The World Conference on Education

11 Pages 2711 Words

ate and, under some conditions, entails the obligation to provide directly. We usually think of the right to education in terms of the obligation of Governments to provide educational services directly; they should rather, perhaps, give more attention to facilitating schooling, especially at the secondary and higher levels.

Social returns to investment in education are high. The data demonstrate unambiguously that government expenditures on education yield substantial benefits on many dimensions of development. But if education pays off so handsomely, why don't Governments and parents guide children accordingly? How can social investment be aligned with private investment? Perhaps we can get an answer by looking at education as a means of addressing the problem of child labour, which is a matter of concern when children work in conditions that are abusive and exploitative. More precisely, Article 3 of the International Labour Organization's Convention on the Worst Forms of Child Labour of 1999 defines the worst forms in terms of slavery, prostitution, pornography and illicit activities, and more generally as "work which by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children".4

Those who offer proposals for dealing with the exploitation of children generally fall into two major camps: the abolitionists who want to end child labour; and the ameliorationists who want to improve the conditions under which they work. Neither camp has been very effective. National and international child labour laws are frequently ignored in both rich and poor nations. Such laws are regularly ignored in practice, because they do not take full account of the social, political and economic forces that sustain child labour. Yes, one can say children should not work, but how then are they and their families to live? Yes, one can say children should have better lighting and better toilet faci...