Child Labor: the Unseen Workers and Its Morality

 by Winicel May Castro Ancheta

Divine Word College of Laoag

Abstract

Child labour has been considered a serious moral issue that greatly affects the lives of many children around the world. This paper seeks to provide a profound understanding of child labour through a comprehensive discussion of its history and present status, the reasons why it exists, and the ways to curtail its incidence. Further, this paper attempts to view the ethical concerns of this phenomenon based on the premises of Utilitarian and Kantian ethics. Through the lens of Kantian ethics, child labour is morally wrong since it violates dignity and disregards the rights of a child. It also emphasizes that children should not work, no matter how poverty-stricken their families might be. On the contrary, Utilitarian ethics argues that child labour is morally right because it gives poverty-stricken families a source of income; thus, it brings pleasure and happiness to the greatest majority.

Keywords: child labour, children, Kantian ethics, Utilitarian ethics, happiness, suffering, respect, dignity, greatest majority, morality

Introduction

In some parts of the world particularly in poor countries child labour is accepted as an ordinary practice. Poverty forces children to go to work to help their parents to earn a living. Instead of enjoying childhood playing and going to school to pursue education for their future, they go to the farm to work together with their parents or the mining field to earn money. The fruit of their labour goes to the market and is consumed by many. They are the unseen workers. This paper will try to uncover the problems surrounding child labour, its history, morality and how to eradicate it.    

Uncovering the Robbing of Their Innocence

Nelson Mandela, former President of South Africa, once said, “There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than how it treats its children."

Undoubtedly, children are very precious beings. They are innocent, transparent, and open to life fully. All the honest truth-telling there is in the world is done by children. While we try to educate children all about life, children teach us what life is all about; how to find the wonders in everyday life; how to be delighted and content with the simplicity of life brought about by the towering mountains and deep oceans; how to be thrilled by exciting stories of the elderly ones; how to experience heart-felt laughter at silly antics; how to face life’s adversities with optimism and confidence; and how to be joyful again amidst the complexities of life. With all of these, children deserve nothing but the best in life – a life that is full of facilities and ease… a life that has less or no struggle... a life that is free from anxiety, pressure, and hatred… a life where they can explore the world without restrictions and reservations.

Unfortunately, as underscored by Wong (2010), it is poignant that many children of today are robbed of their innocence by damaging influences within their lives or from the outside world. Some are forced to grow up too soon and face a perilous future. Some are troubled by the breakdown of family life or peer pressure.  Others are abandoned. Many do not get an opportunity to step in a school and are left to feed and fend for themselves on the streets. Several suffer from many forms of violence and are subjected to cruel and inhumane treatment every second and every minute of each day. And worst, some children are forced to work. They are made to serve as a helping hand to the family when children of their age are enjoying and having so much fun. While children of their age are given money by their parents for their expenses, they in turn give money to their parents for the running of their family.

They are diving in the sea and mining the bowels of the earth. They are exposed to the horrors of the slaughterhouse and the dangers of explosives. They are abused in bars and massage clinics. They cope with noxious fumes, machinery that can crush them, unhealthy noise levels, and the prospect of drowning. Many of them are invincible or hidden behind factory walls and prostitution dens. They are the unseen workers. They are the child labourers.

Child labour is no doubt a very serious and alarming problem in the world, and although it is declining, progress is happening at a slow and unequal pace. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), child labour is defined as work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their dignity, and that is harmful to physical and mental development (Diallo, Etienne, & Mehran, 2013, p. 2). Said organization stresses that child labor specifically refers to work that is mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous and harmful to children; and interferes with their schooling by depriving them of the opportunity to attend school, obliging them to leave school prematurely, or requiring them to attempt to combine school attendance with excessively long and heavy work.

A primer by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) also defines child labour as employing children below 15 years old in factories and industries where they are not directly under the supervision of their parents. It endangers the children’s right to health, education, and general well-being.

