large numbers of children and adolescents are displaced by armed conflict, which poses significant threats to their mental health, psychosocial well-being, and protection. Although humanitarian work to support mental health, psychosocial well-being, and protection has done considerable good, this paper analyzes how humanitarian action is limited by excessive reliance on a top-down approach. Although the focus is on settings of armed conflict, the analysis offered in this paper applies also to the wider array of humanitarian settings that spawn increasing numbers of refugees globally. Top-down approaches, which are driven by outside experts and practitioner agencies such as NGOs, do too little to support children’s and adolescents’ cultural identity, voice, and agency. Since top-down approaches privilege outsider conceptualizations of the problems and the indicated interventions, they tend to marginalize or weaken indigenous cultural understandings of the problems facing children and adolescents and of cultural practices that could support them. This leads to poorly contextualized programs that quietly undermine children’s and adolescents’ cultural identity and dignity. Also, the adults who lead top-down approaches do too little to learn from the voices and lived experiences of children and adolescents. Although top-down approaches frequently encourage “child participation”, they tend to do so in a manner that is limited or even tokenistic, as children and adolescents are implementing partners rather than agents who have significant power and could help to make contextually relevant decisions about program priorities and approaches. Humanitarian work to support children’s and adolescents’ mental health, psychosocial well-being, and protection would be strengthened by complementing top-down approaches with more grounded, bottom-up approaches that feature children and adolescents’ cultural identity, voice, and agency. The paper outlines diverse, evidence-based methods and approaches for doing this, and calls attention to four priorities: cultural humility and reflexive practice; learning from the voices and lived experiences of children and adolescents; enabling the agency of and collective action by children and adolescents; and localizing aid by sharing greater power and funding with local stakeholders, including children and adolescents.
Topic:: Children, Displacement, Conflict, and Agency
Political Geography:: Global Focus

41. The Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on Public School Education

Author:: Accountability Initiative
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: This brief presents some of the key effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on India’s public school education, focussing specifically on children. It begins with a discussion of the pre-pandemic status of school education and key policy shifts over the past few years, and provides an overview of the principal issues arising from the pandemic and the resulting school closures. It then offers potential policy suggestions to address these challenges, and thereby ensuring quality education to all children.
Topic:: Education, Health, Children, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

42. Access to Data on Children in Turkey: An Evaluation Based on the Urban95 Project Experience

Author:: Bürge Elvan Erginli and Gizem Fidan
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Nowadays, the need for the use of data in developing an accurate, effective and measurable urban policy is being voiced by many local administrations and civil society organizations, and as a matter of fact, some local administrations have already increased their efforts for data production and use. However, organizations face with certain problems in regard to accessing, obtaining and generating systematic data. The purpose of this report is to put forward these problems along with their reasons and to offer solutions by focusing specifically on data regarding early childhood period.
Topic:: Civil Society, Governance, Children, Urban, and Data
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

43. Data-Driven Strategy Development for Children’s Play in the City

Author:: Bora İyiat
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: When we consider which areas in the city children use to explore, socialize and play, the first ones coming to mind are school gardens, parks, green areas and playgrounds that are reserved for them with the intent to support their development. These areas which have an important place in the daily urban life of children are designed and planned by local governments. All urban and green spaces, including playgrounds which are areas created especially for children in the city, should be based on spatial planning and quality factors that include children’s needs and preferences. And planning requires the use of data.
Topic:: Governance, Children, Urban, Sustainability, Data, and Urban Planning
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

44. Child Protection Services (CPS) Scheme

Author:: Avani Kapur, Mridusmita Bordoloi, and Mohammad Hamza Farooqui
Publication Date:: 08-2021
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: Child Protection Services is Government of India’s (GoI’s) flagship programme to provide preventive and statutory care, and rehabilitation services to children in need of care and protection and those in conflict with the law as defined under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015. This brief uses government data to analyse CPS performance along the following parameters: Trends in overall GoI allocations, releases and expenditures; State wise GoI releases and expenditures; Child Care Institutes (CCIs) and beneficiaries; Registered cases of crimes against children.
Topic:: Government, Children, Youth, and Social Services
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

45. Educating Refugees in Lebanon

Author:: Wissam Fakih
Publication Date:: 06-2021
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS)
Abstract:: MAAS student Wissam Fakih explores how Lebanon’s triple crises—economic collapse, the port explosion, and the pandemic—have impacted the education of thousands of Syrian refugee children living in the country.
Topic:: Education, Children, Refugees, Crisis Management, and Economic Crisis
Political Geography:: Middle East, Lebanon, and Syria

46. Manufacturing Moral Panic: Weaponizing Children to Undermine Gender Justice and Human Rights

Author:: Juliana Martínez, Ángela Duarte, and María Juliana Rojas
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: This research explores how gender-restrictive groups are using child protection rhetoric to manufacture moral panic and mobilize against human rights, and how this strengthens the illiberal politics currently undermining democracies. The report’s comparative analysis of three country case studies (Bulgaria, Ghana, and Perú) underscores recurring strategies, narratives, and actors and gives insight into how gender-restrictive groups collaborate and engage in coalitional work across the globe. This significant new research includes important findings and recommendations for funders.
Topic:: Human Rights, Children, LGBT+, Gender Minorities, and Gender
Political Geography:: Bulgaria, Peru, and Ghana

47. Case Study 1. Peru: How Gender-Restrictive Groups May Lose the Legal Battle, but Win the Communications and Cultural War

Author:: Juliana Martínez, Ángela Duarte, and María Juliana Rojas
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Case Study
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: Peru is the birthplace of one of Latin America’s strongest transnational gender-restrictive movements. Understanding its sociocultural and political context sheds light on the operation of gender-restrictive groups and the rise of neoconservative politics in the region. Lima is geopolitically and strategically important because it hosts the headquarters for various gender-restrictive organizations in the region, including Ceprofarena, the Office for Latin America of the Population Research Institute, Latin American Alliance for the Family, Opus Dei, and Sodalicio de la Vida Cristiana (interview with George Hale, 2020). Therefore, many strategies that instrumentalize children32 to manufacture moral panic and oppose “gender ideology” in countries such as Colombia, Argentina, Mexico, and Chile are oftentimes planned or tested in Peru, or implemented in the country after their success elsewhere. Concretely, the Don’t Mess With My Kids (DMWMK) movement33 in Peru is representative of how genderrestrictive groups instrumentalize children to threaten children’s rights, along with gender-justice, in a country with disturbing evidence of gender-based violence and intense sexism. The Peruvian case also illuminates the ways in which gender-restrictive groups identify key battlefields related to women’s and children’s issues—such as Comprehensive Sexuality Education—that they use as a toehold to advance gender-restrictive initiatives in many policy areas and at several political levels.
Topic:: Human Rights, Children, LGBT+, Gender Minorities, and Gender
Political Geography:: South America and Peru

48. Case Study 2. Bulgaria: "How Children's, Women's, and LGBT Rights Got Lost in Translation; The Development of the Most Effective Gender-Restrictive Movement in Eastern Europe

Author:: Juliana Martínez, Ángela Duarte, and María Juliana Rojas
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Case Study
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: The Istanbul Convention (IC) was the first European treaty to provide a comprehensive framework to address all forms of violence against women and girls. With wide support from across the political spectrum, the EU presented it to member states for ratification in 2011. Despite the endorsement of 18 European countries, Bulgaria became the first country to decide against ratifying it in 2018. Furthermore, the Bulgarian Constitutional Court declared the treaty unconstitutional. Though this decision took many by surprise, it was the culmination of years of work by gender-restrictive groups in the country. As a member of the European Union since 2007, Bulgaria is a signatory of multiple international declarations that protect LGBT,60 women’s, children’s, and human rights. However, over the last decade—and particularly since 2018—the country has also seen the rise of well-organized gender-restrictive groups that have successfully worked to curtail the advancement of human rights and gender justice.61 Bulgaria’s rejection of the IC was the first of a series of events that jeopardized human rights by directly undermining LGBT, women’s, and children’s rights.
Topic:: Human Rights, Children, Women, LGBT+, and Gender
Political Geography:: Europe, Eastern Europe, and Bulgaria

