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Lara Wouters| 10270566
Master’s Thesis International Development Studies
21/6/2017
THE INFLUENCE OF PERCEPTIONS ON STREET CHILDREN NGOS
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank several people for making this research possible. Firstly, my supervisor Professor Dennis Rodgers. I have been very fortunate to have him as my supervisor. He made it possible for me to do research about a subject of my own interest and his guidance, patience and moral support have been very valuable for me. Secondly, I would like to thank my local supervisor, Erich Hellmer, for his assistance and helpful suggestions during my fieldwork period in Bogotá. I also would like to thank Professor Kees Koonings for being my second reader.
Furthermore, I would like to express my gratitude to all the organizations that have been open to my research. In particular I would like to thank Patricia Gonzalez from Fundación Niños de los Andes, Clara Lopez from YMCA, Steve Bartel from Formando Vidas, Ramon Espinel from Goles Con Sentido, Rafael Ballesteros from ICBF and Wilfredo Granjales from IDIPRON. They have been willing to share their time and experiences with me, which I am very grateful for.
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Content
1. Introduction ... 5 2. Theoretical Framework ... 8 2.1 Street children ... 8 2.1.1 Definition ... 8 2.1.2 Activities ... 9 2.1.3 Dangers ... 10 2.1.4 Causes ... 10 2.1.5 Stigma ... 112.1.6 Street child programs and interventions ... 13
2.2 NGOs ... 14
2.2.1 NGOs - definition, activities and roles ... 14
2.2.2 Actors that influence NGOs ... 15
2.2.3. Conceptual scheme... 18
2.3 Conclusion ... 19
3. Research questions and Operationalization table ... 20
Research questions ... 20
Operationalization table ... 21
4. Methodology ... 24
4.1 Research design and units of analysis ... 24
4.2 Methods of data collection ... 24
4.2.1 NGOs’ perceptions about the street child phenomenon ... 25
4.2.2 Governmental perceptions about the street child phenomenon ... 25
4.2.3 Local community perceptions about the street child phenomenon ... 25
4.2.4 The influence of local community and governmental perceptions on NGO policies ... 26
4.3 Sampling strategy and data analysis ... 26
4.4 Limits, reflections and ethics ... 27
4.5 Quality of the research ... 30
4.6 The study area ... 32
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5. The perceptions of the NGOs ... 36
5.1 Fundación Niños de los Andes ... 36
5.2 Formando Vidas ... 39
5.3 YMCA ... 40
5.4 Goles Con Sentido ... 43
5.5 Conclusion ... 44
6. Governmental perceptions vs. the NGOs’ perceptions... 49
6.1 Governmental perceptions ... 49
6.1.1 Causes ... 50
6.1.2 Solution ... 52
6.1.3 Responsibility ... 54
6.2 Influence of governmental perceptions on the NGOs ... 55
6.2.1 Fundación Niños de los Andes ... 55
6.2.2 Formando Vidas ... 57
6.2.3 YMCA ... 59
6.2.4 Goles Con Sentido ... 61
6.3 Conclusion ... 61
7. Local community perceptions vs. the NGOs’ perceptions ... 63
7.1 Local community perceptions ... 63
7.1.1 Causes ... 63
7.1.2 Solution ... 65
7.1.3 Responsibility ... 66
7.2 Influence of local community perceptions on the NGOs ... 67
7.2.1 Goles Con Sentido ... 67
7.2.2 Fundación Niños de los Andes ... 69
7.2.3 Formando Vidas ... 70
7.2.4 YMCA ... 70
7.3 Conclusion ... 71
8. Conclusion ... 73
References ... 77
Appendix 1 – Background information NGOs ... 82
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1. Introduction
Worldwide around 100 millions of children live on the street (Thomas de Benítez, 2007). Although this phenomenon is present in both developing as developed countries, it has been the most pronounced in the big cities of Latin America (Lusk, 1989). One of these cities is Bogotá, the capital of Colombia, which counted 7,878,783 inhabitants in 2015 (DANE, 2015). This city had a total amount of 2,499 children living on the streets in 2001 (Mellizo, 2005). According to academic literature, poverty is one of the main causes of the street child phenomenon (Abdelgalil et al, 2004; Lalor, 1999; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995;. Scanlon et al., 1998). Although poverty rates have decreased in Bogotá, still over 817,000 Bogotanos live in severe poverty nowadays, which explains the presence of street children (El Tiempo, 2016).
This poverty is mainly caused by the rapid urban growth in the past. The growth of Bogotá started in the 1940s and was especially strong until the 1970s. These decades the urban expansion was primarily caused by rural urban migration as a result of the mechanization of agriculture (Thibert & Osorio, 2014). In the 1970s and 1980s the city continued expanding for different reasons. Firstly, the natural growth within the city attributed to an increase of the inhabitants. In the second place, the emergence of Bogotá as the economic, political and administrative center led to an influx of people from other places in Colombia (Hayata, 1996). Thirdly, the spread of the civil war throughout Colombia led to an increase of Bogotá’s inhabitants. Colombia has suffered from civil unrest since the 1940s. From the 1960s on the drugs mafias began to gain power and by the 1980s this power had affected the whole country, which caused a lot of people to flee from the rural areas. Therefore, a lot of Bogotá’s inhabitants arrived to the city as refugees escaping the civil war. Altogether, about several million Colombians have fled the civil war and are therefore considered internal refugees. The last decade this trend was still seen with an estimation of 280,000 refugees that escaped the rural areas and moved to the city in 2010 (Czerny, 2011). However, in 2016 a peace agreement was signed by both parties of the war, which meant the end of the armed conflict (Oficina del alto comisionado para la Paz, 2017). The rapid growth of the inhabitants in Bogotá in the past has brought some problems to the city. In the 1970s only 10.7 percent of the families that were in need of housing were helped through government programs (Czerny, 2011). This lack of affordable and quality housing forced a great part of the new inhabitants to move to the illegal settlements on the outskirts of the city, where they ended up living in poverty (Hayata, 1996). Hence, these marginalized areas became the breeding ground for street children.
