Runaway Youths

It is important to recognize that the act of running away among children and adolescents is not confined to the borders of the relatively affluent countries of Europe and North America. Large runaway populations affect many, if not most, countries throughout the world, with developing and impoverished countries experiencing larger populations of these youths (Rodwell and Cavalcanti 1998; Wright, Wittig, and Kaminsky 1993). In these developing countries, the causes, consequences, and characteristics associated with runaways and their respective activities are considerably different. In many cases, there is a clear distinction between homeless runaways and throwaways, and street kids. Homeless youths tend to live on the streets for economic reasons and maintain ties with their families and friends back home. Researchers in this area have frequently referred to this distinction as that of "children of the streets" and "children on the streets" (Lugalla and Mbwambo 1999). Whereas children on the streets are the street kids who work all day on the streets and have homes to return to at night or on the weekends, children of the streets consider the streets a permanent residence, and have maintained little or no family contact since their initial run. These children pose a considerable problem for third-world policy makers and planners because their presence is pervasive, and their problems are various. In countries characterized by intense and abject poverty, social programs designed to administer to these socially, emotionally, and physically needy children are scarce. As a result, many of these countries have recently experienced a dramatic increase in the size of their runaway population, and are clearly ill-prepared to effectively and appropriately manage the problems associated with these youths.

In Brazil, for example, runaways represent a sizeable population of children, many of whom are forced to leave their homes for the same reasons as their North American and European counterparts. For these children, "life in the streets is the outcome of [a] perverse combination of factors: the situation at home becoming too unbearable and the appeal and freedom found in the streets becoming too enticing to be ignored" (Rodwell and Cavalcanti 1998, p. 33). However, the social context within which Brazilian children exist differs in that it is characterized by difficult, if not unbearable, living conditions and social policies that do little to protect and assist the impoverished. The decision to leave the home is exacerbated in that little can be done to improve the quality of life within the home. In addition to their intense family turmoil, many (37%) of these children experience both physical and sexual abuse within the home. Thus, these children clearly fit into many of the typological descriptions articulated earlier, but their experiences are considerably more intense, unsolvable, and undeniably more turbulent (Rodwell and Cavalcanti 1998).

The presence and pervasiveness of gangs of homeless youth and runaways on the streets of Honduras is likewise an all-too-familiar reality. Much like in the United States, there are multiple categories of street children within this country: some youths are forced to leave their homes, and some leave their homes voluntarily in an effort to provide economic assistance to their poor families. Although all of these children present a social problem for this impoverished, developing country, some runaway behavior is encouraged as a result of its contribution to the economy. Many market children, as they are appropriately named, are forced to drop out of school to assist their families economically. These youth relocate from the vast rural hinterlands of this mountainous country and congregate in the shanty-areas surrounding the major cities of Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula. It is here that they attempt to earn enough money to provide for themselves and their families. Their presence, although unsupervised, plays an important role in the labor market of the country as these children work for low wages and long hours as market vendors and market aids. However, within Honduras, there is an additional population of street kids who are not classified as market children. These runaways are usually teenagers who have been orphaned or who have been abandoned by their families. Unable to enter the workforce, many of these children engage in delinquent activities such as theft and drug use. They consider the streets their home, and do not have families upon whom they can rely for social and emotional support. These are the truly homeless children who are in desperate need of any and all kinds of physical, emotional, and economic assistance. They pose a considerable threat to the cultural stability of this country, and thus present a major social problem (Wright, Wittig, and Kaminsky 1993).

In Tanzania, the presence of runaways on the streets of the major cities increased dramatically at the close of the twentieth century. Responding to the social and economic crises afflicting this Eastern African country, many of these children run away from home for economic reasons. The economic opportunity that awaits them in the city is more appealing than the poverty that exists within their homes. Many, if not most, of these children are leaving behind families whose primary economic support stems from primitive agricultural production and maintenance. In a semidesert country that is prone to frequent droughts and land that is only occasionally fertile, the economic promise of this endeavor is weak, at best. Children whose families cannot support them are forced to leave their rural communities and embark on a trek to Tanzania's largest city, Dar es Salaam. Most of these children are between the ages of eight and ten years old, and most come from large families with six or eight children. Few have permanent accommodations on the streets, and many are employed only informally as car-parking boys and car washers. As a result of their unsanitary and unhealthy living conditions, these youths experience infectious diseases on a continual basis, rarely receiving medical attention. Also, many of these children become sexually vulnerable as a result of their situation. Both males and females frequently engage in prostitution to obtain money for food and shelter, and they are unlikely to practice safe sex because they cannot afford condoms, nor are condoms readily available in this country. Because of the dangers inherent in this lifestyle, many children join gangs for protection. These groups are highly organized and territorial, providing children with the social and emotional support lost as a result of their running away. Unfortunately, little is done to remedy the problems associated with these children. With only few financial resources, Tanzania is ill-prepared to manage this everincreasing population of at-risk youths (Lugalla and Mbwambo 1999).

Social service programs designed to administer to these needy children, although scant, have arisen in recent years with mixed results. Proyecto Alternativos, a health education and social service program for the street children of Tegucigalpa, is a prime example of a program that effectively addresses the situation of runaways in developing countries or children of the streets (Lugalla and Mbwambo 1999). This program attempts to assist these street children by providing "health education, a feeding program for the otherwise undernourished, nonformal educational and recreational activities, and primary health care" (Wright, Wittig, and Kaminsky 1993, p. 84). These services are designed to provide children with an alternative to the delinquency associated with life on the streets, and to assist them in establishing a permanent residence and obtain employment. In many Latin American, African, and Asian countries, the Peace Corps sponsors Urban Youth Development workers who organize and facilitate similar programs in an attempt to decrease many of the problems associated with the runaway population. These workers initiate programs with the hopes that the host community will maintain them after their service commitment is complete (Peace Corps 2002). Unfortunately, however, there is little information available regarding the effectiveness of these programs and others similar in scope.