JOURNAL
ISSUE 4
2001/2002
Adolescent
Children and Civil Society Project
Stephen
Matula
The Children's Fund of the Slovak Republic, which is simultaneously
the Slovak Section of Defense for Children International,
was founded on May 12th, 1990 as one of the first NGOs in
Slovakia; their objective is to contribute to protection of
children's rights in all spheres of social life and to promote
formation of ideas, concepts and material condition of health,
social, educational and psychological care for children. It
mostly associates professionals from all areas of child care
(health professionals, psychologists, lawyers, artists) and
other activists from the ranks of the public. It has 40 branches
all over the Slovak Republic. The chairman of the Children's
Fund (DF) of the Slovak Republic (SR) is the only representative
of NGOs in the Government Council of SR for the prevention
of criminality and other antisocial activities. The number
of existing registered NGOs in Slovakia is about 10,000 but
only approximately 20 percent of them are active. About 1,000
paid workers and 68,000 volunteers work in these NGOs. About
40 percent of NGOs have their seats in Bratislava; the other
60 percent are relatively evenly fragmented in other regions
of Slovakia. The basic problem of the unsuccessful activity
of many NGOs is due to the low managerial skills of their
representatives.
Every year, many NGOs are dissolved due to inability or unwillingness
to keep accounting agenda. The work of NGOs has a low social
prestige. The number of NGOs that focus on working with children
and youth that actually do function is about 250. The majority
of them take care of children without age limitation. The
second biggest group of NGOs is those that focus on adolescents.
About 25 percent of these organizations work with children
under 15 years of age. The evaluation of the activity of NGOs
that focus on children and youth, by experts alone, is ambiguous
with respect to the issue of problems. It is concentrated
in two crystallized attitudes:
- They (NGOs)
are abundant, but are unsatisfactory in quality.
- Their number
is small, but they work well. The evaluation of NGOs from
the part of the young generation alone is pregnantly vague.
More than one-third of young people were not able to evaluate
their activity. The visibility of their activity in society
is small and it would be desirable to take certain measures
for better propagation of their activity and to allow for
better publicity, mostly among young people. In the activity
of NGOs, not only a dynamic quantitative growth occurs,
but qualitative changes occur, too. Changes lie in a gradual
self-recognition by particular organizations as being parts
of certain systems with significant social meaning and with
common interests. People from NGOs clearly define this sector
as a flexible one, befitting to react to topical problems.
The sector contains (besides state but also charitable organizations)
mechanisms and development potential. A practical
token for the process of finding one's identity emerged
in the appearance of organizations that work in services
of a nonprofit character. In the meantime, only the most
experienced and active organizations undertake such an activity
(for example, SAIA-SCTS, Slovak Humanity Council, Council
of Slovak Youth). The qualitative changes we are speaking
about are also visible in improvement of the ability of
the representatives of NGOs to formulate good ideas in projects.
This is undoubtedly also the result of managerial trainings
for NGOs, which SAIA organized in the largest extent. The
Children's Fund of the Slovak Republic undertook - for the
needs of the members of its branches but also for other
NGOs - three training/educational courses to support preventative
protection in children and youth against social-pathological
phenomena. The duration of each course is five weeks of
training that the participants undergo within two years.
A problem is that young people do not perceive work in an
NGO as a perspective one for their professionalization,
but rather only as a current form of job. Many people who
achieved success in NGOs then leave for entrepreneurship.
More surveys show that NGOs in Slovakia consider the basic
problems of their activities to be the following:
- legislative
framework for NGOs
- laws on
taxes
- lack of
information sharing and service
- malnourishment
of managerial skills
- little
information on resources and fundraising From a legal
aspect there are two forms of a nonprofit organization:
- Foundations
- Civic
associations
In both cases,
founders are due to submit their status, personal data of
statutory representatives and expected resources of earnings.
