Urban livelihoods from children's perspectives: protecting and promoting assets on the streets of Dhaka

Abstract

This paper investigates what children in street situations in Dhaka value as important, and how they protect and promote their livelihoods when living on the street. It argues that, despite the common belief held by many people in mainstream society, in the realm of policy and in NGOs, these children are not destitute. They have dynamic portfolios of assets and show complex coping strategies generally managed in a group. When considering policy implications, this paper argues that to be effective, sustainable and respectful, intervention has to abandon the focus on children's deprivations often fostered by a strict interpretation of children's rights. On the contrary, a more systematic investigation of children's initiatives to improve their lives when on the street should guide interventions on how to help them strengthen their assets, rather than to create substitutes for them. "People think we don't have anything because we live on the street. They don't see the many things we can have even if living here … You can say I am poor but I'm not a 'kangali'. (1) NGOs give us what they want without asking us what is important for us. But we could not live without certain things we value important and we do what we can to get them." (Fumala, 17-year-old girl) Dr Alessandro Conticini holds an honours degree in International Political Economics from the University of Bologna and a doctoral degree from the Institute for Development Policy and Management (IDPM) at the University of Manchester, where he is also an affiliated researcher with the Chronic Poverty Research Centre. He has been the recipient of ESRC doctoral and post-doctoral fellowships, and was granted a research fellowship from the Swiss Confederation at the University of Fribourg. In 2003-2004, he was awarded the Rotary Prize of Ambassador of Peace and Goodwill. His main academic and professional interest is child protection in developing countries.

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“…Begreper som mestringsstrategier og overlevelsestaktikker ble hyppig brukt, og forskere dokumenterte barns mangfoldige måter å takle marginalisering og ekskludering. Conticini (2005) beskrev at gatebarn i Bangladesh har «dynamic portfolios of assets and show complex coping strategies» (s. 69) og «versatile and resilient behaviours in their efforts to secure autonomy and rights for themselves» (s. 70). I mange tilfeller skiftet fokuset fra hvilke utfordringer barn møtte på gata til hvordan de løste disse utfordringene.…”

“…Utover 1990-tallet ble relasjoner i gatemiljøet i langt større grad beskrevet med positive fortegn, anerkjent som: «supportive networks, coping strategies and meaningful relationships outside adult supervision and control» (Ennew, 1994i Beazley, 2003. Conticini (2005)…”

Reconceptualising temporality in young lives: exploring young people's current and future livelihoods in AIDS‐affected southern Africa

“…However, beyond ‘child labour’ concerns (Bourdillon ), children's contributions to livelihoods, and the value their work produces, remain largely unrecognised (Abebe ). Street children have been shown to accrue dynamic portfolios of assets and employ complex livelihood strategies (Conticini ), but children living in other contexts also struggle to support household livelihoods (Abebe and Kjorholt ). Livelihoods are relational, thus options and expectations are circumscribed by both family pressures and changing structural conditions (Katz ).…”

Contested experiences and potential justice at the limit of the law for poor urban children in Bangladesh

“…In Dhaka the boundary between 'illicit' labour and crime is often blurred, so that poor children join gangs to feel empowered and believe themselves to be engaged in a sort of business, with 'crime described as a normal and intrinsic part of Bangladeshi society' (Atkinson-Sheppard 2016, 239). In the slums, petty crime is often tolerated by the authorities, while seemingly unfair police action becomes tolerated as part of children's learning to stay away from crime (Conticini 2005).…”