49. Shifting the Field: Philanthropy’s role in strengthening child- and youth-led community rooted groups

Author:: Marcela Rueda Gomez
Publication Date:: 04-2021
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: The objective of this study was to map current practices in philanthropic support for child and youth led work at the community level and provide strategic advice to donors on how to strengthen their funding modalities through participatory approaches. The recommendations from this process will pave the road for members to challenge their own practices; build on momentum to shift money down to the grassroots level; explore ways to influence the broader sector; and influence and shift the wider donor community thinking and approaches.
Topic:: Children, Youth, Philanthropy, Funding, and Grassroots Organizing
Political Geography:: Global Focus

50. The United Nations Children and Armed Conflict Agenda: Integrating Child Protection Issues and Children’s Voices in Peace Processes

Author:: Asha Asokan
Publication Date:: 05-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:: School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:: One in five children lives in a country affected by conflict (Save the Children 2019). Despite concerted international and national efforts to protect children, these 415 million children face grave human rights violations that continue to rise. More political will and resources are needed from governments and parties to the conflict to prevent such violence against children and protect children in armed conflict. However, research confirms that out of 431 ceasefire and peace agreements, less than 18 percent of peace agreements included child protection provisions (Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict). Often, peace-related documents that mention child protection issues do not mention integrating children's participation into peace processes, which is essential to understanding and addressing children's needs during and after the conflict. To end the cycle of violence against children, a paradigm shift must be made in the way peace agreements address children’s issues and rights. Guided by the “Global Policy Paper on Youth Participation in the Peace Process,” commissioned by the United Nations Envoy on Youth, this paper recommends that mediators and child protection actors employ three integrated but non-hierarchical layers for including child protection issues and children’s participation in the peace process: “in the room,” “around the room,” and “outside the room” of formal peace negotiations. This multi-layered, inclusive approach may help achieve the desired results: preventing violence against children and reaching a sustainable peace.
Topic:: International Relations, United Nations, Children, Peace, and Armed Conflict
Political Geography:: Africa, Middle East, and Asia-Pacific

51. The role of childcare challenges in the US jobs market recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic

Author:: Jason Furman, Melissa Kearney, and Wilson Powell III
Publication Date:: 06-2021
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: This working paper examines how much of the overall decline in employment between the beginning of 2020 and 2021 can be explained by excess job loss among parents of young children, and mothers specifically. Using data from the Current Population Survey (CPS), the authors confirm that, in general, mothers with young children have experienced a larger decline in employment, as compared (unconditionally) with other adults, including fathers. This excess job loss is driven by mothers without a four-year college degree. The main point of the paper is to build off this observation and examine how much of the aggregate employment deficit in early 2021 can be explained by parent-specific issues, such as childcare struggles. To examine this question, the authors construct counterfactual employment rates and labor force participation rates that assign to mothers of young children the percent change in employment and labor force participation rates experienced by comparable women without young children. The paper considers multiple definition, sample, and counterfactual specification alternatives. The analysis yields robust evidence that differential job loss among mothers of young children accounts for a negligible share of the ongoing aggregate employment deficit. The result is even stronger (and flips signs) if all parents are considered, since fathers with young children experienced less job loss than other men. The practical implication of these findings is that nearly all of the aggregate ongoing employment deficit is explained by factors that affect workers more broadly, as opposed to challenges specific to working parents.
Topic:: Labor Issues, Children, Pandemic, COVID-19, and Childcare
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

52. How Misaligned Incentives Hinder Foster Care Adoption

Author:: Isabella M. Pesavento
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Cato Journal
Institution:: The Cato Institute
Abstract:: Adoption, particularly adoption out of foster care, has not been well studied within the field of economics. Researchers may avoid this topic because the adoption market greatly deviates from a typical market, and the system and data collection are highly fragmented, with relatively little federal coordination. Rubin et al. (2007) and Thornberry et al. (1999) show that instability in foster care placements produces negative welfare outcomes, and Hansen (2006), Barth et al. (2006), and Zill (2011) demonstrate that adoption out of foster care is socially and financially beneficial. Yet, children waiting to be adopted out of foster care are in excess supply, which has been exacerbated in recent years. I hypothesize that this is, in part, due to misaligned incentives of government officials and the contracted foster care agencies. I show that earnings are prioritized over ensuring permanent child placement, which hinders the potential for adoption, and government oversight fails to correct such iniquities because of career interests.
Topic:: Economics, Government, Markets, Children, Incentives, Foster Care, and Adoption
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

53. Eliminating child marriage in Ethiopia

Author:: Fana Gebresenbet
Publication Date:: 06-2021
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
Abstract:: How can we explain the large gap between national legal and policy commitments to reduce and eliminate gender-based violence (GBV) and the reality and practice of GBV in Ethiopia? Hitherto explanations mainly centre on the conflict between and social and official norms, and the stubbornness of the former. In this new DIIS Working Paper, Fana Gebresenbet tries to go beyond this dichotomy to examine what happens in the ‘in-between spaces’. While the stubbornness of social norms only brings home to us the slow pace of change, it does not tell us what guides the emerging practices that contribute towards change. Instead, ‘practical norms’ are used here as an analytical tool to examine what happens as we move along the continuum from social to official norms. This helps us capture why routinised, coordinated and socially acceptable new practices occur before the major social norms change. This work is part of GLOW (Global Norms and Violence Against Women in Ethiopia), a research programme financed by the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and coordinated by DIIS.
Topic:: Development, Diplomacy, International Organization, Poverty, Children, Women, and Inequality
Political Geography:: Africa and Ethiopia

54. Bottom-Up Change: Motives behind Erdoğan strategy in ‘politicizing’ the first religious channel for children

Author:: Abdel Latif Hegazy
Publication Date:: 07-2021
Content Type:: Commentary and Analysis
Institution:: Future for Advanced Research and Studies (FARAS)
Abstract:: On June 7, 2021, Ali Erbaş, President of Directorate of Religious Affairs in Turkey, and İbrahim Ärän, Director of the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), signed a cooperation protocol to establish a religious channel for children, which would be the first of its kind in Turkey. Within this context, Erbaş, said, "We have not been able to present Islamic values to children over the past years, since we used to show them animated cartoons designed by foreign companies." He emphasized the need to exert efforts to sustain children with correct religious knowledge. The government’s establishment of a religious channel for children has raised questions regarding the dimensions and motives of this step currently, particularly since there is a Turkish tendency to politicize and use religion to serve the political and electoral motives of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Topic:: Politics, Religion, Children, Islamism, and Erdogan
Political Geography:: Turkey

55. What difference do schools make? A mixed methods study in secondary schools in Peru

Author:: Juan Leon, Gabriela Guerrero, Santiago Cueto, and Paul Glewwe
Publication Date:: 05-2021
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Group for the Analysis of Development (GRADE)
Abstract:: This study contributes to the scarce literature on school effectiveness in secondary education in Peru by addressing the following questions: i) which educational processes within schools are most influential in math and reading comprehension? and in the case of the most effective schools, ii) what is the importance that principals, teachers, and students place on school processes variables in explaining educational outcomes? We use a mixed-method design that follows a sequential explanatory design. Our results point out the relevance of school process variables at the school level. Therefore, educational programs carried out by local and national governments should pay more attention to the dynamics within the school to mitigate the educational inequalities, equalizing upwards the opportunities for children in impoverished public schools.
Topic:: Education, Children, Inequality, and Public Sector
Political Geography:: Peru

