Child labor is a serious problem with over 250 million children working around the world.

·         Poverty is an immediate reason why families send their child to work, but putting children to work in lieu of education condemns them to a life of poverty.

·         Legislation introduced by Senator Harkin to ban products made with child labor from import to the U.S., while never enacted, provided the stimulus for model programs like RUGMARK.

Advocacy by human rights groups, repeated media exposure, and reaction to legislative proposals advanced to ban products made by child labor have led to widespread acknowledgment that child labor is a serious problem in the world. It is a problem that has its roots in poverty and the lack of educational facilities for children of the poor. Around the world, but particularly in the South, these circumstances force children into the work force-pushing children into the streets to beg, into the fields to labor as farm hands, and into factories. The International Labor Organization (ILO), the tripartite body representing governments, labor and employers, estimates that more than 250 million children are at work in the global economy. Many products, ranging from hand-knotted carpets sold in the most exclusive stores, to soccer balls and T-shirts sold in malls, are made with child labor.

Problems with Current U.S. Policy

·         The U.S. lacks any clear policy direction on a comprehensive program to combat the use of child labor in the global economy. President Clinton's call for "voluntary" codes of conduct to get companies to stop exploitative practices is either naive or cynical.

·         The Clinton administration espouses trade agreements that regard boycotts and labeling programs as unduly restricting international trade.

·         A fundamental aspect of any forward-looking policy is that child workers need quality education programs that provide them with skills for the future.

Toward a New Foreign Policy

·         To assume a global leadership role on child labor issues, the U.S. must ratify ILO Convention 138 and initiate a process to create an enforcement mechanism for that universal standard.

·         Any new trade agreements with the U.S. should include a provision to prohibit both the use of child labor in manufacturing and the trafficking of products made with child labor.

·         Through its AID programs and its membership in UNICEF and the World Bank, the U.S. must make education and rehabilitation programs for child workers a development priority.

The policy void on social issues in the global economy is at least partly due to a failure to prioritize. There are many new problems attributable to the rapid spread of global capital, ranging from inhumane conditions for workers in developing countries desperate for employment to the destruction of natural resources and environmental degradation. All these problems arise from the same basic condition: Global trading rules have created a safe atmosphere for the expansion of capital and the protection of property, but the resulting social problems have been dumped on national governments, which are themselves restricted by trade agreements like GATT.

The only provision for social issues is the discredited assumption that more trade will lead to employment and prosperity for all. The gaunt faces of Pakistani children making soccer balls for Nike and Adidas, the thousands of Burmese villagers working at gunpoint to build a gas pipeline for Unocal, and the brave political prisoners in China making soft fuzzy animals for sale in leading U.S. department stores should constitute conclusive evidence that the promised development nirvana will not evolve on its own. Fully developed and highly profitable multinational firms are benefiting from extreme cases of exploitation and will continue to do so until some form of global regulation is in place to make them stop.

As a second step, the U.S. should rigorously enforce the new legislation banning products made by forced or indentured child labor and begin the process of linking trade to a policy of eradicating child labor. Washington should insist that new trade agreements include enforceable provisions that prohibit the production and export of goods made with child labor. Washington should also take other unilateral steps to reinforce its policy commitment, including adopting a child-labor-free procurement policy.