Abstract
Drawing on the work of various researchers and on the findings of a recently published national survey on street children, this article first presents a contemporary and systematic review of the street children phenomenon in Brazil. It then turns to recommendations set forth by international experts in the field, particularly in search of ideas on how to make the Brazilian youth justice system more sensitive to, and more efficacious for, this population. Notwithstanding its focus on the Brazilian context, since street children are indisputably a global phenomenon, this article has an inherent universal appeal.
Introduction
It was in the late-1970s that the so-called ‘street children phenomenon’ started to be recognized as a ‘social problem’ in Brazil (Butler and Rizzini, 2003). Over the years, numerous studies have been undertaken to examine this population and the lives they lead, the National Movement of Street Boys and Girls (Movimento Nacional de Meninos e Meninas de Rua) was founded, a different pedagogical system was introduced to provide ‘street educators’, and many new laws were created to protect children in Brazil (Bush and Rizzini, 2011; De Oliveira, 2000; Lusk, 1989; Pilotti and Rizzini, 1994). More than three decades after the ‘discovery’ of street children, however, and despite Brazil’s recent economic growth, there remains a worrying gap between Brazil’s human rights obligations and the lived experiences of street children.
Based on an extensive literature search and on the findings of a recently published national survey on street children, the first aim of this article is to address a series of questions including: Who are the street children? What takes them to the streets? What do they experience on the streets? What is the nature of their relationship with Brazil’s Youth Justice System? Thereafter, it will turn to an examination of the recommendations of international experts in the field to inform a discussion on how the youth justice system could be reformed to address more effectively the street children phenomenon in Brazil.
The First National Survey of Street Children in Brazil
Brazil’s Federal Government has recently published a draft report containing the findings of the first-ever national survey of street children in the country (hereafter ‘national survey’) (SDH, 2011). The national survey was undertaken at the initiative of the Secretariat for Human Rights of the Republic Presidency (Secretaria de Direitos Humanos da Presidência da República – SDH) and the Institute for Sustainable Development (Instituto de Desenvolvimento Sustentável – IDEST). The survey was conducted between May and June 2010 in 75 Brazilian cities, including all the capital cities and others with more than 300,000 inhabitants, and had both quantitative and qualitative dimensions. A total of 23,973 street children were counted, the majority of whom (22,124) were included in the survey. 1
The national survey has been criticized by some street children campaigners who claim that it ‘was completed in too short a space of time to fully develop and implement an adequate methodology to get a reasonably complete count’ and that ‘local experts were not consulted as to the range of places where street children could be found’ (Bush and Rizzini, 2011: 30). But even the more sceptical commentators agree that the survey ‘provides a much more detailed demography of street children than any other existing study’ in the country (Bush and Rizzini 2011:31; see also Rosemeyer, 2011). Indeed, despite the (unavoidable) limitations in a study of this scope and nature, these first-ever national research findings undoubtedly provide valuable (and up-to-date) insights into the street children phenomenon in Brazil and, as will be seen below, they come to add strength to much of what, for decades, small-scale qualitative localized surveys have revealed. Therefore, throughout this article, frequent reference will be made to the national survey, although care will also be taken to compare its findings with those of prior studies.
Defining the Terms ‘Child’ and ‘Street Children’
This article adopts the term ‘child’, in line with the use of the term in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC, 1989), according to which ‘a child means every human being below the age of eighteen years’ (Article 2). It is worth noting, however, that nearly half (45.13%) of the children counted in the national survey fall between the ages of 12 and 15 years (SHD, 2011), and that previous studies indicate a similar age group of street children in Brazil (see, for example, Fausto and Cervini, 1991; Rizzini, 1996).
No universal definition of ‘street children’ has yet been reached and the term includes a wide range of children whose exposure to the streets, and the precise nature of such exposure, varies considerably including: those who actually live on the streets alone or with their families; those who work on the streets during the day and return home in the evenings; those who have considerable contact with their families and those who have minimal or no contact with their families (Lusk and Mason, 1994). Probably the definition adopted by UNICEF is the most frequently used (Da Fonseca, 2008), according to which a street child is: […] any girl or boy […] for whom the street (in the widest sense of the word, including unoccupied dwellings, wasteland, etc.) has become his or her habitual abode and/or source of livelihood, and who is inadequately protected, supervised, or directed by responsible adults.
