Moral values that structure the socialization of 'vulnerable children' in a government development programme in the south of Bogotá, Colombia - Borda Carulla, Susana
The Colombian Institute for the Wellbeing of Families (Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar or ICBF) is a Colombian public establishment created in 1968 with the scope of “protecting children and improving the stability and the wellbeing of Colombian families”. One of its main roles is to dictate the norms guiding the activities leading to the improvement of children’s conditions and to the “moral improvement of family nuclei”. This Institute is equally responsible for formulating and directing the execution of programs directed to “vulnerable” Colombian women and children. In this paper I explored the notion of “vulnerable” child developed within the ICBF. The corpus of data I analyzed includes the relevant legislation, the internal documents of the ICBF, a number of structured interviews with high functionaries of the ICBF, and field observations of ICBF functionaries in the framework of the ICBF program Community Homes of Wellbeing (Hogares Comunitarios de Bienestar), directed to “vulnerable” women and their small children. My main claim was that that the notion of “vulnerable child” conveyed by the ICBF must be understood in the framework of a child-mother-centered model of family where the role of man is uncertain and often deeply problematic.
Keywords: conferencePaper; Bogotá; Colombia; Development; childhood model; vulnerable child; vulnerable mother