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The article grapples with the tacit interplay of poverty, caste, and gender and its effects on the education of children in a village. It explores how pandemic-induced school closure impacted the life chances of marginalised children during and after the pandemic in the ‘deprived geography’ of rural Madhya Pradesh. The article offers accounts of rural SC/ST children, which subverts the narratives of affordability, flexibility, and ‘freedom’ online education presented during the pandemic-induced school closure for middle and upper-caste/class city dwellers. The experiences of Dalit and Adivasi…
An Exploration of Poverty as a Consumption Object: Voluntourist’s Stories from an Orphanage in Nepal
This paper examines the understanding of poverty emerging in voluntourists’ accounts of their first-hand experiences of poverty alleviation. Based on the ethnography of an orphanage in Nepal, the authors show that despite voluntourists’ good intentions and even (self-)criticism of the volunteer tourism approach to poverty relief, their accounts tend to consolidate rather regressive ideas about poverty. They draw on post-colonial and post-development theory to illuminate specific ways in which the old Orientalist tropes and discourses of othering are perpetuated in this novel neoliberal form…
Orphanage trafficking is a form of child trafficking, in which children are removed from their families, often under false pretences, and transferred or recruited into child care institutions where they often face various forms of exploitation for profit. When a child is trafficked in this way, their identity is frequently falsified so in documents they appear to be an orphan – a process known as ‘paper orphaning’. The exploitation of children in these circumstances ranges from sexual abuse to forced labour, begging, or being sold for illegal adoption or servitude. Some are trafficked for…
Orphanage trafficking involves the recruitment and/or transfer of children to residential care institutions for a purpose of exploitation and profit. It typically takes place in lower- and middle-income countries where child protection services systems are highly privatised, under-regulated, and primarily funded by overseas sources. In such circumstances, residential care is used prolifically and inappropriately as a response to child vulnerability, including a lack of access to education.
This study assesses and maps the legal, policy and procedural frameworks in both domestic and…
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated inequalities and barriers to social inclusion for people with disabilities. These experiences of social exclusion have been felt to an even greater extent by women with disabilities and under-represented groups of people with disabilities, leading to a range of effects on the operations and priorities of Organisation of People with Disabilities (OPDs). To address a critical gap in the evidence base, the Disability Inclusion Helpdesk carried out a rapid assessment of the role of OPDs during the pandemic, and how the pandemic has affected OPDs’ operations…
Sri Lanka's National Policy on the Alternative Care of Children outlines a comprehensive range of alternative care options and encourages the reforming of all formal structures that provide at-home and out-of-home services for children deprived of care and protection or at risk of being so. This policy also extends to children under care of the Juvenile Justice System. It provides policy solutions to programming for children at risk of family separation and facing deprivations such as child abuse, neglect, child labor, poverty, addiction, imprisonment, human trafficking, mental and physical…
Abstract
This article compares and contrasts two humanitarian emergencies and their impact on Nepal: these are the Nepal earthquake in 2015 and the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. It explains how each emergency has impacted children without parental care or at risk of family separation, with specific reference to orphanage trafficking, voluntourism, child institutionalisation and family preservation. In relation to each emergency, the article considers the role of disaster preparedness; the roles of the Nepal government, the international community and civil society; and the significance of one…
Abstract
Literature on orphanage tourism considers the motives of Western volunteers and the problematic nature of their compulsion to ‘help’ vulnerable children in the Global South. Orphanage tourism is also increasingly adopted into ‘rescue ideologies’ (Howard, 2016) and anti-trafficking/‘modern slavery’ campaigns. The perspectives of children involved, however, are missing from these discourses. This article draws on original empirical data to explore the narratives of young Nepali adults who lived in Kathmandu orphanages as children. Through these narratives, the article explores the…
This presentation was delivered by Marinus van IJzendoorn at a 18 November 2020 meeting of the Evidence for Impact Working Group, a working group of the recently launched Transforming Children's Care Global Collaborative Platform. The aims of the presentation were to present evidence of the harmful impacts of institutionalization on children, demonstrate some of the benefits of deinstitutionalization for getting children back on track, and raise questions about gap-year volunteers working in orphanages. Click the 'Settings' icon to view this video with French or Spanish subtitles. Access the…
This briefing paper has been compiled using information included in the Out of the Shadows Index and the ECPAT Country Overview for Nepal. The brief describes Nepal's score on the Out of the Shadows Index, which measured the country’s response to child sexual exploitation and abuse, including its assessment of Nepal's overall environment, legal framework, government commitment and capacity, and the engagement of industry, civil society, and media.
The brief also highlights the response of the Nepalese travel and tourism sector to sexual exploitation and abuse…