The deepest problems are caused by legislation with respect
to financing of NGOs. First, it is the area of taxes. The
tax system, only in a very limited extent, motivates entrepreneurial
subjects for sponsoring. It offers a present by a form of
reducing the tax base (only up to two percent of the gross
profit); however, this also means reducing the profit. We
think that an optimal solution would be if entrepreneurial
subjects were enabled to offer part of their taxes (about
five percent) directly to voluntary organizations. Moreover,
nonprofit organizations are taxed in the same way as entrepreneurial
subjects. The law is that they have to pay tax from all activities
that might bring profit. NGOs are also subjected to "value
added tax" (VAT - 25 percent, i.e., six percent) which
they must pay every time they make a purchase, or when they
import/purchase material presents from abroad. Another severe
problem for NGOs is the system of health, social and pensionary
insurance. Equal to any other employer, NGOs must pay, for
every employee, insurance in the amount of 12 percent of his
or her gross income. Individual NGOs obtain finances for their
activities from various domestic funds, which may or not be
endowed by the state, or they were successful in procuring
financial means abroad. A smaller number of NGOs obtain finances
directly from foreign funds. Finances are always provided
on the basis of elaborated grants and projects.
THE CONVENTION
ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD & NATIONAL LEGISLATION
The Czech and the Slovak Federative Republic ratified the
Convention on Children's Rights as one of the first statutes
of Central and Eastern Europe (the President of the Republic
signed it on September 30th, 1990 and it took effect for CSFR
on February 6th, 1991). The ratification document was placed
on deposit by the General Secretary of the UNO on January
7th, 1991. In the Slovak law order, basic children's rights
are codified separately. The basis for a legal condition is
set forth by the Constitution. The Constitution of the SR
formulates the protective children's and youth's status, traditionally
in the area of economic, social and cultural rights. Under
Article 41 of the Constitution, special protection for children
and youth is guaranteed. This constitutional principle is
made concrete by legal provisions of various law areas, mostly
civic and family law, work law, administrative law, social
security law, health insurance and punitive law. The regulations
of the above-mentioned law areas respect specific status of
children and youth and provide them with a special protection.
Full age is, by the law order of the Slovak Republic, governed
by Civic Code (Law No. 40/1964 Zb.) in reading of later provisions.
Under § 8
of the Civic Code, full age is acquired by reaching 18 years
of age or being married in the case of being under 18 years
of age. Until being full-aged, the citizen has a status of
being under-aged and is subjected to special protection of
the law. The under-aged person is competent only for such
legal acts that pertain to his/her intellect and will, and
maturity that corresponds to his/her age. The onset of compulsory
school attendance starts at the beginning of a school year
following the day when the child reaches his/her sixth year
of age and its duration is nine years. The commencement of
work-legal competence starts on the day when the citizen reaches
15 years of age. The Work Code governs special work conditions
for young workers. They cannot be involved in underground
works, in mineral mining or in constructing tunnels and adits.
Under-aged persons cannot be involved in works that are -
with respect to their anatomic, physiological and mental specifications
- inadequate, dangerous or detrimental to their health.
The Slovak law
order acknowledges equal rights for children born out of marriage
or delivered extramaritally and it does not allow for any
discrimination of children. The demand set forth in Article
12 in the Convention of Children's Rights is also mirrored
in the reading of some new provisions. For example, under
the Law on Freedom of Religious Faith and on Church Status
and Status of other Religious Communities (No. 308/1991),
children's legal representatives decide on matters of their
religious education until the child is 15 years of age. The
child older than 15 years of age decides on this issue alone.
In the same way, the new Law on Name and Surname (No. 300/1993)
in relation to changing a child's name and surname sets forth
that these changes require the consent of an under-aged person
who is older than 15 years of age. The same rule also applies
when a change of an adopted child's name occurs. The basic
laws that pertain to the legal status of children and youth
were already adopted during the former CSFR, and on the basis
of Article 152 of the SR's Constitution, these laws remained
valid in the newly begotten Slovak Republic. With respect
to the fact that the majority of them had been adopted before
1989, they do not match with the new political, economic and
social conditions in our republic. Therefore, essential changes
are going on and are expected to take place in the law order
of the Slovak Republic.
