Role of States and IOs in Reduction of Child Labor: Analysis Based on Abolitionist and Protectionist Approaches

Jin Hun An
2013470001
International Organizations
18 June 2013

Child Labor – Overview and Definition
Overview
Globalization embodies a process of recurring interaction between diverse actors in pursuit of collective goals. With a rise of new technology, a concept of time and space has diminished, and 21st century has seen economic success and increasing numbers of transnational activities. Growing influence of global civil society and cross-border social movements demonstrate how people in the contemporary era seek ways to bring about mutual benefits in hopes of closing gaps between developed and developing countries. (Baylis, Smith, & Owens, 2011) Nevertheless, severe poverty, human rights violations, as well as child labor issues are still prevalent in many developing countries. Worst of all, women and children are victims of governmental apathy and corruption in most persecuted communities.
Children in developing countries with ill-constructed welfare system undergo extreme poverty and malnourishment. For their families’ survival, children under the age of fourteen work for the whole day, and they do not have any spare time to go to schools. Pakrashi (2009) has demonstrated a vicious cycle of child labor trap in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia:
“Despite the high private rate of return to primary education, in Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, many families are unable to afford their children’s education because of the prevalence of credit constraints. The inability of the parents to defray even a small amount of money may give rise to child labor.”

Poverty and child labor issues are not problems that have newly emerged in the contemporary era. Developed nations have experienced these issues during a process of their development in the 19th century. With successful economic growth, they have gradually eradicated them. Rampant poverty and child labor that we see today is considered as a historic recurrence, and they do not meet Westerners’ expectations of “sustainable improvements in the quality of life for all people” (Pakrashi, 2009). A process of elimination of child labor today has slowed down due to the global economic recession. International Labor Organization (ILO) urged more efforts to stimulate global campaign in order to end the practice. According to Global Report on child labor, “ child laborers had declined from 222 million to 215 million, or 3 per cent, over the period 2004 to 2008” (ILO, 1996). Thus, advocacy groups, Intergovernmental organizations, and social movements have called for global support for elimination (ILO, 1996). Definition Child labor that needs to be eradicated does not refer to all work done by children. When their work do not affect their “health and personal development or interfere with their schooling,” they do not fit the negative notion of child labor (ILO, 1996). Children sometimes assist their parents with housework and take a part in building family businesses without their working hours affecting primary education. This is indeed a beneficial experience for children, because they learn to be productive within their communities. On the other hand, ILO (1996) applies the term child labor when work “is mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous and harmful to children; and interferes with their schooling by; depriving them of the opportunity to attend school; obliging them to leave school prematurely; or requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with excessively long and heavy work.”
When child labor is engaged in enslavement, separation from families, and misplacement of children on the streets, ILO experts refer to it as the most extreme forms of child labor. “Article 3 of ILO Convention No. 182” has set the criteria that defines the worst forms of child labor. In such forms, conditions of working area of children are the most hazardous (Smolin, 2000).

History of Child Labor in the Western World Developed countries have successfully eliminated worst forms of child labor. Britain serves as a useful example to illustrate how they have carried out gradual eradication of child labor, because many other nations adopted their policies (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). In the early stage of industrialization, child labor played a critical role in large production of factory manufactures. Severe poverty at the time contributed to abundance of child labor. In fact, development of legal protection slowly took place: “although protective legislation on so-called pauper children was enacted in 1767, it took until 1833 before the working conditions of all children in the textile industry were regulated” (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). In 1867, medical inspection was set in place for children working in factories. From late 19th to early 20th century, the minimum age for child labor was gradually raised from ten to fifteen. In 1870, law enforced children between five and thirteen to receive proper education. In sum, legal protection of child labor gradually reduced working time and enabled children to work at improved conditions (Doepke and Zilibotti, 2005). Employers initially refused to accept legislative protection, because they believed that decline of child labor would eventually cause loss of competitive advantage in production of goods against foreign competitors. Nevertheless, government has successfully implemented legislation that protected children at the most dangerous working conditions. In 1914, the government enacted law that forbade children under twelve from working (Basu & Hoang Van, 1998). Child labor issues in the developed countries during the early period of industrialization manifest historical lessons. Even though economic, social, and political contexts at the time differ vastly from those of today, it is generally agreed that extreme poverty is a major cause of child labor. Poverty reduction is closely linked to decline in child labor, because “the main factors that facilitated the reduction in child labor were economic growth, technological and managerial changes, and the increase of adult earnings” (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). It is important to note that improvement of quality of lives did not come abruptly, but gradually. One of the reasons for slow mechanism was lack of political commitment of the governments. Thus, governmental support is essential in promoting effective prohibition of child labor (Smolin, 2000).

