Anti-Corruption Organizations and Child Labor
September 21st, 2009
One form of corruption involves child labor. Cases of this are well known to happen in the silk and garment industry in India. Even today, the government, although enacting laws regarding this issue, they remain unable to control the situation. This is a case of societal norms, as the caste system of India is based on just this kind of placement, of one’s specific placement on the societal scale. The children working in these industries are basically slaves to the system, and slaves on a literal level. Many times these children have no way out as they are basically sold to the business owners by their parents.
The children work off the “loan”, and should they leave, their families would face considerable consequences. These children are “dalits”, considered to be the lowest form on the level of the caste system, and while they are paid from time to time a paltry sum, they are basically just slave labor. This is an issue that complicates the development of the children into healthy adults. They are pulled into a world that is meant for grown people, and they miss out on education, they miss out on being kids. Statistics compiled by anti-corruption and child welfare organizations, state that in the world today, more than seventy million kids, between the ages of ten and fourteen, are being put to work in businesses all over the world. That means that just over thirteen percent of the children living today in that age group, are in the work force.
These children are not working summer part time jobs for spending money, they are working full time in order to support their families or to pay off the debt. They do not reap the benefits of their toil, it is given away. This has many hazards, that are obvious such as the effects it has on the child, mentally, socially, physically, spiritually and emotionally. Many organizations around the world work hard a combating this, such as Change.org. This group tracks alleged cases of child labor, and serves to get the word out about companies that sell goods that were produced by children. In boycotting these companies, they will be forced to take responsibility for their cruel actions.
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