In order to fight this issue of street children, two important governmental institutions were founded in Colombia in the 1960s. In 1967 the Instituto de Protección de la Niñez y la Juventud
6 (IDIPRON) was established which started to work on the rehabilitation of street children in Bogotá. In 1968 the Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar (ICBF) was founded in order to protect the rights of the Colombian children and improve stability within Colombian families (ICBF, 2014). Besides, Colombia started to embed children’s rights into their constitution after the International Convention of the Rights of the Child from the United Nations in November 1989. The obligation of the family, society and state to guarantee the fundamental rights of children and to offer protection and a harmonious upbringing have been included in articles 44 and 45 of law 12 in 1991. In 2006 law 1098 got accepted, which recognized all children younger than 18 years as subjects of law (ICBF, 2014). Especially article 20 of this law is important for street children, since this article claims that all children should be protected against: “the physical, emotional and psychoactive abandonment by the parents, legal representatives or the persons, institutions and authorities that have the responsibility of their care and attention” (ICBF, 2014, p.7). This shows that Colombia has increasingly given more attention to the protection of street children. Nevertheless, newspaper El Tiempo reported that between 2014 and 2015 the amount of street children in Bogotá had increased, which shows that this is still a relevant issue in Colombia (2015).
In academic literature the street child issue increasingly received attention since the 1980s. Ever since, much has been written about the causes of the street child phenomenon and the conditions these children are living in. Additionally, the negative stigma these children suffer from has been elaborated on extensively. In this regard, Lusk (1989) showed how perceptions about street children shaped the way the issue was approached in the past. In this way he proved the importance of the perceptions about the street child issue, since these strongly influence the actions taken to solve this phenomenon. Currently, much work on the street child issue is executed by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). While academic literature has given much attention to their impact and best practices, nothing is known yet about the perceptions of NGOs concerning the cause, solution and responsibility concerning the street child issue that are underlying their actions. Considering that these perceptions proved to be important, this research gives an insight in these underlying perceptions of NGOs working on the street child issue in Bogotá, Colombia. Since multiple academics (Howell, 2000; Balboa, 2004) claim that NGOs are often influenced by other actors, such as governments, donors and the local community, this research continues by investigating how differences in perceptions about the cause, solution and responsibility between NGOs and other actors influence the actions of NGOs.
This thesis starts with an overview of the theory of street children, NGOs and the different actors influencing NGOs. After this, the research questions, operationalization table and methods that are used for this research are introduced. Then, the first empirical chapter gives an insight in the
7 perceptions of four different street children NGOs in Bogotá, Colombia concerning the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child issue. The second empirical chapter explains the perceptions of governmental institutions about the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child issue and consequently analyzes how the differences and similarities of these perceptions influence the four NGOs. The last empirical chapter focuses on the perceptions of the local communities concerning the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child phenomenon and additionally elaborates on how these affects the NGOs. Finally, the findings of this research, their implications and some policy recommendations are discussed in the conclusion.
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2. Theoretical Framework
2.1 Street children
2.1.1 Definition
Throughout the world, millions of children live on the streets. The definition of street children that is used the most was made by UNICEF (United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund) in the 1980s. UNICEF makes the distinction between ‘children at risk’, ‘children on the street’ and ‘children of the street’. These definitions are based on two characteristics, namely contact with the family and presence on the street (Scanlon et al., 1998). The first category, the ‘children at risk’, consists of children that still live with their family, but are part of the urban poor. They live in a deprived environment and therefore lack the basic needs of life, which makes them vulnerable. In addition, these children often lack sufficient parental supervision, because their parents work during the day and do not have the financial resources to pay for daycare. This group is the largest of the three categories and is the reservoir from which the following two categories emerge (Lusk, 1989).
The second category, the ‘children on the street’, are the children that work in the streets to contribute to the family income, but usually return home at the end of the day. Though, in some cases the streets where they work are too far from home, which results in these children sleeping on the streets for some days a week. Children in this category are partially self-supporting, but still receive family support (Lusk, 1989).
The third category is the ‘children of the street’. For these children the street has become their living place where they both work and live. They do not receive any family support and ties with their family are weak. This means that they do not visit home often, or do not visit home at all. Hence, these children are growing up outside the main socializing institutions, namely the school and the family, which disassociates them from society. For these children, the street is their home, as they find shelter, food and companionship here. Children in this category are either orphaned, abandoned or have run away from home. They do not have contact with their family and spend a large amount of time on the street (Lusk, 1989).
Although the above explained distinction and categorization of street children is widely used, it has also received critique. The first critique is on how these categories appear to be a causal progression, while working on the streets does not necessarily lead to living on the streets (Rosemberg & Andrade, 1999). Besides, street children cannot simply be categorized into one of these three
9 categories, since the categories are to a large degree overlapping and interacting. Street children have proven to frequently switch between living with their parents and living on the streets (Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012). Furthermore, most Latin American street children still have ties with their families, and sometimes even live together with their families on the streets. In these cases, it is hard to fit the children within one of the three categories as distinguished by UNICEF (Rizzini & Lusk, 1995). Additionally, Ennew & Swart-Kruger (2003) argue that not only the fact that the children live on the street or at home should matter in the categorization of street children, but that several domains should be taken into account. Examples of these domains are orphanages, public and private spaces, street workers, institutions and programs. Besides, they also state that the time children spend on the street might be important in categorizing street children (Ennew & Swart-Kruger, 2003). Because of these issues with the definition and categorizations of street children and the street children’s mobility, it is extremely difficult to get to the exact amount of street children in the world (Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012; Lusk, 1989).
2.1.2 Activities
According to Rizzini & Lusk (1995) almost all the street children in Latin America are involved in economic activities varying from shoe shining, to begging, washing cars, scavenging, entertaining passengers, and pushing barrows. Additionally, they sell products such as food, candy, newspapers, souvenirs and lottery tickets (Lalor, 1999; Lusk, 1989; Raffaelli, 1999, Black, 1993). Though, a part of the activities street children are involved in are illegal activities. These activities vary from petty theft amongst the younger street children, to pick-pocketing and armed robberies by the older generation. Furthermore, they sometimes sell drugs and sexual activities (Rizzini & Lusk, 1995). Activities of street children change as they grow older. While small children can earn money by begging, older children cannot because their presence on the street is not tolerated by the public like when they were younger. Therefore, they might switch to different activities (Ennew & Swart-Kruger, 2003). Although, all the economic activities these children are executing may be seen by them as ‘work’ they are far removed from the safety standards seen in conventional working places. In addition, their work is often illegal which makes them even more vulnerable. Thus, street children face severe dangers while working on the streets.