Others prefer what they deem to be ‘a more inclusive’ definition of street children as ‘children for whom the street is a reference point and has a central role in their lives’ (De Benítez, 2007; Rede Rio Criança, 2007). 2
The Processes of ‘Street Involvement’
Nearly 60 per cent of the children who engaged with the national survey indicated that they work on the streets during the day but return to a home (either to their parents’, relatives’ or friends’ home) in the evenings, as opposed to 23.2 per cent who indicated that they regularly sleep on the streets (on sidewalks, squares, bus stations, etc.). Many others indicated that they do not sleep in the same place every day – they sometimes sleep at home, at other times on the streets, and sometimes in other places such as homeless shelters (SDH, 2011).
These figures are important in confirming what small-scale qualitative research studies on street children have suggested for many years (De Benítez, 2003; Fausto and Cervini, 1991; Lusk, 1989; Ribeiro and Ciampone, 2001; Bush and Rizzini, 2011): that most of the street children have not left their homes and families to live on the streets, but even so are ‘street-involved’ and in need of the attention of public authorities.
Poverty and violence
Poverty and violence have become synonymous with the street children phenomenon in Brazil. Indeed, ever since the first studies on street children were carried out, the literature has repeatedly pointed out ‘the need for income’ and ‘the violence experienced at home’ as the two main factors that bring children onto the streets (Butler and Rizzini, 2003; De Benítez, 2007; Moura, 1991; Vargas, 2002; Vogel and Mello, 1991). Accordingly, nearly all children who engaged with the national survey − who reported working or begging on the streets − indicated that they were doing so in order to guarantee their own survival (52.7%) or to support their family’s budget (43.9%) (SDH, 2011). Also, nearly 80 per cent of those who work and sleep on the streets indicated their parent’s unemployment as one of the main reasons (they were allowed to give multiple reasons) for why they stopped returning home in the evenings (SDH, 2011). Again, the national findings echo previous local research. For example, in 1989, 86 per cent of street children who participated in a research project carried out in Rio de Janeiro reported that they were on the streets to help with the family’s budget (Rizzini, 1995). And research carried out in Amazonas, in the early 1990s, found that only 16 per cent of the street children’s parents were employed and that children were pushed to the streets in order to earn money (Rizzini, 1995).
Of course, not all poor children become street children in Brazil. It should be stressed that poverty, as a push factor to street involvement, ‘must be seen within the broader context of supportive or non-supportive relationships of an individual child’ (Wernham, 2004: 47). Violence at home also plays an important role in children’s ‘decision’ to get street involved. In the national survey, nearly 70 per cent of children who work and sleep on the streets indicated ‘domestic violence’ as one of the main reasons (alongside parental unemployment − they were allowed to give multiple reasons) why they stopped returning home in the evenings (SDH, 2011). According to previous research in Brazil ‘street-living children reported higher levels of corporal punishment at home (62%), compared to street-working children (23%)’ (Wernham, 2004: 23). That is, there are data suggesting that ‘violence at home’ is a strong precipitating factor for street involvement, especially among those children who actually sleep on the streets.
Apart from the poverty and violence experienced in the home (micro-environment), Brazilian street children come from low-income communities (meso-environments) – predominantly from the favelas (‘slum’ districts) – where they (together with their families) are subject to multiple deprivations and human rights violations (Bush and Rizzini, 2011; Da Fonseca, 2008; IBGE, 1992). The favelas are spontaneously constructed residential zones that, until recent years, were not even formally recognized by the public authorities and continue to struggle with little or no access to public support or services (Lusk and Mason, 1994). They typically comprise overcrowded unsanitary houses squeezed into ‘undesirable’ public spaces – such as on steep hillsides, near dumpsites, under bridges and viaducts, for example – where the inhabitants scrape a living from odd jobs and poorly-paid employment (Da Fonseca, 2008). The favelas are also sites of intensive criminal activity, especially of drug-related crimes and, therefore, are deemed to be the most violent neighbourhoods in Brazil (Bush and Rizzini, 2011). 3 If street children perceive ‘home’ as a poor and violent environment, this is amplified further by their negative experiences of ‘community’ (Rizzini and Butler, 2003).
