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Migrating with Honor: Sites of Agency and Power in Child Labor Migration in Bangladesh

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Children and Migration

Abstract

This chapter focuses on “choice” in child labor migration as manifestations of agency and power, albeit constrained. As Giddens (1979: 72) writes, “all social actors, no matter how lowly, have some degree of penetration of the social forms which oppress them.” Yet, the global policy agenda on children in international migration and development, especially among child rights advocates, is largely responsible for creating and encouraging an image that children working away from their families and homes did not have any choice due to their parents’ poverty, harmful social practices, or the breakdown of societal values (O’Connell Davidson and Farrow, 2007; Whitehead et al., 2005).

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Authors
  1. Karin Heissler
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. American University in Cairo, Egypt

    Marisa O. Ensor

  2. Georgetown University, USA

    Elżbieta M. Goździak

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© 2010 Karin Heissler

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Heissler, K. (2010). Migrating with Honor: Sites of Agency and Power in Child Labor Migration in Bangladesh. In: Ensor, M.O., Goździak, E.M. (eds) Children and Migration. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230297098_11

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