A study on urban children poverty phenomenon: The deprivation of child rights and basic needs---The case of Tianjin, China

Child poverty is a troubling issue over the world. Many scholars and professionals have devoted themselves to alleviating and eliminating child poverty. However, hundreds of millions of children in the world are still suffering from poverty. In China, poverty is a serious social problem. Chinese government did intervene heavily in poverty alleviation in the last decades. But so far, compared to other social problems, the scholars and policy-makers in China have paid less attention to the issue of child poverty. In light of these developments, this study, based on a children's right perspective, sets out to identify the basic characteristics of urban child poverty as well as the basic needs of poor children. Further, it gauges urban poverty's social, economic and psychological impacts on the children and effects of current social policies. Qualitative methodology, including in-depth interviews and focus group methods, is adopted in this study. Some 19 poor families were interviewed in 2006-2007.;The main findings of this research are as follows: (1) There is no access to health insurance which threatens poor urban children's survival and health; (2) Educational fees, especially expensive compulsory education, compromise the right of development on the basic of equal opportunity. In addition, the existence of key schools and classes gives rise to educational stratification; (3) Basic rights of survival, development and protection of poor urban children are satisfied to a certain extent, but the right of participation is overlooked; (4) Poor families take on too much burden to realize children's rights and needs. Although the government provides some assistance, current social policies have many problems to meet the basic needs and they could not satisfy the child rights due to absence of and ineffective policies, strategies and social services; (5) Support from families, especially from grandparents, is indispensable for children's needs and rights.;This research reviews international experiences to draw attention in China to child poverty as well as to family and adult poverty, which will be helpful to future studies on this issue. We believe the Convention on the Rights of the Child is a basic policy framework to guide the implementation of children's rights and government obligations in China. Actually, the Chinese government should take a more positive attitude towards child poverty. More children's living and developmental indices should be collated and added in national statistics and more studies on child poverty should be encouraged. Universal and low-charge public social services, including education, health, social work and other basic welfare services, should be provided. Safety net and incentive employment policy should be implemented to secure poor people and stimulate them to get rid of poverty by employment. In brief, as a state party of The Convention on the Rights of the Child, Chinese government should work out more concrete policies and strategies to show respect to children's rights, and children's rights can be adopted as Chinese child policy model in the future.