Fun and freedom
There are many other factors pushing children towards the streets. Some, for example, report going to the streets in search of leisure activities or different forms of recreation that they are unlikely to find at home (Lucchini, 2003; Noto et al., 2003; Rizzini and Butler, 2003). Nevertheless, alongside the primary factors of poverty and/or violence, these are often secondary reasons that seem to work more as accelerators of the process of street involvement. Be that as it may, when asked why they were working or begging on the streets, 14.7 per cent of the children who engaged with the national survey indicated that the main reason was ‘to be able to use illegal drugs’; 7.2 per cent mentioned ‘to be free’; 6.8 per cent said there was nothing to do at home; and 6.3 per cent considered going to the streets to be more fun than staying at home (SDH, 2011).
Expectations of the streets
The question ‘what takes children to the streets?’ is intrinsically connected to another: ‘What do children expect from the streets?’. Children go to the streets principally in search of what is missing at home; namely, money, food, protection, support, affection (Rizzini and Butler, 2003) or, as stated by a street boy himself, in search of a ‘more peaceful and happy life’ than the one he had at home (Scheper-Hughes and Hoffman, 1998: 368). These high expectations create a sort of ‘fascination’ (Vogel and Mello, 1991) for the streets and this is what, at the same time, prevents children from considering the high price they will inevitably pay for living there.
Of course this is an over-simplified way of presenting an extremely complex process of street involvement. It is important to say that children do not consciously make a decision to move out to the streets in a certain day for specific, easily articulated reasons. On the contrary, they very often get caught in a coming-and-going pattern to and from the streets, returning home, fleeing again, successively (Ribeiro and Ciampone, 2001). Also, their street involvement should be seen ‘in the context of macro-level factors that impact negatively on family and community life’ (Peacock and Rosenblatt, 2013). Indeed, one must bear in mind that alongside their personal life circumstances, a morass of social, political and economic factors – such as internal migration and rapid urbanization in a post-dictatorship Brazil – also contributes to the presence of children on the streets (Cerqueira Filho and Neder, 2001; Peacock, 1994; Rizzini et al., 2010).
The Street Situation and the Violation of Children’s Human Rights
Brazil is a Signatory State to the UNCRC which sets forth children’s right ‘to survival; to develop to the fullest; to protection from harmful influences, abuse and exploitation; and to participate fully in family, cultural and social life’. However, the so-called ‘street situation’ of thousands of Brazilian children comprises grave violations of these very same fundamental rights (Melo, 2011; Peacock and Rosenblatt, 2013).
Making a living out of legal and illegal activities
To begin, in order to earn money and make a living on the streets, children ‘engage in experiences and embody responsibilities that are usually restricted to adults’ (Dos Santos, 2008). Some work selling goods, guarding and washing cars, carrying groceries, among many other street-based jobs; others beg on the streets or take to illegal activities such as stealing, robbing and selling drugs (Lusk (1992); Pilotti and Rizzini, 1994). In any case, street children generally end up having little or no contact with school (Dimenstein, 1991).
Accordingly, the national survey (SDH, 2011) revealed that the majority of street children carry out low-paid jobs on the streets, such as selling candy, ice cream or other cheap goods (39.4%); guarding or washing cars, or cleaning car windscreens (19.7%); separating recyclables in the garbage (16.6%); and shining shoes (4.1%). Almost one third (29.5%) said they make a living on the streets by begging, whilst some reported being involved in criminal activities such as stealing or robbing (8.1%) and drug trafficking schemes (3.6%).
Regarding the street children’s contact with school, the national survey (SDH, 2011) suggests that 56.3 per cent of Brazilian street children are currently not going to school, compared to 40.2 per cent who are (in a smaller sample of 2246 respondents). Previous studies have provided a much more detailed picture taking account of children’s specific street situation and suggesting that school attendance rates are significantly lower among those who sleep on the streets. In Rio de Janeiro, for example, it was found that among the children who actually live (i.e. sleep) on the streets, only 6.7 per cent go to school; whereas among those who still live with their families, 72.7 per cent go to school (Lusk and Mason, 1994). The explanation for low school attendance rates, particularly in the case of children who sleep on the streets, is clear: since most of these children get street involved because they need to earn money, they prioritize jobs over school (Rizzini et al., 2010).