Philosophers and advocates of policies and programs protecting children have also given their views on child labour. Amartya Sen (1999), an economist and philosopher, describes child labour as the barbarity of children being forced to do things and is made much beastlier still through its congruence with bondage and effective slavery. Sen also notes that abolishing such exploitation without corresponding opportunity to enhance the life situation of these children is equally problematic. On the other hand, Senator Tom Hawking, an Iowa Democrat who has longer favoured a stronger role in protecting children, asserted that kids should be in school, not toiling in the sex trade, hand-knotting carpets, mining ore, making fireworks, carrying bricks or operating saws (Kenen, 1999).

Child labour takes many forms which may vary from country to country, as well as among sectors within countries (United Nations, 2013). Article 3 of ILO Convention No. 182 states that child labour may be all forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery, such as the sale and trafficking of children, debt bondage and serfdom and forced or compulsory labour, including forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflict; the use, procuring or offering of a child for prostitution, for the production of pornography or for pornographic performances; the use, procuring or offering of a child for illicit activities, in particular for the production and trafficking of drugs as defined in the relevant international treaties; and work which, by its nature or the circumstances in which it is carried out, is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children.

Child labour can also be classified according to the type or branch of economic activity. In the report cited by the ILO Global Estimates 2012 (2013) which involved children aged 5 to 17 years old, three economic activities were identified namely agriculture, industry, and services. The agriculture sector comprises activities in agriculture, hunting forestry, and fishing. The industry sector, on the other hand, includes mining and quarrying, manufacturing, construction, and public utilities such as electricity, gas and water. The services sector consists of wholesale and retail trade; restaurants and hotels; transport, storage, and communications; finance, insurance, real estate, and business services; and community as well as social personal services.

This issue continues to be a great concern in many parts of the world. As reported by TheWorldCounts.com in 2014, more than 200 million children today are child laborers and 73 million of these children are below 10 years old. Incidentally, 96% of the child workers are in the developing countries of Africa, Asia and South America. Concerning child workers between the ages of 5 and 14, Asia makes up 61% of child workers in developing countries, while Africa has 32% and Latin America 7%. Further, while Asia has the highest number of child workers, Africa has the highest prevalence of child labour (40%). An estimated 120 million are engaged in hazardous work while 20 million child workers are employed in factories that make garments, carpets, toys, matches and hand-rolled cigarettes. On the other hand, 8.4 million children are trapped in slavery, trafficking, debt bondage, prostitution, pornography and other illicit activities. Most children work on farms that produce consumer products such as cocoa, coffee, cotton, rubber and other crops. The number of children in armed conflicts has risen to 300,000 over the past decade.

Meanwhile, in the Philippine context, “batang tumanda sa paghahanap-buhay” (kids who grew old making a living) is a common phrase to describe child labourers (Doronilla, 1999). Stunted in height, they look much older than their years. 

The term child recently acquired a new meaning in the Philippines upon the enactment of R.A. 7610 in 1992, otherwise known as the Child Protection Law. The new law, which devotes an entire chapter on working children, expanded the definition of children to mean "persons below eighteen (18) years of age or those over but are unable to fully take care of themselves or protect themselves from abuse, neglect, cruelty, exploitation or discrimination because of a physical or mental disability or condition."

Child labour, as defined by the State, through the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), is the illegal employment of children below the age of fifteen (15), where they are not directly under the sole responsibility of their parents or legal guardian, or the latter employs other workers apart from their children, who are not members of their families, or their work endangers their life, safety, health and morals or impairs their normal development including schooling. It also includes the situation of children below the age of eighteen (18) who are employed in hazardous occupations.

The aforementioned definition was taken from the existing child labour statutes of the country and clearly pertains only to the work situations of children which under Philippine laws are considered illegal. Accordingly, children above 15 years old but below 18 years of age who are employed in non-hazardous undertakings, and children below 15 years old who are employed in exclusive family undertakings where their safety, health, schooling and normal development are not impaired, are not considered as "child labour" under the law.

The various faces of child labour in the Philippines have been vividly depicted in the video documentary, “Minsan Lang Sila Bata” (They’re a Child but Once), directed by Ditsi Carolino for the Ateneo Center for Social Policy and Public Affairs and the Archdiocese of Manila Labor Center. The documentary, in black and white, tells the stories of elementary school-age children labouring hard in a slaughterhouse, in a sugarcane plantation and a dockside, transporting bags of cement. Anyone who had watched that film without getting affected by it could only be afflicted with the worst form of apathy.

