Between 1965 and 1981, Costa Ricans changed their perceptions of which characteristics they thought defined appropriate urban childhoods. By 1981, the model of a modern, urban Costa Rican child was that of a child who attended school, did not work on the streets, and played in specifically designated places. Children who did not fit this mold began, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, to be viewed as dangerous to society and as evidencing social pathology. Whereas children who worked on the streets during the 1960s were considered part of the urban landscape, and their childhoods, though difficult, were not perceived as deviant, these same children, two decades later, were viewed as marginal and problematic. To trace this change, this article focuses on the changing perceptions about children on the streets that writers for and public contributors to La Nación, one of the preeminent Costa Rican newspapers, show during the sixteen-year period under analysis.
Paul Kutsche, Voices of Migrants: Rural-Urban Migration in Costa Rica ( Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 1994), 42.
2.
Ibid., 49.
3.
Ibid., 49-51.
4.
Ibid.
5.
Ibid.
6.
Ibid.
7.
Ibid.
8.
Ibid.
9.
Sonya Lipsett-Riviera , "Introduction: Children in the History of Latin America,"Journal of Family History23 (1998): 221.
10.
Bianca Premo , "How Latin America’s History of Childhood Came of Age,"Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth1, no. 1 ( 2008): 64.
11.
Ibid.
12.
Ibid., 69. See for example Ann S. Blum, "Public Welfare and Child Circulation: Mexico City, 1877-1925,"Journal of Family History23, no. 3 ( 1998): 240-71; Asuncion Lavrin, "Mexico," in Children in Historical and Comparative Perspective, ed. J. H. Hawes and R. Hiner (New York, NY: Greendwood , 1991); and Tobias Hecht , ed. Minor Omissions: Children in Latin America and Iberian History (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2002).
13.
Bianca, "How Latin America’s History of Childhood Came of Age," 64.
14.
Ibid., 67-68.
15.
Richard Trexler, "From the Mouths of Babes: Christianization of Children in 16th c. New Spain," in Religious Organizations and Religious Experience (London: Academic Press, 1982); Robert Haskett, "Dying for Conversion: Faith, Obedience, and the Tlaxcalan Boy Martyrs in New Spain," Colonial Latin American Review 17, no. 2 (2008); Elizabeth Anne Kuznesof, "The Puzzling Contradictions of Child Labor, Unemployment, and Education," Journal of Family History 23, no. 3 (1998); John L. Kessell, "The Ways and Words of the Others: Diego de Vargas and Cultural Brokers in Late Seventeenth- Century New Mexico," in Between Indian and White Worlds: The Cultural Broker, ed. Margaret Connell Szasz (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994); Odina E. Gonzalez, "Consuming Interests: The Response to Abandoned Children in Colonial Havana," in Raising an Empire: Children Early Modern Iberia and Colonial Latin America (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2007).
16.
Elizabeth A. Kuznesof, "The House, the Street, Global Society: Latin American Families and Childhood in the Twenty-First Century,"Journal of Social History38, no. 4 (2005): 860.
17.
Ibid., 864-66.
18.
Judith Ennew and Jill Swart-Kruger, "Introduction: Homes, Places and Spaces in the Construction of Street Children and Street Youth,"Children, Youth and Environments13, no. 1 (Spring 2003): 3.
19.
Donna J. Guy , "The State, the Family, and Marginal Children in Latin America," in Minor Omissions: Children in Latin American History and Society, ed. Tobias Hecht ( Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2002), 140, 160.
20.
Irene Rizzini , "The Child-Saving Movement in Brazil: Ideology in the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries," in Minor Omissions: Children in Latin American History and Society, ed. Tobias Hecht (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2002), 165-68.
21.
Mark Connolly and Judith Ennew, "Introduction: Children out of Place," Childhood: A Global Journal of Child Research 3, no. 2 (1996): 131, advocating a "political economy approach to understanding the essential relations behind" the street child problem and stating that the modern street child emerged out of a "process of social change, poverty, and development" (p. 21). Guy notes that there is a connection between economic, geographic, and social conditions leading to homeless kids in LA, not a continuous phenomenon. Guy, "The State, the Family, and Marginal Children," 160.
22.
Connolly and Ennew, "Introduction," 136.