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2.1.3 Dangers
Besides the dangers of their work, there are more harmful issues with which street children have to deal. They often suffer from exploitation, violence, hunger, cold, and a lack of privacy, comfort, supervision, education, nurturance and security (Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012; Le Roux & Smith, 1989; Lusk, 1989; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995). Another danger for street children is the abuse by adults and police officials (Lusk, 1989). Especially abuse by police officials is mentioned extensively in academic literature and is one of the biggest fears of street children. During the ’80s a lot of Brazilian street children were killed by the existing ‘death squads’ who were ‘cleaning’ the streets, which is proof of the brutal and inhumane way these children are treated. Additionally, Lalor (1999) states that street children are regularly physically attacked by other street children. Besides abuse by others, Scanlon et al. (1998) claim that living on the streets also has other effects on their physical health, such as a higher risk of trauma and infections. Furthermore, the use of drugs, which is usually encouraged by peer pressure, is a danger to the physical health of the children (Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012; Lalor, 1999; Lusk, 1989; Scanlon et al., 1998).
To conclude, there are a lot of issues that makes life on the streets dangerous and tough for street children. Because of these dangers and the difficulties they face, street children usually group together in their pursuit of security. In this way they give each other protection and share their lives, which often results in strong friendships. They share information and resources with each other, which is essential for their survival (Aptekar, 1989; Ennew & Swart-Kruger, 2003; Hecht, 1998; Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012; Lalor, 1999; Scanlon et al., 1998). Street children often find themselves a ‘surrogate family’ in these street groups.
2.1.4 Causes
Thinking about all the dangers street children face, one might wonder why children actually move to the streets. Past research has shown that there are multiple reasons for this (Lalor, 1999). Several authors claim that the street child issue is linked with larger social, economic and political factors (Abdelgalil et al., 2004; Lalor, 1999; Lusk, 1989; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995; Scanlon et al., 1998). For instance, Abdelgalil et al. (2004) state that ‘economic stagnation, unequal distribution of wealth, lack of welfare and social services, AIDS, and civil war’ are factors that have attributed to the phenomenon of street children (p. 817). Additionally, Lusk (1989) mentions rural-urban migration as a cause. Cities proved to be incapable of providing the necessary employment, social services and housing to the newly arrived inhabitants of the city, which has led to urban poverty. Hence, the problem’s origin should not be attributed to the children themselves since multiple academics claim that one of the
11 main causes for Latin American children to move to the streets is poverty. Their families are suffering from such severe financial problems that they do not have time to look after their children and often force their children to contribute to the family income (Abdelgalil et al, 2004; Lalor, 1999; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995;. Scanlon et al., 1998).
Another important reason for children in Latin America to move to the streets is family disintegration. Le Roux et al. (1998) claim that social and economic unrest can lead to a disruption of traditional family values and structures. Consequently, family size reduction, caused by for example separation, divorce or death, leaves the family with fewer financial resources to support their children. Additionally, children can be left orphaned which forces them to live on the streets. Concerning family composition, research has shown that the majority of the street children in Latin America come from families run by a mother alone (Abdelgalil et al., 2004; Le Roux et al., 1998, Rizzini & Lusk, 1995; Scalon et al., 1998). This makes children vulnerable, since in times of crisis, they have limited options for support.
Though, not only poverty and family disintegration cause children to move to the streets. Also abuse or neglect in their home situation can push children away from home, which can be caused by drug and alcohol addictions of the parents. In these cases, the dangers children face inside their home situation are worse than on the streets, which makes them leave their home. Furthermore, there is just a small share of the total amount of street children who choose to be in the streets in pursuit of freedom and adventure (Abdelgalil et al., 2004). To conclude, there are many factors that can lead to children living on the streets. However, many authors agree that bigger social, economic and political factors, which are leading to poverty and inequality, are the main cause of the street child phenomenon, rather than other factors.
2.1.5 Stigma
Although on an academic level it seems clear what the main cause of the street child phenomenon is, this is often not in line with what society perceives to be the main cause. Past research showed that it has been generally perceived that street children move to the streets because they are being rebellious and pursue freedom and adventure. Though, this is not in line with reality since academics found that just a small proportion of the street children left their homes for this reason. However, this perception about the cause of the street child issue has led to a negative stigma around street children. Society usually ignores their positive abilities, while characteristics as ungrateful, disruptive and antisocial are dominant (Jones & Thomas de Benítez, 2012). Another reason why street children have a negative stigma is because they are often associated with gangs, illegal activities and drugs
12 (Moncrieffe, 2006; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995). Street gang members are related with extremely negative stereotypes in public opinion. Accordingly, the association of street children with youth gangs has a negative influence on the public perceptions of street children and leads to the fact that street children are often seen as delinquents by society, police, government institutions, and the media. This makes them a moral threat to society (Aptekar, 1989; Gigengack, 1994; Le Roux & Smith, 1998; Salazar, 2008; Scanlon et al., 1998). Although it is proven that street children are indeed sometimes involved in illegal activities and drugs, a great part of them are not. Besides, street children themselves strike the importance of separating them from street gangs (Salazar, 2008). However, because of the aforementioned characteristic of grouping together, groups of street children are often confused with youth gangs, which reinforces their stigma. Thus, the association of street children with gangs, illegal activities and drugs is often undeserved which leads to the majority of the street children undeservedly suffering from intense stigma (Jones & Tomas de Betínez, 2012; Rizzini & Lusk, 1995). Moreover, this stigma is being maintained through the negative, sensationalist way street children are often represented in the media (Salazar, 2008).
Besides the dangers that street children already face on the streets, their stigma can also lead to harmful situations. It can lead to the fact that these children receive less protection from society than other children. When street children are being treated badly, for example by the police, society will not stand up for them. This is because they are already seen as delinquents and have a low social status, which legitimizes the violence that is used against them (Salazar, 2008). In this way, also the aforementioned ‘street cleaning’ by the death squads in Brazil in the 1980s was rationalized (Lalor, 1999, Rizzini & Lusk, 1995, Scanlon et al., 1998). Thus, negative public perceptions have negatively influenced the rights and protection of street children, which turned them into second class citizens. Besides, their stigma leads to the children being pushed to marginalized areas of the city because they are undesired elsewhere. Consequently, they are being associated with these dirty and disorderly places, which leads to further stigmatization and social exclusion. Furthermore, this stigma also has a negative influence on the mental health of the children.Kidd (2003) explains how this stigma can lead to feelings of being trapped and loneliness, a low self-esteem and suicidal thoughts. Besides, it influences the way street children respond to opportunities and exercise their agency. Thus, the negative stigma of street children negatively influences their protection from society, their living space and their mental health.
