Social safety net for aids orphans scarcely works

10 november 2008

South African child-headed households receive little support from family and relief organisations.

Child-headed households in South Africa scarcely receive help and cannot participate in decisions about the help they receive. The social safety net of African families scarcely appears to function. So concludes Dutch development sociologist Diana van Dijk who investigated how children survive in so-called child-headed households in South Africa.

In child-headed households the adult carers of a family are absent, have died or are too ill to care for the family. As result of this the oldest child assumes responsibility for the entire family. The number of child-headed households will rise considerably over the next few years due to the HIV epidemic. However, little research has been done into the functioning and needs of these households. Although it is assumed that child-headed households urgently need help, the help provided can fail to address the problem or can even have an adverse effect where knowledge about these households is lacking.

Threats from neighbours
The majority of child-headed households appear to receive no help or scarcely any help from family members or relief organisations. And if they receive help, the young people have no say whatsoever in this. Consequently the situation sometimes worsens instead of improving. For example, Van Dijk came across situations where family members and neighbours formed a threat to the welfare of the young people. They tried to take their belongings off them or claimed to care for the young people so that they could gain access to financial benefits.

Another aspect that further complicates the situation for these young people is that although they have 'adult' tasks and responsibilities, they are not viewed as adults. This makes it very difficult for them to receive help from official sources.

One-to-one interviews
Development sociologist Van Dijk investigated twenty households in Port Elizabeth. This city in the south of South Africa has one of the highest percentages of poor children, orphans and child-headed households. These households are mostly headed by a young person who was less than eighteen years of age when the home became a child-headed household. The researcher held 77 one-to-one interviews with young people, and also interviewed neighbours, volunteers, social workers and family members. Additionally she made informal visits and held informal conversations, and allowed the young people to make photos of their friends, family or neighbourhood.

Solutions
Van Dijk's findings show that young people are reasonably capable of caring for themselves if they receive the right support. She also argues that young people must gain better access to sources of help. Furthermore, young people must also have a say in the help provided. They understand their own situation best and know what they do and do not need. Also the age limit of eighteen in policy definitions of child-headed households needs to be relaxed. That is because a child-headed household loses its special status, and with this access to help, when the oldest child reaches the age of eighteen, even though the problems such households face still remain.

Van Dijk presented her results during conferences in South Africa, for example. It is vitally important to gain more insight into child-headed households and what children and young people need most. Van Dijk hopes that her research will make a positive contribution in this direction.

Van Dijk's research was funded by NWO-WOTRO Science for Global Development. WOTRO focuses on funding innovative scientific research into development issues, and in particular sustainable development and poverty alleviation.

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For further information please contact:
Diana van Dijk (Radboud University Nijmegen)
t.: +31 10 848 0841, danavandijk@gmail.com
The doctoral thesis will be defended on 26 November 2008.
Supervisors: Prof. L.J. de Haan and Dr F. van Driel