Indeed, child labour is a situation that exploits the child’s innocence across the globe. Although it is a pervasive problem in today's world, it is not a hopeless one. It is obscene. It is urgent. It is actionable. The evidence is clear that when individuals make a commitment when communities mobilize, when societies come together and decide that child labour is no longer acceptable, great progress can be made toward the goal of ensuring that children are not denied a childhood and a better future. However, it is tough going.

Building consensus—and bringing real change—remains an immense challenge internationally, nationally and in the families and communities where child labour exists. The common sense objective is to provide kids the opportunity of a sound education and parents a fair chance at a decent job. This is an economic issue for countries and families—but it is also an ethical one. The fight against child labour is ultimately a battle to expand the frontiers of human dignity and freedom 

Tracing its Roots

The history of child labour can be traced back to the Victorian era. During this period, children were forced to work in mines and factories. Child labour also played a critical role during the industrial revolution. During that time, children as young as five years were forced to work in manufacturing industries under poor working conditions.

In the late 1700's and early 1800's, power-driven machines replaced hand labor for making most manufactured items as cited by Milton Fried in his book The New Book of Knowledge. Factories started to spring up everywhere, first in England and then in the United States. The factory owners found a new source of labour to run their machines—children. Operating the power-driven machines did not require adult strength, and children could be hired more cheaply than adults. By the mid-1800's, child labor became a major problem.

Forms of extreme child labour existed throughout American history until the 1930s. In particular, child labour was rife during the American Industrial Revolution (1820-1870). Industrialization attracted workers and their families from farms and rural areas into urban areas and factory work.  In factories and mines, children were often preferred as employees, because owners viewed them as more manageable, cheaper, and less likely to strike. Historical documents revealed that American children worked in large numbers in mines, glass factories, textiles, agriculture, canneries, home industries, and as newsboys, messengers, bootblacks, and peddlers.

Children had always worked, especially in farming, but factory work was hard. A child with a factory job might work 12 to 18 hours a day, six days a week, to earn a dollar. Many children began working before the age of 7, tending machines in spinning mills or hauling heavy loads. The factories were often damp, dark, and dirty. Some children worked underground, in coal mines. The working children had no time to play or go to school and little time to rest. They often became ill.

Fried (2014) added that by 1810, about 2 million school-age children were working 50- to 70-hour weeks. Most came from poor families. When parents could not support their children, they sometimes turned them over to a mill or factory owner. One glass factory in Massachusetts was fenced with barbed wire "to keep the young imps inside." These were boys under 12 who carried loads of hot glass all night for a wage of 40 cents to $1.10 per night.

Meanwhile, in the Philippines, Aldaba, Lanzona, and Tamangan (2004) reported that child labour has been a problem since the early twentieth century. In a 2015 report by the ILO, there were about 875,000 children aged 5-14 and 1,221,000 adolescents aged 15-17 years involved in child labour in the Philippines. Rates of child labour are significantly higher amongst boys, with 5.4% of boys aged 5-14 involved in child labour compared to 3% of girls.

In the provinces of Negros Occidental and Negros Oriental in particular, the Center for Investigative Research and Multimedia Services (CIRMS) as cited by Latoza (2006) noted an increasing number of child labourers, particularly in haciendas.  Negros Oriental was reported to have nearly 200,000 child workers while neighbouring Negros Occidental has around 140,000. An average of 8,600 new child labourers join Negros Island’s workforce every year.

As reported by Laudato (2007), the conditions which Filipino child labourers are forced to endure vary widely. Some children have jobs that place them in immediate physical danger. These risks include exposure to potentially harmful chemicals or sharp tools, and other dangers that may be less obvious but no less risky. Children are often forced to work long hours with few breaks, which takes a toll on their physical development. Others are abused by their employers, both physically and psychologically. Although some companies make use of both boys and girls in their operations, boys remain at higher risk of becoming child labourers; almost 67 per cent of child workers in the Philippines are boys. Hazardous work involving children is most prevalent in the Central Luzon, Bicol, Northern Mindanao and Western Visayan Island regions. Depending on the type of labour, children are forced to work at a very young age. Sugarcane plantations, for example, employ children as young as six.