However, we must
also say that, in previous decades too, care for children
had been on a decent level. The law provisions that had been
the basis for this care took specific children's interests
and needs into consideration. We must say that rights that
were franchised to citizens, including children, had been
also realized in the former socialist social system, but only
within the limits that this system allowed for. The whole
area of education, the health system and social care had been
secured by the government by means of its bodies and institutions.
A strong paternalistic approach of the state had been manifested
not only with respect to children but also with respect to
adults. It is apparent that new social stratification of the
society will require a differentiated and direct approach
toward children, though limited by the economic situation
of the state. On the other hand, reconstruction of the law
order creates wide room for intensification of children's
rights acknowledged by the Convention. Speaking about the
preparation of special legislation provisions in the area
of child and youth protection, the most important can be the
two following provisions:
- Law on Youth.
This bill is prepared by a special work group attached to
the Ministry of Education of the SR with more youth organizations
represented, including the representative of the Children's
Fund of the SR. The adoption of this bill isn't expected
until the end of 1997.
- Law on Protection
of Children and Youth Against Socially Pathological Influences
of Mass Media The bill was formed on the basis of the Children's
Fund of the SR initiative and it was approved by the Government
Council of the SR for Prevention of Criminality and Other
Antisocial Activity. Presently, under the coordination of
the State Secretary and Ministry of Culture of the SR, its
paragraphed text is in preparation. The pertaining bill
shall cover:
- programs
and press communicators that are being labeled as not
permissible for youth, that is, for the age category
of under 18 years;
- music and
lyrics (text) conveyors available to this age category
in public lending facilities;
- programs
broadcasted until 11:00 p.m. and after 6:00 a.m. The
communicators that endanger the moral and emotional
development of children and youth are considered by
this law to be all those communicators that ethically
disorient and destruct children's value hierarchies
and which level down young peoples' emotional life.
Three significant analyses were realized recently; they
map the situation of children and youth in Slovakia:
I. Situational
Analysis: Children - Slovakia's Tomorrow
In 1995, the Slovak Committee for UNICEF published a report
of 121 pages. This work of a collective team of authors was
coordinated by the Chairman's Secretary of the Children's
Fund of the SR, Mrs. Mariana Arnoldov‡. At the end of
the analysis are statements that the outcome situation for
Slovakia in the issue of care for children is, in many respects,
better than in other countries. For example, the system of
preschool education had functioned very well; Slovakia had
had an excellent standard in vaccination and a low disease
rate in infectious diseases thereof. The eminent objective
of present days is to prevent new economic relationships in
the society and the phenomena that accompany them that have
unfavorable influence on the status and condition of children's
life in Slovakia. We progressed insufficiently in efforts
for integration of health-disabled children to the mainstream
environment, and there are barriers ahead of us that are hard
to manage: invisible obstacles in people's minds which (because
of ignorance) inhibit more explicit advancement. The cultivation
of society and its future morale profile is based on the education
of children and youth. Here lies a key to healing the entire
social climate. Generally confessed conviction that adequate
influence on youth is the most significant prevention against
serious antisocial phenomena must be consistently materialized.
It is necessary to elaborate a complex program of care for
children and youth, and by legislation regulations, to create
room for obtaining nongovernment resources for culture, sports
and education.
II. Situational
Study of Conditions and of Children's and Youth's Perspectives
in Slovakia
In 1995, FOCUS, the Center for Social and Marketing Analysis,
elaborated on and published a 62-page report after receiving
an order from the International Youth Foundation. One of the
respondents, who was interviewed during the preparation of
the analysis, was also the Chairman of the Children's Fund
of the SR. The report concludes with an emphasis that after
the fall of communism, existing formal structures crashed
down without having any other immediate alternative to catch
hold of, and to build new and working structures requires
time. The third sector - the sphere of nongovernment organizations
- seems to be the most suitable and viable platform for fulfillment
of such a goal. The problems concerning children and youth
intensified recently - new problems appeared, problems more
or less quite unknown. This process is faster than is the
appearance of projects and organizations that focus on prevention
and solution.