56. "Diversifying" Social Investment: European Welfare States and Immigrant Integration in the Wake of the COVID-19 Crisis

Author:: Anton Hemerijck and Liam Patuzzi
Publication Date:: 09-2021
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Migration Policy Institute (MPI)
Abstract:: Across Europe, the COVID-19 pandemic has strengthened awareness of the importance of robust, well-functioning welfare states in helping individuals, families, and communities weather threats to their lives and livelihoods. Initial EU and Member State responses to the pandemic and its economic fallout were much more vigorous than responses to other recent economic shocks, such as the Great Recession and the European debt crisis. Even so, European societies will likely have to contend with long-term social and economic impacts, which in many cases are exacerbating existing inequalities. The shift in the structure and goals of welfare spending since the start of the pandemic can be understood through the prism of “social investment.” In recent decades, European welfare states have moved away from a predominantly reactive focus on financial safety nets that protect individuals during periods of unemployment and illness, and toward investing in people’s human capital and employability to help them navigate life transitions and drive growth in advanced knowledge economies. Looking ahead, the success of social-investment policies will depend on their ability to account for immigration and diversity, increasingly prominent features of European societies that are central to understanding the nature and development of socioeconomic inequalities. This report explores whether the social-investment approach to welfare states could serve as a tool for post-pandemic recovery—particularly in diverse, immigrant-receiving societies. It examines how European welfare systems fared and adapted during the Great Recession, how social investment seeks to balance social and economic goals, and how lessons from recent immigrant integration policy developments could help improve the reach, accessibility, and relevance of social-investment initiatives.
Topic:: Education, Health, Children, Employment, Family, Welfare, Integration, COVID-19, and Workforce
Political Geography:: Europe

57. Not for Adults Only: Toward a Child’s Lens in Migration Policies in Asia

Author:: Maruja M. B. Asis and Alan Feranil
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:: Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:: Having experienced substantial international migration since the 1970s, countries in East, South, and Southeast Asia have developed laws, institutions, policies, and programs to govern various aspects of international migration. Children, however, who comprise a significant share of the world’s international migrants, have not received as much policy attention as adults. Children are part of the region’s international migration experience (e.g., children left behind in the countries of origin when their parents migrate for work, children as migrants, and children as members of multicultural families). This article provides an overview of the challenges faced by children as migration actors, and the policy responses and programs that select countries in the region have developed to address children’s experiences and concerns. The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration and the Global Compact on Refugees, which many Asian countries have endorsed, set forth objectives, commitments, and actions, informed by the principle of promoting the best interests of the child and child protection, which specifically address the needs of children. These include actions to promote universal birth registration, enhance access to education and health and social services regardless of migrant and legal status, and otherwise create inclusive and socially cohesive societies. Most countries in Asia have yet to meet these standards. Endorsing the two compacts was a first step. The good practices that have been implemented in a number of countries provide a template for how to translate these objectives into action and how to ensure that the full protection and best interests of migrant children, the left-behind children of migrant workers, and those who are part of multicultural families remain a priority.
Topic:: Migration, Regional Cooperation, Health Care Policy, and Children
Political Geography:: South Asia, East Asia, Asia, and Southeast Asia

58. Lessons from Ukraine: Shifting International Surrogacy Policy to Protect Women and Children

Author:: Emma Lamberton
Publication Date:: 05-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Public and International Affairs (JPIA)
Institution:: School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), Princeton University
Abstract:: Ukrainian surrogacy companies now hold over a quarter of the global surrogacy market since a series of human rights violations caused India, Thailand, and Nepal to close their borders. Similar violations are occurring in Ukraine, including the abandonment and trafficking of children and the abuse of surrogates. The Ukrainian government is not taking action, despite concerns expressed by both lawmakers and surrogates that the industry engages in unethical practices. This paper proposes that the Hague Conference’s Experts’ Group on the Parentage/Surrogacy Project spearhead international ratification of a holistic series of policies focused on protecting women and children from exploitation.
Topic:: International Relations, Children, Women, International Development, and Human Trafficking
Political Geography:: Europe, Central Asia, Eurasia, and Ukraine

59. ISIS after the US repositioning in the Northeast of Syria: camps, women and children, and leadership revival

Author:: Jean-Pierre Keller
Publication Date:: 04-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:: Since the fall of Baghuz city in North East of Syria in March 2019, thousands of women, children and former IS fighters have been imprisoned in either camps or prisons. Following the Turkish military operation in October 2019, the security conditions have deteriorated, resulting in fewer guards as well as more instability and vulnerability for all those imprisoned. The worsening living conditions, the absence of adequate medical care and lack of access to education endanger the future of the children imprisoned in the camp. Moreover, the influence of the Muhajirats remains constant as a means for the spreading of propaganda inside and outside the camps.
Topic:: Security, Human Rights, Children, Women, Islamic State, and Transition
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, Syria, and United States of America

60. Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital: The Case of Thailand

Author:: Sasiwimon W. Paweenawat
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)
Abstract:: This study provides evidence of intergenerational transmission of human capital in Thailand, using data from the Thailand Labor Force Survey of 1985–2017. Employing the instrumental variable approach using Thailand’s compulsory educational reform of 1978 as the instrumental variable to minimise bias caused by the endogeneity of parental education, this study estimates the effect of parental education on children’s education and their labour market outcomes. Besides reaffirming the conventional positive link between parental and children’s years of education, new and intriguing evidence is put forth on the negative link between parental education and the child’s brawn skill, based on the industry and occupation adopted by the child in the labour market. The influence of paternal education is found to outweigh that of maternal education, in contrast to the evidence from developed countries. High intergenerational educational persistence and low intergenerational mobility indicate unequal opportunities in the country, as individual welfare is largely tied to parental background. Therefore, it is recommended that the Government of Thailand weaken this linkage to improve equality in the country.
Topic:: Education, Reform, Children, and Parenting
Political Geography:: Asia and Thailand

61. Determinants of School Enrolment: Relationship between Minimum Wage and Human Capital Investment

Author:: Dyah Pritadrajati
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA)
Abstract:: Most economic research on minimum wage has focused on employment eﬀects. Research analysing the eﬀects of minimum wage on skill acquisition and educational investment is limited, especially in developing countries. To fill the gap in the literature, this paper investigates the relationship of minimum wage and human capital investment using the National Socioeconomic Survey (Susenas). This study is an eﬀort to further analyse whether the minimum wage policy supports or even hinders recent government eﬀorts to keep students in school. The government may be unaware of the possible interaction of diﬀerent policies, especially in a developing country where inter-sectoral policy coordination is limited. This paper finds that minimum wage legislation has significant negative substitution eﬀect on educational investment, i.e. individuals are more likely to drop out of senior secondary school due to an increase in minimum wage. There is no evidence of gender bias in human capital investment, at least as a response to increasing minimum wage. Even though the response to an increase in minimum wage amongst low-income households is positive, the results of a regression incorporating an interaction term suggest that the substitution eﬀect is the dominant factor. Therefore, the positive result amongst low-income households might be generated by a fall in the probability of obtaining low-skilled employment that oﬀsets the substitution eﬀect.
Topic:: Education, Children, Human Capital, and Minimum Wage
Political Geography:: ASEAN

62. Addressing Data Gaps on Child, Early, and Forced Marriage in Humanitarian Settings

Author:: Dyan Mazurana and Anastasia Marshak
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Feinstein International Center, Tufts University
Abstract:: The United Nations and its partner agencies have pledged to focus on the problem and eradication of early, child, and forced marriage. On November 12, 2018, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution on child, early, and forced marriage. As part of this resolution, the General Assembly highlighted the need for better data collection and disaggregation of that data for improved analysis and learning. This report is a comprehensive and user-friendly concept note for a database on child marriage in humanitarian settings, a first step in eradicating the problem. The report identifies the existing knowledge and data on child marriage in humanitarian settings, gaps in that evidence base, and provides recommendations for moving forward with the creation of a comprehensive database. The authors interviewed key stakeholders on child marriage across program, policy, and academia in combination with a comprehensive literature review. The report was commissioned and funded by Save the Children U.S.
Topic:: Health, Human Rights, Humanitarian Aid, United Nations, Children, Basic Data, and Humanitarian Intervention
Political Geography:: Middle East, North Africa, and Global Focus

