Bulletin IINfancia N°9 - June 2020

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Luis Almagro OAS Secretary General Néstor Méndez OAS Assistant Secretary General Berenice Cordero IIN Directing Council President Lolis Salas Montes IIN Directing Council Vice President Víctor Giorgi IIN Director General Daniel Claverie IIN Contents de Coordinator Ingrid Quevedo IIN Technical Assistant of Communication Sara Cardoso Nicole Malacria IIN Design

Edition June 2020

The IIN is as Specialized Organization of the Organization of American States (OAS) in childhood and adolescence, which assists the States in the development of public policies to be taken for the benefit of children and adolescents, contributing in the field of their design and implementation in the perspective of the promotion, protection and full respect of the rights of children and adolescents in the region. Special assistance is aimed at the needs of The Member States of the Inter-American System and at particularities of the regional groups.

The concepts expressed in this publication are the responsability of each author.

The IIN is pleased to enable this space for exchange and reflection with the region.

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INDEX Prologue.........................................................................................................................9 Play: A cultural expression Fernando Thiel.............................................................................................................12 Early childhood and migration. Making the invisible visible Adrián Rozengardt......................................................................................................23 Childhood, cultural and linguistic identity in the Plurinational State of Bolivia Ninoska Durán..............................................................................................................41 Commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC)- an extreme breach of rights Denisse Araya...............................................................................................................51 Public spending on migrant and returned children and adolescents in the northen triangle of Central America Enrique Maldonado....................................................................................................63 Child and adolescent abuse and institutionalization in Colombia from the perspective of the psychopathology of development, neuroscience and complex trauma Juan Carlos Caicedo Mera, Pablo Muñoz Specht y Juan Camilo Sabogal.........................................................................................................................75 How are children and adolescents expriencing the pandemic caused by COVID-19, in conditions of socio-economic inequality?

Laura Rivera Alfaro y Natalia Castro Salgado.........................................................91 The gender perspective in communications on childhood and health in times of pandemic Carlos Guida................................................................................................................101 Childhood, adolescence and sustainable development: Targets.

Will we achieve them by 2030?

María Fontemachi.......................................................................................................111

To return to the index, click on this image at the beginning of each article.

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Prologue Víctor Giorgi

Director General - IIN

Since we launched this second stage of the IINfancia Newsletter, when each new issue is published, we reaffirm our policy of collecting contributions on the different topics that make up the “childhood agenda” in the region. We have contextualized these issues, which contain strong structural determining factors and, therefore, a degree of permanence over time, in the unique circumstances of each situation and every moment: significant dates, specific times the region is going through, opportunities for reflection and taking stock in the process of implementing policies to promote and protect rights that encompass the entire population.

This ninth delivery can be no exception. Its publication coincides with the IIN’s 93rd anniversary, which on this occasion is celebrated in the context of a severe global crisis that threatens the health and lives of all peoples, as well as the functioning of economies, but which in the Americas, in addition to these medical and health issues, it lays bare the deep inequity gaps that affect the continent. These levels of vulnerability 9

are nothing more than the accumulation, generation after generation, of multiple rights breaches that have led to the Americas being recognized as the most inequitable region of the planet.

As a worldwide critical situation, the COVID-19 pandemic brings us face-to-face with daunting questions about the future, uncertainty invades us and, as a result, we fall into the temptation of filling the void with our fantasies and beliefs. We foresee an apocalyptic situation in which our most dreaded scenarios come to pass. This leads to impotence, to paralysis and a sort of realistic reduction of our goals and standards regarding the care of children. Another possibility is to imagine the post-pandemic time as a “new normal” characterized by a widespread attitude of renewed appreciation of life, openness to encounters with “the other” and the minimization of conflict.

The challenge is to differentiate between forecasts based on desires or on fears, in order to think things through on the basis of what is possible, perhaps likely to happen. This will enable us to position ourselves to act now with a view to a hypothetical future, but with certain levels of accuracy. This future will also depend, to some extent, on what we do in the present.

There is no indication to make us think that once the pandemic has passed, the major issues on the agenda of children will be displaced from their priority position. On the contrary, everything seems to indicate that poverty and exclusion, which are already structural in our region, will intensify and with them, the violations of the rights of children and adolescents.

The experience will provide lessons, but will also generate increasing challenges in attempting to strengthen the place of the best interests of the child as an ethical and political horizon when making decisions, allocating resources and coordinating efforts at the level of both governments and multilateral agencies.

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This issue of the newsletter, like the ones before it, includes a series of articles by authors of different nationalities, theoretical leanings and institutional affiliations, which explore a range of topics related to the tension between vulnerabilities, inequities and promoting rights that pervades the American region. The reader will come across topics such as children in human mobility, the violence typical of institutionalization, the most abhorrent forms of exploitation, the challenge of defending public spending on children in a context of shrinking economies, ethnic identities, the presence of the gender dimension in discourse, the “social representation of childhoods�. These issues will continue to be present in the new post-pandemic reality and we should continue to think about them, producing and working, if we want to avoid falling into the primitivization of policies and an immediatism which will prevent us from seeing beyond the crisis.

The crisis reactivates the risk of backsliding from discourse on rights to discourse on basic needs. This forces us to shed light on the situation of children and adolescents beyond medical and health aspects and place on the political agenda the promotion and protection of their rights.

Given the seriousness of the situation and the uncertainty that invades us, it is necessary to reaffirm our principles and reference points: the best interests of the child; the joint responsibility of family, community, and State; nondiscrimination; participation.

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Play: A cultural expression Fernando T hiel

PLAY THE VOICE OF CULTURES It is impossible to talk about play without talking about culture; play is the language that children use to express themselves and through it they communicate their values, dreams, fantasies, fears and desires. When we talk about language and play, we cannot fail to mention Jacques Lacan, who tells us in this regard that play is a recreational activity that arises from language, or that play is structured like a language: the imaginary, the symbolic and the real (2017). In fact, play can help build the imaginary and the symbolic to fill a lack, a separation from the mother (her absence and presence), to help cope with anxiety and anguish and what this entails; it is necessary to develop as oneself, “I am me and not you”.

The function of play is to symbolize a separation from the absolute control of parents, this is the reason why, at older ages, some children abandon play when parents or teachers are watching, or tell them how they should be doing it. Play is essential to contact with others and with the outside world and to be introduced into a culture with its sets of laws, rules, regulations, rituals and traditions that structure the symbolic in the individual and social. “In our attitude towards play, just as we give in to our egotism, we can also show ourselves 12

to be very ethnocentric. We have all learned to play in our communities. The way we play, our new ideas and the objects we play with reflect the economic and social conditions of our own cultures, as well as their values and attitudes.� (Chanan and Francis, 1984).

Play reflects a specific type of culture and how some of these economically powerful cultures, believing themselves to be superior, detract from others, imposing their own games and form of playing. Culture is dynamic, flexible and grows or is modified according to the acts and expressions of its members. “Culture means the sum of the productions and institutions that serve two purposes: Protect man against Nature and regulate the relations of men among themselves� (Freud, 2007).

It is necessary to regulate and safeguard children and adolescents from compulsive, violent and addictive play that is contrary to the culture of each people. We cannot say that one game is better than another, but when play merges with consumer manipulation or market strategies, coupled with new technologies, they can damage the deep cultural values of peoples in development. Amongst our peoples in Latin America, where social and economic differences are increasingly marked, it is also possible to observe this class division in play. There are children and adolescents who own computers, tablets, modern mobile phones, plastic dolls with all kinds of accessories, while most of the population lacks the economic means to acquire or achieve them, which from an early age generates frustration, resentment, strife and inequalities. For adolescents, not keeping pace with technological advances causes dissatisfaction and uncertainty in the social context in which they develop, which hinders their integration in different social strata. Children who play with marbles, yo-yos, rag dolls or simple prepaid phones are belittled or discriminated against. We cannot make a value judgement to determine who has more fun with the elements they use, but we do see that the advertising media tends to overrate the fun, pleasure and happiness derived from electronic games.

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GENERATIONAL DIFFERENCES We commonly hear adults say: “The children of today don’t play, they don’t know how to play, they no longer run about, they spend all day playing video games with computers or mobile phones.” These are the stereotyped expressions of adults who do not accept cultural changes and who not take the time to analyse what is happening in today’s society. The way adults belittle children and adolescents is an unconscious defence mechanism used to hide the anguish and the pain they feel from failing to understand the dynamics of the new technologies. To this is added the multiple names that are currently assigned to the various generational divisions: Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y, Millennials and many more. This makes the division even deeper and more painful for adults, who feel ignorant and obsolete and that their knowledge is “old-fashioned”. While those who know how to use today’s technology believe that they own the “intelligence and the knowledge” and ignore the creators of the past and its history, without recognizing that it is thanks to them that they have access to the technological advances and knowledge of the present. This generational struggle also occurs between current electronic games and the traditional games of the past, in the debate regarding which game is the best to develop children’s intelligence and their senses. “Play allows the expression of fantasies, anxieties and desires, as there is a fantasy masturbatory discharge operating in the manner of a continuing drive to play” (Klein, 2011).

All play is important, so long as it promotes development, health and the free expression of children and adolescents, without them being manipulated by economic, religious, moral or ideal interests, contrary to the culture specific to each people.

If all play is important, why do children today tend to abandon traditional games like marbles, tops, hide-and-seek, tag and others? Is it because electronic games, the Internet and television have won the battle over the games of the past?

The fact is that, as psychiatrist Luis Diego Herrera Amiguetti 14

states, video games are composed of units of very fast action sequences that do not demand focusing the mind on any single thing for long periods of concentration. More importantly, video games are designed for instant gratification, the reward arrives through visual and auditory means (strident electronic sounds), which are attractive to children; hardly any traditional game, homework, or teacher can be more entertaining. Video games are individual games where a player competes against a computer, which does not allow dialogue with others, it absorbs all the player’s attention. If dialogue occurs, it is short, fast, and rhetorical to avoid wasting time and thus winning the game. Electronic games are not social, there is no direct physical and emotional contact with others. Playing traditional games requires psychic abilities, physical abilities, skills, and muscle tone, balance and affective and emotional relationships.

Through them, players learn to resolve conflicts and build strong cultural values. Often these games are accompanied by traditional songs and word games that preserve traditions and develop the particular native language of each culture. “It is possible that traditional games, arts, dances and festivals may preserve what is taking place in a culture much better than toys, especially now that toys are mass produced and travel rapidly throughout the world� (Chanan and Francis, 1984).

If children and adolescents are shown how and encouraged to play with toys and games other than video games, they might change the way they play and what they like to play. Regarding video games, psychiatrist Luis Diego Herrera Amiguetti points out that these games are designed to be addictive, deliberately and by design. Every addiction has a common denominator, the reward is obtained immediately: as occurs with cocaine, alcohol, marijuana, nicotine and other addictions such as compulsive shopping. Video game designers use this principle and others to engage users compulsively. When a child spends many hours playing video games, his or her brain becomes accustomed to a high degree of stimulation and then any other task that lacks a high level of novelty and stimulation seems deadly dull. Thus, a simple wooden spinning top cannot compete with flashing lights, bursts of stimuli and sounds.

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Powerful cultures use the strength of trade, technology, advertising, the media, films, television and more to sell flashy, electronic plastic games with lots of bells and whistles and very expensive compared to the traditional simple and lowcost games that are not very profitable. Often, children are heard to say that they “don’t know what to play with”. This is because of the market strategy that fosters the feeling that if children do not have this or that toy, they cannot play. Thus, all of their creative and imaginative potential that might enable them to play with any object around them is paralysed. Lowincome parents are distressed at not being able to please their children by buying them the toys they ask for. On the other hand, parents who have the financial resources to do so, give their children everything they want, showering them with toys which are tossed out after a few days because they become bored with them. When it seems that children do not feel like playing, parents continue to buy them new toys compulsively, in order to see them happy and active again. However, the important thing for children and teenagers to keep playing is not to shower them with objects or toys (chosen, moreover, by an adult), but to allow them their space so that the “desire” to play can emerge, since it is this “desire” that allows access to play. When parents say, “I buy my children the toy they want so badly, but they play with it for a few minutes and then give up on it”, what happens is that desire has been fulfilled.

But when children have nothing to play with, the desire is born to find something to play with. So, they build, disassemble, experience, imagine, challenge, create and play; thus, their desire is fulfilled when they get tired of playing, because they built the action for themselves.

It should be noted that the powerful countries use all of their commercial artillery to constantly bombard consumers in order to generate and encourage the compulsive desire to buy the latest game being launched on the market, which often has harmful effects on children’s health. Video games can cause symptoms of depression in teenagers, since they detach them from reality and most importantly at this period: from nonvirtual socialization, exploration, initiative and the formation 16

Fernando T hiel Furlano Argentinan 1964, settled in Costa Rica since 1985.

Licentiate in Clinical Psychology, Psychodramatist with an emphasis on Psychoanalysis, Children and Adolescents. Asperger syndrome and Autism since 2012. Drama instructor, actor, playwright and TV producer.

Works as a teacher since 1996, and as an independent actor in theatre and puppet shows for children for more than 40 years. Speaker at national and international conferences on psychodrama and topics related to play and creativity.

Publications: Author of: “Manual de Ludotecas”, published by the Technological Institute of Costa Rica. November 2003. Co-author of the book: “Acción docente contra el trabajo infantil”, sponsored by the SEC of Costa Rica, the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, the International Labour Organization, ILO Costa Rica, the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, March 2004. Author of: “Conversando con mis amigos construyo un mundo mejor”, sponsored by the Ombudsman’s Office and the Swiss Embassy in Costa Rica, January 2007. psicofthiel@gmail.com /grupoticotiteres@gmail.com(00506)89803536 www.grupoticotiterescr.com San José- Costa Rica

of an identity, fundamental actions for development at this stage. “...unfortunately, the desire for bodily possession is transferred to a possessive desire for objects” (Lapirre and Acouturier, 1980).

Being consumed by these games prevents the development of healthy social exchange, which generates fantasies and extensive changes in values. For example, in military-style war games, the “heroes” (who are also killers) kill the “bad guys” with powerful guns, all to create a future arms market where the only way to defend oneself in some cultures is owning one.

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“Reality cannot beat fantasy in a world where illusions are more important than norms and values, and where coexistence is often governed more by the compulsion of a manipulated fashion than by the rationality of intellect and culture” (González and Itzcovich, 1996).

NO TIME TO PLAY Article 31 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) of 1989 recognizes the right of children to rest, to leisure, to play, to recreation activities and to full and free participation in cultural life and the arts.

Despite this, in recent years, recreation time in elementary and secondary schools has been cut back, because it is considered an unnecessary activity. Children and teenagers, therefore, have very little time to socialize and play. To justify this reduction in recess time and play for teenagers, adults use phrases such as: “They are no longer children who need to be playing all the time” and, “Stop wasting time and get your books out”. What a serious mistake to say that teenagers should not play!

“Children also like to play with words; they talk to themselves; they tell jokes to one another; they play rhyming words and invent codes. So do both adolescents and adults at school, at work and during their leisure time, they may even pay others for this kind of entertainment. Playing is human” (Chanan and Francis, 1984). Adolescents attach great importance to language; they use puns, jokes, they play with their bodies, adopting funny poses to make their friends laugh and thus hide their corporal awkwardness, which is due to the physical changes that occur during puberty. They engage in shoving matches and ostentatious falls, exaggerated screams to scare and cause laughter, etc. These behaviours are poorly understood and strongly censured by adults, generating the rejection of teenagers to everything that comes from them, who consider leisure time and play to be useless and unproductive.

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In addition to taking away their recreation time, class hours are added, as well as subjects such as computer studies, robotics and foreign languages. At the same time, subjects that are considered “less important� are eliminated: social subjects, the arts and/or crafts workshops, because they lose value by being less competitive in this market society. This neglects creativity, art, practical activities, life skills and play as a different and less expensive way to teach. Another key element that has taken play time away from this population is the large number of extracurricular activities added, such as art workshops, sports, gymnastics, languages. Children are often not consulted about whether they want to take part in these activities and they can become annoying to them, as they are led and regulated by adults and are not free play.

They may even represent a burden added to their daily tasks, resulting in fatigue; it seems that children and adolescents must have a busy schedule at the same rate as adults and, even worse, without even being consulted about it. It is therefore necessary to bear in mind the UN’s Convention on the Rights of the Child of 1989; specifically, Article 12, which refers to the right to speak and be heard.

Central American countries have agreed to have two hundred school days a year with the aim of improving education, and holidays have been reduced to only one month and a half for rest and play, a measure applauded by parents because children and adolescents are at home less, schools watch them while parents work. The longer parents work and the more stress they undergo, the fewer hours of play do their children enjoy.

PHYSICAL SPACE FOR PLAY Similarly, the space devoted to school playgrounds and public areas in the city has been reduced, leaving less room for free play. There are many schools with restricted space, which, in addition, have not been co-designed by the direct users (children and adolescents), and school buildings with deteriorated classrooms and corridors, among other physical 19

deficiencies. There is also a lack of inclusiveness, which detracts from the concept of free play for everyone. We must take responsibility for the free play of children and adolescents in the city. We are aware that we are permanently exposed to danger, but if there are more people in the streets, the risk of a mishap occurring is lower; cities are safer when we all use them.

