Suchergebnisse

This paper investigates a new determinant of fostering a child and evaluate whether children who are fostered in due to this reason have different schooling outcomes than children who are fostered in for other reasons. The study tests whether households headed by a male who is the eldest of his brothers have a higher probability of hosting a foster child once the variables such as education, wealth and labor needs are controlled. Such a relationship is expected in patrilineal societies if social norms dictate that this is the duty of the kin group's head—the eldest brother—to host a child fostered out following a shock and when no other household can take care of him. This hypothesis is tested in the context of Cameroon where many ethnic groups are patrilineal. The author notes that households headed by a male who is the eldest of his brothers have a higher probability of hosting school-age foster girls but not foster boys. This could be either because girls are more likely than boys to be fostered out in the country following an economic or a demographic shock or because they have more difficulties than boys to find a host household. However, no evidence suggesting that girls fostered in due to norms receive less education than girls fostered in for other reasons is found.

Child fostering is a practice widespread in Sub-Saharan Africa whereby children are temporarily sent to live with a host family. Using a rich household survey conducted in Senegal in 2006-7, the paper aims at describing the selection into fostering of both households and children and at examining the impact of fostering on the wellbeing of children (host, foster- and siblings left behind) measured through their school enrollment, labour and domestic work. Results suggest a wide heterogeneity among foster children, inducing differences in their wellbeing. The main sources of such heterogeneity come from the child's gender and his duration of stay in the host household. Whether the fostering has been formally arranged between parents also seems to matter. Results are reassuring regarding the well-being of fostered children relative to their host siblings, even if they might not fare as well as children not involved in fostering. On average, education and labour outcomes of foster children are not different from those of their host siblings. In particular, results do not support the idea that fostered girls might be overloaded with domestic tasks: they do not seem to spend more time at it than their host sisters.