Child Labor in developing countries today A core cause of child labor in the developing countries today is extreme poverty (ILO, 1996). A decrease in per capita GDP is correlated with increase in child labor. It is difficult for poor families to stop sending children to work, because alternatives are hunger and starvation of the whole families. Pierik and Houwezijl (2006) have put it,
“This is the main reason why targeted boycotts of the products of child labor turn out to be counterproductive (at least in the short term): they focus, in a limited geographical area, only on the effects of child labor—its products—but typically fail to investigate the structural reasons for the occurrence of child labor—namely, poverty.”
Thus, taking jobs away from these children without understanding fundamental principle of the child labor can only send them to worse and less-paid jobs. Prohibition on child labor works well when adult wages increase at the same time, and this would most likely happen if “all regulators, importers, and consumers of products in the world would be able to effectively support such a policy” (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). In this case, enforcement of legislative act on banning child labor will increase public welfare and improve quality of lives in the end. However, such adaptation will doubtfully take place in near future. Developing countries usually have weak central governments, and thus law enforcement cannot adequately be put in place. Another determinant of child labor is availability of education. Elimination of child labor has intention of returning children to schools from dangerous working factories. If education is not available in downtrodden communities, prohibition will not effectively improve their lives’ quality (ILO, 1996). Developing countries today have weak educational infrastructure to provide sufficient schooling to children when they are free from work. School fees are in most cases not affordable by the families residing in poor communities. Well-funded and qualified schools have not been built to provide high-valued education. Without fair and qualified education available to these children, sending children to schools is not a viable alternative. Therefore, poverty and lack of availability of education challenge Western advocacy groups or intergovernmental organizations and prevent them from effectively prohibiting child labor in the developing countries (ILO, 1996).

General Background on International Labor Organization (ILO) In 1919, the Treaty of Versailles formed the International Labor Organization (ILO). Since then, it has become a formal international organization that monitors and reports on child labor violations. The Conference, which is the major body of the organization, includes all the member states. Each member state in the Conference is consisted of two government representative, one employer representative, and one worker representative. “Since its creation, the ILO has always had a tripartite structure including governments, employers, and workers’ groups” (Ho, 2006). The Governing Body manages decision-making processes. A number of representatives for member states of the Governing Body equal those of the Conference (ILO, 1996). The tripartite structure of the ILO makes it particularly effective in monitoring and reporting on child rights violations. Each representative can raise complaints when another violates previously confirmed international labor conventions. Core principles of the organization includes “an extensive process for reporting labor violations, monitoring labor conditions, and issuing recommendations on ways to resolve violations and improve working environments” (Ho, 2006). Not only does it have reporting and monitoring power, it also enjoys enforcement powers under the Article 33 of the ILO’s Constitution (ILO, 1996). The organization’s core principle is abolishment of child labor across the borders. A system of conventions within ILO has traditionally set the international labor standards. Ratification by each member state is necessary in determining such criteria. However, in 1998, the ILO introduced fundamental labor rights regardless of convention ratification: “(1) freedom of association and free collective bargaining; (2) the elimination of forced or compulsory labor; (3) the abolition of child labor; and (4) the elimination of employment discrimination” (Ho, 2006). Furthermore, elimination of child labor has gained international support in late 20th century, and the contention on the Worst Forms of Child Labor was ratified by over 150 out of 178 member states. Article 3 of ILO Convention No. 182 defines the worst forms of child labors as: (a) “All forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom and forced or compulsory labour, including forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict; (b) the use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution, for the production of pornography or for pornographic performances; (c) the use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit activities, in particular for the production and trafficking of drugs as defined in the relevant intnernational treaties; (d) work which, by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children.” Worst form of child labor in India Bonded child labor in India is considered as the worst form of child labor, which is a phenomenon of children working in conditions of slavery in order to pay off their debts (Smolin, 2000). There are an estimated number of fifteen million bonded child laborers. The debt is usually passed on to children from their parents. The parents have taken loans from the creditors in order to “meet subsistence needs, pay for funeral or marriage costs, or replace income lost due to illness or death” (Tucker, 1997). Due to high rates of interest charged with the debts and low wages they gain, bonded child labor has persisted for a long time. Worst of all, the debt is passed on to one generation after another. In addition to poverty, there are many other factors that led to a phenomenon of bonded labor in India. Other elements include:
“an ancient tradition of slavery and debt bondage; the lack of a concerted social welfare scheme to safeguard against hunger and illness; a noncompulsory and grossly inadequate educational system; the lack of employment opportunities and living wages for adults; an ossified stratification of occupations, with little opportunity for upward mobility or intergenerational career changes within families; corruption and indifference among government officials; and endemic societal apathy” (Tucker, 1997).
For the purpose of this paper, association between child labor and education in India will be examined. In 1950, the Indian Constitution was formed, which proposed free education for children under the age of fourteen within ten years from the commencement of the Constitution. However, less than fifty percent of Indian children are going to schools, and literacy rate is lower than forty percent among agricultural workers (Tucker, 1997). The low rate of school attendance is deeply related to poor quality of public school system. The primary public schools are inadequately funded, and teachers are often unqualified. The classes are huge, and teaching materials are outmoded. Indian government chooses to spend their educational budget to subsidize secondary and university education, while disregarding primary education (Tucker, 1997). The government focuses on expanding the nonformal education system for working children. The system allows children to have a full-time job and provides three hours of education a day. Education children receive through this system is insufficient because it only provides basic and nonformal skills. The system that is deeply embedded in many villages exacerbates child rights violations in India (Tucker, 1997).