Teenagers cannot meet on pavements and/or parks to laugh, play some improvised game, shout or speak very loudly; in fact, to share and socialize with their group, without some local resident chiding them or being upset about it. We should understand that a teenager’s group of friends is critical to cement his or her security and individual development.

Conscious or unconsciously, parents use resources to distract and soothe all the sexual potential which emerges in adolescence and use video games and study to keep them away from meeting their peers. This social distancing through various media makes young people insensitive and promotes violence of all kinds, physical, sexual and emotional. Parents prefer to keep their children at home, under their control.

To remedy this lack of space for play, private commercial sites have now emerged, where parents pay for their children to play with “pre-established games�, denying them the possibility of creating or inventing new ways to play. Usually, these places are sponsored by private companies, who claim that the games are educational, but what they do is give play a business sense in order to shape future consumers. Children play at buying and selling, but ultimately, they are playing at being adults. These are activities that grown-ups engage in, but do not correspond to the ages and interests of children, pushing them forward and introducing them prematurely into the world of labour and consumption. When games are manipulated with the intention of intensifying consumption, superficial games are created that do not develop creativity, imagination, and critical thinking; the mental and physical development of children and adolescents. As we explained above, children and adolescents need some separation from 20

their parents to become independent and autonomous. In short, in developing countries, we need to rescue our own cultural identities and we must carry out a thorough analysis and an appropriation of our own games and ways of playing.

In short, in developing countries, we need to rescue our own cultural identities and we must carry out a thorough analysis and an appropriation of our own games and ways of playing.

We cannot ignore the historical moment which we are experiencing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, this article does not attempt to make guesses or false predictions of what might happen in the future with the games developed by children and teenagers. As Fritz Perls and Baumgardner rightly say in their work on Gestalt theory: “Creating an imaginary reality with a future that we still have not experienced generates estrangement with reality causing serious neurosis.

It is not possible to experience what has yet to be lived, we must live the here and now� (2006).

Because of this, at the moment we must prepare for providing children with more space for free play in the future, more places in which to share and socialize after the pandemic. To meet again in our communities, to assist and support children and adolescents when they return to play, without severe restrictions and strict sanitary impositions, playing in parks, public spaces, schools and pavements without fear, meeting in solidarity once again in fraternal community, without forgetting that socializing is a human need.

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Bibliography Chanan, G. y Hazel, F. (1984). “Juegos y juguetes de los niños del mundo.” Barcelona: Serbal/UNESCO. Freud. S. (2007). “El Malestar En La Cultura.” Comandante Spurt, provincia de Buenos Aires: Editorial El Ateneo.

González, E., Itzcovich, S. y Domínguez, M. (1996). “El Niño y La Imagen, video cine televisión.” La Habana: Pablo de la Torriente, Editorial.

Klein, M. (2011). “El Psicoanálisis de niños” Buenos Aires: PAIDOS Krauskopf, D. (1994). “Adolescencia y Educación” Costa Rica: EDITORIAL UNIVERCIDAD ESTATAL A DISTANCIA. Lacan, J. (1977). “Radiofonía y Televisión”. Barcelona: Anagrama.

Lacan, J. (2017). “El Psicuanálisis y su Aporte a la Cultura Actual” D.F. Fondo de cultura económica.

Lapierre, A. y Aucouturier, B. (1980). “El Cuerpo y El Inconsciente, en Educación y Terapia.” Barcelona: editorial científica médica.

Perls, F. S. y Baumgardner, P. (2006). Terapia Gestalt: teoría y práctica.

México, D.F.: Pax México.

Piaget, J. (2018). “La Formación Del Símbolo En El Niño, Imitación, Juego y Sueño. Imagen y Representación“. D. F.: Fondo de cultura económica.

Sábato, E. (2000). “La resistencia” Buenos Aires: SEIX BARRAL

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Early childhood and migration: Making the invisible visible1 Adrián Rozengardt INTRODUCTION: IMAGES OF THE SHIPWRECK Two images encapsulate a metaphor of horror in the twentieth century: the first is the sum of the contours of the concentration camps established by the Nazis in Europe during World War II: a synthesis of the Holocaust. The second is the atomic mushroom, the incandescent column of smoke rising into the sky over Hiroshima: the mushroom of fire. Science and culture at the service of power and its delusions; the representation of having become the only species capable of becoming extinct by choice.

At the start of the 21st century, two other images can also serve as a representation of the current contempt of a powerful and increasingly rich world towards a weaker, more vulnerable and violated one. The first is the depiction of Aylan Kurdi, the three-year-old Syrian boy found drowned on the shores of the Mediterranean, while trying, with some of his family, to escape the war that is raining bombs on homes, fields, schools and hospitals in their native Syria. The other portrays Valeria Martínez Ramírez, the tiny Salvadoran girl who, before 1 This paper includes content from the research study on: “Migration and early childhood in Latin America and the Caribbean: crossroads between a new regional scenario, legislation and state intervention”, prepared within the framework of the agreement between the Horizonte Ciudadano Foundation and the Inter-American Children’s Institute. December 2019.

The research team included the author of this paper, Adrian Rozengardt, and Esteban de la Torre, Julia Fonseca and Katherine Llanos, led by Victor Giorgi. http://novedades.iinadmin. com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Migrations-and-early-childhood-in-Latin-America-andthe-Caribbean.pdf

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her second birthday, and after travelling three thousand two hundred kilometres with her father to escape the poverty of their native land, drowned in the waters of the Rio Grande, without ever knowing what her future could have been.

Both portraits reveal, more than ever, the special relationship established between the youngest children and the growing global phenomenon of international migration. Early childhood and migration represent a network that it is complex to address: it is a social field involving a variety of actors, tensions and representations, with heterogeneous intervention formats, strong public and private institutional fragmentation, low budgets and high levels of inequality reproduction. All of which contributes to making the recognition of the rights of young migrant children and their families problematic; and it is mainly women who bear the burden of the cultural mandate to care for the new generations.

In his work, “Global Inequality” (2017), Milanovic draws attention to the existence of walls, fences and minefields, where the rich world and the poor world are in close physical proximity. No borders, but more visible barriers: “...where we see neighbouring countries (either by land or water) with large income differences, there shall we find the places with the greatest barriers to migration” (p. 169).

As adult society, over the centuries, has established institutions for the protection of the new generations, today the international community and national governments discuss and silence, alternatively, the issue of how to consider and find answers to the challenge of the presence of young children in migration.

MIGRATIONS Human displacements from territory to territory have always existed, but human mobility patterns have been modified in contemporary migration, based on the acceleration of globalization, differentiation, feminization and increasing polarization. International migration is a global phenomenon 24

with significant effects on people and territories. As Sassen (2010) has pointed out, “the new phase of advanced capitalism is characterized by a marked increase in the number of people who have been expelled�.

Human mobility is a wide-ranging and highly complex phenomenon that affects most countries in the world. The OIM2 indicates that there are currently more than 258 million international migrants; one in every 30 persons is a migrant3.

The countries in this region are not free from this reality, and take on various roles as originating or return countries, transit or destination countries.

People migrate as a result of specific historical and family backgrounds and contexts (economic, cultural, related to violence and xenophobia, political, institutional, etc.), which usually come together to spark the hope of building a better life than they have known in their territories of origin. Latin America was formed on the basis of a set of demographic rearrangements that helped to consolidate the diverse cultural fabric that characterizes our continent Class inequalities, as an expression of dominant social relations, traversed by the material conditions of individuals and family groups, access, or lack of it, to goods and services, group or ethnicity identities, mark the whole migratory process. Age is also a central feature in determining how this experience is faced during childhood, and with what consequences.

Internationally, a continuum is recognized in the inequality affecting migrants in their countries of origin, during transit (internal or intra-regional), and in the societies in which migrants attempt to insert themselves.

The social position of migrants tends to reproduce and multiply on the basis of converging inequalities: gender, age, ethnicity, religion.

2 International Organization for Migration (IOM).

3 https://www.iom.int/migrantsday2017

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MIGRATION AND EARLY CHILDHOOD IN LATIN AMERICA In recent decades, there have been changes in the direction, intensity and composition of migration flows; currently, 70% of these flows in South America are intra-regional4 (OIM, 2018), when in the 70s, the percentage was exactly the opposite5.

The peripheral areas that feature in Latin America are poor and underdeveloped, and mark the history of this region. The inequality that characterizes Latin American societies exposes families to countless challenges as regards access to quality goods and services, to ensure material and symbolic resources on the basis of which to generate well-being. International migration is one of the strategies deployed by families to build protection bonds, which include the rights of girls and boys who depend on them (SIPI6).

WOMEN, CHILDREN AND FAMILIES IN THE CONTEXT OF HUMAN MOBILITY If addressing migration in general is complicated by an interwoven diversity that manifests as a social and public issue, the outlook is further complicated when we identify the feminization of human mobility: thousands of women alone with young children. Several different threads intersect and tense, forming knots that are difficult to unravel.

Feminization and the involvement of a diversity of family groups in migratory processes generate social, cultural, political and economic impacts, both in the country of destination and the country of origin; and, increasingly, in transit countries.

Women and families play a key role in migration dynamics and in the deployment of strategies to maintain transnational ties 4 International migration involving Latin American populations adopts two basic patterns: a) intra-regional, and b) extra-regional. The first are the displacements that occur between countries in the region, and the second, between countries of the region and others outside the region.

5 This has increased with the migration of the people of Venezuela to various countries in the region.

6 Information System on Early Childhood. SIPI/SITEAL/UNESCO. Cuaderno 10. Una mirada hacia la primera infancia en contextos de migración internacional. Vanesa D’Alessandre, Camille Roger, Ximena Hernández, Yamila Sánchez.

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Adrián Rozengardt Master’s degree in social policy management and planning (FLACSO. Argentina). Doctoral candidate in Social Science (FLACSO. Argentina). Specialist in “Public Policies for Equality”. CLACSO/FLACSO Brazil (2016/2017).

Academic researcher specializing in public policies for early childhood. Coordinator of the Project on “Early childhood and sustainable development: towards a comprehensive early childhood policy” (SDG Fund) of the United Nations. Consultant for UNICEF Lacro and Argentina, IDB, IIN/OAS, Horizonte Ciudadano Foundation, UNESCO, OMEP, and national, provincial and municipal agencies.

He acted as parliamentary advisor, National Director of Early Childhood/SENAF/MDS Argentina, Coordinator of the National Plan of Action for the Rights of Children and Adolescents 2008-2011, Deputy General Director for Children, Adolescents and Family of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, Chief of Staff of the Deputy Minister for Human Development of the province of Buenos Aires.

Member of Convergence for Action: Network of Leaders for Early Childhood in Latin America. Horizonte Ciudadano Foundation, Santiago de Chile; and the Academic Committee of the Hemispheric Network of Parliamentarians and Former Parliamentarians for Early Childhood, A.C. Coordinator of the Academic Committee of Argentina.

and/or efforts to achieve the partial or full reunification of the original group.

Unlike what occurred in past decades, there are currently thousands of women who are on the move, with various aims: to seek work, to support themselves and their families, to finish their studies, to escape gender-based violence, etc.

Women face a variety of risks and their needs for protection are different to those of men. They go to different places and their integration into the labour market continues to build on patriarchal conceptions that relegate them to activities determined by their status as females: to domestic service, caring for their dependents, cleaning and cooking, etc. The 27

increased demand for migrant women in service and care sectors is one of the factors that has led to the phenomenon of the feminization of migration. It is thus that women (married, single, with or without children) must not only take on care duties in destination countries, but also become responsible for the economic upkeep of their own homes and the home left behind in their country of origin (ECLAC, 2019).

YOUNG CHILDREN ARE NOT ALONE The family is not isolated, it is part of the various networks of social institutions and practices influenced by the State and by law, religious beliefs and practices, economic behaviour, and also by the practices associated with migratory movements, among other processes. Young children are affected by the decisions made by adults. Referring to families in the timespace of migration means verbalizing absence, lack, and the transgression of the rules on which it is based; migration is by definition a fracture, distancing; and, at the same time, an ongoing tension caused by the continuity of links with children, parents, spouses, communities, cultures of origin (Nardone and Giannotti, 2003, p.51).

All family variants, whether or not they are identifiable, will be affected in any of the many formats of migration. The links between the women who remain in their homeland (while men migrate in search of opportunities) and their young children will change, since they must assume new roles in the family organization; if it is the women who migrate, mothers of young children, their children remain in the care of grandmothers or close relatives, or will move with them. In all cases, new ways of bonding will arise and, according to Minuchin (2001) feelings of identity, separation, individuation and belonging will develop at the same time. The experience of both greater well-being and greater suffering will mark forever the future of these children.

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In their early years, migrant children7, will face a “doubly” vulnerable situation: the combination of age and immigration status. This requires the specific and adequate protection of their rights by the States (of origin, transit and destination) and other actors. In this regard, the inclusion of social protection agencies in migration policies is fundamental.

DETERMINING FACTORS OF HUMAN MOBILITY IN EARLY CHILDHOOD International migration and its relationship with early childhood has become an unresolved source of tension, a critical issue for international agencies, the regional human rights system, the laws of each of the LAC countries and national and regional public policy. Those working in this social field are facing a tangled web of actors, processes and consequences which is difficult to categorize and sort out in order to be able to intervene appropriately, in a timely manner, effectively and efficiently.

Like a Rubik’s Cube, the way to approach the resolution of the challenges displayed by this universe does not respond to pre-existing formulas. Rather, it implies the need to identify the many facets that make up this puzzle, to approach it from different angles, since complexity is high and solutions must attempt to resolve the realization of the right of children to a full and happy life.

DETERMINING FACTORS In this respect, we identify the main determining factors8 for early childhood migration.9 1. Migration in early childhood is a multi-causal, 7 According to UNICEF (2017), nearly 50 million children and adolescents in the world are migrants or refugees, of whom 28 million have been driven from their homes by war and armed conflict and another 8 million seek a better and safer life.

8 A set of conditions and processes that make it possible to identify a specific and differentiated phenomenon both in migration as a whole and in the field of childhood and adolescence in particular.

9 An in-depth approach to these determining factors may be found in the paper mentioned above, “Migration and early childhood in Latin America and the Caribbean: crossroads between a new regional scenario, legislation and State intervention” (p.38).

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multidimensional phenomenon.

2. In the vast majority of cases, young children are not alone.

3. Migrant children face a multitude of rights violations simultaneously.

4. Whatever the stage or form of human mobility in which they are involved, young children’s rights are always affected.

5. The separation of children from any of their family members leads to serious consequences.

6. The migration of children is a great loss for the society that drives them out.

7. Children are the targets of bigoted, xenophobic and discriminatory perceptions and treatment during the various legs of their migration.

8. Child migrants are tied to the wishes of adults, without anyone to represent their own voices.

9. The number of young children who migrate has significantly increased in the region.

10. Despite this increase of migration in early childhood, it is still an invisible and invisibilized phenomenon.

For the States in the region to confront this complex scenario successfully, they should not only recognize the human rights of early childhood, but should also assign the importance of the human mobility phenomenon at the earliest stages of life its proper dimensions, undertaking to perceive it as a public issue requiring intervention and resolution. To this end, it will be necessary to link the care provided to the migrant population with national and local services for rights protection, bolstering them where they are weak and creating them where none exist.

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MAKING MIGRANT EARLY CHILDHOOD VISIBLE There is abundant literature on migration and human mobility, both in the academic field and in the papers produced by international agencies working on the issue from the perspective of human rights, economics, demographics, security, or politics. Significantly lower is the volume of papers and studies specifically addressing the relationship between migration and early childhood. In a way, the works dealing with the feminization of migration or the transit of women and young children through third countries (the best-known case in the region is that of Mexico) touch upon certain fringes of the experience where children of the earliest ages play a protagonist role.10 The relevance of investigating, analysing, examining, debating and questioning the relationship between early childhood and migratory movements is an ethical, political and budgetary necessity. The multicausality and multidimensionality of the phenomenon enable us to glimpse the complex universe in which the lives of millions of children worldwide, many of them on our continent, have become enmeshed. The contemporaneity of the phenomenon and its immediate consequences on the quality of life of children and their families, as well as its impact on people’s life trajectories, force national and international actors to act immediately to confront the whole set of violations of the human rights of children who migrate in the first years of their lives.

Human mobility combines structural features and individual agency. Structural causes are observed that involve inequalities, limitations or barriers in societies of origin and destination, 10 Rodríguez Chávez, E; Fernández Calleros, C.; Luna González, R. and Rodríguez García, E. (2016); Álvarez Velasco, S. (2011); Díaz Prieto and Gretchen Kuhner (2007); Anguiano (2008); Anguiano and Alma Trejo (2007); Arriola Vega (2012); Bustamante (2008); Caballeros (2011); Casillas (2011); Casillas (1997); Castro (2015); Fray Matías de Córdova Human Rights Centre (2005); Human Rights Centre Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez, A. C., et al. (2011); Mexico’s National Population Council (2013); Cortés Castellanos (2005); Dahl-Bredine, and DeLorey (eds.) (2009); Kuhner (2012); Leyva, et al. (2015) and (2011); Guatemala’s National Migration Board (2010); Mexico, National Comprehensive Family Development System (2013), (2012), (2011), (2009); UNICEF (2009); París and Zenteno (2015); Pérez and Roldán (2011). Among other authors and institutions.

