Child Labour as an Extreme Form of Exploitation - Essay Example

Child labour is an extreme form of exploitation Introduction The international labour organisation has provided a description and complete definition of child labour in its convention as productive work assignments that children should not be engaged in because their tender age and lack of experience does not allow. Young children engaged in productive work are exposed to a number of dangerous situations that may affect their health and normal growth. In different parts of the globe, children are engaged in child labour which affects their growth while enriching unscrupulous traders in the agricultural, mining, manufacturing and domestic sector (Doepke & Zilibotti, 2010). Early engagement in these activities before adolescents affects the educational needs of the children and these results into a situation where young children at a tender age drop out of schools to work in different parts of the economy. The use of child labour has existed for an extensive period of time in history, dating back to the time of the Second World War when children in the United States and Europe would work for colonialists. The low cost of labour provided by children motivated these countries to engage the children within the agricultural, manufacturing and mining sectors thus affecting their educational goals and needs. The nature of work that children were exposed to and are still exposed to date demonstrates the extreme form of exploitation and violation of the children’s rights. In some parts of the world, children would be subjected to the night shift thus denying them the right and privilege of sleeping and resting as other children of their age. The use of child labour to increase the productivity of a specific region due to their cheap labour is an extreme form of human exploitation that has no regards for human rights and the rights of the children. This paper will seek to demonstrate that the engagement of children in economic activities of an form represents an extreme example of child labour that impacts negatively on children’s growth and exposes them to a number of dangerous situations (Doepke & Zilibotti, 2010). The development of child labour and exploitation The emergence of child labour in different parts of the globe can be traced back to the 19th century when children were used to provide cheap labour in deplorable conditions within mills, factories and farms owned by wealth peasants. The British industrialisation has been accused for using child labour and exploitation to shove up its development due to the low wages paid to the minors. The replacement of hand labour with machines in Britain and other parts of Europe during the industrial revolution led to the development of industries in different parts of the continent (Doepke & Zilibotti, 2010). Though machines were used for the production process, human labour was still needed to supplement the functions of the machine. To save cost and increase profits, the industries opted for low labour alternatives which was only available in underage children. These children were exposed to deplorable conditions as they would work in the damp, dark and dirty environments. In the mining industries in different parts of Britain during this period, children were forced to crawl into coal sites underground due to their small frames and flexibility. This exposed most of the children to the danger of contracting a number of diseases and to the dangers of grounding carvings which would bury them underneath. Most of the children became ill due to the poor environment and the lack of sanitation within this environment that could have protected them from contracting diseases. It is estimated that by 1810, over 2 million school going children had dropped and would work in different industries and farms for 50 to 70 hours per week (Doepke & Zilibotti, 2010). The fact that most of these children came from poor families and no ability to desist from joining these work fields demonstrated the extent of exploitation that child labour developed. As their parents were unable to support them, these children opted to work in the mills and coal mining sites to support themselves, exposing themselves to exploitation by the wealthy industry owners. In the United States, this era marked a dark face in child labour as the working conditions were not only exploitative but reflected the slave economy. In Massachusetts for example, a glass factory fenced the area where the children would work with barbed wire and this prevented them from strolling around or leaving when tired (Doran, 2013). They would be shoved into the work area and enclosed therein with a foreman to supervise their work in an environment that was prone to injury and accidents. The ‘young imps’ as they were known then were less than 12 years old and were forced to carry heavy loads of hot glass at night for only 40 cents to $1.10 per hour. Most these children developed a number of complications that affected their physical, mental and psychological growth due to the nature of the work environment that they were exposed to (Honeyman, 2007). The high temperatures within the glass industries exposed the young children to a number of ailments including lung diseases, heat exhaustion and burns as they were confined in an area to work under supervision without break or rest. The 1900s also created a new form of exploitation for children as young as three years old that came from poor backgrounds and therefore lacked the capacity to afford decent education. Child prostitution and pornography is the new form of child labour that is today practised in different parts of the world (Al-Gamal, Hamdan-Mansour, Matrouk & Nawaiseh, 2013). Young children are transported to brothels and bars and forced to work as prostitutes in environments that expose them to risks and a number of sicknesses associated with sexually transmitted diseases. During the industrial revolution, factories and mines were not the only areas where child labour and exploitation was perfected as household enterprises also employed children at tender ages. Home based industries in the United States and Europe engaged young children in the production activities in environments which prevented the government agencies from monitoring. Due to the home environment, most of these factory owners argued that their homes were secure and the children were working under perfect conditions, a situation which was a false representation of facts. The Soviet Union and Russia during the collectivism period under Stalin