Children's perspectives on their economic activity—Diversity, motivations and parental awareness

Abstract

This research investigates how children from an affluent city in the UK exercise agency to construct their economic worlds. A survey (n = 484) showed that children (ages 10 to 14 years) conduct a range of monetary and non-monetary activities. A second study (n= 83) with diaries, self-documentation, and parental questionnaires, showed that children's economic activity involves individual and social motivations, occurs in formal and informal contexts, and is often self-regulated. Parents acknowledge children's monetary activities and neglect non-monetary activities. The results suggest that children's agency unfolds in diverse economic activities shaped by contextual factors and interactions with peers and parents, thereby supporting a relational view of children's agency.

Vulnerable children aiding visually challenged beggars in Nigeria: Need for social work intervention

“…The decision to work on the street by vulnerable children as found from the study often depends on family decision and benefits exchanged in social interaction. According to Xolocotzin and Jay (2020), children's economic activity involves individual and social motivation. Children who aid visually challenged beggars can therefore trade their ability to guide the visually impaired person around in exchange for cash to start their own street business.…”

Breaking out of the policy enclave approach to child labour in sub-Saharan African agriculture

“…This relatively new focus on children's work is underpinned by an alternative conception of children, in which their vulnerability and need of protection are tempered by their individual and collective agency (Aitken, 2001;Robson, 2004). Thus, not only do many children in SSA work, and often willingly, but they are also social and economic actors in their own right, exercising varying degrees of agency in relation to the opportunities and constraints that shape their lives (Van Hear, 1982;Xolocotzin and Jay, 2020). Tisdall (2017) questions the traditional and limited characterisation of children as 'vulnerable' -stating that 'in much of liberal theory on rights, children are either absent from the theorisations or set up as the counter-example' (p. 62).…”