23.
Ibid., 19.
24.
Luis A.Valverde Obando and Mark W. Lusk, Los Niños de la Calle de San José, Costa Rica ( Logan: Utah State University Press, 1988), 47, 52, and 65. Some of the children, as has been reported in other studies, were not allowed to return home without their daily quota, and others reported being forced to work on the streets. Obando and Lusk, Los Niños de la Calle, 65, 84.
25.
Ibid., 53.
26.
Ibid., 70.
27.
Ibid., 20.
28.
Ibid., 73.
29.
Setha M. Low, ed., "Introduction," in Theorizing the City: The New Urban Anthropology Reader ( Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005), 9.
30.
Ibid.
31.
Ibid. Teresa P.R. Caldeira, "Fortified Enclaves: The New Urban Segregation," in Theorizing the City: The New Urban Anthropology Reader (Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005), 83-84.
32.
La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia" [Parents], January 1, 1965, pp. 5, 8, and 11; La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia," January 6, 1965, p. 22; La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia," January 7, 1965, p. 15; La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia," January 8, 1965, p. 36; La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia," April 5, 1968, p. 37; and La Nación, "Sres. Padres de Familia," May 3, 1968, p. 6, among many others in the late 1960s.
33.
La Nación, "Sucesos" [Happenings], January 9, 1965, p. 10; La Nación, "Menor Fue Atropellado en Carretera a Miramar" [Minor Was Run Over on the Highway to Miaramar], January 12, 1965, p. 12; La Nación, "Sucesos," January 21, 1965, p. 12; La Nación, "Atropellados dos Niños que Fueron Internados" [Two Trampled Children Interned], January 17, 1968, p. 10, among many.
34.
La Nación, "Niño Arrollado por Auto Desconocido" [Boy Thrown by Unknown Car], March 12, 1965, p. 10.
35.
La Nación, "Niña de Seis Anos Atropellada por Autobus" [Six-Year-Old Girl Hit by Bus], April 4, 1965, p. 10.
36.
La Nación, "Niña Murio en Heridia Despuse de Pegar Contra Vehiculo" [Girl Died in Heridia after Collision with a Car," April 30, 1965, p. 10.
37.
La Nación, "Niño de Cinco Anos Murio Ayer en Cartago como Consecuencia de Atropello de Vehiculo" [Five-Year-Old Boy Died Yesterday in Cartago as a Consequence of Collision with a Vehicle] , August 1, 1967, p. 10. Note that the incident in reference here occurred in Cartago, which is close to San Jose and a growing urban center during this period as well.
38.
La Nación, "Pequena de Diez Anos Seriamente Lesionada en Accidente de Transito" [Young Ten-Year-Old Girl Seriously Injured in Car Accident]" April 30, 1965, p. 10.
39.
La Nación, "Muerte Tragica de una Ninita en Barrio Mexico" [Trajic Death of a Little Girl in Mexico Neighborhood], January 3, 1968, p. 10.
40.
La Nación, "Niño de Cinco Anos Herido en Accidente" [Five-Year-Old Boy Injured in Accident] , 10, January 8, 1968, p. 10; and La Nación, "Succesos," February 6, 1968, p. 10.
41.
La Nación, "Niña Victima de Grande Atropello" [Girl Victim of Severe Collision], February 23, 1968, p. 10.
42.
La Nación, "Menor Atropellado por Auto" [Minor Hit by a Car], February 16, 1968 , p. 10.
43.
La Nación, "Otro Niño Atropellado" [Another Child Trampled], February 23, 1968, p. 10.
44.
La Nación, "Orario Inconveniente en Escuelas de Desamparados" [Inconvenient School Schedule for Helpless Children], April 16, 1968, p. 10.
45.
Ibid.
46.
La Nación, "Dos Jovenes Muertos por Error de la Policia" [Two Dead Youths due to Police Error] , January 30, 1968, p. 10.
47.
La Nación, "Proyecto de Crianza de Conejos" [Rabbit Breeding Project], January 8, 1965, p. 28.
48.
Ibid.
49.
Ibid.
50.
La Nación, "Mas de 60 Mil Niños No Asisten a la Escuela" [More Than 60,000 Children Do Not Attend School], January 24, 1965, pp. 1, 78.