Altogether, these children are deprived of the right to ‘develop to the fullest’ and end up in association with people, and immersed in activities, that make them particularly vulnerable to violence and to contact with the youth justice system (De Benítez, 2003).
The problem of substance abuse
Ever since researchers have begun to systematically study the street children phenomenon in Brazil, accounts of substance abuse amongst this population have been persistent in the literature (Inciardi and Surrat, 1998). Indeed, children’s increasing access to harder drugs is nowadays considered to be one of the most problematic issues of the ‘street children phenomenon’ in Brazil (Rizzini et al., 2010).
Back in the 1980s, the types of substances used by Brazilian street children seemed to be limited mainly to shoe glue and marijuana, because of their low cost and ease of availability when compared to other substances (Lusk, 1989; Trindade, 2002; Wernham, 2004). Over time, however, drug trafficking has spread significantly in Brazil and much of the writing on street children has reflected their growing involvement in the drug trade (Inciardi and Surratt, 1998). Due to the easy and inexpensive ways of producing some ‘new’ harder drugs, these are now accessible to drug users across all socio-economic groups. Given all these factors, street children are increasingly taking to harder drugs, such as ‘crack cocaine’, a deadly and highly addictive chemical derivative of cocaine. For example, according to a national survey on drug use among street children, the rate of crack cocaine consumption in Recife (a city in the Northeast of Brazil), which was just 1 per cent until 1997, increased to 20.3 per cent in 2003 (Noto et al., 2003).
Drug use is one of the most stigmatizing aspects of street children’s experience on the streets. Populist perceptions that all street children are drug addicts, for example, have restricted their access to basic services (as will be detailed in the following section), ‘while rendering them more susceptible to verbal abuse and humiliation at the hands of the public and police’ (Wernham, 2004: 55). Indeed, the image of a street child holding a bottle of glue is how the public generally see these children (Soares et al., 2003), and this also contributes to their vulnerability to violence and to contact with the youth justice system.
The stigmatization and stereotyping of street children
Prejudice and discrimination against street children are commonplace in Brazil. In fact, such children are victims of a harsh process of stigmatization that often results in them being presumed to be offenders (even when there is no offence); drug addicts (even if they have never used drugs); and ‘vagrants’ (even if they work hard). This stereotyping becomes very clear when they are referred to as trombadinhas, pivetes, moleques and maloqueiros, all pejorative terms that generalize them as ‘small thieves’ (Frontana, 1999).
As a result, besides becoming vulnerable to violence and to contact with the youth justice system, street children’s fundamental rights as Brazilian citizens are routinely violated. In the national survey’s smaller sample of 2246 children (SDH, 2011) it was found that 36.6 per cent of the respondents have been prevented from entering shops or shopping centres; 31.1 per cent from using public transport; 27.4 per cent from entering banks; and 20.1 per cent from entering a public agency (for example, a post office). Moreover, 12.9 per cent of the children said they have already been denied treatment from public health services; and 6.5 per cent have not been issued personal documents (such as identity cards, which are mandatory for Brazilian citizens). Generally speaking, over half of the respondents have experienced at least one of the aforementioned forms of discrimination.
Violence on the streets
Children often describe daily life on the streets as being characterized by ‘fear and violence’ (Rizzini et al., 2010). Indeed, street children frequently become victims of all forms of violence perpetrated both by members of the public and, what is more striking, by the police. That is, those who should be protecting such children from abuse are very often abusers themselves, in an astonishing double violation of human rights (Wernham, 2004).
Seen as ‘a blemish on the urban landscape and a reminder that all is not well in the country’ (Scheper-Hughes and Hoffman, 1994: 23), street children are often the targets of ‘street clean-up operations’, in which the police simply take them off the streets and either hold them somewhere (e.g. police stations) or send them back home. These operations are characteristic of the Brazilian authorities’ desperate measures to ‘remove problems from people’s sight’ (instead of solving them), particularly during election campaigns or before and during big international events. 4 Unsurprisingly then, due to the lack of ‘a comprehensive and holistic range of child-friendly services to genuinely expand the life choices available to street children’, such children end up returning to the streets at the first possible opportunity (Wernham, 2004: 84).