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which condition the lives of migrants and those of their young children; while each individual has agency to make the decision to face such limitations. Migration cannot be separated from the processes of social and economic change that alter the spatial distribution of the opportunity structure and mobility patterns; it is an error to reduce migrants to passive actors facing the macro forces that interact on a global scale.

Concern in the world of early childhood specialists about issues related to the quality of care and education services, curriculum discussions, the type of infrastructure of the institutions, the mandatory vaccination schedule, the window of opportunity and the rate of return on investment in the early years is incongruous when we are faced with the marginal place in this field of social policies that is assigned to the permanent and significant violations of the minimum subsistence rights suffered by migrant children.

Perhaps there is a belief that recognizing children as rights holders, as established in the Convention and other international and regional treaties, which occupies a good part of the discourse of international agencies and local governments, is enough to provide shelter for all children. The daily confirmation of the issues we are witnessing forces us to recognize that there are millions of them who continue to represent a differentiated category: those who have no voice, who have fallen through the cracks of the rights protection systems, ‘the nobodys’, in the words of Eduardo Galeano in his work, ‘The Book of Embraces’ (1989).

Migrant children, in their early years of life, pose a challenge to adult society, governments and international organizations.

All actors involved in early childhood life are invited to make the invisible visible. That is, recognize that thousands of children up to the age of 6 are directly involved in international migration, which determines that this fundamental stage of life will be affected by an experience that is at least significant and mobilizing, if not traumatic.

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The visibility of this phenomenon, which is growing handin-hand with the increase in female migration, should challenge the current set of national and international leaders responsible for the development and control of compliance, policy planning, fund and budget management, knowledge building, programme and policy management, as well as community and social leaders, mothers and fathers. This challenge, if it is courageous and sincere, will expose a broad list of inconsistencies and gaps; non-compliance with the most basic human rights of the new generations; but it will also facilitate the recognition of practices already implemented, valuable experiences, deep commitments, and possible actions to be taken to promote and guarantee the rights of children under conditions of human mobility.

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Childhood, cultural and linguistic identity in the Plurinational State of Bolivia Ninoska DurĂĄn Girls and boys shape the capabilities inherent to their development process with significant links related to their family and community environments in the first stage of their lives. It is in this sense that children in early childhood progressively learn everything related to the social and cultural dimensions to which they belong and, consequently, generate attachment relationships and contribute to their comprehensive development.

On 12 February 2009, the Committee on the Rights of Child issued its General Comment No. 11 (2009), “Indigenous children and their rights under the Convention on the Rights of Child�, with a focus on special protection, which is based on the Preamble to the Convention itself, which expressly states that States Parties should take into account the importance of the traditions and cultural values of each people for the protection and harmonious development of the child. This is in keeping with the wording of Article 30 of the Convention, which states that a child belonging to a minority or who is indigenous shall not be denied the right, in community with other members of his or her group, to enjoy his or her own culture, to profess and practise his or her own religion, or to use his or her own language.

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In this context, and based on its constitutional mandates, the Plurinational State of Bolivia has incorporated into the text of its Constitution of 7 February 2009, ethical and moral principles underpinning its plural society: “ama qhilla, ama llulla, ama suwa (do not be lazy, do not lie, do not steal), suma qamaña (live well), ñandereko (harmonious life) teko kavi (good life), ivi marei (land without evil) and qhapaj ñan (noble path or life)”, indicating that the Bolivian State itself is based on the values of unity, equality, inclusion, dignity, liberty, equal opportunities, social equity and others.

These elements of constitutional order give clear support to the development of mechanisms to allow the visibility of indigenous children and adolescents as holders of rights and as members of their indigenous, native and peasant communities, which, in compliance with the constitutional mandate and international treaties and agreements that are part of the constitutional law, must be ensured the full recognition of their origins, respecting the cultural and linguistic diversity that is an inalienable part of their lives, their families and their traditions and customs.

As from the adoption of the State’s Political Constitution (2009), Bolivia has undertaken the historical challenge of building the Plurinational State collectively, on the basis of its thirty-six different indigenous, native and peasant nations or peoples, as recognized by the Constitution and with a significant axiological perspective known as “good living”, which implies a profound paradigm shift in social, economic and cultural coexistence in Bolivia.

Good living “means a new form of relationship, not only with humans, but with life. Suma jaqaña, being well; suma kamaña, living well, and suma wiñay qamaña, living well eternally”.1 We are therefore in the presence of a holistic paradigm of wellness and harmony with nature, “a tetralectic model (which surpasses the dialectical Western model) of knowing 1 Fernando Huanacuni Mamani (2010). “Cosmovisión Andina y Vivir Bien”. In “Vivir Bien: Infancia, Género y Economía: Entre la teoría y la práctica. Coord. Ivonne Farah and Verónica Tejerina”. CIDES UMSA, 2013

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well, doing well, being well and feeling well).2 But what fundamental contribution does this relational paradigm shift bring to the lives of children and adolescents?

For Flavia Marco Navarro, it means happy, healthy, well-fed children and teenagers, with quality education, stimulated, whose voices are heard and taken into account, who live in safe communities and neighbourhoods, which make play and recreation possible in a healthy and sustainable environment and a harmonious family setting, free of violence, with love and care.3 Under these premises, the Bolivian State as duty bearer for the human rights of children and adolescents and within the framework of the post-constitutional Bolivian process, has developed public and regulatory policies in line with its constitutional mandates. One of the major contributions of public policy for indigenous children has been the generation of “bilingual nests”, developed as a policy of the Bolivian State through the Plurinational Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures, which answers to the Ministry of Education, and which also received technical assistance from the United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF Bolivia.

Bilingual nests respond to the Bolivian State’s linguistic revitalization policy, under the ILO’s Convention 169 on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, ratified by Bolivia, with a methodology of intergenerational transmission of the original language, based on a natural process of learning by indigenous children, within family, community and institutional settings.

This approach has, in turn, focused on the comprehensive development of early childhood, by promoting and developing skills and techniques for early stimulation among children’s 2 David Choquehuanca, in Nuñez del Prado, José (2011). “Desarrollo – vida y felicidad. Paradigmas de Desarrollo- Cosmovisiones de vida- Aspiraciones de felicidad”. En el desarrollo en Cuestión. Reflexiones desde América Latina. Coord. Fernanda Wanderley. CIDES- UMSA, OXFAM 3 Flavia Marco Navarro (2013). “El vivir bien de la niñez y adolescencia y el ejercicio de derechos”. In “Vivir Bien: Infancia, Género y Economía: Entre la teoría y la práctica. Coord.

Ivonne Farah and Verónica Tejerina”. CIDES UMSA, 2013

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mothers, fathers and primary caregivers, in order to enhance their cognitive, physical and emotional abilities, with a full recognition of their native traditions and customs.

Bilingual nests develop in family and community environments, and institutional areas, and it is the “grandmothers and grandfathers of the community” who voluntarily devote time to children in order to rescue and revitalize their native languages, many of them in danger of becoming extinct.

Thus, bilingual nests have also encouraged cross-generational sharing within communities, as it is the generations of grandmothers and grandfathers of the communities’ families who are called upon to lead these opportunities, since the younger generations of the children’s mothers and fathers, have already incorporated a linguistic hybridization which weakens the essence of the native languages.

Ninoska Durán Burgoa She holds a Law degree from the “San Pablo” Bolivian Catholic University, a master’s degree in Family Sciences from the University of Santiago de Compostela; she is a teacher, consultant and specialist researcher in the Human Rights of Children and Adolescents, Early Childhood, Resilient Communities and Regulatory Development.

Former Director General for Children and Older Persons and former Deputy Minister for Equal Opportunities ai at the Ministry of Justice and Institutional Transparency - the governing body of the Plurinational System for the Protection of Children and Adolescents of the Plurinational State of Bolivia.

Currently, she is CEO and co-founder of the International Law Firm “Abogados del Niño” (Lawyers for Children) and a member of the Network of Latin American and Caribbean Leaders for Early Childhood, “For a start with a future”.

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For indigenous children and adolescents to consolidate their cultural and linguistic identity, receiving the ancestral wisdom of their forbears and thus the transmission of the collective memory of the community to which they belong, through significant events that promote the decolonization of thought, is a fundamental part of the effective exercise of their human rights.

This learning through the natural transmission of language begins with comprehensive care provided in early childhood, which also constitutes a stage of life where it is timely and important for children to learn their native languages.

The comprehensive approach to early child development designed on the bilingual nests model is harmonized to enhance gross and fine motor skills, and all aspects of holistic, psychosocial and emotional dimensions that affect the lives of young children, as well as all matters relating to the areas of language and communication.

In accordance with the Political Constitution of the State, Bolivia’s official languages are Spanish and all of the languages of the indigenous and peasant nations and peoples.4 In this sense, the bilingual nest methodology has been established in Bolivia as a basis for boosting the revitalization of these native languages, which in turn are a vital part of the recovery of the plurinational cultural and linguistic identity, with an approach focusing on early childhood.

In this context, bilingual nests have been implemented in three specific ways: a. Family nests, which recover the family type of relational and cross-generational reciprocity, in which children receive their original language naturally in the performance of daily 4 Art. 5 of the Political Constitution recognizes as official languages, Spanish, Aymara, Araona, Baure, Bésiro, Canichana, Cavineño, Cayubaba, Chácobo, Chimán, Ese Ejja, Guaraní, Guarasu’We, Guarayu, Itonama, Leco, Machajuyai-Kallawaya, Machineri, Maropa, MojeñoTrinitario, Mojeño-Ignaciano, Moré, Mosetén, Movima, Pacawara, Puquina, Quechua, Sirionó, Tacana, Tapiete, Toromona, Uru-Chipaya, Weenhayek, Yaminawa, Yuki, Yuracaré and Zamuco.

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activities; for this, it was first necessary to identify an adult in the family whose mastery of the language maintained its essence and who was willing to transmit it to the new generation of children in the family. This transmission occurs on the basis of everyday events and has also led to the transmission of other cultural knowledge conserved by generations of adults in the family. It should be noted that this specific modality has encouraged reaching out to other children in the extended family, and their attendance, to which end the approach is participatory and not restrictive. Meeting venues have been freely chosen by the families, whether in the home of one of the families, in family gardens, in nearby fields, and other places. This has also promoted family-style integration, not only between children and their ascendant generations, but also through encounters with other children and adolescents to revitalize their native language on the basis of cross-generational and intra-generational dialogue, which is also important in the overall development of early childhood.

b. Community nests are another modality implemented in areas where indigenous languages are in a critical situation with regard to their vitality, since in some communities there are only a few people who still speak the native language with its original substance (mainly the grandparents and greatgrandparents of the community) and the younger generations understand the language but do not speak it, since the natural transmission from one generation to another has been broken.

In this modality, it is the people who maintain their native language who voluntarily help to transmit the language to the children.

The Plurinational Institute of Languages and Cultures has been able to implement this method as part of the execution of State policy, organizing community groups no larger than six children per adult responsible for the transmission of the language; these small groups have aimed to strengthen their command of the native language.

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While the methodology encountered some obstacles initially, such as managing to identify the elderly in the community who could voluntarily give their time to children, the participation of mothers and fathers has been acknowledged in making this strategy to revitalize the native languages sustainable.

This also resulted in significant opportunities for community reciprocity, the social recognition of the senior generations in each community and the transmission of practices and meanings relating to the identity of indigenous peoples.

c. Institutional nests are another modality that has been established as an important alternative to family and community nests. These bilingual nests have been implemented in children’s centres under the administrative and budgetary wing of the autonomous municipal governments.

These centres implement a model of non-formal education, designed from the perspective of comprehensive development of children under the age of six; the methodology for the revitalization of the native language had to be adapted to the institutionalized model of these centres, so it was the teachers who initially received training to carry out the transmission of the indigenous languages native to the territorial jurisdiction of each centre. The implementation of this methodology encountered some barriers initially, such as teachers in many cases failing to maintain the essence of their native languages, as they had lapsed into the “Spanishing� of their language; because of this, it was necessary to develop significant technical support anchored in the focus and objectives of the public policy.

The revitalization of indigenous languages which began in Bolivia in 2014 also has a significant meaning in relation to revaluing indigenous cultural practices and to the importance of an inclusive State being able to incorporate differentiated models that respect the existence of plural childhoods in keeping with the country’s diversity and plurinational roots.

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As Brondi rightly pointed out, in order to strengthen these aspects and to build a fair world for children, we should first understand that there is no single way of living in the world; that aspirations, interests and needs are not universal.5 Therefore, bilingual nests provide cultural and community significance based on the perspective of the human rights of indigenous children and adolescents, with a special emphasis on early childhood, since this enables shedding light, within indigenous and community contexts, on the youngest children as holders of rights and social stakeholders from the beginning of their existence, with particular interests, capacities and vulnerabilities, as recommended by the Committee on the Rights of the Child, in its General Comment No. 7 (2005)“Implementing child rights in early childhood”.

This community recognition of indigenous children and adolescents, is the fundamental basis for building and respecting national diversity in Bolivia. These State policies have contributed to the generation of plural and collective outlooks for the recovery of our ancestral values and the richness of our multicultural life; revitalizing the native languages is part of the recovery of the culture and history of our nations, and this must start, unquestionably, with our Bolivian children.

5 Brondi, M. (2002). “Culturas e Infancias” in Ser Wawa en los Andes: Representación Social de Mujeres Migrantes Aymaras sobre el niño (a) Aymara. Ana Cecilia Bóhrt and Jorge Domic (2007. In Ajayu Orgáno de Difusión Científica del Departamento de Psicología UCBSP

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Bibliography Bóhrt, Ana Cecilia and Domic, Jorge (2007). “Ser Wawa en los Andes: Representación Social de Mujeres Migrantes Aymaras sobre el niño (a) Aymara”. In Ajayu Órgano de Difusión Científica del Departamento de Psicología UCBSP. Bolivia.

CRC. Convention on the Rights of the Child. Committee on the Rights of the Child. United Nations. New York. 1989.

CRC. General Comment No. 7 (2005), “Implementing child rights in early childhood” CR/C/GC/7, 1 November 2005.

CRC. General Comment No. 11 (2005) “Indigenous children and their rights under the Convention”. CRC/C/GC/11, 12 February 2009.

Farah, Ivone and Tejerina,Verónica. (2013) “Vivir Bien, infancia, género y economía. Entre la teoría y la práctica”. Coordinación Editorial CIDESUMSA. Bolivia.

Núñez del Prado, José (2011). “Desarrollo – vida – felicidad. Paradigmas del Desarrollo Cosmovisiones de vida- Aspiraciones de felicidad”. En el Desarrollo en cuestión.

Reflexiones desde América Latina, Fernanda Wanderley. CIDES – UMSA, OXFAM. Bolivia.

Plurinational Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures IPELC. “Revitalización Lingüística. Nidos Bilingües. Documento Conceptual”.

First edition. 2017.

Plurinational Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures IPELC. “Hablemos nuestro idioma con nuestros niños y niñas. La experiencia de los Nidos Bilingües en Bolivia.”. First edition. 2017.

Plurinational State of Bolivia, Political Constitution of the Plurinational State. 2009.

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Commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC)- an extreme breach of rights Denisse Araya This paper discusses some general aspects of CSEC, some brief specific features of the phenomenon detected in an investigation in Chile, certain methodological elements used in the NGO Raíces to confront it, highlighting the use of drama pedagogy as an innovative element in the reparation process for child CSE victims/survivors. Given the vulnerability of child CSE victims/survivors, it is important to underscore that all of the background referred to here is compounded in the current situation we are experiencing due to the worldwide pandemic, as established clearly by the Committee on the Rights of the Child in its statement on COVID-19 (8 April 2020).

THE COMMERCIAL SEXUAL EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN (CSEC) This is a serious violation of human rights, an abusive – and criminal – practice that devastates the physical and psychosocial integrity of children and adolescents. Through this practice, an adult takes advantage of the vulnerability (age, social, emotional, gender, etc.) of a child or adolescent to satisfy his or her sexual desires, giving payment in return, in money or in kind, gifts or something as intangible as shelter or protection.

While a girl can be forced into sexual exploitation situations through physical force or threats, she can also, however, be persuaded to participate in such sexual activities as a result 51

of more complex and nuanced factors, whether human or situational, including an imbalance of power between the victim and the aggressor (ECPAT I., 2016, quoted in Consejo N. Infancia, NGO Raíces, 2017).

Thus, CSEC, in its various manifestations1 is one of the most devastating attacks perpetrated by an adult against a child or teenager, as it is based on the notion (shared by a tolerant environment, the exploiter, and the helplessness of the victim herself or himself) that a child can be reduced to the status of goods, an asset to be traded. In the life stories of the children who survive this violent aggression, the only constant factor, from their earliest childhood, is the lack of love and the violation of their enshrined rights.

It is a complex and many-faceted social phenomenon (with structural and political, social, cultural, family and individual factors coming together), expressed in abusive dynamics and forms of relationship involving different actors and, unfortunately, seriously naturalized by society.

