At history of Brazil there is little or nothing written about the abandoned children. O child abandonment in Brazil it has existed since the 18th century, as many mothers and families were unable to raise their children and ended up leaving them on the streets. The main factor of abandonment has always been the misery.
However, there were others factors that lead a mother to abandon her children in the eighteenth century and the main one occurred because the woman get pregnant when I was still single. Most of the time, these women gained the child (baby) and remained single. Brazilian society in the 18th century did not accept that single women had and raised their children, as it was a society in which moral and ethical values ended up prevailing - consequently, single mothers underwent a process of discrimination and prejudice.
Today, our society still suffers legacies from that past: thousands of single mothers often continue to suffer discrimination and abandoning their children, both for this discriminatory process and for the misery and lack of economic conditions to create them.
With the advent of industries at the beginning of the 20th century, thousands of Brazilian families ended up leaving the countryside (rural) for the cities - the call rural exodus – in search of work in industries, with the intention of improving their living conditions (economic and social).
As a result, cities began to grow due to the increase in population and the urban problems that emerged (lack of jobs, housing, food, sewage and treated water). Families, usually the father and mother who managed to enter the factories as workers (factory workers), worked 12 hours a day. The children of these fathers and mothers began to be alone at home and began to occupy the streets.
The vast majority of abandoned children in the early twentieth century lived on the streets, in addition to the reasons already mentioned, to carry out activities that complemented the family's income. Today we still see several children who are on the street selling candies, sweets and various other products to help with the family income. At traffic lights, thousands of children are used by adults to ask car drivers for money.
With the sharp growth in the number of abandoned children in the 1920s, the Brazilian government began to implement actions to try resolve the issue of child abandonment, creating orphanages, vocational schools and correctional schools (for juvenile offenders). In 1927, the first laws regulating government policies in favor of children were created – the so-called Minors Code.
In 1990, the Brazilian government created the Statute of Children and Adolescents (ECA), which regulates policies in favor of children and adolescents and establishes their rights and duties. But the situation of abandoned children in Brazil is still far from being resolved: there are currently millions of children living at risk on the streets. Just leave home to see a child in this situation of abandonment!
By Leandro Carvalho
Master in History