On March 16, 2007, Quezon City operatives rescued 25 minors from a garment factory on Dapitan Street, Barangay Sto. Domingo in Quezon City. Police arrested the owner of the garment factory who was charged with violating the country’s Anti-Child Labor. The victims said that they had been forced to work 10 hours a day, seven days a week, with a monthly salary of only Php 1000.00. They also added that they were only allowed to go home every December.

Another example was the raid by the National Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), and the Kamalayan Development Foundation on a chlorine bleach factory in Marilao, Bulacan. The unit freed 11 children who were being illegally detained by their company inside the factory (Arroyo, 1999).

            Amidst the harmful effects that child labour brings, why does it still exist in the Philippines? What are the reasons that cause parents, families, and business establishments to allow and force children to work?  As with many threats to children's development and well-being, poverty is considered to be a root cause of child labour. Families struggle to make ends meet and face hard decisions when it comes to sending their children to work. Lawrence Jeff Johnson, director of ILO's country office for the Philippines, emphasized the urgent need to get to the root of child labour which is linked to poverty and lack of decent and productive work. He also added that while the government strives to keep children in school and away from child labour, it is a must to ensure decent and productive work for parents and basic social protection for families (Child Fund, 2013).

Although regional financial struggles are a major cause of child labor in the Philippines, the global economy is another factor. According to the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, the escalating price of gold has driven mining operations in the Philippines to new levels, and many mining companies make use of children as young as 9 or 10, in some instances. As many as 18,000 children are involved in regional gold mining operations across the Philippines, and currently, the country ranks 19th in terms of gold production. In 2014, the gold mining industry in the Philippines produced about 18 tons of gold, or $700 million. As the demand for gold increases, along with its price, so too will the number of children forced to work. Gold production in the Philippines is highly dangerous. Young boys and teenagers are often forced to descend into watery pits in a process known as compression mining. With only a tube to allow them to breathe underwater, they fill bags with ore before returning to the surface. Aside from the obvious physical dangers of this type of work, children and teenagers face other risks when working in the mining industry, such as exposure to mercury, which is used to leech gold from rock.

Philippine ILO (1998) also claimed that children are impelled to work from an early age because of the centuries-old tradition that the child must work through solidarity with the family group, so as to compensate as much as possible for the economic burden that he/she represents and to share in the maintenance of his/her family, which is usually a very large one. In the Philippines, families particularly value helpfulness and responsibility-sharing. Philippine culture especially in rural areas, "considers child work as a phase of socialization where future roles are learned and working to share in the family is seen as training. [T]he transmission of skills from parents and the evolution of proper attitudes to work are some of the considered social contributions of child labour."

Another reason why children work is the failures in the country’s education system. Many parents prefer to send their children out to work rather than to school, either because there is no school within a reasonable distance of the family home because they cannot do without the income the working child brings in, or because they cannot meet the costs of sending the child to school, or again because they cannot see what use schooling would be to him. Poor schooling has little credibility for many families since it does not promote economic improvement. For so long as developing countries cannot successfully maintain their commitment to a decent quality universal education, increased child participation in the labour market is to be expected (Philippine ILO, 1998)

The report of the Philippine ILO (1998) likewise posited that another major factor in the increase in the number of working children is the demand for child workers. Employers know all too well the advantages of employing children. They represent a docile workforce, which could be hired and replaced at a fraction of adult wages. They do not join labour unions and very seldom complain. Above all, employers who hire children gain a competitive advantage in both national and international markets due to the low wages they pay children.

            While significant progress has been made in reducing the number of child labourers in the Philippines, which declined 40% for children aged 5 to 14 from 2004 to 2013, there is still a long road ahead to eliminating child labour as there are still over 2 million children working.

Eradicating the Problem

Church and labour groups, teachers, and many other people are greatly enraged by the cruelty and mercilessness child labour brings. The Philippines is not alone in the effort to eradicate child labour. It is truly an international campaign.

The elimination of child labour has always been central to the aims of the ILO. In fact, the first international standard to regulate child labour was adopted in 1919. From this time onwards, ten child labour standards were adopted and a Minimum Age Convention (No. 138) was drawn up in 1973. In 1999 the ILO adopted Convention No. 182 on the worst forms of child labor, which is discussed in more detail throughout this resource. Established in 1992, the International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC) is the ILO’s biggest technical cooperation program.

