The Child Indicators movement: past, present and future

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The Child Indicators movement past, present and
future

• Asher Ben-Arieh (Ph.D.)
• Chair, Social Policy Research Group
• Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social
  Welfare
• The Hebrew University of JerusalemE-mail
  benarieh_at_cc.huji.ac.il

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The presentation framework

• When did it all start the historical origin
• The pioneering efforts
• The social indicators phenomena
• Child social indicators
• The rapid development era (1980 2005)
• The shifts
• The present
• The future

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When did it all start the historical origin

• As early as the late 40th
• Sporadic efforts to publish state of the child
  reports.
• A few examples..
• What were they about and why were they published?
  

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The pioneering efforts

• Most of them were a one time episode
• They focused on the existence of risk factors in
  children life
• Most were published by governmental agencies and
  a few by NGOs
• They were heavily profession focused
• Most were non-academic publications

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The social indicators phenomena

• One of the first times the term was used was in
  Bauer's influential book, that made the concept
  scientifically and politically relevant.
• Bauer defined Social Indicators social
  indicators statistics, statistical series, and
  all other forms of evidence that enable us to
  assess where we stand and are going with respect
  to our values and goals .
• As of the 1960s, researchers argue that
  well-measured and consistently collected social
  indicators can provide a way to monitor the
  condition of groups in society, including
  children and families, today and over time.

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The social indicators phenomena

• Social indicators are used by policy makers to
  contribute to the improvement of the well being
  of the people they serve.
• Social indicators measure changes and trends over
  time. The overall direction of change can point
  out what decisions need to be taken, as a policy
  process.
• Social indicators give policy makers a better
  understanding of the conditions and the state of
  the people.
• Social indicators can direct and emphasize where
  exactly steps should be taken?

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Child social indicators

• Recent years have brought new and growing
  attention to social indicators of childrens well
  being.
• This growing interest has been partly due to a
  movement toward accountability-based public
  policy and the need for more accurate measures of
  the conditions children face and the outcomes
  various programs achieve.
• The rapid changes in family life have also
  prompted an increased demand for a better picture
  of children's well being

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Child social indicators

• Indicators of childrens well-being, in
  particular, are used by child advocacy groups,
  policy makers, researchers, the media, and
  service providers to serve a number of purposes
• to describe the condition of children
• to monitor or track child outcomes
• to set goals.
• And while there are notable gaps and inadequacies
  in existing child and family well-being
  indicators, there also literally are dozens of
  data series and indicators from which to form
  opinions and draw conclusions.

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The rapid development era (1980 2005)

• Efforts to measure and monitor childrens
  well-being have dramatically grown in the last 25
  years and is evident, in joint projects by
  government, non-government, and academic
  institutes and especially in the production of
  numerous State of the Child reports.

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The rapid development era (1980 2005)

• Much of this new and enhanced activity can be
  accounted for by
• UNICEFs State of the Worlds Children annual
  report published since 1979.
• The United Nations Convention on the Rights of
  the Child, through its global ratification and
  especially through its reporting and monitoring
  mechanism.
• A number of national and multi-national projects
  and studies such as the Annie E. Casey
  Foundations Kids Count initiative in the United
  States (early 90s). The multi-national project
  on measuring and monitoring children well being
  (1996). The European center childhood project and
  more.

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The shifts

• In a number of studies and papers I have argued
  (as did others) that the field of childrens
  social indicators has been evolving and going
  through four major shifts in the last 25 years.
• From survival to beyond
• From negative to positive
• From well becoming to well-being, and
  consequently
• From traditional to new domains.
• Today it seems a consensus was reached that
  indeed the field is changing in these directions.

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The present

• The field of child social indicators is
  constantly changing!
• Research support earlier studies that argued that
  the field is going through the 4 major shifts
  mentioned above. These shifts are occurring
  everywhere, though at different paces in
  different places.
• Further, I would argue that these shifts are
  correlated with changes in the philosophy or
  approach to child social indicators
• the incorporation of subjective perception as
  well as the child perspective and
• the usage of the child as the unit of observation.

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The future

• I would predict that the field will continue to
  move in the previously mentioned directions and
  will most likely do so at a considerably faster
  pace.
• I further anticipate that the continuation of the
  current trends will eventually lead to the
  creation of a new role for children in the
  effort to measure and monitor their own well
  being a role of active participants rather then
  of subjects for research.
• I would also argue that we are in a midst of a
  shift toward a more closely policy oriented
  indicators

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The future

• I started my presentation with the claim that the
  field of measuring and monitoring children well
  being is changing.
• Not only that it is changing but I have built on
  the direction it is heading to make a case for a
  more active role of children in the study of
  their well being.
• I also made clear that there is a need to
  thoroughly study the policy consequences.
• I think we need to develop new research
  methodologies on the basis of partnership with
  children and policy makers.
• As well as a move from isolated studies to
  studies which are embedded within the policy
  arena and context.

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And a few words on ISCI

• In my eyes ISCI is both a consequence of the era
  of rapid change mentioned before and one of its
  facilitators!
• The first claim is supported by the incredible
  success of this inaugural conference, the number
  of participants it drew and the creation of CIR.
• The second claim needs some elaboration.

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ISCIs History

• To explain ISCI facilitating role - let me walk
  you through ISCI history and creation.
• In 1996 some 35 experts from 17 countries meet in
  Jerusalem for the first international workshop
  titled measuring and monitoring childrens well
  being beyond survival. It is there were the
  foundation for ISCI was laid and were the core
  group of ISCI founders have met.

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ISCIs History

• The Jerusalem workshop has then developed into
  the mutli-national project Measuring and
  Monitoring childrens well being with some 200
  participants from more then 30 countries
  participating in the project workshops and
  meeting. This project work is summarized in a
  number of books and articles and in its web-site
  http//multinational-indicators.chapinhall.org/

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ISCIs History

• It was around the year 2000 when we started to
  discuss the formation of an international society
  of child indicators researchers.
• But it took us until the Childhood 2005
  conference on June 2005 to test its feasibility
  and start the actual process.
• In late 2005 with the support of the AECF we
  convened the founding standing committee meeting
  of ISCI and set the target of having our
  inaugural conference in 2007. We set the criteria
  for our success at 80 participants

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ISCI facilitating role

• Thus, even though ISCI is a new born, its
  origins and work started already in the mid
  1990.
• The influence of the former work and publications
  leads me to conclude that ISCI and its
  predecessors have played a major role in
  facilitating the rapid growth era.

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Thank you!