63. Determinants of Child Malnutrition in Mauritania

Author:: Yahya Abou Ly
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: African Economic Research Consortium (AERC)
Abstract:: The empirical context of this research is in an environment where malnutrition is a real public health concern. The objective of this study was to identify the determinants of the nutritional state of children under the age of five years in Mauritania. Using data obtained from multiple indicators cluster surveys (MICS) in Mauritania in 2007 and 2015, we undertook fixed-effects clusters techniques to control for unobserved heterogeneity. The empirical results demonstrate that the age and sex of a child, level of education of the mother, the standards of living of the household, the area of residence, the availability and use of health care services and access to drinking water are all important factors for the good health of children in Mauritania. These findings suggests improvements in nutritional health, for example, by education of girls until completion of secondary school; an improvement in the conditions of households that are headed by women and an expansion in the coverage rate of multi-purpose health centres.
Topic:: Health, Food, Children, Food Security, and Child Poverty
Political Geography:: Africa and Mauritania

64. Birth Order and Demand for Immunization for Children under the Age of Five in Cameroon

Author:: Negou Kamga Vincent de Paul and Nda’chi Deffo Rodrigue
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: African Economic Research Consortium (AERC)
Abstract:: Despite free basic vaccines administered by the Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI), there is still a fairly high death rate of children aged 0-5 worldwide due to vaccine-preventable diseases. Sub-Saharan Africa is the most affected region due to low levels of vaccination. This study analyses the effect of birth order on the immunization status of children in Cameroon, considering the contribution of cultural, economic and community factors. To do this, it uses data from the Demographic and Health Surveys of 1991, 1998, 2004 and 2011 produced by the National Institute of Statistics with the support of UNFPA, UNICEF, the World Bank and USAID. The EPI module was administered to 3,350, 2,317, 8,125 and 25,524 children under five in 1991, 1998, 2004 and 2011, respectively. The multinomial probit model makes it possible to find that birth order has a negative and highly significant effect on the full and timely immunization of children under five and the impact increases with birth order. Moreover, the impact of birth order increases after adjusting for cultural factors. This increase indicates that, beyond the effect of birth order, cultural factors are at the root of prejudices leading to the abandonment of children. Considering children under two years of age, and vaccines taken during the first four months, the corresponding birth order effect points to the benefits of routine immunization and response campaigns in promoting immunization of children under five.
Topic:: Economics, Health, Health Care Policy, and Children
Political Geography:: Africa and Cameroon

65. Integrated Child Development Services

Author:: Avani Kapur and Ritwik Shukla
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: The Integrated Child Development Services is Government of India’s (GoI’s) flagship programme aimed at providing basic education, health, and nutrition services for early childhood development. This brief uses government data to analyse ICDS performance along the following parameters: Allocations, releases, and expenditures, Component-wise trends, Human and physical resources, Coverage, and Malnutrition status.
Topic:: Education, Health, Budget, Children, Food Security, and Social Policy
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

66. Samagra Shiksha

Author:: Mridusmita Bordoloi and Avani Kapur
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: Samagra Shiksha – An Integrated Scheme for School Education is Government of India’s (GoI’s) school education programme extending from pre-school to senior secondary classes. The scheme was launched in April 2018 to ensure equitable and inclusive quality education. The three erstwhile schemes brought under Samagra Shiksha are: Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA); Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA); and Teacher Education (TE).
Topic:: Education, Government, Budget, Children, and Youth
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

67. Mid-Day Meal Scheme

Author:: Sharad Pandey and Avani Kapur
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: The National Programme of Mid-Day Meals in School (MDM) scheme is Government of India’s (GoI’s) flagship school-based feeding programme aimed at improving the nutritional status of students and promoting the universalisation of elementary education. Using government data, this brief reports on trends for MDM performance along the following parameters: Overall trends in allocations, releases and expenditures; Expenditure performance on key MDM components such as food grains, cooking costs, honorarium to cook- cum-helper (CCH), traveling assistance and monitoring, management and evaluation; Progress on construction of kitchen-cum-stores, and; Coverage as indicated through the provision of meals to students.
Topic:: Education, Government, Children, Food Security, and Youth
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

68. Child Protection Services

Author:: Mridusmita Bordoloi and Avani Kapur
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: Child Protection Services is Government of India’s (GoI’s) flagship programme to provide preventive and statutory care, and rehabilitation services to children in need of care and protection and those in conflict with the law as defined under the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015. This brief uses government data to analyse CPS performance along the following parameters: Trends in overall GoI allocations, releases and expenditures; State wise GoI releases and expenditures; Child Care Institutes (CCIs) and beneficiaries; Registered cases of crimes against children.
Topic:: Government, Budget, Children, Legislation, and Justice
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

69. Armed Conflict and COVID 19: the Ramifications on the Educational Sector in the NW/SW Regions of Cameroon

Author:: Tazoacha Francis
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: The Nkafu Policy Institute
Abstract:: In late 2016, the social and political forces in the now restive South West and North West (NW/SW) regions of Cameroon erupted as a crisis and quickly mutated into a human disaster with a rising human and property destruction that has been going on unabated. The impact of this lingers given that disasters, be they natural or anthropogenic have always had immense ramifications on human lives in the area they occur and even beyond. The NW/SW regions have unfortunately become the theatre of such a ravaging disaster since four years ago triggered by accumulated layers of grievances meted on the consciousness of the Anglophone population in these regions of the country in tandem with marginalization particularly in the educational and legal systems by the Francophone-dominated government which led to widespread protests in September and October 2017. The conflict escalated from a peaceful demonstration that was met with a heavy crackdown from the government security forces. This has resulted in the majority of schools in these two regions to be shot down because of security reasons. This situation has further been worsened with the emergence of the coronavirus (COVID 19) pandemic that was first identified in Cameroon in February 2020 [1]. The COVID 19 situation in Cameroon has been evolving rapidly, with dozens of new cases reported each day. Adding to the current challenges of the armed conflict, the COVID 19 put the educational sector in Cameroon to a halt in March 2020 with far-reaching ramifications on the lives of the children of school-going ages, especially in the war-torn area.
Topic:: Security, Education, War, Children, Pandemic, COVID-19, and Armed Conflict
Political Geography:: Cameroon

70. The Impacts of Covid-19 on Children and Social Policy Responses

Author:: Başak Akkan
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Children had received less attention in the early stages of the pandemic. The mortality rates among children have been almost non-existent, and consequently they have not constituted a risk group. However, in a country with high incidences of child poverty, Covid-19 could have a significant impact in aggravating the existing inequalities among children and in creating new forms of deprivation. Within this context, the impact of Covid-19 on children is analyzed under four headings: The poverty aggravating effect of the pandemic; the manifestation of inequalities regarding the physical (home) environment and living conditions of children; the deepening of digital inequalities and access to education; and increased and unrecorded cases of domestic violence and child abuse amid the lockdowns.
Topic:: Children, Inequality, Social Policy, COVID-19, Health Crisis, and Abuse
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

71. İzmir95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project Report

Author:: Baran Karsak
Publication Date:: 09-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: The report contains certain Izmir-specific (Izmir95) details and preliminary findings on the project process of the Data-driven Policy Tool interactive platforms that have been designed for Istanbul, Izmir and Gaziantep so far and that serve the Data-driven Decision-Making Processes study which is a main area of focus of the Urban95 project.
Topic:: Governance, Urbanization, Children, Urban, Sustainability, and Digital Policy
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