The ‘street clean-up operations’, as described above, represent one of the Brazilian authorities’ ‘legal’ – or, at least, ‘official’ – although ineffective, attempts to get children off the streets. The picture gets significantly worse in respect of the involvement of Brazilian police in so-called ‘death squads’; armed groups that ‘clean-up’ the streets by killing street children, apparently legitimized by claims that they are ‘guaranteeing public safety’. 5 Accordingly, empirical studies reveal that police officers are considered by the street children as ‘their worst enemies’ (Ribeiro and Ciampone, 2001: 46) and what they ‘most fear’ on the streets (Dimenstein, 1991: 3). Such data were recently echoed by the national survey, in which the majority of those who sleep at home said they preferred not to sleep on the streets because of ‘violence’ (56.1%) or ‘police operations’ (35.7%) (SDH, 2011).
Street Children in the Brazilian Youth Justice System
Given the circumstances in which street children live, and the discrimination they endure, they are highly likely to come into contact with the youth justice system whether or not they have actually engaged in criminal behaviour. In fact, they are commonly seen as a ‘threat’ to public safety and, in turn, often meet repressive responses from the authorities (Melo, 2011; Rede Rio Criança, 2007; Rizzini et al., 2010). In this context, Wernham (2004: 14) provides a threefold typology of street children: children in actual conflict with the law; children in perceived conflict with the law; and children in need of care and protection. The first group refers to those who actually engage in criminal activities; the second group, to those who are technically in conflict with the law due to out-dated legislation that needs to be reformed urgently; and the last group refers to those who do not engage in criminal activities, but are arrested illegally on prejudicial suspicion of being involved in criminal behaviour.
Street children in actual conflict with the law
It has always been difficult to collect data on street children’s actual involvement in illegal activities. And this is not only because they are unlikely to ‘open up’ about their ‘criminal experiences’ to an interviewer. In fact, as found elsewhere (Da Fonseca, 2008), the very limited statistics presented by the Brazilian youth justice system fail to show how many registered young offenders are (or were) street children. In fact, most probably reflecting the lack of a standard definition for street children and the many myths around this population (for example, the widespread belief that they are all devoid of family ties and live permanently on the streets), many judges report that for official statistical purposes, all young offenders that claimed to have an address were not considered to be street children (Da Fonseca, 2008).
So, there are no reliable data showing how many street children actually engage in criminal activities or how many known young offenders are currently, or were, street children. Nevertheless, much of the literature illuminates the limited choices available to children living and working on the streets who, despite their best efforts not to engage in criminal behaviour, might be coerced into adult or street gang criminality or simply confronted with dilemmas such as ‘Do I steal or go hungry?’ (Wernham, 2004). Moreover, some studies have suggested that the streets are highly criminogenic environments and that, in turn, the longer children are living on the streets, the more likely they are to get involved in crime (Hagan and McCarthy, 1999).
Street children in perceived conflict with the law
Due to outdated legislation, a legacy from colonial times, street children can still be legally arrested in Brazil for ‘vagrancy’. Indeed, odd as it may sound for a country where millions of people live below the poverty line, there is still legal provision criminalizing the act of ‘wandering about without lawful or identifiable means of subsistence’, as ‘vagrancy’ (defined in Article 59 of the Brazilian Act on Criminal Contraventions). 6 Consequently, as noted by Wernham (2004: 52), huge numbers of children are being arrested and locked up simply ‘for being poor and in the wrong place at the wrong time’.
This was also the case for ‘begging’, which was prohibited in Brazil and considered to be a criminal offence until 2009 (according to Article 60 of the aforementioned Act). Intriguingly, whilst begging was abolished on grounds of being a discriminatory provision against the poor, the vagrancy proscription has remained in force. In any case, whether based on current legal provisions or upon repealed law, ‘vagrancy’ and ‘begging’ are still behaviours that children may engage in whilst on the streets and that may further compound their vulnerability to criminalization and exposure to the youth justice system.
Children in need of care and protection 7
Although children making their home or livelihood on the streets is not a new phenomenon in Brazil, the public authorities have failed to tackle the roots of the problem and instead children are more often than not being ‘treated’ by the youth justice system (Melo, 2011). In effect, the factors that tend to drive children onto the streets (including poverty and ruptured family relationships) are often the very same factors that put them at risk of contact with the youth justice system (Wernham, 2004), in a sort of ‘inevitable’ path from the streets to the youth justice system. That is, a huge number of children in need of care and protection are getting caught up in the Brazilian youth justice system even if they have not committed a crime.