III. The Situation
of Children and Youth in Slovakia: Problems and Perspectives.
The study was
elaborated and published by the Fund for Support of Young
Families in 1996; it has 40 pages. The study concludes with
a statement that this survey revealed a persistent animosity
shared by young people in the SR to be engaged and organized
in something. The consequence of this may also lie in certain
politicization of their activity presently, but is also due
to the fact that young people in Slovakia have not yet sensed
such a pressure on themselves that would compel them to mutually
articulate and advocate their interests or rights. Maybe young
people are unable to utilize their influence to pressure state
organizations into actualizing their interests or rights (insufficient
level of individualism, lack of civic skills, inability to
solve group interests by self-assisting). Teaching young people
with respect to "civic know-how) could also belong to
those activities that should be more explicitly supported
and developed in Slovakia. Every year, the Children's Fund
of the Slovak Republic holds an interdisciplinary, international
conference: CHILD AT RISK - always with a special focus that
would map the most poignant areas of youth's and children's
lives. This year, already the seventh conference, will be
dedicated to the topic of violence in the family. The recommendations
of the conference are published every year in a bulletin,
which we operatively send to pertaining ministries.
PARTICIPATION
We can generally say that those institutions that would allow
youth and children active participation in decision-making
on matters that concern them are not many in number (with
respect to the fact that the young generation should be represented
by their own interests). Representatives of youth NGOs are
delegated to various committees on local but also nationwide
levels, mostly if the issue of problems dealt with by a pertaining
body covers children's and youth's problems. The possibility
to influence the decision-making of these institutions, since
adults are significantly and predominantly represented in
them, is minimal. Within the region of Slovakia, some attempts
have been made at establishing, both at basic and secondary
levels, students' parliaments that would declare, on a local
level, children's and youth's interests. However, none of
these attempts appeared to have had a long duration. Until
now, too little responsibility has been ascribed to children
and youth from the part of adults. Informing children about
their rights is mostly done in two ways:
- The issue of
children's rights and directing the young generation to
know and respect them - if they become parents - is consistently
elaborated in school curricula within several subjects.
We think that the extent and direction of this teaching
is sufficient.
- More NGOs (including
the Children's Fund of the SR) have, in their scope, a need
for creating and realizing methods that focus on nationwide
education and propagation to keeping children's rights.
We can say that, as a consequence of systematic mass media
rehashing of these problems, the level of the young generation's
and adults' informedness about children's rights is getting
better.
VOLUNTARISM
There are several dozens of youth civic associations in Slovakia
that work on the basis of the voluntaristic principle with
the fact that the activity of central bodies is financed by
the form of grants from state resources. However, a significant
majority of these members perform these activities without
entitlement for reimbursement. Theses associations have, on
the one hand, a religious character (Catholic, Evangelic and
Jewish associations) and they are, on the other hand, based
on widespread activities (touristic, science/technical, educational,
informational, cultural, artistic, sports, ecological, student
activities, etc.). After the fall of communism, a revitalization
of such worldwide organizations as the YMCA and the Scout
movement took place in Slovakia. These organizations very
significantly participate in securing and realizing youth's
and children's leisure time activities, that is, in allowing
for a wide scale of activities in the areas of culture, sports,
international contacts, recreation and rest, informedness
in the unemployment area and the area of negative phenomena;
these facets affect youth and children today. They also participate
in developing their interests, they help to create conditions
for outgrowth and improvement of practical skills and they
help to utilize leisure time wisely. They enhance the spiritual
orientation of the young generation, too.
MINI REPORT:
DISABLED CHILDREN
Care for disabled children and youth has a rich history and
a long tradition in Slovakia. In the second half of the 18th
century, the first attempts of organized education for disabled
individuals had already started. From that time on, a system
of special schools and educational facilities has been built
here. Now, almost 30,000 disabled children are educated here
according to their age and the type and degree of disability.
