Childhood and Child Agency in Kyrgyzstan

3rd ISCI Conference University of York

27-29 July 2011Saltanat Rasulova,DPhil CandidateUniversity of Oxford

Childhood and agency in Kyrgyzstan:Research objective

To develop an understanding of child agency fromthe perspective of children and explore howchildren exert their agency in a specific socio

economic and cultural environment

‘ A house with children is a field of flowers; a house without them is a desert’ - Kyrgyz proverb

National context: Kyrgyzstan

• 37% of population is aged 0-17 years• High poverty and especially childpoverty

National context: Kyrgyzstan• Long time transition to

market economy after collapse of the Soviet Union

• 2 revolutions since 2005 resulted in a change of the political leadership

• Weak governance

Literature review• Active agents and not passive subjects of

social structures and processes . (James et al., 1998: 207)

• ‘doers’ and ‘thinkers’ (Robson et al. 2007)• ‘…simultaneously both dependents and

agents’ (Robson et al. 2007)• ‘bounded agency’ (Evans and Heinz, 2007)• ‘…needs to be understood in the context …of

dependence on, and submission to, the authority of adults’ (Redmond, 2009)

Literature review

• Active agents but are constrained by their economic conditions which affect their capacity to exercise their agency (Ridge, 2002)

• a constraint and a facilitator, as children adapt to manage the constraints of economic disadvantage (Redmond, 2009)

• ‘thinners’ as children have to make decisions and take actions in a highly restrictive context with few alternatives (Klocker, 2007)

Qualitative Research design Children (boys and girls, aged 12 and 16, state

and private schools in the capital city): • Group discussions• Diaries, drawings, vignettes, observations• 40 semi-structured interviewsParents/carers• Group discussions/interviewsAnalysis of Kyrgyz proverbs

Differences between state and private schools

• Socioeconomic backgrounds of families and children

• Neighbourhoods and infrastructure• Quality of education: curriculum and staff • School fees• School dinners

PRELIMINARY FINDINGSGIRLS AND BOYS AGED 16

Socioeconomic divisions and child agency - state school

• Material disadvantages are not necessarily a source of unhappiness, low aspirations, less agency, inconfidence

• Children exert ‘other regarding’ agency towards parents and siblings e.g. support , care, less pressure, paid work, domestic chores,

• Able to act in problem solving ways• Earning and helping do not make children seen

as more agentic - it is culturally expected

Socioeconomic divisions and child agency - private school

• More personal problems resulting from competing with siblings, peers, conflicts with parents.

• Changing roles of children (less domestic chores, contacts with extended families, time with siblings)

• School (learning) is the only main defining feature of childhood , children are more agentic at learning

• AMore considered as ‘becoming’ than ‘being’

Culture and child agency• Age as a structural factor of power&authority

‘The eldest can rule the young. But the youngest cannot command the elder one’

• Fathers and sons relationships: ‘If my father says something, I must do it, no one can change it’.

Adult regulation of children at home and school – different spatial agency identities

‘When my father comes home, I feel myself an adult’. ‘My father is strict, and he does not like childishbehaviour’

Some emerging trends• Different child agency is emerging among

rich and poor in the traditionally hierarchical Kyrgyz society

• Poor children and their families are more prepared for current changes, the rich for future prosperity

• The new sociology of childhood is (partially) not applicable for Kyrgyz

• Culture as freedom and reason for agency