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2.1.6 Street child programs and interventions
In addition to the aforementioned influences, perceptions about the street child issue also proved to influence the way street child programs are set up and policy is implemented (Toro et al., 2007). This is because development actors form ideas that are not only based on reality, but also on their personal perception of the reasons behind this reality and how the situation should be. In this way, perceptions influence development goals and interventions (Bebbington, 2005). Besides, social workers in the field also make decisions that are based on their personal understanding of the problem rather than knowledge, which can influence policy implementation (Harris et al, 2011; Conticini, 2005; Raffaelli, 1997). Hence, public perceptions about the street child phenomenon influence both development organizations and development workers and should therefore not be ignored.
How perceptions about the street child issue have influenced development programs has been elaborated by Lusk (1989). He also claims that different programs are influenced by different discourses and assumptions of the street child problem. Based on these different discourses and assumptions, he distinguishes four different types of approaches to the street child phenomenon. Firstly, the correctional approach. In this approach children are considered to be on the street because they are pursuing freedom and are seen as delinquents. Therefore, this approach leads to children being placed into institutions. Though, in the past these institutions often turned out to be abusive and dangerous, which resulted in damaging the children. The second approach is the rehabilitative approach. In this approach the children are seen as victims of poverty, bad conditions at home and abuse. In line with this approach programs were set up in which children were gradually moving to different environments to remove their lifestyle away from their lifestyle on the street. In addition, the children received education to reach a secondary school level. Although these programs delivered secondary school graduates, these children still had a lot of problems fitting into the unjust and discriminative society, which have led to children backsliding into former habits. The outreach strategy is the third strategy. This strategy has the same assumptions about the phenomenon, but tries to reach the children on the street because the rehabilitative approach proved to be too removed from the children. In this approach the children were offered different services such as education and counseling on the street. In this way, the children learned things such as business skills and basic hygiene. The fourth approach is the preventive outlook. This approach focused more on the children at risk and recognizes the fact that the street children problem is not a problem of the children themselves, but a bigger social problem. Therefore, this approach tries to prevent children from going to the streets by, for instance, providing daycare for working parents and support local employment.
14 Besides the perceptions about the street children themselves, the different assumptions and perceptions about the responsibility to solve the issue also have an influence on the way institutions are dealing with the problem. It determines if different actors take action to tackle the problem or not. Le Roux & Smith (1998) explain how the police considered the social workers to be the ones who are responsible, while social workers pointed their fingers at the community. Concurrently, the community perceived the police to be the actor that should deal with the problem. Hence, Le Roux & Smith (1998) found that none of the actors considered themselves responsible to solve the street children issue, which resulted in passivity of these different actors regarding street children.
To conclude, street children suffer a lot from the negative views on them. This, while these perceptions are mainly based on assumptions that are not in line with reality. The perceptions about the street child issue influenced who took action to solve the street child issue, and how street child programs were set up in the past (Le Roux & Smith, 1998; Lusk, 1989). Currently, a great part of the work with street children is being done by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Since the focus of this research will be on how NGOs are dealing with the street child issue, the next section will elaborate further on NGOs and the actors that influence NGOs.
2.2 NGOs
2.2.1 NGOs - definition, activities and roles
Although NGOs have already been active for a long time, the development community started to discover these organizations only in the late 1980s. During this decade a rapid expansion of the amount of NGOs occurred, which sustained into the 1990s (Charlton, 1995). Ever since, different definitions for NGOs have been established (Lewis, 2010). According to the definition of Vakil (1997) NGOs are “self-governing, private, non-for-profit organizations that are geared to improving the quality of life for disadvantaged people” (p. 2060). Besides the term non-governmental organization there are other terms that are overlapping, such as non-profit organization or voluntary organization (Lewis, 2010). However, the most popular term continues to be the term NGO, which will consequently be used here. According to Lewis (2010) there are two different types of NGO activities, which are “the delivery of services to people in need, and the organization of policy advocacy” (p. 1056). Based on these two activities, Willetts (2002) argues that a division can be made between operational- and campaigning NGOs. Another way to analyze NGOs is through their role. Lewis (2010) states that there are three main roles that NGOs can take, which are the implementer, the catalyst and the partner role. The implementer role concerns the “mobilization of resources to provide goods
15 and services to people who need them” (p. 1056). This could be done within the own programs of the NGO or through a collaboration with the government or donor. The catalyst role is defined as “an NGOs ability to inspire, facilitate or contribute to improve thinking and action to promote social transformation” (p. 1057). The NGO can inspire either individuals or other development agencies, such as governments or the private sector. The partner role “reflects the growing trend for NGOs to work with government, donors and the private sector on joint activities, such as providing specific inputs within a broader multiagency program or project, or undertaking socially responsible business activities” (Lewis, 2010, p. 1057). This role also includes ‘capacity building’ work with communities and other NGOs to strengthen capabilities. An organization is not limited to just one of these three roles, but could in fact fulfill all of these roles mutually, or shift between roles over time (Lewis, 2001). Besides the differences in roles and activities of NGOs, there is also a great variety of the structure of NGOs. The term NGO can either refer to an organization with a global hierarchy or to a small scaled local organization (Willetts, 2002). Thus, NGOs can have different activities, fulfill different roles and take different forms.
2.2.2 Actors that influence NGOs
An important distinguishing feature of NGOs compared to other organizations is the fact that they receive higher public trust. They are often seen as independent actors that represent the voice of the people, because they are not aligned with the government (Banks & Hulme, 2009). However, this idea about NGOs is not entirely accurate. Both Howell (2000) and Balboa (2014) explain that NGOs are not operating in a vacuum and that they cannot be separated from the government, private sector and local community. Also Beck (2014) argues that NGOs are not entirely independent and that environments put pressure on NGOs. To add to this, Banks et al. (2015) argue that NGOs can even face serious constraints regarding their ability to stand up for the disadvantaged people because of the context in which the NGO is operating.These ideas about the influences of other actors on NGOs can be linked to the resource dependence theory, developed by Pfeffer & Salancik in 1978. This theory emphasizes that organizations are dependent on resources, which can be in hands of other organizations. Therefore, organizations are never independent since they rely on the relations with the organizations in their environment for the access to their necessary resources. This resource dependency is the basis of power dynamics between different organizations and actors. Hence, the context in which the organization operates is important since it can either benefit or constrain the NGO. Underneath, three different actors that can have an influence on the NGO in their policy making
16 and implementation are elaborated on. These are the government, the donor, and the local community.