72. Preschool Education Statistics of Istanbul Districts

Author:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Preschool Education Statistics of Istanbul Districts created for the Urban95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project with National Education Statistics of the Ministry of National Education covering the 2018/’19 period.
Topic:: Education, Children, Statistics, Digital Policy, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, Istanbul, and Mediterranean

73. Preschool Education Statistics of Gaziantep

Author:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Preschool Education Statistics of Gaziantep Province created for the Urban95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project with National Education Statistics of the Ministry of National Education covering the 2018/’19 period.
Topic:: Education, Children, Statistics, Digital Policy, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, Mediterranean, and Gaziantep

74. Preschool Education Statistics of Izmir Province

Author:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Preschool Education Statistics of Izmir Province created for the Urban95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project with National Education Statistics of the Ministry of National Education covering the 2018/’19 period.
Topic:: Education, Children, Statistics, Digital Policy, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, Mediterranean, and Izmir

75. Preschool Education Statistics of Istanbul Province

Author:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Preschool Education Statistics of Istanbul Province created for the Urban95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project with National Education Statistics of the Ministry of National Education covering the 2018/’19 period.
Topic:: Education, Children, Statistics, Digital Policy, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, Istanbul, and Mediterranean

76. Preschool Education Statistics of Turkey

Author:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:: Preschool Education Statistics of Turkey created for the Urban95: Data-Driven Policy Tool Project with National Education Statistics of the Ministry of National Education covering the 2018/’19 period.
Topic:: Education, Children, Statistics, Digital Policy, and Preschool
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

77. Mapping State Interventions Towards Women and Child Protection in Maharashtra

Author:: Accountability Initiative
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: This study examined interventions addressing violence against women (VAW) and violence against children (VAC) in Maharashtra. The study, conducted between August 2018 and October 2019, analyses budgetary allocations, expenditures, and utilisation for measures addressing VAW and VAC over 5 years FY 2014-15 to FY 2018-19. This study was commissioned by UNICEF Maharashtra as a part of a larger project between UNICEF, UN Women and Government of Maharashtra on tracking outlays to outcomes for women and children.
Topic:: Governance, Children, Women, Violence, and Public Policy
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

78. A Hidden Cost: The Pandemic’s Impact on Nutrition

Author:: Avani Kapur and Ritwik Shukla
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Centre for Policy Research, India
Abstract:: This brief’s focus is solely on core nutrition specific interventions for pregnant women, lactating mothers, and children under six years of age. These address the immediate determinants of fetal and child nutrition and development. Nutrition-sensitive interventions are discussed where relevant.
Topic:: Development, Children, Women, Food Security, and Pandemic
Political Geography:: South Asia and India

79. COVID-19 Future Trends: Impacts on Children and the Search for Opportunities

Author:: Sol Pradelli
Publication Date:: 10-2020
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Elevate Children Funders Group
Abstract:: This short thought-piece was commissioned by ECFG in September 2020 to help members navigate the uncertainty around how COVID would impact children in the longer-term. The paper includes a desk review of the impacts of previous pandemics and economic crises on children; an overview of likely impacts for children of the COVID crisis, including projections by age cohort; four potential scenarios and related planning questions; recommendations for funding, advocacy, and research; and a bibliography of key resources and reports.
Topic:: Children, Advocacy, COVID-19, Funding, and Economic Crisis
Political Geography:: Global Focus

80. Predictors of school dropout across Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam

Author:: Santiago Cueto, Claudia Felipe, and Juan Leon
Publication Date:: 07-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Group for the Analysis of Development (GRADE)
Abstract:: In this paper the authors utilize the five rounds of Young Lives household surveys across four countries (Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam) to study the characteristics of children who had dropped out of school by 22 years of age. While most children in the longitudinal sample go to primary school, they tend to drop out more often and earlier in Ethiopia. In India most children complete the early grades of school but drop out later, particularly in grades 11 and 13. Researchers find that in all countries, except Vietnam, there is a considerable number of children who drop out of school but at some point return to it, either to complete secondary or drop out again. The reasons provided by children for dropping out across the countries are oftentimes related to poverty: for example, the need to work, or care or provide for family. The multivariate analysis shows that indeed in many cases the wealth level of the family at an early age predicts later dropout, as does maternal education level, students’ early skills and residence in certain regions of each country. There are also some variations across countries; for example, boys are more likely to drop out of school in Ethiopia and Vietnam, and children who have repeated a grade are more likely to drop out of school in Peru. However, having high educational aspirations at early ages seems to be a protective factor against dropping out. This suggests that the value that children place on education may be an important preventative factor against dropping out. Overall, these results suggest the need to act early through education and social protection interventions to target young children who are at risk of dropping out, and the follow their trajectories, providing support as needed to specific groups and even individuals, so that all children may fulfill their right to complete at least secondary education.
Topic:: Education and Children
Political Geography:: Africa, India, Asia, Vietnam, Ethiopia, and Peru

81. Youth, God, and Empire: Interview With Dr. Joy Schulz

Author:: Joy Schulz
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Commentary and Analysis
Institution:: The Toynbee Prize Foundation
Abstract:: With young activists like Malala Yousafzai, Greta Thunberg, and Xiuhtezcatl Roske-Martinez coming to the fore of headlines and social movements, the present has proven itself to be an opportune moment to reassess the role of youths in historical change. In this vein, Dr. Joy Schulz's book Hawaiian By Birth: Missionary Children, Bicultural Identity, and U.S. Colonialism in the Pacific (2017) stands out as crucial reading. Emphasizing the centrality of American missionary children in the domination of the Hawaiian Islands during the second half of nineteenth century, Schulz's analysis exposes the potency of youth power through a series of chapters that trace the development of these young evangelists into colonizers and revolutionaries. In the process, she draws attention to the complexities born at the intersections of childhood and empire and underscores the capacity of children to record their own histories in ways that may complement or complicate adult ambitions. Dr. Schulz and I discuss these themes, and the challenges and opportunities that children present as the subjects of transnational histories.
Topic:: Religion, Political Activism, Children, Colonialism, Youth, and Empire
Political Geography:: Asia-Pacific and Global Focus

82. Child Skill Production: Accounting for Parental and Market-Based Time and Goods Investments

Author:: Elizabeth Caucutt, Lance Lochner, Joseph Mullins, and Youngmin Park
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Human Capital and Productivity (CHCP), Western University
Abstract:: This paper studies the multidimensional nature of investments in children within a dynamic framework. In particular, we examine the roles of parental time investments, purchased home goods/services inputs, and market-based child care services. We first document strong increases in total investment expenditures by maternal education; yet expenditure shares, which skew heavily towards parental time, vary little with parental schooling. Second, we develop an intergenerational lifecycle model with multiple child investment inputs to study these patterns and the impacts of policies that alter the prices of different inputs. We analytically characterize investment behavior, focusing on the substitutability of different investment inputs and the way parental skills affect the productivity of family-based inputs. Third, we develop an estimation strategy that exploits intratemporal optimality conditions based on relative demand to estimate substitutability between inputs, the relative productivity of different inputs, and the role played by parental education. This approach requires no assumptions about the dynamics of skill investment, preferences, or credit markets. We also account for mismeasured inputs and wages, as well as unobserved heterogeneity in parenting skills. We further show how noisy measures of child achievement (measured several years apart) can also be incorporated in a generalized method of moments approach to additionally identify the dynamics of skill accumulation. Fourth, we use data from the Child Development Supplement of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to estimate the skill production technology for children ages 12 and younger. Our estimates suggest complementarity between parental time and home goods/services inputs as well as between these family-based inputs and market-based child care, with elasticities of substitution ranging from 0.2 to 0.5. We find no systematic effects of parental education on the relative productivity of parental time and other home inputs. Finally, we use counterfactual simulations to explore the extent and sources of variation in investments across families, as well as investment responses to changes in input prices. We find that variation in prices explains 48% of the overall variance in investment expenditures, and differences in wages explain more than half of the investment expenditure gap between college-educated and non-college-educated parents. We further show that accounting for the degree of input complementarity implied by our estimates has important implications for the responses of individual inputs to any price change and for the responses in total investments and skill accumulation to large (but not small) price changes.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Children, Human Capital, Economic Mobility, Credit, Productivity, Skilled Labor, and Price
Political Geography:: Global Focus