Abolitionist Approach Major trends in international discourse on child labor include abolitionist perspective, which argues that elimination of child labor should be legally enforced in order to effectively end the practice. The abolitionists proclaim that states or external actors should directly impose policies that child labor. Bessel (1999) has referred abolitionist mechanism to the first wave of policies regarding child labor:
“The first wave has its origins in attempts to remove children from the workplace in the industrializing nations of Europe and the United States and was steadily exported around the world, particularly through the work of the International Labor Organization (ILO) since 1919.”
The ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work and its Follow-up (1998) added that,
“All members, even if they have not ratified the Conventions in question, have an obligation arising from the very fact of membership in the Organization to respect, to promote and to realize, in good faith and in accordance with the Constitution, the principles concerning the fundamental rights with are the subject of those Conventions, namely: freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining, the elimination of all forms of forced or compulsory labor, the effective abolition of child labor, and the elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation.”

The ILO has worked hard to implement effective prohibition on child labor; however, legal intervention sometimes does more harm than good. The abolitionist idea of eliminating child labor with legal forces benefits local families only if other sources of income are available. ILO Convention NO. 182 categorizes worst and other forms of child labor. The abolitionism suggests that the former should be abandoned if banning all forms of child labor is impossible. “The unequivocally worst form of child labor includes work that, by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, hinders the physical, psychological, mental and social development of children, or is work in unhealthy and dangerous environments, or sequesters children from the society’s normal protection” (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). While other forms of child labor are tolerable to a certain degree, the worst form of child labor should immediately be abolished. In the document The State of the World’s Children, UNICEF (1997) noted that considering all forms of child labor as equally intolerable underplays the issue and makes the end of practice even harder to be achieved. In sum, the abolitionists believe in eradication of child labor with legal empowerment, but their approach does not apply to all forms of child labor.

Abolitionist approach in India Legislative enforcement against child labor came into action in 1993, when India was under British colonial power. The prohibition act was called the Children (Pledging of Labor) Act. Upon attaining independence, Indian government passed additional laws governing child laborers, including the Child Labor (Prohibition and Regulation) Act of 1986, which regulated work hours and working conditions. The most highlighted legal protection for children working in conditions of servitude was Bonded Labor System (Abolition) Act, which was passed in 1976 (Tucker, 1997). The Bonded Labor Act outlaws child labor system under any debt agreements. The act frees all bonded laborers, cancels any debts against them, and prohibits any new bondage agreements (Smolin, 2000). In spite of legal protections, bonded child labor is still prevalent, and prosecution is not yet strengthened. Punishments for violations against law are light and ineffective. Scarcity of legislative infrastructure is rooted in governmental apathy and corruption. Indian governments adopted abolitionist approach in a sense that they tried to abandon the worst form of child labor with legislative empowerment. Poverty and child labor are reduced to a certain extent, but prohibition policies have been less effective than they were expected (Tucker, 1997).