Since the segregated system of educating disabled children
(applied at the same time of communist dictatorship) is itself
an oblique factor in the process of gradual integration in
society, it is the integration of the disabled in regular
school systems that became the subject of the present reform
of the Slovak school system. During the last five years, basic
legislation provisions took effect on the basis of which the
education of intact children occurs simultaneously with that
of children who require certain special pedagogic or technical
service. Integration for children with a variety of disabilities
(body, sensory or mental disabilities; children with disordered
communication ability, children with combined disorders) takes
place in a regular type of class or in a special class. It
is expected that full integration will be carried out within
the next ten or fifteen years. Nowadays, integration is hard
to practice due to its pedagogic and mainly material demands,
which are furthermore complicated by present budget limitation
in school systems due to the state budget. In recent years,
significant changes too place in care for children that require
a special educational approach and special care due to behavioral
disorders, psychosocial-developmental disorders or educational
family malfunction. The reform probably affected this area
most severely and it is already legislatively embedded. The
basic characteristic of the reform is:
- the emphatic
shift toward prevention and working with child and family
in a phase of risk, with an objective to avoid formation
of behavioral and psychosocial development disorders;
- prevention
is tightly linked with the building up of the early detection
and screening system, and with the system of educational
counseling;
- building up
of the superstructure - centers of educational and psychological
prevention that secure employment of specific care for children
with psychosocial development disorders. The main goal of
this care is to evade placement of children in alternative
forms of education.
The reform also
seriously covers, within its contents, the system of alternative
education. It explicitly moves in the direction of family
forms of alternative care and toward the specification of
re-educational programs for children placed in facilities
due to serious behavior disorders or punitive activity. The
organization of education in special schools is based on that
of regular, basic schools but with a certain variance. A consistent
individual approach toward disabled children in the educational
process allows for a reduced number of pupils in the class.
It is dependent on a kind and degree of disability and the
number of students in the class is usually between six and
fifteen pupils. The last representative survey, which was
realized in this area, selected 13 risk groups of children
and youth:
- Romanian children
and youth (about five percent of the population)
- Children from
socially weak families
- Children from
orphan's homes (almost 10,000 children)
- Mentally handicapped
children
- Apprentice
youth
- Children from
incomplete families (almost ten percent of dependent children
live in incomplete families)
- Children from
special schools
- Suburban children
- Young people
without any qualifications
- Rural children
(more than half of the children in the SR)
- Urban children
- Young people
after completion of school attendance
- Young unemployed
people
MINI REPORT:
CHILDREN IN CONFLICT WITH THE LAW
In the area of children's conflict with the law, youth that
do not find in their microclimate adequate patterns of behavior
and emotional saturation are more endangered. As consequences
of this absence, youth seek out patterns for their behavior
elsewhere - in peer groups or in inadequate offers of mass
media. Emotional deprivation, or insufficiency of emotional
saturation in the family - where there is a high risk that
youth would incline to asocial juvenile groups, where these
young people find room for their self-actualization - is rather
an impulse for escape and further frustration. These youth
are mostly endangered by negative phenomena occurring in society
in the form of antisocial and punitive activity. Their influences
produce mental and physical damages, and later, diversion
from socially acceptable life careers without psycho- and
social-pathological characteristics. Among the negative phenomena
that influence the status of these groups of the population
belong, as a concomitant phenomena of transforming society
and liberating free traveling, mostly the high unemployment
rate, intense social polarization of society, commercialization
of mass media, infiltration of international crime to the
territory of the SR (whose victims are also persons of these
age categories) and intense drug threat.
Other phenomena that reduce possibilities of protecting these
groups involve the increasing migration of perpetrators of
punitive activity and increasing systematization of crime,
the consequence of which is increasing latency not only of
the total punitive activity but also of punitive activity
perpetrated by adults on children and youth. A proof for this
assertion is the case of the Belgian pedophile who had been
impossible for our police to find and who had permanent contacts
in Slovakia.
A negative influence
on children, juvenile persons and near-juveniles is also taking
place in interhuman relationships - not only in families but
among citizens, too - where we can see a gradual closure of
families in their inner world and also diversion from traditional
Slovak kind-heartedness, welcoming and willingness to help.
