(7 March 2008) "Investing in Women and Girls," the theme of this year's International Women's Day, is a call to close the gap in equality caused by gender and improve the lives of today's, and tomorrow's, women.
From Brazil, the project Circo de Todo Mundo (Everybody's Circus) presents a simple, replicable model that invests in gender equity through community participation, direct services and public policy advocacy to eliminate child labour and provide support to teenage girls working as maids. The project took fifth place, from nearly 900 applicants, in the 2007 "Experiences in Social Innovation" competition organized by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), with support from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.
For the hundreds of young women and men who have entered the programme, the Circo de Todo Mundo Cultural Center is a canvas tent where a tight rope, juggling lessons, make-up and instruction in theater arts allow them to recover lost childhoods and self-esteem, while giving them a chance to embark on new paths for the future.
Working with a network of public and private institutions, Circo de Todo Mundo helps poor families generate the income that will allow their daughters to stop working outside the home as maids and nannies. The more than 200 girls working as maids who have gone back to school is an example of its achievements. In the words of Maria Eneide Teixeira, general coordinator of this NGO founded 17 years ago in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais: "Having a guarantee to the right to education opens new possibilities in the lives of girls and teens working in domestic service."
In Brazil alone, half a million youths between the ages of five and 17 labour as domestic employees; more than 90% are female; 61% are Afro-descendant; and 45% are under age 16, the minimum legal working age.
Poor girls and teens are the most likely to enter domestic service. As ECLAC states in its report Women's contribution to equality in Latin America and the Caribbean: "Caring is a task for women, and serving one for poor women."
Domestic employment confronts women workers with a wall of exclusion. Dropping out of school, low wages for long hours, negative impacts on health and the threat of mistreatment and sexual abuse are part of this barrier.
The faces of these young women are hidden behind the doors of the houses they work in, far from their families, lacking opportunities to study or even to play. They constitute "an invisible army of workers, subject to all kinds of exploitation in a supposedly 'healthy' alternative to resolve situations of extreme poverty that is rarely called into question," notes Teixeira.
The girls and teens of Latin America and the Caribbean need protection, not patrons, the Circo believes, to guarantee the rights to childhood and education. But progress is underway.
"I was in school when I was discovered by the Circo," recalls a young woman who started working as a babá (babysitter) at the age of 11. "They gave me a scholarship so I could stop working and attend school fulltime and take Circo courses. I studied Portuguese, computers and handicrafts." Today, she is employed by the Legislative Assembly of Minas Gerais.
For an overview and photos of the Circo de Todo Mundo project, click here. To contact Circo de Todo Mundo, write or call: Néllie Vaz Branco; E-mail: comunicacao circodetodomundo.org.br; tel: (55-31) 3461-2763, Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil. Click here to learn more about the ECLAC/Kellogg "Experiences in Social Innovation" project or contact: lezak.shallatcepal.org ; telephones: (562) 210-2060/ 2451/2263. |