Protectionist Approach The second wave of policies regarding elimination of child labor is mainly characterized by intervention by external actors. In opposition to the abolitionism, the protectionists proclaim that emphasis should be focused on “efforts to improve working conditions, to protect working children from abuse and exploitation, and to provide services such as health and educational facilities” (Bessel, 1999). In the matter of providing services to working children and improving working conditions, NGOs are the major players. They do not disregard importance of legislative policies, but they maintain that prohibition policies should be enforced alongside stronger educational, service, and health infrastructure. The protectionist school is characterized by three arguments: (1) as long as extreme poverty is prevalent in a certain area, children often work out of necessity; (2) when working conditions are not harmful to children’s health and development, working experience can be beneficial to children; (3) children have a right to work. This rights-based approach suggests different strategic procedures in prohibiting child labor depending on the contexts (Bessel, 1999). Protectionist approach can be regarded as indirect policies against child labor. These policies not only address child labor itself, but they also emphasize issues connected to it. As poverty is the major determinant of child labor, policies aimed to reduce poverty are considered as the most effective in halting child labor in developing countries. As globalization introduced immense economic interdependence between developed and developing countries under the international institutions such as WTO, World Bank, and IMF, Western societies have duties to seek effective ways to end the global poverty. Therefore, it is argued that financial support to governments of the downtrodden states is one of the best policies to prevent children from going to work (Pierik and Houwerzijl, 2006) In addition, the protectionists put emphasis on building better educational infrastructure. Pierik and Houwerzijl (2006) have demonstrated negative correlation between availability of education and the occurrence of child labor, which implies that “the occurrence of child labor can be influenced indirectly by policies that reduce the costs of education, increase the accessibility of education, or increase the expected returns of education.” There are many ways to improve educational infrastructure in the peripheral states. Government or international institutions’ subsidies can reduce the cost of education. In fact, ILO and UNICEF have long been supporting education subsidies. School construction programs driven by the NGOs can also make education accessible to local children. Improvement in quality of teaching can further motivate children to return to school (Bessel, 1999). The Oportunidades program in Mexico is a good example that represents the protectionist approach. Under the program, local parents are rewarded when they send their children to schools:
“This program started in 1997 and pays parents if their children go to school; the stipend increases with the child’s age” (Pierik & Houwerzijl, 2006).
The education subsidies reach about two-thirds of what the students would make for full-time work. In addition, the families are granted additional costs for their nutrition and health. This policy is effective in preventing children from going to work, because it increases educational accessibility, and at the same time, it practically manages health and nutrition problems. The program is acclaimed for its tackling poverty, which is the root cause of child labor and educational problem. When the program raises family income, families’ dependence on children’s work is lowered. In the end, it can end the vicious cycle of poverty trap. After children receive proper education, they can enter the market as high-skilled laborers. High incomes they receive in the future gradually abolish child labor, because next generation will not face mandatory duty to work to support their families. Due to its effectiveness, many other developing countries tried to adopt similar program. However, without financial resources available to the governments, instituting the program is not feasible. In this context, cooperation between governments and NGOs is essential. After consultation with NGOs who are familiar with the local situation, governments can provide financial aid, which will effectively be put in use (Ho, 2006).

Protectionist Approach in India The program that follows the protectionist approach is called the Elimination of Child Labour Programme, which is designed for the purpose of sending working children to “special schools”, which provide nonformal education and vocational training. Families engaged in this program receive one hundred rupees and children have one daily free meal at schools:
“The one hundred rupee incentive was first initiated by the 1987 National Child Labour Policy. This policy, funded by international donor agencies (primariliy the International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC), of the International Labour Organization) and administered by local nongovernmental organizations, established the first special schools to provide nonformal education to working children” (Tucker, 1997).
Most often than not, external actors play significant roles in providing services or financial funds to local families. Thus, The protectionist school encourages the government to collaborate with the nongovernmental organizations. The government has resources and authority to implement the law, and the organizations facilitate implementation with trust from the grassroots. Moreover, NGOs can play a significant role as watchdog on governmental programs, and this is particularly important in India where there is a collapsed government or authority. The Elimination of Child Labour Programme is considered as a successful policy because the program served 7,000 children as of 1995 (ILO, 1996).

Conclusion The global civil society today has called for recognition of the expanding influence of the non-state actors. These actors are peoples-based institutions, which are important in providing expertise that states lack. The representatives of the grassroots mainly deal with environmental protection, gender equality, and human rights issues (Baylis, Smith, & Owens, (2011). In the case of a child labor issue, the abolitionist approach driven mainly by the governments has shown some limitations. In most cases, developing countries do not have well-constructed governmental infrastructure. Implementation of abolition act under such collapsed governments sometimes does more harm than good. Without sufficient services that lure children to go to schools, they often end up trapped in the vicious cycle of child labor. The protectionist approach is more plausible, because it seeks to reduce poverty, which is the core cause of the child labor. Even though child labor is still prevalent in India, protectionist mechanism has brought about effective reduction in numbers of child laborers. In particular, the protectionist school has addressed education, food, and family budgets as the major causes of child rights violations. As eradication of child labor in Western countries did not come in an abrupt fashion, developing countries today can gradually abolish child labor by reducing poverty and improving social welfare system (Pierik and Houwezijl, 2006). The governments and external actors such as ILO and NGOs need to collaborate. The governments have authority and resources to implement policies against child labor, and the external actors can facilitate implementation by monitoring the governmental programs (Tucker, 1997). The global campaign should be strengthened to motivate both the governments and international institutions to end the practice in collaboration. Sustainable development, which addresses fairness between developed and developing countries, can be accomplished when financial, technical, and political assistance are effectively put in place.

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