Undoubtedly, the sex trade is strongly grounded in the social imaginary, which naturalizes and tolerates the sale, exchange and use of the female body, allowing the reinforcement of a number of cultural practices that promote the abuse and subordination of the weak, including children and adolescents.

Regarding sex, in the country – and worldwide – the great majority of child victims/survivors of CSE are girls, who, because they are female, are more heavily punished, stigmatized and discriminated against by their social environment. According to research conducted in Chile (National Council for Children, NGO Raíces, 2017), 87% of these victims are female, while 13% are male, a difference which is further accentuated in adult prostitution or environments associated with the drug trade and consumption, as well as in the field of tourism and trafficking.

1 1) Sex in exchange for money, gifts, favours, other; 2) The use of children in pornography; 3) Exploitation in tourism and travel; and 4) trafficking in children and adolescents for sexual exploitation.

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This research has confirmed certain factors which explain how a child can fall into this harmful experience. Thus, the patriarchal gender role structure, which culturally legitimizes the use of female sexuality in exchange for payment, constitutes a fundamental cultural basis that affects the daily lives of the victims. There are records of violent family backgrounds, negligent and highly exposed to risk, as a factor triggering harmful and expelling family dynamics; an extremely complex emotional and psychological world, highly affected

Denisse Araya Licentiate degree in Social Sciences. Catholic University of Lyon, France. 1983. Infant educator, University of Chile.

1976, Founder and Director of the Raíces Collective, 1991-1997.

Executive Director. As Director of the Raíces NGO, she has represented ECPAT-Chile since 2008. Member of the Board of Directors of the International Bureau for Children’s Rights (IBCR), Canada, since 2018. She has directed several promotion and development projects in the areas of gender, childhood and adolescence. She has served as a consultant and evaluator for gender projects (Chile and Ecuador) for the Cooperation Agency Norwegian People’s Aid and CEDEP in Chile, UNICEF Uruguay, ECPAT International in Peru and CAM Mexico. Speaker and rapporteur at a number of international conferences and seminars for UNICEF, IOM, ECPAT I., OAS, ILO, and others. She has worked – and currently works – as a lecturer at the University of Chile, Alberto Hurtado and other national universities, as well as at the Ibero-American University of Mexico City and the Autonomous University of Chiapas in Mexico, the Central American University, UCA, and San Miguel in El Salvador. Southern Cone representative on the Latin American Committee Against Trafficking in Persons. She has co-produced shadow reports as alternatives to those submitted by the State of Chile, as well as reports tracking and monitoring compliance with international commitments undertaken by Chile in CSEC and trafficking in persons. She has conducted research and produced publications on the working conditions of women in the textile, fishing and agriculture areas, as well as on children and adolescents undergoing commercial sexual exploitation and other breaches. denissearaya@vtr.net - d.arayacastelli@gmail.com raices@tie.cl

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by many damaging experiences can shape victims who are easily seduced and manipulated by those responsible for their violation (National Council for Children, NGO RaĂ­ces, 2017).

While there are some warning signs that make it possible to identify cases of child CSE victims/survivors for proper referral and subsequent reparation, it is important to note that these signals should never should be viewed in isolation, considering that many of them can occur in children and adolescents who are not being sexually exploited, but, nevertheless, suffer other violations. In keeping with this criterion, the following are some characteristics that were identified in children by the aforementioned research, as well as others detected in previous research studies (ARCIS/SENAME, 2004; NGO RaĂ­ces, 2006, 2010): Victims are mostly female, aged between 12 and 18.

Unfortunately, detection is belated. The family contexts of the victims are marked by labour and economic insecurity, violence, drug and alcohol abuse, proximity to crime and crossgenerational violations, especially in the field of sexuality. In such contexts, the care of girls and teenagers is negligent, with fuzzy boundaries, permissiveness and lack of care in the face of risks and breaches. Generally, these families lead to behaviours that are more or less obviously expelling, leaving teenage girls in serious situations involving abandonment.

The female members of the family have experienced as much or more violence in their own childhood.

Children must deal with multiple risks and a lack of protection factors. Street life dynamics, drugs and crime are some of them. Moreover, protective areas such as schools do not meet the particular needs of girls, and in most cases, nor do protection or health institutions. It is evident that absconding from safe or shelter homes may be high risk events for them, as it puts them at the mercy of exploiters. It was found that this was an opportunity that exploiters take into account and include in their recruitment strategies.

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These children have low levels of self-esteem, and engage in self-destructive behaviour manifested in their high drugs and alcohol consumption. They have learned to develop a series of behavioural patterns as mechanisms or ways of life that are detrimental to themselves and pave the way to abuse and manipulation by adults. However, most of them “appear” to dominate and “control” exploitative situations.

They harbour multiple painful feelings of sadness, anxiety, and anger as a result of their very low self-esteem and lack of hope. However, they more easily express feelings of anger and aggression, rather than grief or sadness. They are fanciful in small things, unrelated to their personal (sexual) lives, but through fantasy they attempt to reclaim their innermost beings, which have been deeply wounded.

Depending on the type of exploitation to which they have been exposed, they may display seductive or eroticized behaviour towards their peers and adults, or, infantilized behaviour, acting as if they were small children.

Psycho-emotional dissociation dynamics. Owing to the violence to which they have been exposed, some children, as a defence mechanism, have learned to separate the experience of exploitation from their physical and emotional feelings, behaviour that in psychology is referred to as dissociation.2 This is manifested in how they initially refer to their experience, describing situations with ease, as if it were they who controlled their “clients” at all times, talking about it as if it were just an everyday experience. However, when they begin to integrate the experience with their feelings and emotions, they express anger, pain, disgust, and repugnance and their responses can get extremely violent towards themselves and towards others.

2 For psychoanalysis, dissociation is a defence mechanism consisting of excising elements that are disruptive to oneself, from the rest of the psyche. Dissociation implies a lack of connection between thoughts, memories and a person’s sense of identity. We call this emotional numbing, one of the main aspects of post-traumatic stress disorder (Maldonado et al., 2002).

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They fail to recognize the violations that they are experiencing.

They either deny them, or they avoid referring to the damage, or they naturalize it; one of the most significant features of this violation is that victims do not consider themselves as such. Overwhelmingly, they feel absolutely responsible for what they have experienced. They feel shame and guilt, and perceive themselves as deserving of what happens to them.

They conceal it, even specialized projects3 can take months before they are able to unveil the situation. Given their emotional limitations, they protect their exploiter, whom they identify as being one of the few people who has offered them help, who has “worried” about them.

While the effects of the multiple violations experienced had been identified in previous research, the 2017 study made it possible to observe that these effects make up a solid system in which the enormous vulnerability of the victims resides and which combines badly damaged self-esteem, defensive behaviour, fear and difficulties in visualizing their own future.

This combination makes children particularly fragile in the face of exploiters’ strategies.

REGARDING EXPLOITERS AND INTERMEDIARIES With regard to the “clients”, the study (National Council for Children, NGO Raíces, 2017) confirmed that they are mostly adult men, regardless of age. Intermediaries or pimps are both men and women. There is a tendency for gender to determine the type of relationship they establish with the children, where women take on the features of maternal figures and in the case of some male intermediaries, they also act as “clients”. Regarding their social background, the study confirmed the existence of “clients” with considerable financial resources and others whose level is similar to that of the girls themselves, depending on the type of manifestation.

In the case of intermediaries, their social background is very similar to that of the girls. Some of them have increased their 3 Projects specializing in repairing damage done to child victims of CSEC (PEE for its acronym in Spanish). The State of Chile has 18 of these nationwide. The NGO Raíces pioneered a Pilot Plan in 2001.

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income as a result of their CSEC “enterprise” and have become a “model” for the girls to follow.

It was found that the relationship between victims and exploiters (both “clients” and intermediaries) is not merely utilitarian, but is accompanied by behavioural and relational strategies that generate affection, as well as fear and submission. The study confirmed the tendency of exploiters to justify their actions without acknowledging their responsibility for the events or the rights violations that take place. Consumers or producers of child pornography tend to be younger than paid sex “clients”.

Regarding labour groups that are systematically associated with CSEC, taxi drivers and bus drivers are mentioned as “clients” and as intermediaries. Other studies (ECPAT International, 2016) identify certain occupational groups noted for their power, or for being in transit, which leads to the requisite impunity, such as business travellers, migrant workers, foreign residents, professionals involved in working with children and adolescents (especially in social or child protection programmes), the military and peacekeepers in countries in conflict, religious groups. According to ECPAT, intermediaries are usually found in groups such as corrupt police officers, employers who allow child labour, the parents of teenage wives, tour operators. NGO Raíces (2010) discovered groups of men with seasonal jobs in places such as bus terminals.

As for the relational system between victims and exploiters, the 2017 research study detected a very strong complementarity between emotional deprivation among girls and the strategies employed by exploiters. The strategies of both “clients” and intermediaries generate momentary feelings of affection and the recovery of self-esteem through seduction; exacerbation of fear and anxiety through threats; double-bind relationships.

Regarding the significance mechanisms between victims and exploiters, coherence between the significance of victims and exploiters was detected, which hinders the recognition of the breach: both deny it. Denial of the victim through: avoidant 57

tendencies (emotional disconnection); naturalization of the damage; guilt and accountability; fear. Denial of the exploiters through: shifting responsibility onto the child (I was seduced); it was a “mistake” (and will not be repeated); deception (I was tricked); “helping” the victim and his or her family; sexual needs (“client”).

IS IT POSSIBLE TO REPAIR THIS SERIOUS DAMAGE? Repairing the harm done to CSE victims/survivors and working towards the restoration of their rights imply becoming involved with human beings, with their individualities and specificities, with complex life circumstances in multiple ways.

It is, therefore, key to perceive damage reparation processes as comprehensively as possible, with a multidisciplinary strategy in order to address the various situations and experiences from a holistic perspective. Comprehensive intervention in all areas stimulates the creation of family, community and public ties and support networks, which allow the development of awareness of the responsibility due to all in the protection of children. So, combining personalized and group methods from different disciplines effectively will encourage and boost creative and autonomous development, since children will be able to deploy and bring into play their unique skills and capabilities, achieving personal development enabling them to intervene, question and learn, relearn and unlearn, based on the accumulation of their life experiences – socialization – which prevent and/or enable their growth and harmonious development, as well as that of the society to which they belong.

At the same time, developing children’s potential, interacting with others, will allow them to provide themselves with the necessary means – spiritual and psychological – for healthy growth (NGO Raíces, 1992, 2018). Hence the importance of ensuring that the various activities – routine, group, others – should be carried out in a loving and affectionate environment, based on mutual respect. With the purpose that they should be able to explore and discover themselves through these experiences. Also, that they should manage to express their feelings and emotions freely, so they can gradually engage in 58

a process of self-discovery, acknowledging their potential and resources, which each of them undoubtedly has, and which often lie dormant as a result of the harmful experiences it has been their lot to undergo during their short lives. Thus, following a process, they can acquire autonomy, confidence, and security and feel that the venue, whether or not it is temporary, is their place of affection-family, so that they can rediscover their capabilities, appreciate and learn about aspects of themselves as persons, which they thought they lacked, or simply did not know about themselves (NGO Raíces, 1992, 2018).

In short, the centre of the process is the children, in whom we believe and whom we trust. They develop their own process, but always in interaction with others, following a methodological process which is formative/dialogical/healing/ loving, which enables, contributes, facilitates in children the capacity to be active subjects in the experience, deploying their skills and potential.

In this process, the role of the professional educator, facilitator, therapist, psychologist, monitor, tutor in the psychosocial intervention team is crucial, because the commitment and ethical choices of these professionals are a factor that is believed to drive psychosocial intervention.

DRAMA PEDAGOGY - AN EFFECTIVE CONTRIBUTION TO THE HEALING PROCESS In 2004, the NGO Raíces began an experience that it has been developing and strengthening in recent years: the use of theatre as a tool in the process of repairing the damage and restoring the rights of child survivors of CSE. In the context of a psycho-social and educational intervention aimed at reworking traumatic experiences and building new life meanings and senses, drama emerges with the purpose of complementing – not replacing – other interventions carried out under the three Projects Specializing in CSEC implemented by the NGO Raíces and funded by the National Service for Minors (SENAME), in 59

the west and south of the metropolitan area and in Punta Arenas.

Art, drama pedagogy, music, and the visual arts have a tremendous therapeutic potential. Research-action has been conducted, which has led to developing their own methodological elements, adapted to the healing process of child CSE survivors. The work reinforces their permanence, perseverance, responsibility and shared commitment. Also, this is an area for play, magic, dreams and emotion.

It is an invitation to create other realities, or redraft their own, with a language that allows them to transform them, not relive them in their cruelty.

IN CONCLUSION...

Sexual violence of all kinds has serious consequences for the life and integrity of the children and adolescents who suffer it, leaving deep and painful scars that must be treated; it is necessary to find ways to heal them. However, this is exacerbated in CSE because it is much more naturalized and tolerated given that it takes place as an exchange between adults and children, either through a direct sexual act or by mediating a contact between children and other adults (pimping). This exchange determines the way in which the various actors account for the exploitative situation, as it leads to the misconception that the child has been “compensated” through payment. The “apparent” consent of the child or adolescent, by receiving payment in exchange – of whatever kind – results in both adult exploiters and the child or adolescent victims, as well as their social setting, tending to think that this is a voluntary act, or at the very least, that any possible harm has been compensated. Thus, the exchange easily results in a supposition in the social imaginary that the children are in control of the situation, an assumption that is generally shared by the victims themselves.

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Owing to the special features of the CSEC problem and the situation of the victims, and how it is addressed, it is essential that people who work with children whose rights have been breached should have tools to prevent, detect early, provide primary care, refer to specialized areas and carry out joint work with third parties, across sectors, to strengthen the process that children undergo, acting together constantly to repair the harm done to children.

Finally, it must be remembered that the various experiences that teams undergo with the children, whom they care for and shelter in their sorrows, pain and various types of violence suffered, to some extent, wear them out and lead to behaviours that often impinge upon their professionalism and teamwork (burnout syndrome). It is therefore necessary to consider self-care and the care of all the members of the team, which involves first, feeling supported rather than judged, backed by the whole team, doing their everyday work in a climate of trust and openness; no one can work alone, work should be done together. This process involves generating strategies to address the risk factors for the team, placing a special emphasis on individual and group self-care, on teamwork and on work organization (including defining roles clearly, defining shared tasks, planning and ongoing assessments).

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Public spending on migrant and returned children and adolescents in the northen triangle of Cental America Enrique Maldonado This paper is part of the process for completion of a master’s degree in Needs, Rights and Cooperation for Development in Childhood. As a Central American, throughout my professional life I have witnessed how development indicators, far from improving, are getting worse (with the exception of Costa Rica and Panama).

The migration of children and adolescents without an accompanying adult is a reflection of the limitations of a first level of health care and early childhood education, and the persistence of chronic malnutrition and poor public educational provisions for teenagers, which leads to pushing them to seek their well-being in a foreign country. Similarly, for many, violence and drug trafficking mean that their only alternative is to migrate. This crisis has become so extreme that since October 2018, caravans have been formed bound for the United States, exacerbating the living conditions of migrants. Among them are children and adolescents who migrate unaccompanied by a responsible adult or one of their parents.

The rights of this age group have been breached and their only option is to flee (migrate) to a safer destination where they may have opportunities for development. In that sense, 63

this paper explores the situation beyond public investment in children and adolescents. What is the response of sending States to migrant children when they are returned?

Central America is a region which, until the end of the last century, was marked by military interventions from the United States, which led to internal armed conflict (Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala) and the establishment of military dictatorships, with the exception of Honduras, mainly due to the military base that United States has installed in this country. At the same time, these nations are characterized by the existence of business elites, who view minimizing the role of the State and trade liberalization as development and base their success on tax exemptions, weak tax administrations and minimal and inefficient public spending, riddled with corruption.

These conditions force many citizens to seek their well-being in other nations. The following chart shows the number of Central Americans of the Northern Triangle who have tried to enter the United States illegally between 2002 and 2018; in total over those years, 3.077 million people, of whom 339,841 were “unaccompanied migrant� children and adolescents, representing 4.3% of the total number of migrants in 2008, and climbing to 26.5% in 2016. The ratio shows a decreasing tendency after that year, reaching 18.5% in 2018, a phenomenon possibly associated with the practice of the United States Border Patrol of placing them in cages and cold cells (the notorious ice boxes), without fast access to a lawyer or family member resident in that nation.

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Figure 1 Number of unaccompanied children and adolescents arrested, deported and inadmissible in Mexico and the United States

Source: Mexico Security Initiative at the University of Texas at Austin.

According to data provided by the United States Border Patrol and Mexico’s National Migration Institute, over the period 2008-2018 (11 years) a total of 339,841 minors were arrested; that is, an annual average of 30,895; which, translated into daily data, means that these institutions arrested an average of 85 underage Central American children every day, one every fifteen minutes.

The regions from where these children and adolescents migrate, make the decision to travel alone to the United States, are diverse. For example, with the help of the “Northern Triangle Migration Information Management Initiative” of the International Organization for Migration, it was possible to determine that, at least in the case of Guatemala, they mainly come from the poorest departments and are of indigenous descent. Such departments as: San Marcos, Huehuetenango and El Quiché, which only in 2018 recorded a total of 3,118 cases of children, representing 61.6% of the cases recorded in the country.