These groups especially are not prepared for the implications
of a Western style of life. A violent transformation in the
thinking of contemporary young persons brings changes in his/her
value orientation, which is most likely exhibited in a desire
for an above-standard way of life and noncritical perception
of one's own abilities and possibilities in the context of
society.
For children from
malfunctioning family environments (an environment that endangers
the child's mental and physical development), there is, within
the SR, a system of facilities of alternative education set
up which consists of orphan's homes, diagnostic centers, re-educational
homes and homes for mothers. In 1996, 83 such facilities operated
within the SR and the establishment of three other facilities
is planned until the end of 1997. Youth become victims of
punitive activity that adults perpetrate in many cases. There
are many instances of sexual abuse due to dependence (boarding
houses, families); rapes; trafficking with young girls when
they are (under illusion of lucrative employment) taken abroad,
where they are restricted in personal freedom and are forced
to serve as prostitutes, etc. In many cases, bullying of committed
persons takes place with permanent consequences. Adult perpetrators
often abuse the gullibility of under-aged children to gain
unrighteous access to someone else's apartment, which results
in subsequent theft.
Youth also become
victims of adult perpetrators by other unlawful acts, acts
that do not immediately force them to perpetrate punitive
or other antisocial activity, but acts that create conditions
for basic preconditions of other activity. Among such punitive
acts belong the violation of morality, negligence of the child's
compulsory sustenance, serving alcohol to youth, etc. From
1990 through the first half of 1996, attacks by perpetrators
of punitive acts affected 427 children aged zero to six years,
4,767 children aged six to 15 years and 3,236 juvenile children.
In spite of the above-mentioned cases, where children or youth
were directly endangered by a perpetrator of a punitive act,
a significant number of so-called "endangering delicts"
was registered, where, necessarily, nothing might have happened
but where physical or mental threat could indeed happen to
children or youth. In a five-year follow-up including the
first half of 1996, 21,463 punitive acts of neglecting compulsory
sustenance, 477 cases of endangering moral education, 128
cases of toxicomania dissemination and 28 cases of serving
alcoholic beverages to youth were documented. From the aspect
of type composition of punitive activity by which youth were
most endangered, there were: 57 murders registered where the
victim was under 18 years of age, 13 murders of a child by
a mother, 1,255 cases in which these persons became victims
of robbery, 2577 times when harm was done to a victim, 844
times that they became the victims of blackmail and 139 cases
when these persons were bullied. From other serious cases
we can mention 15 instances of abandoning the child, 283 instances
of restricting one's personal freedom, 534 rapes, 413 cases
of sexual abuse due to dependency and 2177 cases where other
instances of sexual abuse took place. In recent years, 12
girls under the age of 18 whom perpetrators had trafficked
for prostitution were registered.
The participation of youth in perpetrating punitive activity
is very hard to estimate. But if we focus on available statistical
indicators, we can say that the participation of youth in
a clarified punitive activity is, in many years, above 20
percent. The most severe part of youth is perpetrating property-related
punitive activity. Here, the form, place and subject of perpetration
are significantly different and they depend on the age and
the mental and physical maturity of the individual. In under-aged
persons, mostly small thefts at school prevail (attractive
or inaccessible objects); there are also thefts of small financial
amounts (tea-break food, etc.), then thefts in shops, pocket
picking, stealing bicycles, etc. From a long-term aspect it
is possible to say that there is a growth of youth's participation
in committing mainly violent criminality, especially robbery
in nationwide (but also in Bratislava's) context. Youth's
participation in committing punitive activity, from the aspect
of its structure, is principally not changed, however, there
is a growth of its involvement in punitive, drug-related activity.
Increasing brutality and intensity of violence among young
people is also registered. Special and highly latent punitive
activities, which much too oftenend in tragic consequences,
are various forms of violence among children, juvenile persons
and young adults in collectives.