The ‘revolving door’ cycle
So, street children are highly likely to come into contact with the youth justice system – but then what? In accordance with the UNCRC, Article 122 of the Brazilian Statute of the Child and Adolescent (ECA) provides that the detention of under 18year-olds should be used ‘as a measure of last resort’ and ‘for the shortest period of time possible’. In practice, however, street children are often locked-up for long periods of time for alleged offences that would not result in imprisonment if they were committed by adults (Human Rights Watch, 2003; De Mello, 2004). Moreover, once caught up in the Brazilian youth justice system − for any of the reasons outlined above − street children often get trapped in a cyclical process, moving back and forth between the streets and ‘detention’ (Rizzini and Butler, 2003; Wernham, 2004).
Indeed, whilst remanded in custody – whether unofficially in police stations, in preventive detention (awaiting trial), or as a result of sentencing – these children are not provided with adequate educational and rehabilitative programmes. In turn, when released, they often return to the streets where they are again vulnerable to contact with the youth justice system. The ‘revolving door cycle’ is described by Wernham (2004: 63): [It] is likened to ‘a revolving door’: however far the children enter into the system, without [adequate] intervention, they are likely to end up back on the streets again where they started from – most likely even worse off than before, with additional mental, physical and sexual scarring to add to the existing catalogue of difficult experiences with which they must already cope.
Revisiting Recommendations on How to Tackle the Street Children Phenomenon
As demonstrated, the street children phenomenon clearly raises many different concerns, ranging from children’s problematic relationships with the police to their addiction to drugs, to their low rates of school attendance, and ultimately to the ‘revolving door’ cycle in which they become enmeshed in the youth justice system. Unsurprisingly, the topic can be approached from very different perspectives and, in turn, intervention strategies for street children may vary considerably in scope and nature.
Back in 1989, Lusk identified four different approaches to the street children phenomenon in Latin America: the ‘correctional approach’ (in which street children are perceived as ‘delinquents’ and are therefore ‘locked-up’ by public authorities); the ‘rehabilitative perspective’ (where, based on assumptions of personal pathologies and skills deficiencies, street children are ‘treated’, often by NGOs and in residential care settings, to develop social skills and pro-social attitudes); the ‘outreach strategies’ (where educational, counselling and advocacy services are provided to children in the street setting, normally by street educators) and the ‘preventive outlook’ (in which emphasis is placed on community-based programmes providing daytime activities that prevent children from getting street-involved) (Lusk, 1989: 67−74). He concludes by briefly suggesting that what approach should be used depends on the group of street children under consideration – for example, according to him, ‘rehabilitative and outreach programs are needed for those children who have severed their link to society’s institutions’ (Lusk, 1989: 74).
More recently, De Benítez (2003) distinguished between three main governmental approaches to the problem of ‘homeless street youth’ (with no particular focus in any country): a ‘reactive’ approach (where street children are seen as a ‘criminal problem’ to be dealt with by the youth justice system), a ‘protective’ approach (in which street children are perceived as people in need of special care and protection and where interventions are focused on specific problems such as integrating them into formal education and withdrawing them from work), and a ‘rights-based’ approach (in which children are seen ‘as human beings whose fundamental rights have been violated’ and, therefore, interventions are holistically – and broadly – directed towards ensuring these children’s access to basic health services, education, housing, etc.). According to De Benítez, ‘only one approach, the rights-based approach, responds adequately to the legal responsibilities towards street children assumed by all governments upon ratification of the [UNCRC]’ (De Benítez, 2003: 6).
There is clear convergence between Lusk’s and De Benítez’ conceptualizations. De Benítez’s ‘reactive approach’, for example, refers to the same sort of programmes that Lusk would place under his ‘correctional approach’ label; and much of what Lusk means by ‘rehabilitative perspective’ echoes the ‘protective approach’ proposed by De Benítez. It might be helpful to rearrange the aforementioned categories into two distinctive approaches to the ‘problem’ of street children in Brazil: a ‘prevention-oriented approach’ (in which street children’s human rights are respected and they are considered to be in need of care and protection) and a ‘repression-oriented approach’ (in which street children are viewed as a potential threat to public order).