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Map 1 Number of UAC returned by country, by department of origin during 2018

Source: produced by the author, based on IOM data.

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Meanwhile, in El Salvador, they mainly migrate from the department of San Salvador which, unlike Guatemala, is not the poorest department, but it is one of the most violent.

According to the Transparency Portal of the Judiciary, in 2018 the homicide rate in this department was 59.4 per hundred thousand people. In addition, other departments with the largest number of returnee UAC are Usulután and San Miguel, with multidimensional poverty rates of 46.5% and 38.3% respectively (Technical and Planning Secretariat of the Presidency and the Ministry of the Economy, 2015).

While in the case of Guatemala one of the main causes of migration is the extreme poverty of the indigenous communities, in El Salvador there is clearly a relationship between poverty and violence. Meanwhile, in the case of Honduras, the relationship between violence and migration is much stronger. For example, 23.5% of the total UAC returned to the country in 2018 originated from the department of

Enrique Maldonado Economist, specializing in social and fiscal policy, with over ten years’ experience in quantitative and qualitative research. He has co-authored more than 30 reports on public investment with a focus on children and adolescents. Since 2018, he has acted as independent consultant (among others) to the International Institute for Educational Planning ‘UNESCO Argentina’ and the Changing The Way We Care ‘CTWWC’ initiative, with Maestral International.

He holds a master’s degree in Needs and Rights of Children from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, and another in Development from the Universidad del Valle of Guatemala.

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Cortés alone, and two of the main cities of that department display high homicide rates, such as in the case of San Pedro Sula, where in 2012 the rate was 173.6 per hundred thousand1, and although by 2018 the rate had decreased to 34.5, it is still one of the highest in the world. Cholma, for its part, is another major city in Cortés whose homicide rate (always per hundred thousand) in 2008 was 83.2, and 86.5 in 2017.

Outcomes Guatemala From 2008 to 2017, the Government of Guatemala, through its Ministry of Social Welfare and as part of the activity providing “care for migrant children and adolescents” spent a total of USD745,346.

With these data we can trace the relationship between budget accrued and number of UAC arrested both by the Mexican and by the US authorities. This shows that in 2008 the government of Guatemala allocated a total of USD40.3 per UAC. It is easy to deduce that this issue has been exacerbated; the State has not responded as it should have done, since the allocations for each of them declined and reached two dollars and seventeen cents in 2017, which demonstrates the limited capacity of the Ministry of Social Welfare to translate budgetary allocations into goods and services for this age group.

1 According to the Institute for Democracy, Peace and Security of the Autonomous University of Honduras.

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Figure 2 Public expenditure on each Guatemalan child arrested on the border between USA and Mexico (in dollars)

Source: Prepared by the author, on the basis of data from SICOIN and the University of Austin, Texas.

El Salvador In this country, the budget of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs includes a line of work on “protection and development of migrant Salvadorans”, with information covering only from 2014 to 2017. It also encompasses a Public Services System, “El Salvador is Your Home”, a line which included a budget of USD543.7 thousand over those same years. Unfortunately, because in El Salvador the activities performed by the State are not unbundled, it was not possible to identify a line of work in its programme structure that specifically targeted unaccompanied migrant infants and adolescents. Therefore, we have used the total number of persons deported (including children) to obtain per capita data; on average, over the four years analysed, the figure amounts to USD1.74, but it should be noted that these amounts do not show a tendency to decrease, as they do in Guatemala. but to remain stable.

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Honduras Unlike the previous countries, in the case of Honduras, public spending related to migration and immigration activities was identified in six institutions, which, together, accounted for a total USD91.5 million.

From that amount, the budget’s programmatic structure was disaggregated by activity or task, with the following result: In the Department of Children, Adolescents and Family there is a Programme for Migration and International Return of Children, which is subdivided into institutional strengthening activities and care specifically for this age group.

In the Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion, the main activity of the Social Compensation programme involves caring for and protecting vulnerable young people at social risk, focusing primarily on returning migrants.

In the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, there are four programmes with their respective activities, mainly focusing on the employment of deported youth and adolescents.

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Table 1 Honduras: organizations, programmes and activities related to providing care for migrant children and teens during 2011-2017, in millions of dollars YEAR

2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

2017

Total

Children, Adolescents and Families Directorate

0.20

0.19

0.39

Migration and International Return of Children

0.20

0.19

0.39

Ministry for Development and Social Inclusion

0.74

0.66

0.75

2.16

Social Compensation Programmes

0.74

0.66

0.75

2.16

0.04

0.00

0.16

0.27

Ministry for Labour and Social Security

0.02

0.01

Employment and Vocational Training Policy

0.03 0.03

0.03

Management of Employment, Inclusion, Migration and Vocational Training Policy

0.16

Employment and Vocational Training Policy

0.04

Employment and Wage Policy 0.02

0.01

Total

0.01

0.02

0.00

0.16

0.04 0.03

0.03

0.78

0.86

1.10

2.81

Source: Prepared by the author, based on data from the Ministry of Finance.

It should be noted that these activities appear in the budget accrued since 2011, and although they do not appear to be accounted for in 2013, this is possibly due to a reorganization and/or budgeting based on the consolidation of these activities. It should also be noted that the amounts allocated per year were actually infinitesimal until 2014, and that subsequent years have shown notable increases that even exceed one million dollars exclusively for this age group, when in 2012, the amounts the Honduran State destined to address the catastrophe only reached USD9250.14.

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Specifically, during 2016 and 2017 there were actions for the restitution of the rights of migrant children and adolescents, with accrued budgets close to two hundred thousand dollars, while social compensation programmes (especially conditional transfers) in the Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion, for 2015-2017, accrued amounts of USD718.9 thousand on average.

With regard to allocations per capita, of the designated amount, USD2.8 million was used at that time to cover the needs of a total of 75,715 children and adolescents who were arrested between Mexico and the United States and deported to their country of origin, with an expenditure of USD37.1 per capita, fairly high compared to the expenditures of Guatemala and El Salvador. However, it should be noted that it is more reliable to discuss this indicator as from 2015, when a greater degree of institutionalization appears for these activities and programmes.

In short, it must be recognized that the structural causes of migration are machismo, racism and inequality in access to development opportunities for our children. In this respect, the only way to reduce and/or eliminate it is by establishing a social protection system to ensure a minimum level of welfare among Central American families.

The results shown here indicate the response of the States to deal with the consequences of those causes, which have always been neglected in public budgets.

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Bibliography Child Fund. (2019). Guatemala, 10 años de inversión en niñez y adolescencia. Resultados, desafíos del financiamiento y la gestión pública. Guatemala: Child Fund.

Mexico Security Initiative at the University of Texas at Austin. (3 July 2019). Central American Migration Model. Retrieved from: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Rp8Zhwtul-WUNr3mlIkO5rnBpFYaQRTf8aFXZ_MflY/edit#gid=172439985

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Child and adolescent abuse and institutionalization in Colombia from the perspective of psychopathology of development, neuroscience and complex trauma Juan Carlos Calceido, Pablo MuĂąoz y Juan Camilo Sabogal CHILD AND ADOLESCENT ABUSE IN COLOMBIA While there are forms of violence such as wars and territorial struggles between armed organizations that appear every day in the mass media, there are other forms of violence that seem to move through history along invisible channels, related to the private microsocial sphere and the everyday cultural practices of many human groups. This is the case of domestic violence and child abuse, whose imprint appears to mark whole generations, without any clear indication of political, ideological or economic facets that could make it a matter of public and priority interest for many States. However, the social cost of child abuse is related to its proven lifelong association with many psychopathological disorders and developmental problems (Green et al, 2010; Oh et al, 2018), whose impact can be very high on health services, education systems and the workforce, but at the same time, could be diluted among different sociodemographic indicators and factors.

In Colombia, a relatively recent legal characterization of the problem, Law 1098 of 2006, which provides for the Childhood Code, has defined child abuse as “all forms of prejudice, 75

punishment, humiliation or physical or psychological abuse, neglect, omission or negligent treatment, maltreatment or sexual exploitation, including abusive sexual acts and rape, and generally all forms of violence or aggression against children or adolescents committed by their parents, legal guardians or any other person” (Congreso de Colombia, 2006).

Studies in recent years have shown that child abuse is an evident reality among our Colombian population (Briceño, Durán, Blanco, & Zorro, 2015; Cuadros, 2016; Ramírez, 2006), causing damage in the short and long term, establishing it as an issue of public health (Pinzón, Suescún, Pereira, Meléndez, & Montoya, 2016). However, the true prevalence of the phenomenon is underreported (Briceño, Durán, Blanco, & Zorro, 2015), which makes it difficult to address it and could affect its priority on the political agenda.

The Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar (Colombian Institute of Family Welfare - ICBF) has a data registry which is open to the public based on the records of the Administrative Process for the Restoration of Rights (PARD for its acronym in Spanish), carried out when the rights of minors are violated through different forms of violence against children, including child abuse, sexual abuse, child labour or malnutrition (Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar, 2019). In observing the data for 2018, considering the age ranges Early Childhood, Childhood and Adolescence, 16,225 cases were registered, sexual abuse being the form of violence that most affected girls and female adolescents, with 8,039 cases, followed by 6,378 cases of child abuse including physical abuse, neglect, psychological abuse, and other types of aggression.

In addition, the National Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences (INMLCF), in its report, Forensis 2018, (Instituto Nacional de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses, 2019) provides the results of the performance of domestic violence in the forensic system for 2018. The document includes 10,794 expert reports on violence against children and adolescents for the year in question. With regard to the 76

Pablo Muñoz Specht Graduated as a psychologist from the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, and as a Doctor of Psychology (D.Psy) from Laval University, Canada. He has experience in the design, evaluation and coordination of projects related to intervention among vulnerable children and young people. He currently serves as assistant professor at the Department of Psychology of the National University of Colombia. He is clinical supervisor at the Psychological Care Service (SAP) of the National University and coordinator at this Service of the department of psychological care for children, adolescents and families. In addition, he is director of a line of research on “Child and Youth Mental Health” within the Research Group on Lifestyle and Human Development GIEVDH at the National University of Colombia.

Juan Carlos Caicedo Mera Physician and Doctor of Biomedical Sciences in the field of Neuroscience from the National University of Colombia. Since 2004, he has been working as a teacher and researcher at the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences of the Externado University of Colombia, on the Social Brain, Ecology and Coexistence line of research.

He has worked on issues such as pro-social behaviour and its neurobiological correlates, the effects of early-life stress owing to the disruption of the maternal bond on neurodevelopment and sexual dimorphism in response to stress.

Juan Camilo Sabogal Graduated as a psychologist from the National University of Colombia. He took part in the research project on “Study on traumatic disorder during development in institutionalized children of the city of Bogota – Colombia”. His research project focused on comparing stress responses and emotional regulation in institutionalized children with complex trauma.

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alleged perpetrators, fathers are first on the list at 30.58%, followed by mothers, at 29.46%. The setting in which this type of violence most frequently occurs is the home, at 76.03% of the total.

These statistics show the severity and magnitude of the problem of violence against children and youth in Colombia, and invite us to continue studying the phenomenon from different theoretical and methodological perspectives.

CHILD AND ADOLESCENT ABUSE FROM THE PSYCHOPATHOLOGY OF DEVELOPMENT AND COMPEX TRAUMA The psychopathology of development is emerging as a way to study clinical dysfunctions, maturation and the adjustments that occur throughout development, contemplating all stages of life (albeit with a strong emphasis on the study of children and adolescents) to generate diagnostic, evaluation and treatment models (Kazdin, 1989) . This paradigm has established itself today as an important research framework for understanding processes of development in conditions of exposure to domestic violence, from a dynamic, multicausal and complex perspective (Toth & Cicchetti, 2013; Eme, 2017; Rutter & Sroufe, 2000; Drabick & Kendall, 2010).

Various branches of study converge in this approach, such as biology, medicine, genetics, psychology and sociology, which theoretically and methodologically contribute to the understanding of development processes when functioning normally, as well as when damage has been caused by child abuse (Drabick & Kendall, 2010; Toth & Cicchetti, 2013).

In this context, in recent years a growing number of authors who are studying the effects of trauma during childhood and adolescence have mentioned the importance of conceptualizing a new disorder that can encompass the complexity of these phenomena, and make it possible to assess the involvement of different dimensions of development (D’Andrea, Ford, Stolbach, Spinazzola, & van der Kolk, 2012; van der Kolk, 78

2005; López-Soler, 2008; Stolbach et al., 2013; Teague, 2013).

During the first decade of this century, van der Kolk (2005) and his collaborators began proposing Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD) as a new diagnostic criterion.

Over the last decade, the scientific community has begun to carry out initial studies, providing valuable empirical evidence about the impact of DTD on the different dimensions of development (cognition, socialization, emotional, etc.) and on attachment styles (D’Andrea et al., 2012; Stolbach et al., 2013).

Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD), also called complex trauma (CT), is a phenomenon that can occur when boys or girls are victims of physical or psychological abuse, neglect and/or sexual abuse over long periods, with the perpetrator being one or more of their primary caregivers (van der Kolk, 2005; LópezSoler, 2008). They inflict damage in two dimensions, because on the one hand they become systematic victimizers, and on the other, they betray their role as figures of protection and care, giving rise to confusion and loss of trust in the children.

The disorder may become apparent through its impact on at least one of the domains of development, through significant delays and/or presenting particular psychopathological symptoms.

Below we shall discuss some recent studies on the links between these early experiences of trauma and adversity and damage to brain structures and functions.

COMPLEX TRAUMA AND BRAIN DEVELOPMENT The development of the brain is a complex and dynamic process that depends on both genetic influences and interaction with the environment. The time and quality of the early experiences are closely linked to brain plasticity, inasmuch as the early years of life represent a critical period for the modelling of neural networks (Fox, Levit and Nelson III, 2010). As humans are socially dependent from birth, ties and exchanges with others become crucial to determine the connectivity of the human brain throughout life (Chambers, 79

2017). Luyten, Campbell and Fonagy (2018) suggest that a safe and protective social environment makes it possible to develop human capacity that is evolutionarily pre-wired for social learning and mental salutogenesis. Conversely, complex trauma strongly alters these capabilities at a neurobiological level, which translates into a weakening of basic trust in the social environment, affecting mentalization and social learning abilities and, in many cases, leading to the emergence of psychopathology. Similarly, Nelson III and Gabard-Durnam (2020) argue that adverse events represent a violation of expectations about the environment that could change the physiological and behavioural responses of children.

In complex trauma, as caregivers become aggressors, the violation is related to a perception of the betrayal of the bond and all its consequences in the process of social adaptation.

Several studies have reported on the association between child abuse and brain development disorders (Green, McLaughlin, Berglund, Gruber, Sampson y Zaslavsky et al, 2010; Luke y Banerjee, 2013; Oh, Jerman, Silvério, Koita, Purewal, Burke and Bucci, 2018).

The mechanisms underlying neurobiological disorders related to complex trauma are currently being widely studied. Several studies have focused on the deregulation of hormonal responses to stress, particularly showing altered patterns of cortisol secretion (Peckins, Susman, Negriff & Noll, 2015; Oh et al, 2018; Quirin, Pruessner & Kuhl, 2008, Dueñas, Caicedo and Torner, 2017). Overall, there is evidence that child abuse in the early stages increases the production of this stress hormone, and that the body attempts to compensate for the exposure of cells to these toxic hormone levels by decreasing the expression of receptor molecules through epigenetic mechanisms (Cecil, Zhang and Nolte, 2020). Thus, what appears to be an adaptive mechanism at an early age, becomes a deregulation of the hormonal response to stress which may last for the rest of the person’s life (McGowan, Sasaki, D’Alessio, Dymov, Labonté, Szyf et al, 2009), with adverse effects on different brain structures (Chambers, 2017).

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Other authors have also demonstrated a different biochemical mechanism related to complex trauma: child abuse is associated with chronic inflammation processes that could deteriorate the fronto-limbic connections of the brain associated with executive functions and emotional regulation, among other processes (Kraynak, Masland, Hanson & Gianaros, 2019; Lacey Pinto, Li and Danese, 2020). Cohodes, Kitt, Baskin-Sommers and Gee (2020) have also reported on a special susceptibility of fronto-limbic circuits to early stress events.

The psychological results of these brain disorders include a wide range of neuropsychiatric symptoms (Green et al, 2010) and cognitive impairments (Oh et al, 2018). However, recent studies suggest that the social cognition skills are a highly affected area, which is probably related to problematic externalizing behaviours such as oppositional and aggressive behaviours. In complex trauma, the primary caregiver is the cause of overwhelming anxiety and attachment consolidation is distorted. This would affect the ability for reflective performance and mentalization in a broader social framework, such as among peers and in the community, through alterations in brain areas and processes related to social cognition (Luyten, Campbell and Fonagy, 2018). Other authors confirm these hypotheses (Lahousen, Unterrainer & Kapfhammer, 2019; Boccadoro, Siugzdaite, Hudson, Maeyens, van Hamme & Mueller, 2019; Luke & Banerjee 2013; Sun, Haswell, Morey and de Bellis, 2019).