2.2.2.1 Government
The first actor that influences NGOs is the government. Clark et al. (1991) argue that NGOs are dependent on the government, either on a local, national or international level, since they determine the organization’s room of maneuver. This is because the policies, practices and attitudes of the government strongly influence the capacity of NGOs to operate and grow (Clark, 1995). Hence, it is impossible for NGOs to ignore the state since it influences the way NGOs are set up and which activities and roles they can fulfill. There are multiple ways NGOs can receive governmental support, for example through privileges, tax discounts or simply by getting permission to operate (Najam, 1996). Therefore, it is important for NGOs to have a good relationship with the government, since it significantly influences the development impact NGOs have (Lewis, 2010; Matei & Apostu, 2014).
Lewis (2001) distinguishes three different strategies of NGOs concerning their relationship with the government. First, NGOs can take a gap-filling role through “working in the ‘spaces’ which exist in government provision” (p. 150). However, in this way governments sometimes take the credit for what is accomplished by the NGO. Secondly, NGOs can choose to collaborate with certain governmental agencies. A constraint of such collaborations is that inconsistencies could arise in policy and policy implementation. Finally, NGOs can also act as a pressure group to support certain interests and consequently influence governmental policies.
Although a relationship with the government can be beneficial for NGOs, NGOs might also face some challenges concerning governments. When NGOs are formed in governments that are repressive, the organization may have difficulties to trust the government and can be seen by the government as a threat, even when the political situation has changed (Banks et al., 2015). Besides, governments are usually supportive toward NGOs that provide social services, but might be less welcoming when these NGOs challenge their policies. Hence, governmental support might depend on the activities of the NGO and turn into obstruction when the NGO is not doing what the government wants (Howell, 2000). Another challenge for NGOs are the problems with effectiveness and bureaucracy they might face when they start to collaborate with governments. Furthermore, the NGO could lose its identity when it starts to have a close relationship with the government (Banks et al., 2015). Also Clark (1995) argues that it can be counterproductive for NGOs when they are too closely linked to the government. This, because NGOs may accept the government’s role in coordinating development activities too easily and fail to include the grassroots perspective. Additionally, a
17 situation in which NGOs get funding through the government might jeopardize its autonomy and independence (Clark, 1995).
2.2.2.2 Donors
Besides the government, also donors have a significant influence on NGOs. Banks et al (2015) argue that strengths of NGOs are undermined by their increased dependence on donor funding. The donors’ control of money creates an unequal power relation between them and the NGO (Lister, 2000). Consequently, NGOs are willing to set aside their relationship with their beneficiaries and change their goals and mission in response to donor requirements to receive funding (Heyes & Martin, 2015; Najam, 1996). This implies that the donor has influence on the policies of the NGOs. Thus, through implementing donor policies instead of its own, NGOs lose their role as independent actors and weaken local ties with their beneficiaries (Banks et al., 2015). Hence, Beck (2016) argues that NGOs are responding to donor demands at the expense of participation of beneficiaries. In this way, donors have played an important role in shaping civil society since NGOs have been prioritizing donor accountability over accountability toward their beneficiaries (Howell, 2000; Vallejo, 2011). Another influence of donors that has been mentioned by several authors, is the fact that collaboration with donors leads to more administrative work. In this way, NGOs have less time for their main activities, which therefore negatively influences their work (Banks et al., 2015; Brinkerhoff and Brinkerhoff, 2004; Charlton, 1995; Lewis, 2003). Additionally, issues can arise due to the asynchronous schedules of project implementation and donor funding (Charlton, 1995). Furthermore, demands from donors can oppress innovation and experiments within the NGO due to a pressure for results. This, while the ability of NGOs to experiment is something crucial since the development field is always changing and flexible (Banks et al., 2015). Another issue with the collaboration with donors is the fact that it makes NGOs vulnerable since donors usually do not commit to long-term funding. This makes it hard for NGOs to focus on long-term change instead of short-term projects (Banks et al, 20015; Lewis, 2003). Finally, donors also have a strong influence on where certain NGOs are located and which issues are tackled. This is especially the case for international NGOs (Bebbington, 2004).
2.2.2.3 Local community
Another actor that influences NGOs is the local community. However, the degree of influence strongly depends on the role the NGO takes. Especially when an NGO takes the role of the ‘implementer’ it will try to develop ties with local communities through which they can deliver their services or goods. Hence, these implementing NGOs are more strongly influenced by the local
18 community. One way the work of NGOs can be influenced by the local community is through its existing power relations. It has been proven that community leaders and the local elite can take advantage of their power, leading to an unequal distribution of services and goods provided by the NGO. This can constrain NGOs’ ability to reach their target group (Lewis, 2001). Another aspect that influences the NGO is the different culture and different assumptions and expectations of the local community. Lewis (2003) explains how a cross-cultural encounter usually occurs between the local community and the NGO workers, which can cause tension between the two. Two examples of this tension between the local community and NGOs are given by Katikiro et al. (2015) and Levine (2002), who did research on marine protected areas and environmental conservation in Tanzania. Both found that NGOs experienced strong resistance and hostility of the local community toward their work, which led to a reconsideration of their policies. Thus, in some cases the local community has proven to be able to influence NGO policies. However, while much has been written about the influence of governments and donors on NGOs, not much has been written yet about the influence of the local community.
2.2.3. Conceptual scheme
The former sections showed that there are different mechanisms through which NGO policies can be influenced by different actors. The conceptual scheme in Image 1 summarizes the different ways in which the government, donors and the local community can influence NGO policies. The mechanisms through which policy is being influenced strongly depend on the NGO and the relations this NGO has with other actors. Part of this research is to identify how policy is being influenced by different actors for different NGOs.
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Image 1: Conceptual Scheme
2.3 Conclusion
To summarize, this chapter showed that there are different actors that can have an influence on NGO policies, which are the government, donors and the local community. Consequently, each actor has different ways in which it can influence NGOs. A lot of negative ways have been mentioned on how these actors can influence NGOs. However, Brinkerhoff & Brinkerhoff (2004) explain that partnerships between these actors and NGOs are valuable since it is the only effective way to solve development problems. Hence, a good collaboration between governments, donors, local communities and the NGO can significantly improve the impact of NGO work. Coming back to the street children issue, also several authors argue that street children NGOs would be more effective if they work together with these other actors (Dybicz, 2005; Volpi, 2003). Hence, it is no wonder that most street children NGOs are working together with one or multiple of the aforementioned actors. Considering that Lusk (1989) showed that perceptions influence programs, and the above section showed that different actors influence NGOs, my question is how NGOs are being influenced by the similarities and differences between their perception and other actors’ perceptions about the cause, solution and responsibility concerning the street child phenomenon. Since this has not been investigated yet, this will be the aim of this research.