51.
Ibid.
52.
La Nación, "Menor Persiguio a un Hampon y Recupero lo Robado" [Minor Gave Chase to a Thief and Recuperated the Loot], February 15, 1968, p. 10.
53.
Ibid.
54.
Ibid.
55.
Ibid.
56.
Ibid.
57.
La Nación, "Niños de 12 Anos a Jovenes de 18 se Benificiaran con Programas de Aprendizaje que Prepara INA" [Children and Youth from 12 to 18-Years-Old Will Benefit from Educational Programs Prepared by INA], April 3, 1968, p. 29.
58.
Ibid.
59.
Ibid.
60.
La Nación, "Sin Solucion el Problema de los Vendedores Ambulantes" [Without Solution: The Problem of Ambulant Vendors] , February 9, 1968, pp. 9, 18. These arguments were repeated later when more stringent initiatives were implemented as well.
61.
Ibid.
62.
La Nación, "Dos Niñas Sorprendidas Robando" [Two Girls Caught Stealing], April 6, 1965, p. 10.
63.
La Nación, "Menor de Edad Hurto Prendas de Vestir" [Minor Stole Articles of Clothing], April 19, 1965, p. 10.
64.
La Nación, "Menores Lanzados al Delite por un Sujeto Detenido por la Policia" [Minors Induced into Crime by an Individual in Police Custody], April 9, 1968, p. 10.
65.
Ibid.
66.
La Nación, "C 3000 Hurto una Pandilla de Menores" [Band of Minors Stole 3000 Colones], April 21, 1968, p. 10; La Nación, "Con Producto del Robo a Una Escuela Fue Capturado Menor" [With the Goods Stolen from a School Minor Was Captured], April 20, 1968, p. 12; La Nación, "Comlicado Robo con Escalamiento Cometieron Niños de 9 y 11 Anos" [Comples Robbery with Scaling Committed by Children 9 and 11-Years-Old], April 29, 1968, p. 12.
67.
La Nación, "C 3000 Hurto una Pandilla de Menores" [Band of Minors Stole 3000 Colones], April 21, 1968, p. 10.
68.
La Nación, "En Forma Alarmante Aumenta Delinquencia Infantil" [Youth Delinquency is Alarmingly on the Rise], April 20, 1968, p. 10.
69.
La Nación, "En Redada de Drogadictos Capturan a Menores" [In Drug Raid Minors Are Captured] , January 14, 1968, p. 12.
70.
Ibid.
71.
La Nación, "Menores Drogados en Fumadero de Marihuana" [Drugged Minors in Marihuana Den], February 29, 1968, p. 10.
72.
Gary S. Elbow, "Costa Rica," in Latin American Urbanization: Historical Profiles of Major Cities, ed. Gerald Michael Greenfield (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1994), 171.
73.
Mavis Hiltunen Biesanz, Richard Biesanz, and Karen Zubris Bieasanz, The Ticos: Culture and Social Change in Costa Rica (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1999), 34.
74.
Harold D.Nelson, CostaRica: A Country Study (Washington, DC: Department of the Army, 1984), 67.
75.
Ibid.
76.
Ibid.
77.
Ibid.
78.
Ibid., 253. La Nación, "La Juventud y La Violencia" [Youth and Violence], July 31, 1981, p. 14A; La Nación, "Capturan a Lideres del Movimiento Terrorista" [Leaders of the Terrorist Movement Captured], July 9, 1981, p. 8A.
79.
Nelson, Costa Rica, 253.
80.
Ibid., 67-68.
81.
Ibid., 68.
82.
Ibid.
83.
La Nación, "Peligro" [Danger], January 8, 1980, p. 1.
84.
La Nación, "Prevencion del Delito: Para los Niños, Poco Dinero" [Crime Prevention: For Children, Little Money], January 5, 1980, p. 3C.
85.
La Nación, "Parques Infantiles" [Youth Parks], July 26, 1981, p. 16A.
86.
La Nación, "Huellas de la Crisis" [Scars of the Crisis], July 17, 1981, p. 16A.
87.
Ibid.
88.
La Nación, "Juego de Niños" [Childsplay], August 8, 1981, p. 16A.
89.