Finally, it is worth reflecting on a crucial aspect of public policy action against child abuse, which, paradoxically, may have harmful effects independent of the phenomenon it is attempting to combat: we refer to institutionalization as a measure for the protection and restoration of child rights.

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COMPLEX TRAUMA COLOMBIA

AND

INSTITUTIONALIZATION

IN

In the Colombian legal framework, the child and adolescent population, where a child is understood to be between 0 and 12 years and an adolescent, between 12 and 18 years, are considered to be rights holders (Congreso de Colombia, 2006). Hence, the Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar (Colombian Institute of Family Welfare) (ICBF) was established in Colombia as the agency responsible for generating regulatory and management systems consistent with international commitments, in order to safeguard these rights for children and adolescents whose rights have been breached in situations such as abuse, exploitation, homelessness or any other form of violence against children (Colombian Institute of Family Welfare - ICBF, 2018). Thus, in the pursuit of comprehensive protection for children and adolescents, one of the routes of action established for the ICBF is the Administrative Process for the Restoration of Rights (PARD) to restore rights that have been violated in a comprehensive, fitting and effective manner, by means of a care model that includes various forms.

One of these involves offering to support and strengthen the child in a different setting to that of his or her family of origin or network, such as a foster home or institution.

The latter process, institutionalization, takes place when remaining within the family setting poses a risk. In this case, based on the decision of the family court, the child is withdrawn from this setting and taken to an institutional environment that can shelter up to tens or hundreds of children. Such State action is problematic, as many studies have shown evidence of the negative influence of these environments on the psychological development of children and adolescents.

For example, Bos et al. (2011). The intention of the Bucharest Early Intervention Project was to discover the impact of early institutionalization on a group of 136 children; it was discovered to have negative effects on mental health, attachment disorders, impaired emotional reactivity and 82

externalizing and internalizing psychiatric symptoms, in addition to differential outcomes by gender and duration of institutionalization. Similarly, in a meta-analysis conducted by Carr, Duff & Craddock (2018), the authors found that children exposed to severe neglect in institutions with limited resources have problems in domains such as physical and cognitive development, the social sphere and mental health. Other studies found some consequences of institutionalization to be the presence of higher levels of stress and dysfunctional coping strategies(Gómez, Romero, & Consuelo, 2017), as well as fewer psychosocial and academic skills and behavioural and emotional regulation issues in adolescents (Fernández & Fernández, 2013; Deambrosio, Gutierrez de Vázquez, Arán, & Román, 2018; Carr et al., 2018; Li, Chng, & Chu, 2017; Stolbach et al., 2013). Moreover, institutionalized children showed neurological disorders such as reduced volumes of grey and white matter in the brain and decreased electroencephalogram signal strength records (Nelson III, Zeanah and Fox, 2019).

In a study we conducted recently with institutionalized children in Colombia (Sarmiento, 2018), the effects were studied of complex trauma and institutionalization on the socio-emotional development of 48 Colombian children and adolescents aged between 5 and 14 years. Possible differences were addressed in variables such as relational behaviour, mentalization and prosocial-altruistic behaviour. The research was undertaken according to a quasi-experimental design type with a target group n=24 (institutionalized children and adolescents with complex trauma) and a control group n=24 (children and adolescents living with their biological families) matched by sex, age and socio-demographic conditions. It was found that institutionalized children with complex trauma displayed greater problems in the relational domain and less tendency to donate in an experimental game to evaluate altruistic behaviour, than children in the control group. These results suggest that complex trauma can jeopardize the socialization capacity of children and adolescents, as well as the development of prosocial behaviours that constitute an important substrate in the cohesion of the social fabric.

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While the results of a large number of scientific research studies are conclusive regarding the effects of institutionalization in response to severe child abuse, it is important to conclude that it is a complex and controversial issue. Therefore, beyond discussing whether or not children should be institutionalized, we must, above all, reflect on the protection system as such and how comprehensive support can be provided to families at risk. We can conclude by stating that we need a protection system focused on prevention, on intervention programmes and support for families at risk; contributing at the same time to the strengthening of foster families through selection processes, support and quality training.

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D´Andrea, W., Ford, J., Stolbach, B., Spinazzola, J., & van der Kolk, B. (2012). Understanding Interpersonal Trauma in Children: Why We Need a Developmentally Appropriate Trauma Diagnosis. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 82(2), 187-200. doi:10.1111/j.19390025.2012.01154.x Deambrosio, M., Gutierrez de Vázquez, M., Arán, V., & Román, F. (2018). Efectos del maltrato en la neurocognición. Un estudio en niños maltratados institucionalizados y no institucionalizados. Revista Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales, Niñez y Juventud, 16(1), 239253. doi:10.11600/1692715x.16114

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Drabick, D., & Kendall, P. (2010). Developmental Psychopathology and the Diagnosis of Mental health problems among youth. Clin Psychol (New York), 17(4), 272-280. doi:10.1111/j.1468-2850.2010.01219.x.

Dueñas, Z., Caicedo, J.C., Torner, L. (2017). Global effects of early life stress on neurons and glial cells. Current Pharmaceutical Designs 23, 1-8.

Eme, R. (2017). Developmental psychopathology: a primer for clinical pediatrics. World J Psychiatr, 7(3), 159-162. doi:10.5498/wjp.v7.i3.159 Fernández, M., & Fernández, A. (2013). Problemas de comportamiento y competencias psicosociales en niños y adolescentes institucionalizados.

UniversitasPsychologica, 12(3), 797-810. doi:10.11144/Javeriana.

UPSY12-3.pccp Fox, S., Levitt, P., Nelson III, Ch. (2010). How the Timing and Quality of Early Experiences Influence the Development of Brain Architecture. Child Development 81(1): 28–40. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01380.x.

Gómez, E., Romero, E., & Consuelo, D. (2017). Estrés y afrontamiento en niños institucionalizados y no institucionalizados. PsiqueMag, 5(1), 171-183.

Green, J., McLaughlin, K., Berglund,P., Gruber,M., Sampson, N., Zaslavsky, A., Kessler, R.(2010). Childhood adversities and adult psychopathology in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R) I: Associations with first onset of DSM-IV disorders. Archives in General Psychiatry 67(2): 113.

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Brain Behavioral Immunity. pii: S0889-1591(19)30307-1. doi: 10.1016/j. bbi.2019.08.186. [Epub ahead of print] Lacey, R., Pinto, S., Li, L., Danese, A. (2020) Adverse childhood experiences and adult inflammation: Single adversity, cumulative risk and latent class approaches. Brain, Behavior and Immunity, https://doi. org/10.1016/j.bbi.2020.03.017 Lahousen, T., Unterrainer, H., Kapfhammer, H. (2019). Psychobiology of Attachment and Trauma. Some General Remarks From a Clinical Perspective. Frontiers in Psychiatry (10) article 914. doi: 10.3389/ fpsyt.2019.00914 Li, D., Chng, G., & Chu, C. (2017) Comparing Long.Term Placement Outcomes of Residential and Family Foster Care: A Meta-Analysis.

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Oh, D., Jerman, P., Silvério, S., Koita, K., Purewal, S., Burke, N., Bucci, M. (2018). Systematic review of pediatric health outcomes associated with childhood adversity. BMC Pediatrics 18:83. https://bmcpediatr. biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12887-018-1037-7 Peckins, M., Susman, E., Negriff, S., Noll, J. (2015). Cortisol TPK. profiles: A test for adaptive calibration of the stress response system in maltreated and nonmaltreated youth. Developmental Psychopathology. https:// doi.org/10.1017/S0954579415000875.

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Ramírez, C. (2006). El impacto del maltrato en los niños y las niñas de Colombia. Revista infancia, adolescencia y familia, 1(2), 287-301.

Obtenido de https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237392900 Rutter, M., & Sroufe, A. (2000). Developmental psychopathology: concepts aand challenges. Development and psychopathology, 12, 265296. doi:10.1017/S0954579400003023 Sarmiento, V. (2018). Desarrollo socio-emocional en niños, niñas y 88

adolescentes institucionalizados con Trastorno Traumático durante el desarrollo. Comparación con un grupo control (Tesis de maestría).

Bogotá: Universidad Nacional de Colombia. Obtenido de http://bdigital. unal.edu.co/70485/2/VanesaSarmiento.2018.pdf Sun, D., Haswell, C., Morey, R. & de Bellis, M. (2019) Brain structural covariance centrality in maltreated youth with PTSD and in maltreated youth resilient to PTSD. Developmental Psychopathology 31(2): 557– 571. doi:10.1017/S0954579418000093.

Stolbach, B., Minshew, R., Rompala, V., Dominguez, R., Gazibara, T., & Finke, R. (2013). Complex Trauma Exposure and Symptoms in Urban Traumatized Children: A Preliminary Test of Proposed Criteria for Developmental Trauma Disorder. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 483-491. doi:10.1002/jts.21826 Teague, C. (2013). Developmental Trauma Disorder: A Provisional Diagnosis. Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, 22, 611-625. doi:10.1080/10926771.2013.804470 Toth, S., & Cicchetti, D. (2013). A developmental psychopathology perspective on child maltreatment. Child Maltreatment, 18(3), 135139. doi:10.1177/1077559513500380 Van der Kolk, B. (2005). Developmental Trauma Disorder: Toward a rational diagnosis for children with complex trauma histories.

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How are children and adolescents experiencing the pandemic caused by COV ID-19, in conditions of socio-economic inequality?

Laura Rivera and Natalia Castro “Exemplary! He walks, climbs a tree in search of a signal, but does not abandon his dream” claims the headline of a local newspaper in the northern border area of Costa Rica. Thus is unequal access to the right to education romanticized on a daily basis in the media, and resolving the social exclusion that affects millions of children and adolescents in Latin America is assigned to individual responsibility, making it seem to be only a matter of determination, commitment, and reproducing the idea which is so deeply rooted in society: “where there’s a will, there’s a way”.

This kind of story is repeated every day throughout Latin America, at a time when the health crisis caused by COVID-19 has overrun all spheres of society, affecting the access of children and adolescent to rights of all types.

It is because of this that this paper aims to discuss areas where inequalities are having implications for children and adolescents in Latin America, particularly in Costa Rica, where the authors are based. The significance of shedding light on this issue in the current context is based on socio-economic and demographic data generated by various international organizations.

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According to UNICEF, in The State of the World’s Children 2016, unless inequity is addressed as a matter of urgency, by 2030, 167 million children throughout the world will be living in extreme poverty, 69 million children under the age of 5 will die between 2016 and 2030 and 60 million children of an age to attend elementary school will not be in school. These data did not contemplate the implications of a pandemic for the situation of children and their families in terms of access to social and economic rights; coupled with the fact that Latin America is the most unequal region in the world, and that that situation manifests itself even more starkly among the population of children and adolescents.

Inequality regarding the distribution of income in Costa Rica is abysmal. According to the Costa Rican Institute of Statistics and Census (2019), in 2019, 20% of households in the country with the highest incomes accumulate 50.5% of the total national income, while at the other end, 20% of households with the lowest incomes accumulate only 4.2%.

These lower-income households are under the poverty line, and their situation is aggravated by the fact that on average, they have one more family member than non-poor households; they “have more children aged five years or younger, more demographically dependent persons and a higher percentage of households are headed by women” (INEC; 2017).

With this information, “the average household income is 12 times higher among households in the fifth quintile, compared to the average for households in the first quintile, a ratio which increases to 17.6 times at per capita levels” (INEC, 2019, p.

40).

Income inequality throughout Latin America affects children and adolescents acutely. According to ECLAC (2019), in 2018, while in general terms around 30.1% of the regional population was below the poverty line and 10.7% was below the extreme poverty threshold, the poverty incidence for children and adolescents aged 0 to 14 years was 46.2% and in the case of 92

extreme poverty, 18.4%.

The children and adolescents belonging to these families, are, in the best of cases, economically dependent on income that other family members can generate or on State transfers, when they are not responsible for generating income for themselves. Their access to the right to education and health depends on public policy, which in a health crisis scenario, which has also involved the temporary closure of schools, seriously jeopardizes access to economic and social rights for this group in particular.

These families, whose incomes were already insufficient and whose basic needs were therefore unsatisfied, find themselves in an overwhelming situation in the current scenario. According to the International Labour Organization, only between April and June this year, COVID-19 will cause the disappearance of 6.7% of hours of employment worldwide, equivalent to the loss of 195 million full-time jobs; “In Latin America, it is estimated that the livelihoods of nearly half of the workers in the region are at risk, while the loss of working hours represents the disappearance of 31 million full-time jobs� (ILO; 2020).

The current context is without doubt a challenge for all walks of life, for which there are few precedents in recent history.

We should, therefore, discuss areas that are particularly likely to be affected by this situation in the short and long term, such as access to the right to education, associated in this context to access to information and communications technology owing to the way in which education is going online and generating a response to the need for physical distance through remote access.

In addition, the crisis context exacerbates situations involving violence, which causes major damage to the rights of children, and which must be addressed from a perspective that shows the unequal ways in which this violence is heightened in 93

various social strata1, owing to the structural violence which particularly affects the poorest families.

“It is estimated that the first month of the crisis led to a decrease of 81% in the income of informal workers in Latin America (...) for millions of workers – and their families – the absence of income is equivalent to no food, no security and no future” (ILO; 2020).

INEQUALITY IN SPECIFIC ISSUES This year, 2020, has brought with it a process in which society has changed drastically and posed serious challenges for public policy management. Latin America shares a situation involving States with high levels of public debt, which makes it difficult to come up with timely responses, especially when it comes to social policies classified as expenses.

It is of particular interest to focus on education policy and on policies for social protection against violence and access to physical areas that enable children to live through this period under conditions that promote their development and protect them from the risk of physical and emotional scars due to physical isolation.

Regarding education, according to UNICEF, “As at 23 March 2020, some 154 million children and adolescents (more than 95% of those enrolled in education in the region) were temporarily out of school due to COVID-19” (ECLAC, 2020, p. 39). In lower-income households, among other reasons because they have a larger number of dependents, their needs and dynamics are more complex and care tasks become a greater burden for caregivers.2 1 This in no way disregards the fact that violence against children and adolescents exists in families with different socio-economic profiles, and is in no way ascribing blame only to people of a certain income. What we are attempting to highlight is the fact that there are social determining factors, such as overcrowding, unsatisfied basic needs, anxiety about the impossibility of generating family income, access to information and an appropriate education to cope with the pandemic, as well as other elements that generate a differentiated reality in the way that psychosocial resources are handled when coping with the current scenario.

2 “This is all the more so in lower-income households, where patriarchal cultural patterns are compounded by the region’s socio-economic stratification and lack of good-quality public services. These households encounter greater difficulties in decisions on the organization of care, as they are unable to acquire market goods and services to alleviate the burden of domestic and care work” (ECLAC, 2020, p. 30).

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The strategies that have been proposed to solve the physical distancing necessary seem to be based on the assumption that students have access to technological and psychosocial resources to enable them to continue the school year. However, the current situation entails the great risk of reinforcing inequality in access to education, which is already a reality in the region.

In Costa Rica, the Ministry of Public Education (MEP) has implemented different strategies to ensure the continuity of education. Following the closure of schools, it launched a strategy for pedagogical mediation called “Learning at Home”.

The design of this strategy contemplated four educational settings, depending on access to technological resources and connectivity. In addition, as part of this strategy, the ministry has resorted to other communication channels, such as television or radio, in order to coordinate the programmatic content established for each school year.

Although this pedagogical strategy seeks, through these scenarios, to support the various sectors that make up the student population, it is not only a question of having a phone or a computer. It means having certain skills in handling these devices; as well as having the connectivity that enables access to applications or to downloading files, which, for those who only have data on their mobile phones, is quite a difficult feat. In addition, another serious inequality factor among the student population is that the implementation of this pedagogical mediation strategy involves the active participation of the people who make up the student’s family circle. It is the persons in that circle who must support children and adolescents in their process of autonomous learning; however, not all of these people will have the emotional resources or expertise required in order to provide this support, thus increasing the inequality gap between students from different sectors.

Coupled to this, although at this time children’s access to technological devices tends to be standardized, because of the possibility of receiving an education through them, we should 95

not ignore the risks involved in their using these devices without proper supervision; already an increase has been reported in the consumption of child pornography during the lockdown period.

No doubt the fact that children and adolescents are not attending school has closed off one of the most important channels in the process of identifying domestic violence.

Teachers, as well as psychologists, counsellors and social workers who work in schools in communities where violence against children and adolescents is most widespread, play a key role on the “front line�, detecting signs of physical, psychological or sexual violence. At this time, the fact that these people are not able to attend their institutions implies that the support they provide is, in most cases, in abeyance, and the absence of the resources that these professionals represent for many children at a school age especially, greatly increases their vulnerability.

That is why it is essential that, in addition to generating a strategy that enables the continuity of educational content, other social functions that the school provides should also be resolved, especially those that seek social protection for this population. Perpetrators are very often to be found within the family, and therefore, lockdown in these limited physical spaces in the current situation restricts the opportunities for children and adolescents to gain access to other forms of support.

Coupled to this, as mentioned above, the increase of structural violence has repercussions that are expressed unequally also in family contexts, exposing children living in overcrowded households, with no chance of ensuring their basic needs, or gaining access to the right to health in an environment of constant threat, to more acute manifestations of such violence in their daily lives.

In this respect, some protective factors should be bolstered and implemented in the current context. Rural settings 96

allow for a less adverse scenario, since children are able to play outdoors and to be in contact with nature, promoting movement, physical activity and mental health. In the case of urban environments where physical inactivity was already a more pronounced problem for this population prior to the pandemic, a strategy should be developed to enable the use of public parks, administered by the community, empowering grassroots organizations to take control of the use of these spaces, which could also be used for educational purposes from the perspective of community health.

It is not possible to maintain a government-based strategy to handle this crisis; we should be following the examples of countries that have managed to engage citizens in a collectivist vision of finding and implementing solutions, which requires that the State should generate responses to the particular needs identified by these organized communities.

Children do not experience confinement in the same way as adults, who keep up with dozens of daily contacts via mobile phones, e-mails and computers, a possibility that has prevented physical distance from becoming a period devoted to daydreaming. We need to understand that vital activities for children involve, among other things, the possibility of using play as a constitutive experience of their personality, it is their way of disassociating themselves from the concerns of the adult world, or at least, of devising a way to handle these concerns that they are receiving from the perspective of their own worldview.

It is because of this, that it is considered critical to socially organize ways to address those other needs that go beyond developing conditions so that certain contents of a school year are made available to the school-age population.

The class-biased, paternalistic and adult-centred approaches which give rise to many of the government responses in the current situation should be brought into question by the officials themselves, but also by families, and by community 97

organizations that can promote self-managed forms of support and networking that help to shed light on what has often been invisible; children and adolescents who experience the worst conditions when attempting to cope with and even survive this juncture.

Bibliography Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).

(2020a) The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the new global and regional context: scenarios and projections in the current crisis. Santiago, 2020.

Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).

(2019). Social Panorama of Latin America. Santiago, 2019. Available at: https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/44989/1/ S1901132_en.pdf Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Censos (2017). Encuesta Nacional de Hogares, 2017. Available at: https://www.inec.cr/publicaciones?fuente_ tid=136 Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Censos (2019). Encuesta Nacional de Hogares, 2019. Available at: https://www.inec.cr/publicaciones?fuente_ tid=136 International Labour Organization. (2020). ILO Monitor: COVID-19 and the world of work. Third edition. Updated estimates and analysis. Available at: https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@ dgreports/@dcomm/documents/briefingnote/wcms_743146.pdf International Labour Organization. (2020a). América Latina y el Caribe: Primero de Mayo en confinamiento. News, 30 April 2020. Available at: https://www.ilo.org/americas/sala-de-prensa/WCMS_743342/lang-es/index.htm?fbclid=IwAR0hlYVY_lJABWa2yiu3ifMSjnFbK0QuVxFlgxbMGdwK9tsCBhmOBDzW0U 98

Natalia Castro Salgado She is a psychologist and philologist.

In 2019, she served as an intern for the inter-agency community mental health care programme, Aulas de Escucha, and in addition, she was assistant to the Interdisciplinary Studies and Social Action Programme on Child and Adolescents Rights, PRIDENA-University of Costa Rica. Currently, she serves as adviser on textual production for La Voz Activa and consultant at Innova Prosalud.

Laura Rivera Alfaro She is a social worker and a lawyer. Master’s degree in Social Work from the Federal University of Pará, Brazil. With over 10 years’ experience in the NGO sector, in both social projects and fundraising. Over the period 20182019, she was a contributor to the Interdisciplinary Studies and Social Action Programme on Child and Adolescents Rights, PRIDENA-University of Costa Rica and Coordinator of the V International and IX National Symposium on Child and Adolescents Rights, “Inequalities, Approaches and Experiences in a Scenario of Sustainable Development”, held in San Jose, Costa Rica in September 2019. Currently she teaches at the School of Social Work, University of Costa Rica and acts as independent consultant on issues related to public policy, sustainable development and human rights.

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T he gender perspective in communications on childhood and health in times of pandemic Carlos GĂźida

During the first four months of 2020 – and even before the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak to be a pandemic – children began to be mentioned in various communications aimed at specific groups: mothers and fathers, health care professionals, education communities, and others.

In these communications, children have been perceived from different angles, reflecting to some extent the paradigms underpinning them: - As individuals who might contract the SARS infection, but without developing the severe symptoms of other age groups; that is, with a very low probability of becoming seriously ill and dying.

- As individuals who are contagious, and therefore able to transmit the potentially lethal virus to populations more at risk, especially in emotional terms: their grandparents.

- As individuals who are vulnerable in terms of family life, mainly due to the risks of mistreatment and sexual abuse.

- As dependent individuals in the care of busy adults, who 101

must find ways to reconcile taking care of their children and at the same time, perform telecommuting tasks and unpaid work, among other situations.

This classification could be more extensive and comprehensive, but for the purposes of this paper, it is interesting to emphasize certain aspects of such communications.

The consequences are first considered in relation to the possibility of becoming seriously ill and dying. However, a clinical-healthcare perspective is insufficient and, if we understand health with a rights-based point of view, based on the satisfaction of basic human needs, tends to lose sight of other consequences. In this regard, a UNICEF communication (2020), emphasizes that: Without urgent action, this health crisis risks becoming a child-rights crisis. Disruptions to society have a heavy impact on children: on their safety, their well-being, their future.

Only through multilateral cooperation can we keep millions of girls and boys – including those who have been uprooted by conflict, children living with disabilities and girls facing a variety of risks – healthy, safe and learning.

This warning from UNICEF, is key to understanding the depiction of girls and boys transmitted by the media and virtual networks.

In a changing context, and with the urgency that safeguarding child rights deserves, it is in our interest to examine to what extent do the messages issued by prestigious health institutions reproduce – to varying degrees – the gender stereotypes and linguistic sexism so typical of the Spanish language. This, considering gender to be a social determinant of health-related inequalities.

There is undoubtedly a range of stereotypical messages, and it is clear that institutions that advocate for the right to health at this time do not encourage misogynist and homophobic messages. But in the interstices of texts and signifiers it 102

Carlos Güida Leskevicius Doctor in Medicine, University of the Republic (Montevideo, 1994). He has served in various roles and positions in various social organizations and government institutions and international cooperation in the field of childhood and adolescence, mainly in promoting gender equality. He was one of the founders and coordinators of the Free Lecture on Reproductive Health, Sexuality and Gender of the Faculty of Psychology at the University of the Republic.

He was elected Fellow of the ASHOKA Social Entrepreneurs in 2000, for his work with men on masculinities and gender. At present, he is an Associate Professor and Director of the Department of Community Health of the Science Faculty of the University of the Americas (Chile) and Executive Director of the Disasters and Risk Reduction Programme at the University of Chile (CITRID).

is possible to find clues to the continuity of sexist and androcentric linguistic practices.

Discussions on the Spanish language and its use are not new, but there is an area of dispute in the academic and social field. Two recognized authors state that “the problem of the inadequate representation of women by discriminatory or offensive language is not rooted in the alleged inadequacies of the language system, but in the linguistic practices of the speakers themselves and the action that social forces exert upon them” (Tapia-Arizmendi and Romani, 2012).

Moreover, various UN system agencies have been advocating for gender equality for decades.1 This has received a positive boost with the commitment undertaken by most nations in joining the 2030 Agenda 1 Some of these agencies include: UNFPA, UNDP, ILO, WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, UN Women.

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for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which includes in each goal certain gender equality targets, beyond the specific nature of the fifth goal. All of the goals emphasize acting on the basis of a positive valuation of girls and involving children in a future of greater equity.

We then explore the communications issued by some of the paediatric societies in Latin America and by the United Nations (particularly by WHO), in order to observe the use of gender inclusive language in writing in the Spanish language and how girls are, thereby, made visible.

THE LOSS OF THE GENDER PERSPECTIVE: COMMUNICATIONS FROM PAEDIATRIC SOCIETIES An analysis of the language used in communications related to the COVID-19 pandemic issued by paediatric societies of Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay, shows some similarities regarding the gender-based perspective.

We shall refer to some of them below.

A communication uploaded to the website of the Chilean Society of Paediatrics (SOCHIPE, 2020) in March shows that gender-inclusive language is non-existent. Only the male gender is used for terms that should include male and female, for example, niño (male child) and los niños (male children), references to caregivers: padre (male parent), and to medical practitioners: médico (male doctor) [Spanish nouns have a lexical gender of either masculine or feminine; when a term refers to male and female, in conventional grammar, only the masculine gender is used, which supposedly includes the feminine].

This style of language contrasts with the picture of a girl in the arms of a woman. People are encouraged to care for children (niños) and help them through this period of home confinement, but girls (niñas) are not mentioned; nor are the main home care reference points: women.

Two further aspects stand out in this communication addressing caregivers: the source of the information 104

also fails to use language inclusive of girls: it is the newsletter in Spanish of the American Academy of Pediatrics.1 And, moreover, it invites parents to use a children’s story (para niños), where the virus is personified as female.2 Similarly, a publication of the Uruguayan Society of Paediatrics (SUP, 2020), written in the first person plural, seems to refer only to nuclear urban middle-class families, with references to male figures in the plural in their home environment: abuelos (male grandparents), padres (male parents), cuidadores (male caregivers) of niños (male children). It is a healthy exercise to contrast this androcentric language to the suggestions put forward by the UNDP (UNDP, 2020) regarding care in times of pandemic: Non-remunerated domestic and care work has increased as a result of the outbreak of COVID-19, due to patient care at home, school closures, care of the elderly, social distancing measures and mandatory quarantines. Women and girls are often the primary caregivers at home and in general have more domestic chores and care responsibilities relative to men, spending on average 2.5 times more time in non-remunerated care work.

In this context, it is worth visiting the paper on Recomendaciones elaboradas por grupo interdisciplinario inter-sociedades científicas e intercátedras de Uruguay [Recommendations drafted made by the interdisciplinary, inter-scientific societies and inter-departmental group of Uruguay] – available on the website of the Uruguayan Society of Paediatrics – in which we note that el niño (the male child) is mentioned a total of 19 times, los niños (male children), 28 times, and niña (female child) or las niñas (female children), never. In the same paper, madres (mothers) are mentioned 20 times, while padre (father) is only mentioned a few times, in the role of “companion”.

1 The newsletter is called healthychildren.org, which in Spanish is also translated into the generic masculine: https://healthychildren.org/spanish/family-life/family-dynamics/communication-discipline/paginas/positive-parenting-and-covid-19_10-tips.aspx 2 The statement says “If your children (niños) still have trouble understanding, or are very small (chiquititos), here’s a very short text prepared especially for them (ellos) [all references are masculine]. Click HERE”. https://sochipe.cl/v3/docs/virus.pdf

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The term “gender” is non-existent in this paper related to the biomedical field of practice. It is not only a matter of the terms used, but this probably reflects what we have discussed in various published papers (Güida, 2003, Güida, 2011, Güida, 2006) regarding the role of the maternal and child health model and the place assigned to fathers.

A graphic example of the absence of the gender perspective in the communications of some paediatric societies appears in publicity for the online Cearense Congress of Paediatrics on COVID-193, where the roles of children follow the traditional gender roles.

While Portuguese supports the use of gender-inclusive language, through the use of a neutral term – criança – to refer to either a boy or a girl, this does not mean that professional practices have abandoned conservative paradigms.

3 Conference website: https://www.sbp.com.br/imprensa/detalhe/nid/socep-promove-congresso-cearense-de-pediatria-on-line-sobre-covid-19/

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GLOBAL HEALTH GOVERNANCE INITIATIVES: THE WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION With regard to health and in terms of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (United Nations, 2015), achieving the targets in goals three (good health and well-being), four (quality education) and five (gender equality) involves the highest consideration of health promotion with a gender perspective, including education and health communication.

However, this perspective appears to be elusive in some important declarations, within the framework of international consensus on health. In the Shanghai Declaration on promoting health in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (WHO, 2016), there is only one mention of the empowerment of girls, without any reference to the gender perspective. And in the Declaration of Astana (WHO, 2018), the culmination of the Global Conference on Primary Health Care, there is not a single mention of children – although it could be argued that they are implicitly included – and again the gender perspective is very labile, if observed in the light of the commitments undertaken in the SDGs. The WHO has now issued a teaching tool in the context of the coronavirus pandemic: a story that has been translated into several languages. This story, ‘My Hero is You’, has been translated into Spanish as Mi héroe eres tú (Patruck, H; 2020).4 An examination of its different versions shows that the text in Spanish is confusing at least when it comes to the language used: the mother is un héroe (a male hero), and the girl is un héroe (a male hero) [un is a masculine article; heroína is the feminine version of the word, although héroe is also used for women, but with a feminine article, una/la]. It is not only that gender-inclusive language is absent; the Spanish language itself has been misused. We should note that the book is a project produced by the IASC Reference Group on Mental 4 After the edition of this article, a new version of this story has emerged which incorporates the change previously mentioned. Which is good news, neverless the web page still has a version the other way. https://interagencystandingcommittee.org/system/files/2020-05/My%20 Hero%20is%20You%2C%20Storybook%20for%20Children%20on%20COVID-19%20 %28Spanish%29.pdf

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Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings. The publication gives a list of people who have taken part in the project: Over 1,700 children, parents, caregivers and teachers from around the world took the time to share with us how they were coping with the COVID-19 pandemic. A big thank you to these children, their parents, caregivers and teachers for completing our surveys and influencing this story. This is a story developed for and by children around the world.

In short, a text written with a clearly inclusive intention (nationalities, gender and disabilities), confronts a major obstacle in its translation into Spanish. If we examine the story in its Portuguese, Italian, French and English versions, we realize how inclusively language has been used, compared to the Spanish language.

It is also interesting to note that in the WHO’s own website in Spanish, this difference in the use of inclusive language is maintained, since the citations concerning various agencies keep using the generic masculine in Spanish.

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BRIEF CONCLUSIONS It is possible, therefore, to observe the shortcomings of the Spanish language and also the proper use of idiomatic resources to give visibility to girls when referring to all of those who are passing through childhood. It is also important to acknowledge the role of translations into Spanish by United Nations agencies.

In addition, the language used by paediatric communication areas may imply more than just a convenient adherence to the generic masculine; it may be a reflection of the perception of an individual referred to as niño (male child), so typical of the mother and child model. And which is in tune with analyses of the gender perspective gaps in the field of health care, education and sustainable development.

Bibliography Sociedad Chilena de Pediatría (SOCHIPE) (2020): “Niños y coronavirus: todo lo que debes saber sobre covid-19”. Rescatado 03/05/2020 de: https:// sochipe.cl/v3/mihijo.php?id=419 Uruguayan Society of Paediatrics (SUP), (2020): “Prevención de lesiones en el hogar. Desafío cuarentena: cuidarse del coronavirus y de las lesiones en el hogar. Rescatado 03/05/2020 de: https://www.sup.org.uy/2020/04/21/ prevencion-de-lesiones-en-el-hogar/ Tapia-Arizmendi, M; Romani, P. (2012): “Lengua y género en documentos académicos”, pp. 69-86. Convergencia, Revista de Ciencias Sociales, núm. 59, 2012, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México. Rescatado 02/05/2020: http://www.scielo.org.mx/pdf/conver/v19n59/v19n59a3.pdf García, A. (coord.) y col. (2020): “Recomendaciones elaboradas por grupo interdiscipliniario inter-sociedades científicas e intercátedras de Uruguay”. Rescatado 02/05/2020: https://www.sup.org.uy/2020/04/21/ comunicado-a-la-poblacion/ UNDP (2020): “Briefing Note: The Economic Impacts of COVID-19 and Gender Inequality: Recommendations for policymaking”. Retrieved on 109

02/05/2020: https://www.latinamerica.undp.org/content/rblac/en/ home/library/womens_empowerment/los-impactos-economicos-delcovid-19-y-las-desigualdades-de-gene.html Güida, C. (2006): “Equidad de género y políticas públicas en Uruguay: Avances y resistencias en contextos complejos” en Careaga, G. y Cruz, S. (coord.). Debates sobre Masculinidades. Poder, desarrollo, políticas públicas y ciudadanía. Edit. PUEG. UNAM. DF. Güida, C. (2011): “Varones, paternidades y políticas públicas en el primer gobierno progresista uruguayo” en Aguayo, F, Sadler, M. (comp) “Masculinidades y Políticas Públicas: Involucrando Hombres en la Equidad de Género”. Ediciones LOM. Santiago de Chile.

Güida, C. (2003): “El papel de los servicios de salud en la consolidación de las masculinidades hegemónicas” en publicación “Masculinidad”. AUDEPP - TRILCE. Montevideo.

WHO (2016): “Shanghai Declaration on promoting health in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”. Retrieved on 03/05/2020 from: https://www.who.int/publications-detail/shanghai-declaration-onpromoting-health-2030-agenda United Nations (2015): “Sustainable Development Goals” website. Retrieved on 04/05/2020 from https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/ WHO and UNICEF (2018): Global Conference on Primary Health Care.