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3. Research questions and Operationalization table
Research questions
As the theoretical framework showed, little is known about current perceptions of NGOs on the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child issue. Additionally, how NGOs are being influenced by the similarities and differences between their perception and other actors’ perceptions about the cause, solution and responsibility concerning the street child phenomenon is also still unknown. Therefore, the aim of this research is to fill this research gap by answering the following main research question:
What are the governmental- and local community perceptions regarding the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child phenomenon and how do they influence the policy interventions of NGOs working with street children?
This research question is answered by means of the following sub-questions aimed at distinguishing between governmental and local community perceptions about the street child phenomenon, and identifying how these affect NGO policies:
1) Are street children perceived as a problem on a governmental and local community level in Bogotá, Colombia and why?
2) What are the perceptions about the cause of the street child phenomenon on a governmental and local community level in Bogotá, Colombia?
3) What are the perceptions about the solution of the street child phenomenon on a governmental and local community level in Bogotá, Colombia?
4) What are the perceptions about the responsibility of the street child phenomenon on a governmental and local community level in Bogotá, Colombia?
5) How do the governmental and local community perceptions about the cause, solution and responsibility of the street child phenomenon coincide with and differ from the perceptions of NGOs in Bogotá, Colombia and how does this influence NGO policy interventions?
In the following section the operationalization table is shown. This table serves as guidance to this research and shows how different concepts are operationalized and how the research questions will be answered.
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Operationalization table
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4. Methodology
This chapter explains which research design was used and how the data was collected. Furthermore, the quality of the research and the limitations are reflected on.
4.1 Research design and units of analysis
This research has a comparative research design since four different NGOs are included in this research, explained separately and consequently compared with each other. In this way, different perceptions about the street child issue and different kinds of relationships with the local community and the governmental actors are included. The units of analysis of this research are NGOs that work on the issue of street children. The units of data collection for this research differ depending on the question that is answered. As will be further explained later on, in order to answer the sub-questions with regard to the local community perceptions, inhabitants of a certain neighborhood are interviewed. To answer the other sub-questions, NGO workers are interviewed. Therefore, the units of data collection are regular inhabitants of Bogotá in one part of the research and NGO workers for the other part of the research. Besides, also policy makers and policemen are included for the governmental perspective and are therefore the units of data collection for these sub-questions. As explained in the theoretical framework, street children can be divided into three categories. The children at risk, the children on the street and the children of the street (Lusk, 1989). In this research all categories are included.
4.2 Methods of data collection
To collect the data for this research fieldwork has been done for eight weeks. This research was not part of an already existing research project and therefore contacts still had to be established before and during the field work period. During this period, only NGOs that work directly with the street child issue, either through full time care or prevention, have been contacted and included in this research. All the interviews were done in Spanish except for one that was done in English with a native English speaker. Luckily, no help from an assistant was needed since my level of Spanish proved to be sufficient. The sections underneath explain how the data of each part of the research was collected.
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4.2.1 NGOs’ perceptions about the street child phenomenon
In order to find out how the NGOs think about the causes, solutions and responsibility regarding the street child phenomenon, semi-structured interviews have been done with the founders and workers of four different NGOs. The four NGOs that are included in this research are Fundación Niños de los Andes, Formando Vidas, YMCA and Goles Con Sentido. More information about the mission, vision and actions of these four NGOs can be found in the Appendix 1. Semi-structured interviews were used because this technique makes sure that certain issues are included while it leaves space to talk about other issues as well. Only the workers that either work directly with the children, such as psychologists or educators, or have a position higher in the hierarchy of the organization have been included in this research. This decision is made because they are perceived to be experienced with the issue of street children and therefore considered representative for the NGO perspective.
4.2.2 Governmental perceptions about the street child phenomenon
For answering the sub-questions about the governmental perceptions of the street child phenomenon semi-structured interviews have been done with the police, the national child protection agency of Colombia, the Instituto de Bienestar Familiar (ICBF) and the Instituto Distrital para la Protección de la Niñez y la Juventud (IDIPRON), which is the agency for child protection on the level of the district of Bogotá. Although the IDIPRON only works in Bogotá, it is still a governmental agency. Therefore, the decision has been made to include the perception of the IDIRPON in the governmental perception. Besides, several policy documents from the ICBF have been analyzed to investigate the governmental perceptions about the causes, solutions and responsibility concerning the street child issue.
4.2.3 Local community perceptions about the street child phenomenon
During the interviews with the NGO workers about their perception of the street child issue, these respondents were also asked how they experience perceptions of the local community. Although this is just the perceptions of the NGO workers on the perceptions of the local community, and not strictly the perception of the local community itself, it is still used as a measure of the local community’s perception since I believe it does give an indication about how they think about the problem. Furthermore, journalists from CityTv, which is part of the news paper El Tiempo, who are
26 specialized in social issues, have been interviewed about how the Colombian society thinks about the street child issue. They are included because they are seen as external actors that have knowledge about how society and local communities think about street children. Though, the local community perception will not be based solely on ideas of NGO workers or the journalists about the local community perception. During the fieldwork period, one of the NGOs was chosen to further investigate the local community perception through focus groups, which is the NGO Goles Con Sentido located in the neighborhood Paraiso. After the neighborhood was chosen, its demographic characteristics were gathered to identify which people should be included in the focus groups. Consequently, four focus groups were set up, one with teenage girls, one with teenage boys, one with men and one with women. Unfortunately, due to unexpected circumstances the focus group with men was not possible anymore. Nevertheless, three focus groups have been done, each with five people with teenage boys, teenage girls and women. Additionally, a semi-structured interview has been done with another woman living in the neighborhood and the head of the local council of the neighborhood. The decision to do semi-structured interviews had the same reason as described above with the NGO and governmental perception.
4.2.4 The influence of local community and governmental perceptions on NGO policies
When the data regarding the NGO, the local community and the governmental perceptions about the street child phenomenon had been collected and briefly analyzed the data for answering the sub-questions about the NGO policies was collected. To get more information about how the NGOs are influenced by the local community and governmental perceptions some of the NGO workers that know more about this had been interviewed again. In this second phase of data collection, the findings concerning the local community and governmental perceptions about the street child phenomenon had been kept in mind in order to make a comparison between these perceptions and to ask questions about how these possible differences influence the NGO.
