Children’s rights: The need for care, safety and protection

Abstract

This paper aims to highlight the push factors leading to children’s vulnerabilities especially in historically impoverished communities in post-apartheid South Africa (SA). These push factors are hangovers that Black1 children continue to experience in their daily lives because of the ongoing impact of poverty and family behavioural patterns. Furthermore, the paper highlights how socially constructed violence is perpetuated in the form of gangsterism when factors such as unemployment, mental health issues and lack of services contribute to a lack of care, safety and protection of children, alluding to the State’s failure to provide basic services in impoverished communities. The lack of access to services coupled with the need to protect the rights of children promulgated in the UN Declaration of the Rights of the Child highlight how the State is directly implicated in the neglect of SA children’s wellbeing. Data collection included focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews with adult community members from two South African communities, exploring perceptions and experiences of everyday violence. Collaborative thematic analyses was used for analyses. Core themes that emerged centre on perceptions on the various dynamics within the family system that ruptures the family system and the various pull factors that attracts children to other replacement family systems. These factors are discussed under sub-themes.