83. The EITC and Maternal Time Use: More Time Working and Less Time with Kids?

Author:: Jacob Bastian and Lance Lochner
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Human Capital and Productivity (CHCP), Western University
Abstract:: Parents spend considerable time and resources investing in their children's development. Given evidence that the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) aects maternal labor supply, we investigate how the EITC aects a broad array of time-use activities, focusing on the amount and nature of time spent with children. Using 2003-2018 time-use data, we nd that federal and state EITC expansions increase maternal work time, which reduces time devoted to home production, leisure, and time with children. However, for children of all ages, almost none of the reduction comes from time devoted to investment activities, such as active learning and development activities.
Topic:: Economics, Labor Issues, Children, Women, Income Inequality, Tax Systems, Human Capital, Family, and Productivity
Political Geography:: United States

84. Motherhood, Labor Market Trajectories, and the Allocation of Talent: Harmonized Evidence on 29 Countries

Author:: Inés Berniell, Lucila Berniell, Dolores de la Mata, María Edo, Yarine Fawaz, Matilde P. Machado, and Mariana Marchionno
Publication Date:: 11-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Distributive, Labor and Social Studies (CEDLAS)
Abstract:: In this paper we assess whether changes in labor market decisions upon motherhood lead to potential inefficient allocations of talent. Using an event study approach with retrospective data drawn from SHARE for 29 European countries we show that motherhood effects go beyond the well studied effects of labor market participation decisions: the arrival of the first child substantially affects the uptaking of alternative modes of employment, such as part-time and self-employment, that are characterized by flexible or reduced work schedules but also lower pay on average. We also show that the size of labor market responses to motherhood are larger in societies with more conservative social-norms or with weak policies regarding work-life balance. To assess the effects of motherhood over the allocation of talent, we explore how labor market responses to parenthood vary by alternative measures of talent or ability. We find that all women, even those with the highest level of ability and abler than their husbands face large motherhood effects, while men show virtually no changes in the labor market when becoming fathers. We also find that mothers who become self-employed after the birth of the first child are those that are less entrepreneurial-able according to cognitive ability and personality traits shown to impair business survival. Overall, our results suggest relevant changes in the allocation of talent caused by gender differences in nonmarket responsibilities that can have sizable impacts on aggregate market productivity.
Topic:: Labor Issues, Children, and Employment
Political Geography:: Global Focus

85. Pay for Performance for Prenatal Care and Newborn Health: Evidence from a Developing Country

Author:: Maria Laura Alzúa and Noemi Katzkowicz
Publication Date:: 12-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Distributive, Labor and Social Studies (CEDLAS)
Abstract:: Empirical literature analyzing the effect of pay-for-performance programs (P4P) for healthcare providers on maternal care and newborn health outcomes is scarce. In 2008, Uruguay’s Ministry of Public Health implemented a P4P called Metas Asistenciales (Healthcare Goals), a country-wide program that grants healthcare providers an economic incentive for complying with certain maternal and newborn healthcare goals. Health organizations use these funds to provide maternal and child health services. Using administrative records and a difference-in-difference methodology, we evaluate the effect of the Metas Asistenciales program on maternal and newborn health outcomes. We find that in the institutions affected by the program, 10 percentage points more women received an adequate number of prenatal checkups and pregnancy detection in the first trimester improved by 5 percentage points. We also found better results among newborns for indicators related to birth weight, premature births, and stillbirths. In sum, the program had a positive, significant impact on the rate of pregnant women’s utilization of health services and on newborn health outcomes. This study thus provides evidence supporting the idea that economic incentives are a promising tool for incentivizing healthcare providers to achieve better health services in developing countries.
Topic:: Health, Health Care Policy, Children, and Birthing
Political Geography:: South America and Uruguay

86. Priorities for the UN's Children and Armed Conflict Agenda, 2020

Author:: Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination
Publication Date:: 05-2020
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:: Priorities for the UN's Children and Armed Conflict Agenda, 2020 is the final report from LISD's annual workshop co-organized with the NGO Watchlist on Children and Armed, and held on January 29, 2020. The report reflects the discussions from three closed working sessions dedicated to (1) ongoing challenges and concerns impacting the implementation of the CAAC agenda, (2) emerging concerns and trends for the CAAC agenda, (3) the role of Member States in advancing the CAAC agenda through the Security Council Working Group and Group of Friends. A final recommendations section reflects findings from the workshop's wrap-up session which summarized key discussion points and recommendations of the working sessions.
Topic:: Security, United Nations, Children, Conflict, and Armed Conflict
Political Geography:: Global Focus

87. Inclusive education in ASEAN countries: how to support children with disabilities in schools

Author:: Tze Peng Wong
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: This policy brief provides recommendations to enable equal participation in education among children with disabilities in ASEAN countries. It specifically calls for governments and schools to adopt inclusive education recommendations which include the training of teachers of inclusive principles, the allocation of funding to build relevant infrastructure and the development of new curricula.
Topic:: Education, Children, and Teaching
Political Geography:: ASEAN

88. Supporting full participation of mothers in the labour market: Childcare-related leave policy lessons from East Asian economies

Author:: Ruby Chau and Sam Yu
Publication Date:: 03-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Asia Research Institute, University of Nottingham
Abstract:: Policy makers should implement alterations to the law in order to support women and families in getting back into the workforce. This policy brief reviews how governments in Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan use paid childcare-related leave policies in supporting women to stay in the labour market. It shows that these policies have not been very successful for two main reasons: 1. The leave is not long enough to cover the whole period from birth to the time when the child is entitled to universal state childcare services or school education. 2. These policies do not address the issue of the gender pay gap and hence overlook the financial loss a family may suffer if the father, instead of the mother, takes a substantial period of time off to look after the children.
Topic:: Gender Issues, Children, Women, Family, Labor Market, and Childcare
Political Geography:: Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and Hong Kong

89. A Study and Analysis of the Treatment of Mexican Unaccompanied Minors by Customs and Border Protection

Author:: Kiera Coulter, Samantha Sabo, Daniel E. Martinez, Katelyn Chisholm, Kelsey Gonzalez, Edrick Villalobos, Diego Garcia, Taylor Levy, and Jeremy Slack
Publication Date:: 04-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:: Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:: The routine human rights abuses and due process violations of unaccompanied alien children (UAC) by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have contributed to a mounting humanitarian and legal crisis along the US–Mexico border. In the United States, the treatment of UAC is governed by laws, policies, and standards drawn from the Flores Settlement, the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA), and CBP procedures and directives, which are intended to ensure UAC’s protection, well-being, and ability to pursue relief from removal, such as asylum. As nongovernmental organizations and human rights groups have documented, however, CBP has repeatedly violated these legal standards and policies, and subjected UAC to abuses and rights violations. This article draws from surveys of 97 recently deported Mexican UAC, which examine their experiences with US immigration authorities. The study finds that Mexican UAC are detained in subpar conditions, are routinely not screened for fear of return to their home countries or for human trafficking, and are not sufficiently informed about the deportation process. The article recommends that CBP should take immediate steps to improve the treatment of UAC, that CBP and other entities responsible for the care of UAC be monitored to ensure their compliance with US law and policy, and that Mexican UAC be afforded the same procedures and protection under the TVPRA as UAC from noncontiguous states.
Topic:: Human Rights, Migration, Border Control, Children, Youth, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