Most studies on street children promote a ‘prevention-oriented approach’ focusing on how the social welfare and educational systems could be reformed to prevent this phenomenon (see for example Cerqueira Filho and Neder, 2001; De Benítez, 2007; Rede Rio Criança, 2007). Such writers generally avoid making recommendations on how to better tackle the street children phenomenon through the youth justice system, probably to avoid the danger of criminalizing social policies involving street children, which is, of course, a legitimate concern in light of the fact that such children are already victims of a harsh process of stigmatization and criminalization. In contrast, as argued throughout this article, repressive approaches are the most common responses amongst Brazilian public authorities’ attempts to tackle the phenomenon. And, as stated, this simply means that street children often get trapped in the youth justice system’s ‘revolving door’, moving back and forth between the streets and ‘detention’.
In consequence, I would argue that reforms must be made to the Brazilian youth justice system in order to effectively tackle the ‘street children phenomenon’. This is not to say that remedial interventions should be favoured over preventive interventions (to prevent children from getting street-involved in the first place). Nor is the intention to criminalize social policies involving street children. Moreover, any attempt to improve the way that the Brazilian youth justice system responds to the phenomenon is likely to be fruitless unless it is accompanied by more holistic ‘social reorganization’. The fact remains that street children in Brazil are highly likely to come into contact with the youth justice system regardless of their involvement, or non-involvement, in crime. Urgent reforms to improve the Brazilian youth justice system are needed, therefore, to promote and protect the human rights of street children and to help halt the revolving door cycle described above.
So, whilst it may be argued that reforming the Brazilian youth justice system will be fruitless if complementary reforms are not implemented simultaneously, the opposite is also true: reform of the social welfare, health and educational systems will be wasted if the Brazilian youth justice system is not similarly changed. The following proposals aim to offer some guidelines on how the Brazilian youth justice system could become more sensitive to, and more efficacious for, the street children phenomenon.
Street children’s voices must be heard
Researchers are unanimous that programmes involving street children must allow for their voices to be heard (see for example De Benítez, 2011). And the rationale underpinning such a recommendation is simple: ‘they are the ones who know the most about what they need and what could make a difference in their lives’ (Rizzini et al., 2010: 75). Giving such children ‘voice’ is the only way through which individually tailored approaches can tackle the street children phenomenon. The criminalization, stereotyping and dehumanization of street children arise precisely from a failure to understand and treat each child as an individual. An individualized approach would help to change the way street children are perceived by others and, ultimately, inhibit the ‘often blanket responses from the youth justice system’ (Wernham, 2004: 22).
Interventions should help street children reorganize their sense of ‘selfhood’
In a very interesting study carried out to identify the reasons why some children are able to ‘escape’ the streets, Lucchini (2003: 66–84) suggests that the process of ‘street detachment’ requires children to reorganize their sense of selfhood in the first place. He goes on to explain that the feeling of belonging to the streets is a very important component of street children’s individual identities and that, therefore, the decision to leave the streets necessarily implies a change in the way they see themselves. According to Lucchini, to be able to create this ‘new’ image of themselves, children will almost always need positive references, which are often other people (usually adults) for whom the streets are not a central part of life. When this ‘new’ image is formed and becomes irreconcilable with their living conditions on the streets, the process of ‘street detachment’ begins. Finally, the existence of a viable non-street alternative project is crucial for this process to be successful.
Drawing on the above, interventions to tackle the street children phenomenon in Brazil should provide the opportunity to help such children change the way they perceive themselves. But this will only be feasible if children’s families and the wider community become actively engaged in the process of ‘street detachment’, whether in the early days of their ‘street life’ or during children’s passage through the youth justice system. In effect, the family and community members are the ones to play the role of ‘positive references’ and, without their engagement, designing an alternative project to life on the streets becomes almost impossible.
Work with street children needs to focus on choices
Putting together alternative plans for children on the streets, as a means of ‘successfully’ completing the process of ‘street detachment’, necessarily implies exploring the concept of choices. This means that, if the aim is to break the ‘revolving door’ cycle in which these children are trapped, any reform to the youth justice system should allow for: (1) a better understanding of their choices; (2) opportunities to expand their choices; and (3) strategies to empower them to actually make, and carry through, their (new) choices (Wernham, 2004).