Ibid.
90.
Ibid.
91.
La Nación, "Gobierno Mantiene Acciones para Reducir las Ventas Callejeras" [The Government Maintains Actions to Reduce Street Vending], January 24, 1980, p. 4A.
92.
Ibid.
93.
Ibid.
94.
Ibid.
95.
Ibid.
96.
Ibid.
97.
La Nación, "Aprobado el Reglamento Para Ventas Ambulantes" [Approved: The New Law for Ambulant Selling], October 29, 1981, p. 6A.
98.
Ibid.
99.
Ibid.
100.
See generally Obando and Lusk, Los Niños de la Calle.
101.
La Nación, "Urge un Correccional Para Menores" [Correctional Facility for Minors Urged], May 14, 1968, p. 8.
102.
La Nación, "Tercera Encuesta Periodistica de Opinion Publica" [Third Newspaper Inquiry into Public Opinion], February 19, 1978, p. 4D.
103.
Ibid.
104.
Ibid.
105.
Ibid.
106.
La Nación, "Pandillero Juvenile en Manos de la DIC" [Youth Gang Leader in the Custody of DIC], January 17, 1980, p. 12A.
107.
Ibid.
108.
Ibid.
109.
La Nación, "Juventud Descarriada" [Derailed Youth], July 30, 1981, p. 16A.
110.
Ibid.
111.
Obando and Lusk, Los Niños de la Calle, 1. Citing UNICEF.
112.
Ibid., 95-103.
113.
"Street children in the developing world are currently the focus of tremendous attention in both fields of social policy and academic research. This is not just a consequence of their rapidly escalating numbers and of the resources necessary to alleviate poverty in the urban landscape. It also results from a concern to adequately portray street children-as young people with particular social and economic behaviors in urban centers The ‘characteristics’ of street children-their tenuous links with families and independent activity-are the hallmark of a childhood distinct from the ‘proper’ childhood portrayals of street children as vulnerable, abandoned, delinquent, deviant, or marginal youth rests on a particular representation of children in contemporary Western thought a given conceptual and normative discourse of childhood." Noting "despite a growing number of innovative studies on children’s diverse childhood experiences, socialization theory and the belief in a universal model of childhood continue to exert a strong influence." Catherine Panter-Brick, "Street Children and Their Peers: Perspectives on Homelessness, Poverty, and Health," in Children in Anthropology, ed. Helen B. Schwartzman (London: Praeger, 2001), 83. Joachim Theis, "Participatory Research with Children in Vietnam," in Children in Anthropology, ed. Helen B. Schwartzman (London: Praeger, 2001), 99.
114.
Kristen E. Cheney , Pillars of the Nation: Child Citizens and Ugandan National Development (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2007), 11.
115.
Sharon Stephens , "Introduction," in Children and the Politics of Culture, ed. Sharon Stephens ( Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 7.
116.
Helena Iracy Junqueira, "The Social Consequences of Urbanization to Children-Summary of Working Paper," in UNICEF, compiler, Children and Youth in National Development in Latin America: Report of Conference, 28 November-11 December 1965, Santiago, Chile (New York, NY: United Nations, 1966).
117.
See listing of children-related programs on USAID website, for example.
118.
Tobias Hecht, "Introduction," in Hecht, Minor Omissions.
119.
"The family was the first group to affect the physical, mental and emotional needs of children and adolescents. The child’s development was dependent upon its parents’ health and economic circumstances, and upon the care and acceptance surrounding it. Accordingly, the economic, social and political acceptance of the parents by the community was of vital importance, as also was the parents’ level of education. Thus, the effort to overcome, through mass communication media (radio, cinema, etc.), the adults’ traditional ignorance and superstition, particularly in rural areas, has had the effect of improving children’s mental development and adaptation to the circumstances of modern living. Hence those activities should be continued and increased." UNICEF, Children and Youth in National Development in Latin America, 11. Also noting the disappearance of the extended family, the inability of mothers to earn a living, and irresponsible fathers. Ibid., 77.
120.
La Nación, "Los Niños de la Calle the Costa Rica (The Street Children of Costa Rica) , September 13, 2003. Available at http://www.nacion.com/ln_ee/2003/septiembre/13/opinion4.html.