IPEC works towards the elimination of child labour, taking action throughout the world to improve the situation of child labourers every day. Thanks to IPEC’s efforts, hundreds of thousands of children have been taken out of work and given better opportunities or have been prevented from having to work.

In June 1999, over 160 countries approved an ILO agreement known as the ILO Convention No. 182, or the Worst Forms of Child Labor Convention (Doronilla, 1999), which came into effect in the year 2000. It covers forced labour, slavery, trafficking, and debt bondage. It includes prostitution, pornography, and other types of exploitative and dangerous work. It opposes types of work likely to harm the health, safety, and morals of a child. Convention 182 calls for immediate measures to eliminate these practices.

In 2002, the ILO chose June 12 as the world day against child labour (Flores, 2006). The event was commemorated in the cities of Ormoc, Bacolod, and Davao in 2006.

History tells us that some countries have already taken their battle against this perennial dilemma even before the establishment of the ILO. Britain was the first to pass laws regulating child labor (Fried, 2014). From 1802 to 1878, a series of laws gradually shortened the working hours, improved the conditions, and raised the age at which children could work. Other European countries adopted similar laws.

Meanwhile, Fried (2014) affirmed that in the United States, it took many years to outlaw child labour. By 1899, 28 states had passed laws regulating child labour. Many efforts were made to pass a national child labour law. The U.S. Congress passed two laws, in 1918 and 1922, but the Supreme Court declared both unconstitutional. In 1924, Congress proposed a constitutional amendment prohibiting child labour, but the states did not ratify it. Then, in 1938, Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act. It fixed minimum ages of 16 for work during school hours, 14 for certain jobs after school, and 18 for dangerous work. Today all the states and the U.S. government have laws regulating child labor. These laws have cured the worst evils of children working in factories. But some kinds of work are not regulated. Children of migrant workers, for example, have no legal protection. Farmers may legally employ them outside of school hours. The children pick crops in the fields and move from place to place, so they get little schooling.

            The Philippines joins this global fight against child labour. In 1946, when the country claimed its independence from American Rule and became a Republic (The Philippine Campaign, 2012), the country was allowed to make its own child labour laws. One significant law was the power of the Secretary of Labor to grant a special work permit for the employment of a child whose employment is otherwise prohibited (The Philippine Campaign, 2012). This allowed any child to work. In the years 1953 and 1960, the Philippines ratified three international conventions adopted by the ILO, relating to child labour (The Philippine Campaign, 2012). These conventions made laws that prohibited the employment of children in industry during night time, fixed the minimum age of employment for industry at 15 years but allowed younger children to be employed in undertakings in which only members of the employer's family are employed, provided that such work are not dangerous to the life, health or morals of the children employed, and required the medical examination of children as a pre-requisite to employment and their subsequent re-examinations (The Philippine Campaign, 2012).

It was in the year 1986, right after the People's Revolution when projects for street children and child scavengers began to emerge in the country. In 1988, the government, through the auspices of the United Nations Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF), launched the "Breaking Ground for Community Action on Child Labor" project to identify and assist communities in regions with a high concentration of child labour. Activities under the project focused on the provision of basic health and education services to children, on the provision of livelihood and entrepreneurial skills to children's parents, and on advocacy work to convince parents and employers to remove children from heavy or dangerous work. Significantly, in 1989, the government promulgated the Philippine Plan of Action for children which set specific goals for children in especially difficult circumstances, among which is the banning of children from hazardous occupations/situations by 80% by the year 2000.38 The year 1991 saw the creation of the National Child Labor Program Committee which expanded the original implementers of the project "Breaking Ground..." to involve 14 governmental and non-governmental agencies.

Also, the country’s DOLE set up the Sagip Bata Quick Action program in 1994. In the meantime, the DOLE has incorporated the ILO Convention No. 182 into Department Order No.4 (Doronilla, 1999).