90. Starting Young to Prevent Violence Against Women

Author:: Sexual Violence Research Initiative
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: The Sexual Violence Research Initiative
Abstract:: More than 50 percent of children have experienced some form of sexual, physical or emotional abuse or neglect in their lifetime. The wide-ranging and lifelong consequences of witnessing or experiencing violence in childhood can be profound.1 Individuals exposed to childhood violence, including child sexual abuse, physical abuse and harm, or witnessing the abuse of their mothers, are at greater risk of becoming perpetrators or victims as adults. Through our core work and grant-making, the Sexual Violence Research Initiative (SVRI) is building evidence to help us respond to violence as early as possible and to stop it from continuing. Between 2016 and 2020, we funded several studies on violence against children in Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and other regions (in partnership with the World Bank Group). This research has taught us that services and prevention programmes must start with parents and families, and continue throughout the individual’s life. To be most effective, programmes need to target critical development phases, from pre-conception and conception through early childhood to adolescence. Programmes to prevent violence in the home, including programmes that offer parenting support, are essential. Continuing research into childhood violence, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, is essential. Research can help us to effectively prevent and respond to both violence against women and violence against children, and it is essential for creating policies and practices that really work.
Topic:: Education, Children, Gender Based Violence, and Youth
Political Geography:: Africa, Latin America, North America, and Southeast Asia

91. Economic Mobility across Generations: Old versus New EU Member States

Author:: Roy van der Weide, Ambar Narayan, and Mario Negre
Publication Date:: 01-2019
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS)
Abstract:: A country where an individual’s chances of success depend little on the socio-economic success of his or her parents is said to be a country with high relative intergenerational mobility. A government’s motivation for seeking to improve mobility is arguably two-fold. There is a fairness argument and an economic efficiency argument. When mobility is low, it means that individuals are not operating on a level playing field. The odds of someone born to parents from the bottom of their generation will be stacked against him or her. This is not only unfair but also leads to a waste of human capital, as talented individuals may not be given the opportunity to reach their full potential. Reducing this inefficiency will raise the stock of human capital and thereby stimulate economic growth. Since the waste of human capital tends to be concentrated toward the bottom of the distribution, the growth brought about by mobility-promoting policy interventions tends to be of an inclusive nature, in line with the spirit of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 10 on reducing inequality. For large parts of the world’s population, individual education is still too closely tied to the education of one’s parents, and there is a clear divide between the high-income and developing world. The patterns observed globally are also observed within Europe. Intergenerational mobility (or equality of opportunity) is visibly lower in the new member states (i.e. Eastern Europe), where national incomes are lower. Raising investment in the human capital of poor children towards levels that are more comparable to the investment received by children from richer families will curb the importance of parental background in determining an individual’s human capital. Countries at any stage of development can raise intergenerational mobility by investing more to equalise opportunities. The evidence strongly suggests that public interventions are more likely to increase mobility when: a) public investments are sufficiently large, b) are targeted to benefit disadvantaged families/ neighbourhoods, c) focus on early childhood, and d) when there is a low degree of political power captured by the rich.
Topic:: Education, Children, Inequality, Family, and Economic Mobility
Political Geography:: Europe, Global Focus, and European Union

92. Enhancing Young Children’s Language Acquisition through Parent-Child Book-Sharing: A Randomized Trial in Rural Kenya

Author:: Heather A. Knauer, Pamela Jakiela, Owen Ozier, Frances Aboud, and Lia C.H. Fernald
Publication Date:: 02-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: Worldwide, 250 million children under five (43 percent) are not meeting their developmental potential because they lack adequate nutrition and cognitive stimulation in early childhood. Several parent support programs have shown significant benefits for children’s development, but the programs are often expensive and resource intensive. The objective of this study was to test several variants of a potentially scalable, cost-effective intervention to increase cognitive stimulation by parents and improve emergent literacy skills in children. The intervention was a modified dialogic reading training program that used culturally and linguistically appropriate books adapted for a low-literacy population. We used a cluster randomized controlled trial with four intervention arms and one control arm in a sample of caregivers (n = 357) and their 24- to 83-month-old children (n = 510) in rural Kenya. The first treatment group received storybooks, while the other treatment arms received storybooks paired with varying quantities of modified dialogic reading training for parents. Main effects of each arm of the trial were examined, and tests of heterogeneity were conducted to examine differential effects among children of illiterate vs. literate caregivers. Parent training paired with the provision of culturally appropriate children’s books increased reading frequency and improved the quality of caregiver-child reading interactions among preschool-aged children. Treatments involving training improved storybook-specific expressive vocabulary. The children of illiterate caregivers benefited at least as much as the children of literate caregivers. For some outcomes, effects were comparable; for other outcomes, there were differentially larger effects for children of illiterate caregivers.
Topic:: Children, Language, Rural, Parenting, and Reading
Political Geography:: Kenya

93. Vaccine Introduction and Coverage in Gavi-Supported Countries 2015-2018: Implications for Gavi 5.0

Author:: Roxanne Oroxom and Amanda Glassman
Publication Date:: 06-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: With a vision of “creating equal access to new and underused vaccines,” Gavi set several coverage-specific targets for 2020 as part of its Phase IV strategy, including the immunization of an additional 300 million children, increased pentavalent 3 and measles-containing vaccine (MCV) 1 coverage, and greater equity in coverage across wealth quintiles.[1] The strategy also called for broadening protection through improved routine coverage and the introduction of new vaccines.[2]
Topic:: Health, Children, Public Health, and Vaccine
Political Geography:: Global Focus

94. What We Learn about Girls’ Education from Interventions that Do Not Focus on Girls

Author:: David Evans and Fei Yuan
Publication Date:: 07-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: Despite dramatic global gains in access to education, 130 million girls of school age remain out of school. Among those who do enter, too many do not gain the essential skills to succeed after they complete their schooling. Previous efforts to synthesize evidence on how to improve educational outcomes for girls have tended to focus on interventions that are principally targeted to girls, such as girls’ latrines or girls’ scholarships. But if general, non-targeted interventions—those that benefit both girls and boys—significantly improve girls’ education, then focusing only on girl-targeted interventions may miss some of the best investments for improving educational opportunities for girls in absolute terms. This review brings together evidence from 270 educational interventions from 177 studies in 54 low- and middle-income countries and identifies their impacts on girls, regardless of whether the interventions specifically target girls. The review finds that to improve access and learning, general interventions deliver gains for girls that are comparable to girl-targeted interventions. At the same time, many more general interventions have been tested, providing a broader menu of options for policy makers. General interventions have similar impacts for girls as for boys. Many of the most effective interventions to improve access for girls are household-based (such as cash transfer programs), and many of the most effective interventions to improve learning for girls involve improving the pedagogy of teachers. Girl-targeted interventions may make the most sense when addressing constraints that are unique to girls.
Topic:: Education, Children, Women, and Feminism
Political Geography:: Global Focus

95. Minor Misery: What an Islamic State Registry Says About the Challenges of Minors in the Conflict Zone

Author:: Daniel Milton and Don Rassler
Publication Date:: 10-2019
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: The Combating Terrorism Center at West Point
Abstract:: One of the much-discussed aspects of the Islamic State’s caliphate project was the opportunity it provided for families to travel and live under the control of the organization. While various studies have provided a somewhat clear picture of the more accountable population of those travelers—the men and women who decided to join the group—less clear-cut information has appeared regarding the minor population that lived under the organization’s governance. Using a portion of a spreadsheet captured by U.S. military forces, this report offers an examination of the minor population that lived inside the Iraqi portion of the Islamic State’s control in late 2016. It reveals a diverse population of over 100,000 minors, mostly from Iraq but also from 56 other countries around the world. This report provides important context and data for current discussion regarding what to do with those left in the conflict zone and those being repatriated to countries throughout the world.
Topic:: Children, Islamic State, Youth, Conflict, and Syrian War
Political Geography:: Iraq, Middle East, and Syria

