The Children Left Behind: UNICEF report on children in the richest countries

I've been meaning to prepare a blog post for readers of GPS so as to answer some of the questions posed to me in the comments of these two posts. Like something explaining what "social control agent" means. Or describing exactly what a child welfare specialization entails. I'm getting there.

However, this is too important to not blog about right now! The link takes you to a page which is a press release for the report, and where you can download the pdf version.

The following is copied from that page:

"[The report] ranks, for the first time, 24 OECD countries in terms of equality in health, education and material well-being for their children. The report looks at a particular aspect of disparity – bottom-end inequality – and asks how far behind are rich nations allowing their most disadvantaged children to fall."

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives blogs about the report here, in a post titled "UNICEF shames Canada for inequality among children". (That's right, they SHAME Canada. If only UNICEF could impose harsher sanctions than shaming. CCPA concludes by wondering if our government has any shame at all.)

CCPA reports the study "looks at inequality by measuring the gap between those at the middle of the pack (the median position) with those at the bottom. The critical question, the report says, is just how far behind children should be permitted to fall?"

One final quote, (from UNICEF) and I will end my rant:

"The idea that inequality is justified as a reflection of differences in merit cannot reasonably be applied to children. Few would deny that children’s early circumstances are beyond their own control. Or that those early circumstances have a profound effect on those present lives and future prospects. Or that growing up in poverty incurs a substantially higher risk of lower standards of health, reduced cognitive development, of under achievement at school, of lower skills and aspirations and eventually of lower adult earnings, so helping to perpetuate disadvantages from one generation to the next.

None of this is the child’s fault."