also engaged children under extremely exploitative and poor working environments (Doran, 2013). The children would be engaged in mandatory and unpaid work during the evening which the government considered as work education provided to enhance the skills and mental capacity of the children. The history of child labour has demonstrated the historical exploitation that children were exposed to and how this work environment affected the education and growth of children. By working in such an environment, the children were denied the time to play and interact with their colleagues in a free environment which is beneficial to their cognitive and perceptual growth (Al-Gamal, Hamdan-Mansour, Matrouk & Nawaiseh, 2013). Causes of child labour The different reasons as to why child labour increased in different parts of the globe further demonstrates the lapse in the leadership in these countries and strengthen the argument that child labour is exploitative. One of the main reasons behind the development of child labour in different parts of the world today and during the industrial revolution is poverty. Due to poverty, most children during the industrial revolution were unable to afford education and basic needs which forced them to move to different industries to take care of themselves (Hindman, 2002). During this period, a number of families were living way below the poverty line and could not therefore afford to take their children to school and provide them with their basic needs. This exposed the children to the pangs of hunger and encourages them to engage in these activities as a way of eradicating poverty and achieving their dreams. Exploitation is committing an act to an individual because their position cannot prevent you from harassing them or cannot allow them to move out to search for alternative means (Fors, 2012). Due to poverty and inability to fend for themselves, factory and mine owners exploited the children and pushed them to work in environments which exposed them to a number of risks. This is however different with people who have improved cognitive abilities and strengths to think beyond the problem and provide solutions to the current problem. Cognitive skills and exercises results into the enhancement of the brain activity and this enhance mental abilities and thus the ability of the same student to perform better. With the changing society and the needs of the world, the educational goals are quickly changing to adopt a method that involves creating a correlation between the content of the lesson with the real world (Al-Gamal, Hamdan-Mansour, Matrouk & Nawaiseh, 2013). A good teaching exercise is based on the development of one-on-one interactive sessions that enables the teachers to understand the abilities of each pupil. Finally, the tone and voice used in delivering information in within a class setup also determines the effectiveness of a teaching process and whether it can be categorized as effective or ineffective. A good teaching process employees an appropriate tone and volume that addresses the specific needs of the pupils while maintaining professionalism at all times. Good teaching cannot be highlighted without mentioning good teacher pupil relationship in the class set up. The moment of interaction between a child and the teacher provides a great opportunity to develop an interactive positive relationship that shall create basis for good teaching and learning environment. The process of building good positive relationship can adopt a number of methods such as the development of good listening skills when talking to the children, maintaining eye contact with them to enhance the process of confidence building and developing a one-on-one interactive sessions with the pupils. All these methods enhance the process of developing a good teacher-student relationship that can enhance a positive learning environment and good teaching. At an early age, children are sensitive to sound and the voice used in delivering different messages to them whether positive or negative. Good teaching that integrates good teacher-student relationship involves the use of soft voices with children, simple languages and good facial expressions. The factors that drive children to engage in employment and salaried activities today are not identical to states or region but are uniform and associated to the deficiencies in their own background. A number of countries especially in the developing world have cut their spending on social facilities such as education and healthcare services. These facilities have a direct bearing on poverty and the wellbeing of citizens as no access to educational facilities pushes children to engage in employment activities. This is essential for their survival and attainment of a specific social status that can be respected and recognised by the society, but at the expense of their education, health and mental development. By reducing the funding on the social facilities which are essential for child growth, development and educational requirement, the government has increased the prevalence of child exploitation in these countries. Though child labour has only been associated with working in the industries and in the miming industries, modern forms of child labour exists, with some perpetuated by family members and parents. In situations where parents have a low income and high poverty index, such families ignore the educational and health needs of their children and force them to engage in different productive activities for the family. In the developing world for example, children are forced to work in the farms and other sectors that the family is engaged in to increase the family’s income. This denies the children the chance to go to school and increase their chances of attaining a better life as compared to that provided by their parents. Such children are also denied the chance to play with their colleagues as most of their time is spent in the fields with the family members as opposed to playing or learning as other children. In times of conflict and arguments during teaching, a good teaching process should not seek the winner in a competitive situation but instead develop a win-win scenario that leaves all pupils feeling great despite their wrong or right answers. The response to students that fails in their attempts in answering questions should also be positive and encouraging in a good teaching environment as it encourages the student to try again next time. Students have personal and private weaknesses and strengths and thus require approaches that are customized