It is necessary to understand that street children are often confronted by what they perceive as limited or non-choices – such as ‘Do I stay at home and continue to be abused by my step-father, or do I take my chances of being abused on the streets?’ or ‘Do I help in the older boy’s robbery or get beaten up by him?’ (Wernham, 2004: 26). Within this context, work has to be done to help street children identify other life options. This will sometimes mean that ‘new’ choices will have to be made available (e.g. a ‘new’ job opportunity will have to be offered), but sometimes it will simply be a matter of helping them to recognize the choices that are already available to them (e.g. that their family members are willing to have them back at home).
Finally – after understanding and expanding street children’s choices, and considering that some of them have been through ‘a history of repeated coercion or abuse which can be inherently disempowering’ (Wernham, 2004: 27) – interventions should be able to empower them to follow through with their ‘new’ choices. Again, the involvement of family and community members in the ‘process of choices’ is crucial – particularly during the stages of ‘expanding choices’ and ‘empowering children to go through them’.
Diversion should be favoured over formal court proceedings and detention
Diversion programmes should be implemented at the earliest possible stage of street children’s contact with the youth justice system (De Benítez, 2003; Melo, 2011; Rizzini et al., 2010; Wernham, 2004). The claim is particularly relevant for turning children away from the formal court proceedings and, ultimately, from ‘detention’.
Indeed, diversion is crucial for four core reasons. First, formal court proceedings and detention do not usually allow for street children’s voices to be heard – in turn, the above mentioned ‘blanket responses’ are commonplace and it becomes difficult to put all the other recommendations into force. Second, such interventions do not help street children to change the way they perceive themselves – on the contrary, formal court proceedings and detention often ‘label’ children and reinforce their criminal ‘status’. Third, because of their formality and proceduralism, court proceedings allow little space for discussions over street children’s ‘life choices’; and detention usually lessens the choices available to them (for example, after detention, reintegration into the family might not be perceived as an alternative to the streets anymore). Fourth, when street children leave the streets due to detention, ‘this rupture with the streets will almost always lead to their introduction in adult criminality’ (Lucchini, 2003: 81).
Concluding Remarks
After illuminating the street children phenomenon and the lives that such children lead, this article makes the case for a ‘youth justice approach’ to the ‘problem’ of street children in Brazil. In this context, I have argued that, although preventive intervention should be favoured over remedial interventions, the fact that many street children are already trapped in the Brazilian youth justice system’s ‘revolving door’ should not be ignored. That is, although changes to the social welfare, health and educational systems are vital they are not enough in themselves: the Brazilian youth justice system has an important role to play in addressing the street children ‘problem’ in Brazil and should be actively engaged in national efforts to tackle this phenomenon. 8
That being the case, urgent reform to the Brazilian youth justice system is needed. The lack of specific legal provisions on street children (both in the UNCRC and the ECA), alongside many other legitimate reasons (including to avoid criminalizing social policies involving street children), may well have led the Brazilian youth justice system to give insufficient consideration to the special profiles of such children. In turn, they are being dealt with via ‘blanket responses’ that often ignore their complex life trajectories, do not allow for their voices to be heard, and do little or nothing to empower them to ‘escape’ the streets.
The recommendations laid out above are intended to shed light on the principles upon which the Brazilian youth justice system might be reformed to become more sensitive to, and more efficacious for, the street children phenomenon. And although this article cannot – and should not – be the final word on the topic, it will hopefully inspire further discussion and debate around the role that youth justice systems should play in addressing the street situation of millions of children in Brazil and elsewhere in the world.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I thank Professor Carolyn Hoyle and the anonymous reviewers for their comments, which have improved this article significantly. All errors remain, of course, my own.
Notes
Fernanda Fonseca Rosenblatt is a Lecturer in Criminal Law at the Universidade Católica de Pernambuco, Brazil. She has been awarded a scholarship from CAPES Foundation, an agency under the Brazilian Ministry of Education, and is currently on sabbatical leave to pursue doctoral research at the University of Oxford, UK.