Presentation given by Dorte Thorsen to a meeting at Chatham House in 2017.

1. IS CHILD LABOUR ALWAYS WRONG?
Dr Dorte Thorsen,
Gender and Qualitative Research Theme Leader
Migrating out of Poverty Research Consortium, University of Sussex
Photo:DorteThorsen
Chatham House Forum, London, 20 July 2017

2. CHILD LABOUR DEBATE
• Emotive & deeply moral
• Children as dependants
• free of responsibilities
• in school
• leisure time spent playing
 European, middleclass childhood
Photo:Ecouterre
Photo: ChangeInSociety
Photo: Make Chocolate Fair UK

3. WHAT IS CHILD LABOUR?
• Paid work that deprives children of:
• their childhood
• their potential
• their dignity
• Work that is harmful to physical and
mental development
 But how can we assess these deprivations?
Photo: Dorte Thorsen
Photo:DorteThorsen

4. FAD FOR STATS

5. CONTRASTING VIEWS
Abolition of child labour
• Universal labour standards banning child labour
with the aim of preventing harm, exploitation and
trafficking
• To increase participation in formal schooling
(EFA/UPE)

6. CONTRASTING VIEWS
• Academic critiques rooted in child-centred research
• Children may need and choose to work because of social
and economic rewards
• Labour standards to protect working children, not
criminalise them
➢ Uncertain link between work and trafficking
➢ Challenging universalism - need to know more about the
context of children’s lives
Photo:DorteThorsen

7. RENEWED FOCUS ON CHILD LABOUR
• UK government focus on combatting
modern slavery, trafficking and child
labour
• Inclusion of minimum age standards
for work (ILO Convention No. 138) in
the UN Convention of the Rights of the
Child

8. TROUBLES WITH THE ‘CHILD LABOUR’ LABEL
• Assumption that keeping children out of
work up to a certain age will keep them
safe and in school
• Minimum standards incorporated in
legislation
➢ Younger children barred from formal
employment and pushed into invisible and
harmful work
➢ Older children may be exposed to
exploitation and harm as legislation is tied to
age not the work conditions
Photo: Jaaay Nguyen, Emaze

9. WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOUR
• Instruments like the ILO Convention No. 182
designed to address exploitation and harm
are useful
• But only if we understand the nature of the
work children are doing
➢ Age-appropriate work
➢ How labels are used locally
Photo:DorteThorsen
Photo:DorteThorsen

10. CHILD LABOUR & CHILDREN’S POTENTIAL
• Causal link in child labour definition between paid
work and deprivation of potential
• Ignores that
• Adolescents work to finance their own schooling or
vocational training
• Adolescents learn through work – specific
occupations and navigating the (informal) labour
market
Photo: Dorte Thorsen

11. EFFECTIVE POLICIES
• Preventing the exploitation of working children best
done through
➢ Enforcing children’s rights as workers
➢ Enforcing protection through the ILO Convention No.
182 but based on detailed knowledge about working
conditions
• Enable education through
➢ Increasing quality of education
➢ Reducing formal and informal costs of schooling
Photo:DorteThorsen

12. For further information
Dorte Thorsen, Email: d.Thorsen@sussex.ac.uk
Co-author of Child Migrants in Africa, Zed Books, 2011
Author of:
Weaving in and out of employment and self-employment: young rural
migrants in the informal economy of Ouagadougou. International
Development Planning Review, 2013.
Jeans, bicycles and mobile phones. Adolescent migrants' material
consumption in Burkina Faso. In: Child and youth migration. Mobility-in-
migration in an era of globalization Palgrave MacMillan, 2014.