By social case
history of juvenile perpetrators' families, which the Justice
Ministry of the SR provided, it was found that 59 percent
of perpetrators come from a full family, 31 percent come from
families where only the mother takes care of the juvenile
person, 4.5 come from families where only the father takes
care of the personand 4.5 percent where the grandparents take
care of the juvenile person. The average length of the sentence
imposed upon youth 11.7 months and the average length in a
correctional institution for youth is 7.1 months. This means
that discharge during probation is used to quite a big extent.
Problems with resocialization appeared mostly in the high
rate of recidivism when, until one year from prison-sentence
discharge, 47.9 percent of juvenile persons repeatedly committed
punitive acts. The severity of resocialization also lies in
the fact that after these young people are discharged from
their prison sentences, only about five percent of them are
employed and almost 90 percent do not work after being discharged
from prison sentences and are on social benefit. In the future,
we can expect a further increase in the influence of crime-genic
factors on the personalities of young individuals.
These factors
would mostly include dissemination of drug addictions related
to gradual expansion of the drug-consumers' networks. In relation
to hard commercialization of the society, there will be further
continuation of undesirable transformation of value systems
of adults and subsequently young generations, too. There is
only one specialized prison for juvenile persons in Slovakia.
The majority of juvenile persons who got in conflict with
the law are placed in re-educational institutions for youth.
These institutions are in competence of school resort. In
the novelization of punitive law, proposals of so-called "extra-court"
solutions take place and they are comparable with measures
in other European countries.
The Children's
Fund of the Slovak Republic is engaged in supporting a gradual
juvenile justice system. Besides, we also organize training
and education of youth within so-called "peer programs."
This way of prevention is, however, only at its beginning
in our country.
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION
OF CHILDREN (UP TO 18 YEARS)
Long-term statistics show that there is a considerable rate
in the occurrence of sexual abuse and sexual abuse due to
dependence (boarding houses, in families); rapes; trafficking
with young girls when they are, under illusion of lucrative
employment, taken abroad, where they are restricted in personal
freedom and forced to serve as prostitutes; etc. In many cases,
bullying of a committed person takes place also, with permanent
consequences. Adult perpetrators often abuse the gullibility
of under-aged children to gain unrighteous intrusion into
someone else's apartment, which results in subsequent theft.
In relation with gradual integration of the Slovak Republic
into European structures, but with persisting and deepening
differentations in economic spheres (mostly in the area of
inhabitants' purchase power), we expect an increase in the
growth of the exploitation of young girls and boys in taking
pictures of them for pornographic magazines, making movies
and prostitution. We expect, in the future, that young girls
will be trafficked abroad by means of travel agencies and
fictive companies that mediate lucrative employment abroad.
Unregulated prostitution in domestic environments indicates
a possible increase of sexual diseases in Slovakia and also
an increase of punitive acts in pandering and thefts done
in sexual intercourse, etc.
It seems that
the legislation and mainly practice of other engaged institutions
do not allow for complex approaches toward solving the problem
of sexual abuse of children; many cases remain unrevealed.
This issue is still aside the interest of NGOs in Slovakia
mostly due to intricacy in solution. The last work discussion
at the premises of the Slovak National Parliament took place
on May 7th, 1997. The chairman of the Children's Fund of the
SR participated and postulated one solution to increase the
age limit of sexual abuse from 15 to 16 years of age.
DRUG/SUBSTANCE
ABUSE AMONG ADOLESCENTS
Since 1990, mainly after the borders were opened and after
the liberalization of traveling, youth have become a center
of drug-traffickers' interest - traffickers are mostly citizens
of former Yugoslavia. These people, on the one hand, make
use of young people's probity and they recruit them as couriers
for drug smuggling within Europe with assurance for abundant
profit, and on the other hand, youth become the focus of interest
for drug distributors who intend that they begin to abuse
drugs and subsequently a network of consumers and customers
will be created. Sale and inchoative free distribution of
drugs, that is, products containing a drug (cigarettes, candies)
takes place in front of school facilities, boarding houses,
in parks, in night and disco clubs and in many youth clubs.
Alcohol addiction is to date the most disseminated addiction
and, unfortunately, socially the most acceptable form of dependence
among youth. In a family, a child comes in contact with alcohol
in a completely natural way, which mostly takes place during
family celebrations, feasts, etc.