Today, the focus of actions in the country is on the elimination of risk to children rather than on ending their participation in all forms of work. Such an approach is needed to accommodate the poverty element in child labour and allow the families flexibility in maintaining their essential survival mechanisms while protecting the children involved. Thus, among the emerging strategies now being pursued by the government is the focus of rescue efforts on the most exploitative forms of child labour or the high-risk children such as the very young (below age 12 or 13), those in hazardous working conditions, or those in bonded labour. For the rest of the working children, however, until alternatives for survival are set in place, heightened efforts should be exerted to ensure that they are in jobs that are not harmful to their health and physical and mental development, and that they have opportunities for education and recreation, and that they receive the same conditions of employment and protection as ordinary workers in addition to their rights as children. The protection of existing labour legislation, standards, as well as welfare schemes designed to protect workers' well-being, should be extended to them. At the same time, sufficient and effective programs of rehabilitation are needed to complement the said strategy.

Eradicating child labour truly is a moral cause and a societal challenge. If we summon the will to do it, we can bring hope to children all over the world and affirm the inalienable right of every child to have a childhood.

Judging its Morality

One of the best ways to determine the morality of an issue is to understand it using opposing theories. In this paper, two known theories are used to underscore the ethical concerns of child labour. These are the Kantian and the Utilitarian Ethics.

The underlying idea behind Kantian ethics is that each human being has inherent worth.  Simply because you are a human, you have worth in and of yourself (Wood, 2008).  Kant’s evidence for this is simple, without human beings, there would be nothing “valued” — so, since the value must come from someplace, it must be from human beings. Further, Kant argues that human reason facilitates human autonomy.  So, we can reason about what we want to accomplish in the world — i.e. we can make decisions about how to act and the overall course of our lives.  Thus, we can also reason for the right behaviour.

One of the major variations on the categorical imperative is the “means or ends” formulation, which makes an important point about Kant’s view of humanity — namely, that you ought not to treat humans as a means to an end (Sullivan, 1998).  In other words, you should not use people to get what you want.

Looking through the lenses of Kantian ethics, it is no doubt that child labour is immoral since it violates the fundamental human rights of a child and has been shown to hinder children’s development, potentially leading to lifelong physical or psychological damage. Children are not economic objects to be used to promote the interests of an individual or a group.

In Guatemala, for instance, a seven-year-old child inserts fuses into firecrackers, a dangerous work that can cause explosions and burns. In India, on the other hand, 50,000 children work in the glass industry, in front of burning furnaces. In Bangladesh, Egypt, and Pakistan, children work in tanneries, where they are exposed to corrosive chemicals and bacterial contamination (Kenen, 1999).

In the Philippines, it has been mentioned earlier that most of the country's working children are exposed to very poor working conditions. Children in agriculture are exposed to heavy loads, chemicals used for fertilizers and pesticides, and natural elements such as rain, sun and strong winds. Those in fishing suffer from ruptured eardrums and shark attacks. On board the fishing vessels, they have to endure congested, unsanitary conditions and poor food which often lead to illnesses.

Laudato (2007) also noted that of the children in the informal sector who work on their own account, those involved in street trades suffer not only from sickness due to exposure to heat, rain, dust and fumes, but also from the risk of vehicular accidents and from frequent molestation and harassment by peers, adult syndicates and even law enforcers. In addition to these, the child scavengers suffer from tetanus infections, while those engaged in prostitution are constantly exposed to sexually transmitted diseases and maltreatment from sadistic customers.

 Factory child workers also risk cuts and other injuries from accidents caused by modern machinery and from the lack of protective mechanisms such as gloves and masks. Children in garment factories and in wood industries suffer from back strain, hand cramps, eye strain, headaches and allergies due to dust. Those in pyrotechnics manufacturing run the additional risk of injury or death caused by the accidental explosion of their products.

With all the aforementioned harmful and risky types of work children engage in, it can be concluded that child labour is unethical based on the premises of Kantian ethics since it does not only entail physical repercussions such as stunted growth and diseases, but also causes certain psycho-social, emotional, and intellectual effects. Furthermore, child labour is unacceptable since it distorts the children’s values, leads to the loss of their dignity and self-confidence, and exposes them to anti-social behaviour.