4.3 Sampling strategy and data analysis
For this research only NGOs that work directly with the street child issue, either through full time care or prevention, have been contacted and included. Due to limited time and resources it was not be possible to do random sampling for the research about the local community perceptions. Therefore, the choice has been made to do the focus groups with the people that were available to
27 the researcher. Besides, the NGOs and agencies that have been included in the research were based on the accessibility to the researcher. Hence, a non-probability way of sampling is applied. After the data has been collected as described above, the analysis was done. The interviews were analyzed through the computer program AtlasTi, which made it possible to analyze the interviews through labeling certain quotes.
4.4 Limits, reflections and ethics
Unfortunately this research has limitations. Firstly, the limited time in which this research was done. More time could have increased the quality of this research in multiple ways. For example, just one neighborhood was included to get to know more about the local community perception. This neighborhood is located in the most marginal areas of Bogotá, which might result in different outcomes than if a more developed area of the city would have been included. Based on the interviews with the NGO workers about reactions of the neighbors, I would have expected to find more negative perceptions about street children in the more wealthy neighborhoods of the city. Hence, it would have been ideal to be able to included different types of neighborhoods in this research. However, due to the limited time this was not possible.
Another issue linked to the limited time is the fact that not all NGOs have been investigated equally thoroughly. From one NGO just two workers were interviewed. However, one of these workers was the founder of this organization, who represents the perception of the organization the best. Therefore, I believe that including this NGO in my research is extremely valuable and makes the issue of a small amount of interviews within the NGO negligible.
Also personal safety was an issue. Since I am not Colombian, I decided not to enter certain parts of the city by myself. Therefore, I did not gather the respondents for the focus groups by myself, but asked a contact that was affiliated with one of the NGOs included in the research to do this for me. In this way, the people that were included in the focus groups were not a random sample of the neighborhood which might cause a bias. I believe that the people gathered by this contact are probably very involved with their children, since the contact is very involved with his children and children of others himself and probably gathered people he knows well. Therefore I believe that if this has caused a bias, it would be a bias of more positive attitudes toward street children. Nevertheless, being able to do focus groups in this neighborhood through this contact did improve my research significantly.
28 Something else that limits this research is the fact that the perceptions of NGO workers are partly seen as the NGOs’ perceptions. Conticini (2008) explains that practitioners are led by their personal interpretation of the problem in their work. Especially within bigger NGOs, discrepancies between the perceptions of NGOs and NGO workers might occur. This results in the fact that some personal perceptions about this issue are included in this research and are seen as the NGO perception, while this might not be (entirely) in line with the position of the NGO itself. Though, it was necessary to do interviews with NGO workers because policy documents of the NGOs did not specify the perceived cause, solution and responsibility concerning the street child issue. However, only the perceptions of the NGO workers that work directly with the children or higher in the organizational hierarchy have been included, which minimized the possible discrepancy between the perceptions of the NGOs and the individual NGO workers.
Another limitation is the fact that the research will be mainly based on interviews. Although, some policy documents are included, it was difficult to gather policy documents from the NGOs that specified the perceived causes, solutions and responsibility about the street child issue. Therefore, the credibility of this research would have been stronger if more other sources, such as policy documents, could have been included.
Another aspect that influences the quality of the research is the fact that the interviews were done in Spanish and the thesis written in English. Because of this, quotes needed to be translated which can cause content to get lost in translation. Besides, the fact that Spanish is not my first language has probably also influenced my research since reading between the lines and interpreting sayings and slang might have been harder for me. Nevertheless, doing the interviews in Spanish is still considered better than using a translator, since in this way even more information would have gotten translated and consequently be possibly biased through the interpretation of a translator. Besides, I believe my Spanish was sufficient to do this research without the use of a translator and the original quotes are included in the appendix of this thesis.
Apart from all these practical limitations, researching street children in general also brings its limitations. One limitation that is applicable to this research is the use of different definitions. The term ‘street child’ can be interpreted in different ways, which proves the importance of defining this term in academic research (Hutz et al, 1999). When I asked questions about ‘street children’ it might not have been entirely clear if the respondents think about the same group of children as me. However, the aim of this research was to investigate how the respondents actually think about street children. Therefore, I did not want to force my vision of street children on the respondents, since their own vision is a valuable part of this research. Additionally, all categories as distinguished by UNICEF
29 are included in this research. Hence, I believe that not specifying the used definition of ‘street children’ did not cause any issues.
An ethical issue arose when I started to arrange the focus groups. Based on demographical statistics of this neighborhood, the ideal set up for these focus groups would be four groups of teenage boys, teenage girls, men and women. Since the teenagers are not adults yet, the ethical issue arose concerning the informed consent. Although, I have asked my contact to make sure the parents of the children agreed with their child’s participation, it was not possible for me to check this. This is because most of the parents were not able to accompany their children to the focus group. However, I believe that teenagers in Colombia, especially in the marginalized areas, are usually more independent compared to teenagers in Western societies. Therefore, I argue that the children that participated in my focus groups were old and mature enough give me their consent themselves.
Another issue with the focus groups is that due to unexpected circumstances, it was not possible to do the focus group with men. Due to limited time and access to the neighborhood it was not possible for me to arrange another focus group at another time. Therefore, the perceptions of the men in the neighborhood are not represented in this research, which might cause a bias. Considering the fact that a lot of respondents argued that the Colombian ‘machismo’ culture, consisting of masculine dominance, plays a role in the street child phenomenon it would have been interesting to include the perceptions of men in this research. Nevertheless, still three focus groups with five respondents each were done, which I believe is sufficient to base the local community perception on.
Another ethical issue is the impact of my research on the NGOs and street children. I hope that this research gives the NGOs insight in how they are influenced by other actors and offers ideas to improve their work. However, this insight in their relationship with other actors might reveal problematic results of existing power relations, which might make NGOs more aware and possibly more resentful against the interference of other actors. Besides, the governmental institutions could also get resentful when critiques on their work by NGOs will be revealed. In the worst case, this could lead to a deterioration of the relationship between these different actors, which will probably not benefit the work of the NGO. Hence, this scenario will also not be beneficial for the street children. On the other hand, by revealing the weaknesses of the relationship, also ideas of improvement of this relationship can arise from which both actors might benefit. I expect that the chances are higher that the relationship between the NGOs and other actors improve and I hope that this will be the result of my research.