to suit their personal abilities. Working as unpaid domestic servants represents the hidden form of 21st century form of child labour as the children are used to elevate the financial status of the family but are not paid for their input. Good teachings should thus provide a critical thinking and reflective environment to enable pupils relate the lesson with their real life experiences as they grow up. Tension and seriousness also characterize class environments making it difficult for pupils to understand the objective of the lesson and thus benefit effectively. Good teachings use the essential and reflective humour and jokes and defuse the tension that may exist in such a class environment. Good teaching does not just end on the way it’s delivered or even the effectiveness of the instruments used to deliver it but the behaviour and etiquette of the teacher. A good teacher should thus endeavour to dress appropriately and in a manner that demonstrate the beliefs of the institution and the administration. Contractors in different parts of the world demand cheap labour which is not readily available from the mainstream workforce among the adults and the experienced workers. This has forced them into engaging young and tender children in exploitative work like breaking ballast and mixing mortar at a lower pay compared to other employees. By opting for the cheap labour provided by the young children, the contractors have continued to perpetuate the vice of child exploitation thus denying them the chance to pursue their educational and life goals. In war torn countries like the central African republic and the democratic republic of Congo, new forms of child labour has developed and this has exposed children to raw forms of violence and gun use. Most of these children are lured into the military with better pay due to their poor economic and educational background and are recruited into the guerrilla army to fight the governments. Not only does this exposes them to violence at a tender age but also increases their chances of being killed before they become adult due to the crude nature of the violence of these countries. Aggression towards the government in these countries is dealt with ruthlessly and this has been associated with deaths of most of the children in these countries. The persecution of a former Congo warlord at the international criminal court in The Hague over the use of child soldiers demonstrates the level of child exploitation in developing countries. Sexual exploitation and prostitution by the minors has also increased significantly as a result of poverty and lack of education in most of these countries. Young boys and girls have been lured into sex cartels to work as commercial sex workers for the bar owners who pocket most of the revenue from the exploitation of the children. While this exposes them to the risk of contracting diseases and the violence of the perpetrators, these people have continued to enjoy the income from such activities. This demonstrates the level of modern day child exploitation as carried out in different parts of the world as a result of poverty and lack of basic social facilities in the country (ILO, 2010). In Europe during the early industrialisation period, a cultural belief adopted towards work increased the use of child labour and exploitation. In Russia for example, it was believed that rationalised labour contributed in the character and skill development of children which would contribute to the growth and development of the economy. As a result of this belief, most governments during this period developed a program that would force children to work on weekends after school without pay in an attempt to improve their skills and shape their character (Nederveen & Lieten, 2011). This was, however, exploited by industry owners who overused the children to increase their production at a lower cost compared to the cost of normal age production. Today, the education of the girl child in some countries has continued to lag behind due to primitive cultural beliefs that favour the boy child (Ray & Chatterjee, 2012). Young girls have therefore been forced to work as house helps or even prostitutes to cater for the education of the boy child. This denies the girls the right to education and normal growth as the boys are allowed to develop and improve their overall status at the expense of the girls (ILO, 2010). Child labour incidents and accidents The occurrence of child labour incidents and accidents across the world demonstrates the massive exploitation that child labour has created from the industrial revolution time to date. In this section, historical evidence of the incidents and accidents that have occurred in factories where children are employed will be used to demonstrate the devastating impacts of child exploitation in form of labour. In most factories across the world, children work in unguarded environment and this increases the risks of accidents due to their lack of experience and knowledge on the operation of the machines. In a parliamentary committee hearing in Manchester in 1819, a doctor and surgeon reported a high number of child accidents reported and attended to in the hospitals. Most of the children were brought to the facility without their arms and hands as they were cut off in the machines. This was due to the poor working condition that these children were exposed to that lacked the basic occupational health measures nor training to enable them understand the operations of the machine (Hindman, 2009). By this early revolution report, the massive exploitation of child labour is brought to the fore and a demonstration of the suffering made. In a report by the house of common is 1832, the devastating impacts of child labour on child development was discussed especially in factories that fenced the work area of the children. In this report, the fact that the young workers are abandoned by the management during accidents demonstrates the level of exploitation that occurred in these factories. Not only did the factory provide a poor environment for the workers to perform their duties but did not also attend to their emergency needs during disasters and accidents. This demonstrated the massive level of exploitation that exited in these industries during the industrial revolution in Britain which is representative of the situation in other parts of the continent (Nepal & Nepal, 2012). In Bangladesh, sweatshops have been created by American multinationals like Nike to produce low cost clothing and wears for their markets in Europe and America. These