Junto con los Ninos: Street Children in Mexico

Summary

A notable absentee from the ten-point action plan set out by the 1990 World Summit for Children was the issue of street children. Yet such children are a common sight in cities of the developing world, and live in some of the most extreme conditions of poverty. The article looks at the experience of street children in the Mexican city of Puebla. It argues that current research neglects the moral and geographic dimensions of work with street children. This has led to practice that regards street children as a welfare concern (as children), and pays less attention to their geographic context (the street). By contrast, the work of an NGO, JUCONI, indicates that a sensitivity to this distinction can offer critical insights. The article outlines JUCONI’s approach and evaluates the implications for ‘best practice’.