Snijders, Anne. Child labour in Booming India.
Diss. University of Amsterdam, 2011.
This
article is about India and the many struggles that it faces. It should be noted
that my research is limited to only chapter three of this document. In this
chapter the author explicitly discusses historical affects, national affects
and causes of child labor. The article begins to first mention that India is a
large country and that population can effect on a countries poverty statistics
and identifies this could be a factor in child labor. The author points out
some historical background, that many countries during the industrial
revolution acquired child laborers. Most of those countries out grew their
child laborers, like France and Germany. Some causes that the article address
for child labor is that of poverty, 37% of the India’s national population is
below the poverty line. Another main cause is the lack of quality education
that is readily available. It is also mentioned that girls are experiencing
continual and more often labor outside of the home. But it is noted that 85% of
child laborers specific jobs go unrecognized because of forced or bonded
issues; including sex trafficking, prostitution, and begging on streets. The
last important thing this article reveals is that from 2000-2005 ten cities
decreased, eight cities increased and two cities child labor rates stayed the
same.
A new
idea that this article brings to the table is that in the matter of population.
No previous source has mentioned or proposed that population could be a
contributing factor to the issue of child labor. With this in mind my question
has changed greatly since the proposal. I still have some uncertainties about the
question, but currently the question will address how government, cultural
beliefs, population & education standards have an effect on prolonging
child labor in India. This current article has made be question population as a
factor because not all large countries have a problem of child labor. This
article is in agreement with the book, The Child and the State in India:
Child Labor and Education Policy in Comparative Perspective, on the stance of the importance of
education. Both sources make excellent remarks and strides in showing how the
improvement of educational systems could help to end the continuous cycle of
child labor in response to poverty.
This source has affected by
thinking primarily by the population being a contributing factor and the
historical background that was provided. The first thing that really stood out
to me was that at some point almost all countries had child laborers. So what caused
India’s child laborers to continue and their conditions to worsen? This
question is what leads me to think that place matters. What I mean by that is
the population and poverty state of a country most certainly affects the usage
of child laborers. I am led to the idea all these factors that I found
throughout other articles and books all contribute to the continuation of child
labor. Others may play bigger parts but they all matter. I am also starting to
consider that an important cause for prolonging child labor might be education.
This idea that education of children could stop the cycle interests me and I
can see paths in which this might be true. I am definitely coming to the
conclusion that education, population, and government are important factors to
look at in relationship to the number of child laborers.
Some of the questions that I am
now asking are primarily about education. If a quality educational system was
put in place in India would children attend? Does educating children improve their social
rank/class? Does this in turn disrupt India’s caste system? If so does that explain
why high class/government leaders aren’t enforcing quality education across the
country? These are just some questions that come to mind about education.
Another question I need to ask is about population. I have not read much about
the effects of populations on societies, especially in India. I will need to
conduct more research on this topic. My next step is to find more articles that
discuss the population of India. I’m anticipating this to be difficult because I
have not seen much mention of population. Also I will continue to look at links
between child labor and education.
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