clothes are sold at a higher price to the American and European consumers who don’t regard the production process and the exploitation in Bangladesh. In 2013, a building in the country that has been used to produce textile for the American companies collapsed and Savar and killed over 386 workers, most of them children below the labour minimum age. Most of the children earn less than $38 dollars a month, a value that is less than the value of one shirt produced for the American market. While the bodies of the underage workers are still being removed from the debris of the wreckage, the American and European markets are profiting from the blood stained clothes (Siddiqi, 2013). Most of these companies have continued to post massive profits and revenues due to the ‘smart’ production approaches which exploit the rights of the Bangladesh child’s right. By using cheap child labour from the less developed countries in Africa and Asia, the multinationals from the United States and Europe have continued to demonstrate the exploitative nature of child labour. The rake in high profits and enjoys the labour of the malnourished and deprived children in the Asian markets without feeling for their plights (Hindman, 2009). This demonstrates the highest level of modern day exploitation perpetuated by multinationals with massive global influence. In Ghana, one of the leading producers of gold in Africa, child accidents within the gold mines have increased despite the approaches that have been adopted to eliminate child labour (Ganesh, 2013). Abroso Donkor, an orphan who had been affected high level of poverty due to the death of his parents to participate in gold mine to support him. This demonstrated the lack of proper government policy to provide educational and training opportunities to youths in the country that lack the ability to afford basic education and fend for them. By participating in gold mining activity, one of the most lucrative minerals in the world, the 15 year old boy participated in an activity that has supported major foreign economies and business empires. This demonstrates the level of exploitation that has been perpetuated by child labour in the developing countries in Africa and in the Asian continent (Siddiqi, 2013). Mitigation of child exploitation and labour Since the inception of the international labour organisation and other child welfare organisations, the exploitative nature of child labour has been described and brought to the public knowledge. Companies that have participated in child labour or have exploited children have been identified in an attempt to shame them and push the fight to end child exploitation ahead (Howard & Rivera, 2010). The international labour organisation with conjunction with different countries has also developed laws and legislations to assist in the fight against child labour and exploitation. In this section, the child labour and anti-exploitation laws developed by the international labour organisation and different countries across the globe will be discussed. This will demonstrate how these laws have been instrumental in the elimination of child labour and exploitation in the developed and developing countries (Ganesh, 2013). According to the child employment laws in the United Kingdom, the youngest age that a child is allowed to engage in productive work is 13 years and the work terms must be part time. This law however exempt children working in television, entertainment and modelling industry who may use their talents for full time engagements and employment (Siddiqi, 2013). However, an individual can only engage in full time employment after attaining minimum school leaving age at which they are allowed to work for a maximum of 40 hours a week. In the United States, the fair labour standards act oversees the employment issues in the country and regulate the minimum working age for children and the minimum wage they can be paid. This has assisted in eliminating child exploitation by industries as has been witnessed in different parts of the world as a result of the lack of laws to govern the use of child labour. The legislation of these laws demonstrates the negative exploitation that children have been exposed over the years when these laws were not in place. However, the input of the international labour organisation and UNICEF has led to the development of laws that have contributed in the elimination of these exploitative practises by factories and industries in the developing and developing economies. References Nederveen, E. & Lieten, K 2011, Child Labours Global Past, 1650-2000, Bern: Peter Lang. Howard, N, & Rivera, I 2010, Child Labour In America, New York: Nova Science Publishers. Fors, H 2012, Child labour: a review of recent theory and evidence with policy implications, Journal of Economic Surveys, 26, 4, pp. 570-593. Honeyman, K 2007, Child Workers in England, 1780-1820: Parish Apprentices and the Making of the Early Industrial Labour Force / Katrina Honeyman, Aldershot, England: Ash gate, c2007. Nepal, A, & Nepal, M 2012, Is child labour a substitute for adult labour? The relationship between child labour and adult illness in Nepal, International Labour Review, 151, 1/2, pp. 109-121. Ray, R, & Chatterjee, B 2012, Trade and Child Labour: A Review of Theoretical Literature, Journal of International Economics (0976-0792), 3, 1, pp. 93-113. Hindman, HD 2002, Child Labour: An American History, Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe. Hindman, HD 2009, The World Of Child Labour: An Historical And Regional Survey, Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe. Ganesh, K 2013, Child Labour: Determinants, Dimensions and Policies in India, Economic Affairs: A Quarterly Journal Of Economics, 58, 4, pp. 417-429. Doran, K.B 2013, How Does Child Labour Affect the Demand for Adult Labour? Journal Of Human Resources, 48, 3, pp. 702-735. ILO, 2010, Accelerating Action Against Child Labour: Global Report Under The Follow-Up To The ILO Declaration On Fundamental Principles And Rights At Work, Geneva: International Labour Office. Doepke, M, & Zilibotti, F 2010, Do international labour standards contribute to the persistence of the child-labour problem? Journal Of Economic Growth, 15, 1, pp. 1-31. Al-Gamal, E, Hamdan-Mansour, A, Matrouk, R, & Nawaiseh, M 2013, The psychosocial impact of child labour in Jordan: A national study, International Journal Of Psychology, 48, 6, pp. 1156-1164. Siddiqi, A.F 2013, Important Determinants of Child Labour: A Case Study for Lahore, American Journal Of Economics & Sociology, 72, 1, pp. 199-221. Read More