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SUMMARY. For the greater part of the nineteenth century experiences of popular childhoods were rooted in family economies to which children were expected to contribute. Family economies were diverse and family‐controlled with children making a range of contributions depending on age and gender within local economies and subcultures. While older children, especially boys, entered paid employment if possible, younger children and girls undertook unpaid domestic tasks. Throughout the century there was a steady decline in opportunities for paid employment among children. Among families where wages and standards of living were rising, childhoods were gradually reconstructed as parents postponed their children's entry to paid employment. The rise in wages was very uneven and there was a growing crisis in the family economies of the poorest families, where children continued to see themselves as contributors despite shrinking child labour markets and the introduction of legislation to control them. Although schooling remained a costly item in domestic budgets, parents who could afford it sent their children to school and a period of often brief and irregular school attendance was a feature of the majority of childhoods by the 1860s. The introduction and enforcement of universal, compulsory school attendance after the Education Act 1870 greatly increased the costs of childhoods, causing a sudden large increment in the dependency of children upon their parents. This marked an acceptance of the legitimacy of intervention by the state in parent child relationships. With a settled period of more or less regular school attendance childhoods became more standardised and visible. Notions of popular childhoods were gradually reconstructed moving away from children as contributors towards children as consumers.

This article examines equal opportunities polices (EOPs) in higher education - the supply side of senior staff in management and the professions. In the United Kingdom (UK) EOPs have been intro duced as a result of the law. The article shows that their effect on, access and employment in institutions of higher education (HEIs) has been marginal. The analysis suggests that the belief in the rhetoric of equality in the chariers of institutions, the notion of academic merit as an objective construct and the values underlying the exclusive prestige hierarchy all conoibute to complacent and reluctant managements. Evidence of the effectiveness of policies in Northern Ireland and initial teacher education (ITE) in the past support the need for a firmer legisladve framework. As evidence from data collection becomes available, the contradiction between rhetoric and, reality will cause increasing controversy in higher education.

An increasing number of institutions of higher education in Britain advertise themselves as 'Equal Opportunities Employers'. A variety of evidence is presented from reports from the Commission for Racial Equality and the Hansard Society, case studies from a polytechnic and a university and published evidence from Oxford. Queen's University, Belfast and University College, London. It shows that progress in the implementation of equal opportunities policies in British higher education is unimpressive, foundering at the stage of monitoring recruitment practices. Managements believe the criterion of academic merit is a guarantee against discrimination and are resistant to the introduction of effective equal opportunities policies. The CVCP Guidance on Good Practice for Equal Opportunities in Employment in Universities, emphasising positive action, is a significant step forward at a timely moment. It highlights fundamental and much neglected issues in the management of higher education.