In Kantian ethics, it is likewise emphasized that one should not act on motives that he or she would not want to be a universal law. If you were to put yourself into the shoes of a child labourer, would you be willing enough to undergo the unbearable pain that he or she feels? Would you find it ethical if others let you suffer while they enjoy the fruits of your labour? If your answers are no, then definitely, child labour is immoral.

            On the contrary, Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill’s Utilitarian ethics believe that the purpose of morality is to make life better by increasing the number of good things such as pleasure and happiness in the world and decreasing the number of bad things such as pain and unhappiness. It rejects moral codes or systems that consist of commands or taboos which are based on customs, traditions, or orders given by leaders or supernatural beings. Instead, utilitarian ethics thinks that what makes morality true or justifiable is its positive contribution to human and perhaps non-human beings (Smart, 1973). In other words, this theory emphasizes that one may use whatever means or act on whatever motives are necessary to achieve an end that increases happiness. It doesn’t matter why one did the action, only that the end result is an increase in happiness.

            If we are going to determine the morality of child labour based on the grounds of Utilitarian ethics, there is nothing wrong with child labour since this ethics states that, in all situations, one should act in a way that generates the greatest benefit for the greatest number of people. Everyone’s interests are considered equal. Thus, if utterly poor families are only able to survive when the children work, it is unethical to prevent them from doing so. By permitting child labour, we are promoting the greatest good for the greatest number of people. The family remains intact as a result of the income received, while consumers obtain inexpensive goods from their retailers.

Families and consumers are not the only ones who are benefited from child labour. Companies are likewise taking advantage of this practice. Since the economy of the whole world has been in a declining state, companies have found different ways to cut their costs down. Some of these ways include outsourcing and using child labour. Even though this may not be legal or ethical, some companies do capitalize on child labour since these businesses believe that young souls do not have an essential stake in any economic configuration of their world.

One of the famous companies exploiting child labour is Nike. According to Cushman (1998), the supervisors at Nike’s Subakumi Plant in Indonesia frequently throw the shoes of their child labourers, slap them in the face, kick them, and call them dogs and pigs. Apple, Hershey’s West Africa supply chain, and Microsoft are also said to be engaged in child labour, especially in underdeveloped countries which lack laws to protect children (Stevens, 2012).

Another known company which concurs with the foundations of Utilitarian ethics is Gap which was accused of using child labor in their Indian factories in 2007. For several years following the Cambodia child labour disaster, Gap built up its reputation as a stakeholder-friendly, socially responsible business. Sadly, this company was involved in a big issue when child workers were discovered in horrible factory conditions in India. Despite the dilemma that beset the company, Gap knew how to prevent the harsh scrutiny it faced in the past.  They immediately cancelled their order from the said factory and took full responsibility in the press for the incident. Their new response was to publically accept that child labour was not just a concern of a single company, rather, it is an issue for all companies that outsourced and no one company could change this. Bill Chandler, Gap Inc.’s Vice President of Corporate Communication, supported this notion when he pointed out that there is no single company that can change a societal situation, rather, it is going to be an industry response (Smith et al, 1975). 

To start an industry response to the problem, forums for retailers, non-governmental organizations and the Indian government were funded by said company to disseminate information about child labour within India. Because of this move, there was little, to no negative impact on the public image of Gap. Even though this occurrence was actually worse than the incident in Cambodia, it had a broader support base and out down the issue within just a few days.

In examining their history with child labour from an ethical perspective, it is readily determined that Gap, Inc.’s true intentions were to be and to act ethically and not manipulate facts for the sole purpose of public approval (Siddiqiq and Patrinos, 1998).  It seems that from the start, this company was not overtly focused on strictly public image, but more so on the principle of its actions. Because of this, Gap has proven itself to be quite utilitarian.  The perfect example of utilitarian action was their reaction to Cambodian child labour. When most retailers cut and run from working with the country completely, the company decided to remove itself from that particular factory, but not the country as a whole. Its reasoning was that historically when companies all retract from a specific country with production factories, the children dismissed from those factories are often left in a worse position (Smith et al, 1972).   With the companies pulling out their work, the underage workers may not be compensated for the efforts of their previously completed labour and their future employment is placed in jeopardy.  Gap was not only thinking of their public image but the livelihood of Cambodian citizens. While its image was significantly tarnished with the decision to not immediately and totally withdraw from the country, few appreciated that Gap had a larger picture in mind. It was after this incident that the company changed its management style to include not just monitoring, but remediation of and response to the situation.