96. Fall 2019 edition of Strategic Visions

Author:: Alan McPherson
Publication Date:: 09-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Strategic Visions
Institution:: Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, Temple University
Abstract:: Contents News from the Director ……………………… 2 Announcing the Immerman Fund ………. 2 Fall 2019 Colloquium …………………... 2 Fall 2019 Prizes ………………………… 3 Spring 2020 Lineup …………………….. 4 Note from the Davis Fellow …………………. 5 Fall 2019 Interviews …………………………. 6 Nan Enstad ………………………………6 Thomas Schwartz ………………………. 9 Book Reviews ………………………………...12 Great Power Rising: Theodore Roosevelt and the Politics of U.S. Foreign Policy Review by Stanley Schwartz ……12 Little Cold Warriors: American Childhood in the 1950s Review by Abby Whitaker ………14 Armageddon Insurance: Cold War Civil Defense in the United States and Soviet Union, 1945-1991 Review by Michael Fischer ……..16 France and the American Civil War: A Diplomatic History Review by James Kopaczewski …18 “Celebrating Campaigns & Commanders: 66 Titles in 20 Years!” …………………..20 “One Must Walk the Ground”: Experiencing the Staff Ride ……………..21 Announcing the Edwin H. Sherman Prize for Undergraduate Scholarship in Force and Diplomacy………………………….24
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Civil War, Cold War, Children, and History
Political Geography:: United States, Soviet Union, and Global Focus

97. Role of Judicial System of Pakistan in Social Maladjustment of the Children under Child Custody Litigation

Author:: Kaleem Javed and Umbreen Javaid
Publication Date:: 07-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: South Asian Studies
Institution:: Department of Political Science, University of the Punjab
Abstract:: The present study is aimed to explore the role of judicial system of Pakistan in social maladjustment among the children under child custody litigation. In addition, the study is also intended to find out the gaps in child custody litigation for addressing the problems in child custody litigation. The presents study used qualitative research design and conducted 25 in-depth interviews lawyers, judges, parents and relatives of the children under child custody litigation. For the purpose of data collection, researchers selected eight guardian courts situated in Lahore. Interview guide was used to collect data from the respondents who were selected using purposive sampling techniques. Respondents were assured that their provided information will not be shared with anyone without their prior permission. For analyzing data, thematic analysis technique was used. The present study found that judicial system in general and child litigation particularly have an active role in enhancing social maladjustment among the children. There are many factors which are responsible for this increase which include both internal and external factors of court. However, court is responsible to make decision therefore; the majority of the respondents were of the views that court delay in decision making, unpleasant court environment and inefficiency of staff and judges is the main cause of social maladjustment in children. It is concluded that the role of judicial system and its impacts are very severe upon psychological health of the children, therefore, court should tackle the cases very seriously and on urgent bases for keeping children in good environment according to their needs.
Topic:: Children, Courts, Psychology, and Youth
Political Geography:: Pakistan, South Asia, and Punjab

98. Can Transparency and Accountability Programs Improve Health? Experimental Evidence from Indonesia and Tanzania

Author:: Jean Arkedis, Jessica Creighton, Archon Fung, Stephen Kosack, Dan Levy, and Courtney Tolmie
Publication Date:: 05-2019
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:: We assess the impact of a transparency and accountability program designed to improve maternal and newborn health (MNH) outcomes in Indonesia and Tanzania. Co-designed with local partner organizations to be community-led and non-prescriptive, the program sought to encourage community participation to address local barriers in access to high quality care for pregnant women and infants. We evaluate the impact of this program through randomized controlled trials (RCTs), involving 100 treatment and 100 control communities in each country. We find that on average, this program did not have a statistically significant impact on the use or content of maternal and newborn health services, nor the sense of civic efficacy or civic participation among recent mothers in the communities who were offered it. These findings hold in both countries and in a set of prespecified subgroups. To identify reasons for the lack of impacts, we use a mixed-method approach combining interviews, observations, surveys, focus groups, and ethnographic studies that together provide an in-depth assessment of the complex causal paths linking participation in the program to improvements in MNH outcomes. Although participation in program meetings was substantial and sustained in most communities, and most attempted at least some of what they had planned, only a minority achieved tangible improvements and fewer still saw more than one such success. Our assessment is that the main explanation for the lack of impact is that few communities were able to traverse the complex causal paths from planning actions to accomplishing tangible improvements in their access to quality health care.
Topic:: Health, Health Care Policy, Children, and Randomized Controlled Trials
Political Geography:: Africa, Indonesia, Tanzania, and Southeast Asia

99. Character Reform: Egypt’s Year of Education

Author:: James Aird
Publication Date:: 01-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Harvard Journal of Middle Eastern Politics and Policy
Institution:: The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:: As Egypt’s ‘Year of Education’ begins, the government pushes much needed reform in pre-university education across the country. Supported by a $500 million World Bank loan, the government is accelerating efforts to train teachers, build schools, and implement tablet technology in primary and secondary education. The reforms include one ambitious project that is especially deserving of more attention: the expansion of a pilot program adapting Japanese educational techniques to the Egyptian context. At a meeting in Tokyo on February 29th, 2016, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced a joint partnership that sought to link Egypt to Japan through educational development, in part thanks to al Sisi’s personal admiration for Japan’s education system. As part of the joint partnership, Japanese and Egyptian administrators and policymakers set out to reshape Egyptian pedagogy. Modeled on Japan’s Tokkatsu education system, which refers to a program of “whole child development,” Egypt aims to build schools that place great emphasis on teaching students to be responsible, disciplined, and clean, as opposed to the more traditional model prioritizing higher standardized testing scores. A Tokkatsu-inspired curriculum is already being used at over forty schools that accepted more than 13,000 students in September 2018. While President al Sisi plans to personally monitor the new education system, other MENA states should also watch closely. If it successfully contributes to building Egypt’s human capital and improving students’ competitiveness, other states in the region might consider implementing similar educational policies.
Topic:: Development, Education, Reform, Children, Partnerships, and Youth
Political Geography:: Japan, Middle East, North Africa, and Egypt

100. Worsening gaps in education for Syrian refugees: Lessons from the early education response in Jordan

Author:: Reva Dhingra
Publication Date:: 01-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Harvard Journal of Middle Eastern Politics and Policy
Institution:: The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University
Abstract:: The 2018-2019 school year opened with some worrying figures for Syrian children in Jordan. Over forty percent of an estimated 240,000 registered Syrian school-aged refugees remain out of formal school. Despite ongoing efforts, enrollment levels of about 131,000 in September remained well below the target of 170,000 children. With most refugees unlikely to return to Syria in the immediate future—the number of registered refugees increased in 2018—education while in Jordan remains a pressing concern. Funding cuts, school and teacher quality, documentation barriers, and complex mental health and psychosocial problems among refugee children contribute to education shortfalls, but only partially explain the unexpectedly low enrollment of refugee children. The initial education response was fractured between the immediate imperative of keeping children off the streets and the long-term imperative of integrating children into formal school. As the crisis stretches into its eighth year, however, the impulses of the early education response continue to impede efforts to educate Syrian children in Jordan. Despite the best efforts of donors, NGOs, and the Jordanian government, this early approach may have inadvertently increased time out of school for children who, under government regulations, are not allowed to re-enroll after three years. As a result, many of these children will likely never be able to enroll in school again. Examining the refugee education response in Jordan offers lessons for providing education during the early stages of refugee crises.
Topic:: Education, Children, Refugees, and Syrian War
Political Geography:: Middle East, Syria, and Jordan

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COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS