• Violence against children

Violence against children

This report aims to promote a better understanding of street children’s lives and encourage policy-makers, activists, community leaders and service providers to take effective actions to prevent and reduce violence experienced by street children.

The key findings of the report are:

• street children accumulate numerous experiences of violence from an early age and in a range of environments. Their high risk of exposure to multiple abuses is consistently overlooked in policy development and service delivery for street children
  
• street children's experiences in countries across the world are strikingly similar understanding street children’s exposure and responses to violence is key to developing integrated, preventive and protective policies and services which nurture children’s resilience
  
• governments around the world still continue to use violent tactics with street children, which contravene their rights, exacerbate their experiences of violence and scapegoat them and their families
  
• civil society approaches have matured during this period,introducing inclusive methods of supporting children, families and communities to reduce the risks of violence in street children’s inter-connected environments

The report makes six central recommendations:

• policy makers, community leaders and service providers must work to secure a social protection system with a wide variety of options for supporting street and other children who have experienced multiple abuses
  
• a culture of violence-free households should be a central goal, public policies need to prepare and support people for parenting and ban all violence in the home
  
• investment to develop community-based organizations and linkages between them in poor neighbourhoods is fundamental to reducing local violence, particularly schools should be inclusive, affordable and violence-free
  
• a culture of respect for children must be introduced and sustained in institutional services and public spaces. Police and staff at all levels of the juvenile justice and welfare systems need adequate training
  
• poverty and inequality in wider society need to be addressed to reduce violence and prevent children from needing to work or survive on the streets
  
• an international body should be charged with coordinating and improving the availability of data associated with street children and risks of violence.

The report does state though that no single recommendation will prevent children from experiencing violence or protect street children who have already experienced violence. Effective strategies must address the wider environmental system, of family relationships, community and society within which each child develops and with which he or she interacts.

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