Citation

Olsen R. Child. Soc. 2000; 14(5): 384-394.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2000, National Children's Bureau of the United Kingdom, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1099-0860.2000.tb00192.x

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Existing analysis and discussion about young carers -- children caring for ill or disabled family members -- has been limited in scope, concentrating on narrow policy and service issues. In this paper, I attempt to introduce a more historical perspective to these debates, by comparing responses to the issue of young caring in the 1990s to resistance encountered in the implementation of child labour and education reforms towards the end of the nineteenth century. I discuss the parallel ways in which the quality of childhood for some children became problematised without sufficient recognition of the limited choices that some families face.