Ind, Gap adheres to the views of utilitarianism since this company espouses that the value of monitoring extends far beyond uncovering problems; it includes all of the actions the company takes to facilitate remediation in a sustainable way (gapinc.com). This principle clearly states that Gap focuses on more than just public image, but rather on the best consequence for most people. Gap’s goal is to provide for and assist millions of factory workers, while providing its customers with quality products and to not be seen as just benefitting its executives and shareholders.

In general, the utilitarian approach used by Gap to foreign labour does actually produce the best outcome for the most people. Factory workers can keep their jobs and are paid relatively fairly in manageable working conditions while Gap executives are no longer under constant scrutiny and can take pride in their labor endeavors. In the case of the shareholders and consumers, they can invest reasonable amounts of money in products and ownership that are not too expensive and fund socially responsible efforts. It may not be a perfect system, but the outcome is purely utilitarian by producing the most beneficial outcome for the highest number of stakeholders.

            While these utilitarian views of child labour make sense on the surface, in analyzing further, it is never comforting to hear that you purchase products made by children in remote factories with unimaginable conditions. Even knowing that companies do their best to prevent such problems, they still place the burden of uncertainty on the consumers. The benefits many companies and people get by capitalizing on child labour do not make it morally or ethically right for them to exploit children in all forms.

            While it is true that utilitarianism promotes the common interest of the greatest majority, the common good must be made apparent in its concrete term, which is not, as defined by Fr. Gorospe (1974), the sum total of the social, political and economic goods in society and the dynamic common good of persons, the total human development of each and every person.

Child labour, being a malignant social cancer, is a prime example of how we have failed to promote the common good. Children scavenging for trash is a painful symbol of the reality of inequitable growth in the country. Child labour may produce a sense of happiness for the family of the children involved; however, the amount of joy generated from letting the children work is very small, instead, considerable suffering prevents the children from obtaining an education and from experiencing the simple joys of childhood 

Hoping for its End

            Indeed, the fight against child labour is long and arduous. The wealth of a nation is not solely based on its natural and economic resources, but it depends more obviously on the kind and quality of the wealth of its children and youth who are considered the creators, moulders, and shapers of a nation’s tomorrow. Their quality and personality will determine the kind of destiny that will help the nation realize its goals.

For that reason, it is the prime duty of every nation and every society to develop and foster a strong, creative, passionate, healthy and intellectual youth. The older generations must guide and direct the youth on the right path. The youth is the heart of every nation for they possess the zest and the potential to strengthen and improve its sectors. The youth is the powerhouse of every country for they demonstrate limitless energy, willpower, capability, fervour, and interest. Hence, this infinite storehouse of energy has to be properly moulded and needs to be given appropriate direction as well as sufficient guidance. The youth has to be trained to use their talents and abilities in constructive ways and help in nation-building and strengthening it.

Be kind and compassionate to the young, and they will flourish and succeed, becoming tomorrow's doctors, scientists, engineers, poets, artists, musicians, visionaries, and leaders. But treat them badly, and they will become tomorrow's suicide victims, drug addicts, drunks, thieves, gangsters, rapists, armed robbers, and murderers.

This applies not just to parents, either, but to anyone who has contact with children. As a parent, teacher, big brother, counsellor, scoutmaster, doctor, psychiatrist, social worker, neighbour, mentor, or even just an ordinary citizen, you have an immense responsibility. You have a great role to play in teaching these young minds and in touching their lives. Treat them with compassion and bestow upon them the right to grow, to love, to live, to dream, and you will certainly safeguard the future of the human race. Treat them with hardheartedness and deprive them of their rights, and you will assure a future which is evil and loathsome. The choice is yours.

Conclusion

Protecting children and eradicating child labour are always going hand in hand with education and economic development. Unfortunately, these issues are also interrelated with corruption. When corruption is high, the economy is affected and education too. When people are succumbed to poverty, then there is no other choice of parents, except to get their children into work and thus deprive their natural life as children and education.

References

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