From Alma-Ata towards universal health coverage and the Sustainable Development Goals. Retrieved on 02/05/2020 from: https://apps.who. int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/328123/WHO-HIS-SDS-2018.61-eng. pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y Patruck, H; (2020). “My Hero is You. How kids can fight COVID-19!” IASC. Retrieved on 03/05/2020 from: https://www.who.int/news-room/09-042020-children-s-story-book-released-to-help-children-and-young-peoplecope-with-covid-19 UNICEF (2020): “Protecting the most vulnerable children from the impact of coronavirus: An agenda for action”. Retrieved on 02/05/2020 from: https://www.unicef.org/coronavirus/agenda-for-action 110

Childhood, adolescence and sustainable development: targets.

Will we achieve them by 2030?

María Fontemachi

INTRODUCTION The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted in 2015 by 193 countries, establishes 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which the international community must reach for everyone, and do so sustainably and with equity. Beyond the fact that these goals are not binding, because there is no punishment for those who do not comply, they serve to guide us in our actions, as they are a vision of what should be achieved and where we must aim.

The SDGs promote the rights of humankind, and represent an opportunity to protect all children.

Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals is a challenge for associations such as the Asociación Latinoamericana de Magistrados, Funcionarios, Profesionales y Operadores de Niñez Adolescencia y Familia - ALAMFPYONAF (Latin American Association of Magistrates, Officials, Professionals and Operators for Children, Youth and Families) who work for the welfare and defence of the rights of Latin American and the Caribbean children and adolescents, striving to turn discourse into practice.

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Meeting the goals of the agenda proposed for the next decade, making the SDGs a reality, is a challenge involving structural, ideological, political and social changes in our countries, which will result in changing practices and putting children and adolescents at the centre, as protagonists, respecting their rights before any others and putting their interests ahead of those of adults, as provided for in the relevant international, national, provincial and municipal laws.

Ensuring the well-being of children and adolescents is an essential obligation of public policy that should engage the three powers of the State: administrative, legislative and judicial, each within the scope of its powers.

This move towards the goal, this guiding principle should be strategically planned and thought out if it is to be effective and make daily progress on this path towards meeting the goals, which are nothing less than respecting children’s basic fundamental rights... giving them what they deserve day by day. In this regard, we have noted some efforts, as reflected in the presentations at the various Latin American Conferences on Children, Youth and Family organized by ALAMFPYONAF every year (www.alatinoamericana-naf.com). But they are not enough.

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The laws have changed since the proclamation of the International Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989.

In general, the countries reiterate the principles of the commitment undertaken before the United Nations in their respective ratifications.

Practice, however, is another issue. No changes have been apparent in the social and political model that should put children and adolescents at the centre of decisions, especially in resource allocations in budgets, which are always limited when we talk about children, adolescents and family issues.

This is the situation we live in and we must work to make their sufferings cease, especially in the case of those who are historically the most vulnerable, those growing up in extreme poverty, lacking the loving care of a family with sufficient skills, with no education appropriate to their circumstances, without health, without basic care, in environments of violence in the absence of an effective defence of their rights, notwithstanding that many countries have created entities such as the “children’s advocate”, “child defender”, “curator ad litem”, etc.; we know that in many cases these are just words, with no foundation in reality. All of this affects children’s health and development and, ultimately, impedes their chances of having a life project.

We need the increased participation of all government actors, of those who have committed to achieving these goals; also of society, and especially, we need to give children and adolescents the place they deserve as protagonists of this present and of the future, as well as greater integration, interdisciplinary and inter-agency work, concrete proposals and actions that promote sustainable and inclusive development.

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2.STATEMENT, RESPONSIBILITIES

COMMITMENT,

TARGETS

AND

What are these targets?

What is the Latin American situation, for example, regarding poverty, the cause of the failure to comply with other rights that should be respected?

Which of these targets is it possible to develop in order to meet the objective “from discourse to practice�, thus safeguarding compliance for the well-being of children and adolescents?

In principle, it is important to understand what all of the sustainable development targets or goals are, as proposed by the very people who must meet them, the Latin American and Caribbean States: 1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere 2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture 3. Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages 4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all 5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls 6. Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all 7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all.

8. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all 9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and 114

sustainable industrialization and foster innovation 10. Reduce inequality within and among countries 11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable 12. Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns 13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts 14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development 15. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss 16. Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels 17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development All of these goals, except for 5, 13, 14 and 17, can be reduced to the first, as clearly outlined in the Declaration of the Heads of State and Government, which is transcribed below: “We, the Heads of State and Government [...] resolve, between now and 2030, to end poverty and hunger everywhere; to combat inequalities within and among countries; to build peaceful, just and inclusive societies; to protect human rights and promote gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls; and to ensure the lasting protection of the planet and its natural resources.�

These goals are wonderful if they could come true, but I wonder whether the Heads of State who signed these objectives really 115

believed that they were possible to achieve. What strategies were concocted in order to meet them? What requirements were proposed to their administrations by those who have the power to act more equitably, to change terrible realities such as poverty, inequality, cold or bloody wars, the destruction of the planet, etc.?

These changes would mean a great effort on the part of those who have more, in terms of equity, of renouncing privilege, of education of all and for all. So far, there are no signs, especially among the most powerful, that they are willing to do so.

What good are speeches recounting rights and misery, unless we change our practices?

What is the role of societies organized in public welfare institutions, associations and foundations?

In principle, I believe, firstly, that we must all train and commit to achieving everything that we are talking about; secondly, we must evaluate the impacts of what we say and do; thirdly, we should promote more and better scientific research concerning these issues. We should demand that government institutions and all persons and institutions with a special commitment as regards children and adolescents should fulfil their obligations and show actual data regarding the situations we refer to, poverty, education, violence, children without parental care, etc. There is still a great deal that we must change. Is this possible?

Our Latin American children and adolescents often lack the minimum elements necessary for subsistence, and face family and parenting problems associated with poverty, domestic, structural and social violence, organized crime, lack of a quality education that would allow them to develop comprehensively; in short, access to the rights enshrined in the Convention, especially access to justice.

Regarding the responsibilities based on the joint responsibility 116

principle, paraphrasing Provincial Law 9139 (Mendoza Republic of Argentina), we are all responsible: “families, State agencies, civil associations, regular associations and/ or foundations must ensure children and adolescents the full development of their personality, to the maximum of their potential, as well as the enjoyment of a full and worthy life, and these responsibilities must be fulfilled taking into account the best interests of the child.”

We must generate these necessary changes together, and, above all with true awareness of reality; as I have said, data are essential when planning changes. The few data available to institutions are often wrong, are kept from us, or do not exist; and/or we fail to make inquiries.

While this is a common and universal commitment, we know that every country has full sovereignty over its wealth, and I would also add, over its “poverty”, resources, lack of resources and economic activity, and each sets its own national goals.

It would be desirable that each should to adhere to the Sustainable Development Goals, as established in the text adopted by the General Assembly. In this connection, we must bear in mind the different situations, capacities and levels of development of each country in Latin America and the Caribbean, and even the differences within the same country.

An example of this is Argentina, which exhibits very different issues, resources and conditions throughout its territory. For example, the City of Buenos Aires (CABA) and the Province of Buenos Aires comprise 11% of the total area and account for half of the population, 20 million inhabitants of the 44 in the whole country. It is where most of the population and most resources are concentrated, and in consequence, the nation’s public policies are based on these circumstances, on the needs and, ultimately, the problems of this urban group. Laws are enacted that influence the whole nation, without considering the difference in resources and social behaviour in other areas of the country, to the detriment of the less populated regions.

The provinces with fewer resources are trapped by these 117

public and social policies that often fail to reflect their needs, are detrimental to sustained growth and are barriers to finding solutions to overcome their own situations.

II.- LATIN AMERICA, THE CARIBBEAN AND THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME: THE SITUATION Although the situation in Latin America and the Caribbean is well-known, there is no clear information about the context of children and adolescents, as related to the SDGs. This is very clearly evident in the reports that each country submits to the UNDP. It should be noted that when researching the situation of these goals in the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) appears on the Internet. As published on its platform, this programme is “an organization advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life”. On its website (undp.org) it includes its UNDP Strategic Plan, 2018-2021, which has been designed, according to this publication, to respond to the great diversity of countries they serve. “The diversity is reflected in three broad development contexts: eradicating poverty; structural transformations; and building resilience.”

Thus, the website of the Government of the Republic of Argentina, like other Latin American countries, when referring to the SDGs states that: “National Member States of the United Nations (UN) adopted in that document 17 Goals and 169 Targets to be met by 2030. The SDGs recognize that efforts to eradicate poverty must go hand in hand with strategies to promote economic growth and address a number of social needs, among which should be noted, reversing poverty, hunger, supporting education, health, social protection and employment opportunities, while fighting climate change and promoting the protection of the environment.”

Initially, Argentina considered the indivisible, comprehensive and cross-sectional features of the Agenda, in order to 118

adapt it to the national context; accordingly, it included the 17 SDGs and prioritized the 169 targets in keeping with the Government’s 8 major Objectives (OG) and 100 priority initiatives, with the elimination of poverty at the forefront. (https://www.argentina.gob.ar/agricultura/objetivos-dedesarrollo-sostenible).

Some of the objectives mentioned on the platform for 2030 refer to “End hunger, achieve food security and improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture, proposing goals and indicators adapted to Argentina”; “Double agricultural productivity and the incomes of small-scale food producers, particularly women, indigenous peoples, family farmers, herders and fishermen, including through secure and equitable access to land, other production resources and inputs, knowledge, financial services, markets and opportunities for generating added value and non-agricultural jobs”; “Increase value added production potential through balanced and sustainable agroindustrial development, to achieve a diversified exportable supply, safeguard food security and support small and medium producers and rural workers by increasing their income and improving their quality of life to encourage remaining on the land”.

The assignation of targets to the National Executive’s various ministries and agencies was performed in accordance with their respective responsibilities and objectives. Thus, each of the “agencies responsible” was responsible for at least one target, which was directly connected with its politicalinstitutional mandate.

Six working committees were convened to conduct this interagency work, according to the strategic areas constituted by the various ministries and agencies. These committees were: Education; Science and Technology; Sustainable Agricultural Production; Housing, Habitat, Urban Development and Infrastructure; Labour and Employment, and Social Protection.

The Ministry for Agro-Industry is part of the Sustainable Agricultural Production Committee, together with the Ministry 119

for the Environment and Sustainable Development and the Ministry for Treasury and Finance. But no results have been in evidence, since the poverty rate rose from 30.7% in 2015, when the goals were signed, to 35% in 2019.

Some of the data that appear below were published by the UNDP Programme for each country, although not all of them (Bolivia, Chile and Venezuela) included poverty rates, which were found in other reports, such as ECLAC’s.

From my research on this subject, in keeping with what was published by the UNDP on its site on Chile, for example, we should note that the Programme has focused on helping Chile’s institutions to develop solutions and knowledge to improve people’s lives. With respect to gender, only 23% of the representatives in Congress are women and regarding the distribution of wealth, 51.5% of income is held by the richest 5%.

These data are not very clear if we compare them to each other as regards poverty rates, income per person per year, etc., but we can conclude that discourse did not lead to practices, contrary to what was hoped for, in the last five years, in Latin America and the Caribbean at least, no reduction has been achieved in the rates of poverty, femicide, violence, etc.; per capita income has dropped and, as a result, children and adolescents suffer much more.

According to an article published by the BBC, in the last 5 years, 17 million people joined the ranks of the extremely poor in Latin America. While in 2014 there were 46 million in this situation, in 2018, figures rose to 63 million. The reasons for this were considered to be the fiscal adjustments achieved by cutting resources for the poorest households.

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), in its publication Social Panorama of Latin America, 2018, states that: “Although the region has made great strides over the period between the 2000s and 2015, 120

María Fontemachi PhD in Human Behaviour, Master’s degree in university education, Specialist in Criminal Sciences, Family Violence. Chair of ALAMFPYONAF. Undergraduate and Postgraduate Lecturer. Former magistrate

Country

Population

Poverty % 2015/2018/19

Income P/C USD

HD Percentage %

ARGENTINA BOLIVIA BRASIL CHILE COLOMBIA ECUADOR GUATEMALA

44.938.712 11.350.000 207.600.000 18.730.000 48.200.000 17.096.789 14.901.286

30,7 14,7 22,8 11,7 20.02 23,3 23.04

35,4 15,2 26,5 13,7 19,2 34.6 23,00

12.730,00 3.548,59 239,00 33.604,00 5.805,61 6.344,87 359,00

0,825 0,693 0,759 0,843 0,720 0,758 0,492

PARAGUAY

6.600.000

22,20

23,08

7.580,00

0,676

URUGUAY

3.415.179

9,07

8.1

16.246,00

0,808

CUBA

11.000.000

RCA. DOMINICANA

10.266.000

30,5

30,5

8.050,63

0.736

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since then it has experienced setbacks, particularly with regard to extreme poverty rates. The region’s poor performance in recent years, coupled with the weak economic cycle, calls for public policies on social protection to be implemented and renewed, particularly with regard to workplace inclusivity and income redistribution measures.” And it goes on to say that: “Efforts must be redoubled to promote high-quality jobs and the construction and expansion of comprehensive and effective social protection systems, which would enable the most disadvantaged households to accumulate the resources needed to have a decent quality of life.” And with regard to the SDGs it adds, wrongly in my opinion, “Achieving the poverty reduction targets set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is still feasible for the vast majority of the region’s countries.” Stating that “To this end, economic growth must be accompanied by public policies that help to reduce income inequality, both through labour markets that guarantee good wages and decent working conditions, and through (contributory and non-contributory) pension systems and transfers that ensure an income base for the most vulnerable”. https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/44396/4/ S1900050_en.pdf

The goals, as we see, according to the table above and the statistics, are very ambitious and if we continue using the same arguments and proclamations, without putting forward any practical proposals for their implementation, it will not be possible to achieve them. We need international agencies to take charge of evaluating them and contribute concrete and achievable proposals, so that the governments that undertook this commitment, comply with what they agreed to do, which was to end poverty by 2030, or at least, as ECLAC says, reduce it.

With regard to the SDGs, UNICEF has this to say: “We encourage the governments of the world to implement the Agenda for Sustainable Development, and in particular to: 1. End violence against children 2. Make ending child poverty the essential 122

element in eradicating global poverty. 3. Renew global efforts to end maternal and child deaths that can be prevented. 4. Pay more attention to adolescence, the second decade of life. 5.

Tap into the growing “data revolution� to promote the rights of all children. 6. Increase investment in all children, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized. 7. Break the cycle of chronic crises affecting children. 8. Prioritize education so that all children and adolescents attend school. 9. End exclusion and discrimination against girls. 10. Cope with climate change for the good of future generations� (UNICEF, 2015).

These are very moving accounts, but deeply unrealistic if we do not manage to make radical changes in our practices. As in other reports published by international organizations that aim to try to change these circumstances, UNICEF points to what should be done, in general terms, but this falls very short of being enough to change the situation as they intend.

To this outlook, we must now add the COVID-19 Pandemic, which has more than ever ravaged the economies of the countries in the region, with no possibility of defence or assistance, owing to the situation they were already in.

We need rigorous structural changes. We need to design and implement policies such as those described by agencies and in documents, which genuinely contribute to achieving balance.

To this end, special attention must be paid to the contexts and causes that have led Latin America and the Caribbean to this poverty and inequality which disproportionately affects children, adolescents, families and, especially, indigenous peoples.

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CONCLUSIONS: Countries have their representatives and they meet at the United Nations with the purpose of alleviating crises and inequalities on the basis of proposals, SDGs, etc., posed precisely by those responsible, who are in charge of solving them, those who manage the wealth of countries, those who administer them and who should be the ones who fulfil these aims.

The priorities imposed by those with political responsibility for planning and deciding depend on the human, technical and financial capabilities of each country, as well as on the degree of harmonization of national policies and plans with the SDGs. Society and the competent authorities are also key players for this achievement, as it is they who control these resource allocation decisions.

Based on what we have seen so far, we can infer, as I said above, that we are very far from meeting these goals. On the contrary, we are in a downward trend in terms of positive changes in the lives of people, especially in the lives of children and adolescents. We therefore need to think about how we can achieve them, each and every one of us, from our own places, and strive to ensure that the corruption that corrodes Latin American coffers, the inequality and the lack of good administration of resources, do not continue their onslaught on those who need these goals the most.

This is why I reiterate, “From discourse to practices�.

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Bibliography www.alatinoamericana-naf.com https://www.argentina.gob.ar/agricultura/objetivos-dedesarrollo-sostenible https://www.cl.undp.org/content/chile/es/home/our-focus. html https://www.uy.undp.org/ https://www.py.undp.org/ https://www.br.undp.org/ https://www.co.undp.org/ https://www.ec.undp.org/ https://datosmacro.expansion.com/idh/bolivia http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/es/countries/chile-es/ https://www.unicef.es/sites/unicef.es/files/triptico_ods_2015_ imp.pdf https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/44395/11/ S1900051_es.pdf

BBC NEWS MUNDO https://www.bbc.com/mundo https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&met_ y=sp_pop_totl&idim=country:BOL:PRY:CHL&hl=es&dl=es

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