This paper is part of a broader research and networking programme that aims to strengthen linkages between action on poverty, development and child protection. It reports on an adapted systematic review that examines the contribution of anti-poverty programmes to child protection interventions in four areas – child marriage, sexual violence, physical violence and inadequate care – in low- and middle-income countries. In addition, it adapts a systematic review methodology to increase its applicability to policy areas where much of the evidence is qualitative and/or based on grey literature.
The review focuses on two questions: to what extent do child protection interventions (in the four focal areas) have an anti-poverty focus; and what contribution do anti-poverty components make to improving the quality of child protection interventions.
Key findings:
- The majority of evidence suggests poverty is not a particularly significant factor underlying corporal punishment and social norms condoning corporal punishment play bigger role. Although, in some contexts the risk of frequent and severe punishment is higher in poor households. There is also no quantitative evidence to suggest sexual abuse of children occurs more frequently in lower-income households. Thus it would be expected that both the extent of economic strengthening activities and their impact to vary between different types of child protection violation.
- Economic strengthening is rarely the sole mechanism employed in child protection programmes– only in one programme combating early marriage and one aimed at reducing sexual violence is it the sole mechanism employed. It is the sole mechanism for three programmes that affect the quality or quantity of care young children receive, but in all of these the impact on children is a secondary benefit rather than the focus of the programme. The majority of child protection programmes with an economic strengthening component involve multiple activities and have a reasonable degree of integration between them (typically children/young people who took part in economic strengthening components were also attending life skills or vocational skills classes).
- Most of the programmes examined involved direct activities with children and young people or their families, to prevent violation of protection rights or support children whose rights had been violated. Thus, most economic strengthening is implemented at the micro level: they aim to raise poor households’ income directly (e.g. through cash transfers) or by strengthening young people’s capacity to make a living. Likewise, most education, life skills or awareness-raising programmes involve direct activities at community level. No programme was found that formally linked participants or users to existing public social protection or other anti-poverty programmes.
- Majority of economic strengthening activities aiming to reduce early marriage and sexual exploitation focus on adolescent girls. Where economic strengthening activities were targeted only at girls (or certain groups, e.g. refugees, former child soldiers), this led to some resentment among other young people who were often equally poor and had no access to programmes of this kind, indicating the importance of more inclusive services. Programmes aiming to reduce young people’s involvement in or vulnerability to physical violence disproportionately benefited boys. Adolescent-focused life skills and education programmes are typically targeted at teenagers. Few evaluations discussed any differentiation in how far young people were able to practise the life skills they had learnt.