Besides these implications for the relationship between NGOs and other actors, also my recommendations for the improvement of NGOs can have an impact. In the end of this thesis I will make some recommendations for NGOs, which might concern the way they are working with street
30 children at the moment. If they decide to take my recommendations into consideration, my thesis could impact how the street child issue is being approached by NGOs. However, three out of four NGOs that are included in my research have already been dealing with the street child issue for several decades. Therefore, I do not expect that my research will result in strong changes of the NGOs’ approaches. Nevertheless, maybe small changes will be implemented because of my recommendations. In this way, this research can also directly influence the way NGOs are attacking the street child issue.
Despite of the above mentioned limitations of this research, I believe that this research is valuable since it addresses an issue that has not been investigated before, namely the issue of influences of different perceptions of different actors on NGOs. This is important since being aware of these influences could improve the impact of NGO work. Therefore, I argue that this research is a relevant addition to academic knowledge and is additionally valuable on the practical level of NGO work on street children.
4.5 Quality of the research
In total I conducted 33 interviews during my time in the field. Since my research is based mainly on these interviews and some policy documents, my research is completely qualitative. There are a few criteria that help assessing the quality of qualitative research. First, the criteria of trustworthiness, which can be divided into sub-criteria: credibility, transferability, dependability and confirmability. Secondly, the criteria of authenticity can help assess the quality of qualitative research (Bryman, 2008).
Regarding the first sub-criteria of trustworthiness, namely credibility, I think that my research is of a high quality. This, because I think that through living in Bogotá and visiting a lot of different places, and besides having spent quite some time in other Latin American countries, I know enough about the Latin American and Colombian context to be able to use my interviews to develop coherent and valid theoretical ideas. This is also generally seen as the biggest strength of qualitative research and I believe that this is also applicable to my research (Bryman, 2008). Additionally, a lot of different people with different backgrounds have been asked the same questions even within the different NGOs. In this way I made sure that I do not base my analysis on the perspective of one NGO on the answers of just one respondent. Besides I have interviewed a wide range of respondents for the local community perspective and the governmental perspective, which secured the credibility of my research. In addition to the interviews I have reflected my research methods with my local supervisor
31 on a regular basis, which also contributed to the credibility of my research. Furthermore, the use of both interviews and documents also increases the credibility of my research.
I think that transferability is always difficult in qualitative research since this is usually highly context specific, which is also the case in my research. This research could have gotten different outcomes if it would have been done in a different city within Colombia, let alone a different country in the world. A lot of the gathered answers are highly context specific for the Latin American and Colombian culture. Nevertheless, I believe that my research is still to some extent transferable to different contexts because there are NGOs and local community and governmental perceptions in almost every country. Besides, I think that the structure between NGOs and the local communities and governmental entities could also be similar in other countries. NGOs will always depend on funding and support by others. In this way they are always influenced by how either society or governments think about their work. Hence, the conclusions about how these structures and differences influence NGOs could also be transferable to different situations.
With regard to dependability I believe I have done enough to secure the quality of my research. All the steps during the process have been written down, all the interviews were recorded and all the transcripts saved in a way that anyone can always get back to it. In this way others can easily follow the steps I have taken and decisions I have made during my research, which enhances the dependability. Nevertheless, some thought processes take place without making conscious decisions. Hence, it is always difficult to make your research a hundred percent dependable.
Regarding confirmability I have tried to be as objective as possible. However, everyone has their own values which can guide interviews. Nevertheless, the four main questions were the same for each interview and always asked at the beginning in the same order, which minimized subjectivity. To secure my objectivity even more, I have transcribed all my interviews entirely and literally, to make sure that I did not jump to the wrong conclusions too fast through summarizing them. Besides, they were transcribed in Spanish instead of translated to English to ensure that I would not lose objectivity through interpretations made during the translations.
Concerning the second criteria of Bryman (2008), which is authenticity, I believe that my research can help contribute to NGOs’ understanding of their situation. Besides, this research gives advice about how NGOs and their relation to other institutions and local neighborhoods can be improved by comparing different NGOs with each other. I think that particularly this part will be useful for the NGOs and the ICBF, since NGOs can learn from each other’s methods, and the ICBF can learn from certain critiques NGO workers have given them. Hence, I think that these specific recommendations will help society and consequently increase the authenticity of my research.
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4.6 The study area
This research took place in Bogotá, Colombia. Colombia is a country located in South America with total of 49,202,482 inhabitants on the 2nd of May 2017 (DANE, 2017). This makes Colombia the
third biggest country of Latin America in terms of inhabitants after Mexico and Brazil. Colombia is classed as an upper middle income country according to the World Bank. Though, the wealth is not divided equally, proven by the GINI coefficient, which was 53.5 in 2014. The majority of the Colombians live in urban areas, namely 76.4 percent of the total population and the largest city in Colombia is its capital Bogotá (World Bank, 2017). The city of Bogotá was founded the 6th of August in
1538 by Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada. It is situated in the center of Colombia and is part of the Cudinamarca department. Image 2 shows the location of Bogotá within South America and Colombia.
Image 2: The location of Bogotá (Source: Bedoya, 2012, p. 22)
From north to south, Bogotá covers an area of more or less 33 kilometers and from east to west around 16 kilometers (Alcalcía Mayor de Bogotá (2), 2015). The city has a surface of 1775.98 km2
and is divided into 20 localities (La Secretaría Distrital de Cultura, Recreación y Deporte, 2017). Image 3 shows where the different localities are situated within the municipality of Bogotá. The amount of inhabitants of Bogotá has been growing for decades already. Between 2005 and 2015 the population of Bogotá increased from 6,840,117 inhabitants in 2005, to 7,243,201 in 2009 and ultimately 7,878,783 inhabitants in 2015. This is an increase of 15.2 percent between 2005 and 2015 (DANE, 2015). Though, the whole metropolitan area of Bogotá has an amount of inhabitants much higher
33 than just the city, namely 9,764,769 (World Bank, 2015), and consequently accounts for 26.5 percent of the urban population in Colombia. The rapid growth of Bogotá has resulted in a strong marginalization of some areas in Bogotá. One of the localities that is now one of the most marginalized areas of the city, is Ciudad Bolívar, in which part of this research is done. As can be seen in Image 3, Ciudad Bolívar is located in the southwest of the city. It is the third biggest locality of Bogotá with a surface of 12,998 hectares and it is divided over 252 neighborhoods (Alcaldía Mayor de Bogotá D.C., 2017). The locality has a total amount of 687,923 inhabitants and is still growing nowadays (DANE, 2015). Image 4 shows the division of the inhabitants in 2011 by age. It shows that 49.2 percent of the inhabitants is younger than 25 years old. This makes the average age of the inhabitants of Ciudad Bolívar lower than the average of Bogotá.