There is also
a development of dependency on hard-core drugs. Present estimations
for drug-addicted persons speak of numbers between 10,000
and 30,000, of whom the majority is youth aged up to 18 years
or close to juvenile age. In both cases, the onset of antisocial
activity mostly penetrates to the family environment where
the youth start to take small amounts of cash from the home
without letting parents know about it, or with story excuses;
later they start to sell things from the household and then,
so that their addiction is not observed, their activities
to obtain financial means take place outside of the household.
These activities are roughly exhibited and will be more apparently
exhibited in two basic streams. One of them has a character
of clearly property-related punitive acts, that is, thefts,
burglaries, frauds, loans of money without intention to return
it, etc.
The second stream
is a mediated property-related punitive activity that is preceded
by violent criminality, mostly robbery, blackmailing, hijacking
or feigned hijacking with a goal to obtain ransom, etc. Drug
addiction mostly endangers persons between 15- and 17-years-old,
but also children 11- to 14-years old. This is confirmed by
the structure of persons treated for drug addiction where
there is absolute prevalence of young people 15- to 19-years-old.
About six percent of the population has had at least one experience
with drugs. The Committee of Ministries for Drug Addictions
and Drug Control in the SR, which was formed by the government,
stated that in Slovakia there is a percentage growth of drug
addicts who are mostly dependent on heroin. In 1992, they
represented only 2.1 percent of all drug-addicted persons;
in 1994 it was already 82.5 percent.
The government
adopted a National Anti-Drug Program and the law on the State
Anti-Drug Fund is in preparation; certain financial resources
are also appropriated within the existing State Health Fund.
However, these activities and financial means are insignificant.
There is an estimation that only three percent of NGOs pay
attention to the issues of drug addiction, which is too insufficient.
The legislation does not allow in this area a more radical
procedure against drug pushers and dealers. The last work
discussion at the premises of the National Slovak Parliament
of the Slovak Republic took place on May 7th, 1997, and the
chairman of the Children's Fund of the SR participated and
offered a proposal to significantly tighten sentences for
hard-core drug dealers.
ADDENDUM
To conclude, we think it is important to briefly draw attention
to several other negative phenomena, which can be appended
to a mosaic of social pathology in Slovakia, as well as a
complex solution for prevention as it was elaborated and introduced
in practice by the Children's Fund of the Slovak Republic.
a.) Child and
Youth Suicides
The negative influences of micro- and macro-environments (mostly
bad social situations in families), the influence of alcohol
and other drugs, unpreparedness of young persons to solve
crisis situations, crisis of one's identity and general neuro-instability
are manifested in registered cases of accomplished suicides
and accomplished suicidal attempts between 1990 and 1995 within
the SR. At this time, 15 suicides of boys 14 years of age
and under were registered as well as seven suicides of girls
the same age. Six suicides were registered in 1995, which
gives the highest number since 1990. In the given period,
83 boys and 22 girls between the ages of 15 and 19 committed
suicide. In this same age category, the second highest suicide
rate was achieved last year. In the same period, 38 suicide
attempts of boys up to 14 years of age were registered as
were 89 attempts by girls of the same age. In the age category
of 15- to 19-year-olds, 409 suicides were registered for boys
and 697 suicides were registered for girls. From the above-mentioned
data obtained from the health statistics we can indicate several
facts. Boys up to 14 years of age accomplish suicides 2.14
times more than their female counterparts. In the elder age
category (15 to 19 years of age), this difference that disfavors
boys is even higher and one's accomplished suicide attempt
by a girl is equivalent to 3.77 accomplished suicides by boys.
However, in suicide
attempts the situation appears to be reverted. In youth up
to 14 years of age, girls attempt to do this 2.34 more often,
and 1.7 times more often for those aged 15 to 19. From this
it is clear that girls of both age categories more often try
demonstrative forms of suicide attempts with an effort to
draw attention to the existing problem. This is also confirmed,
in a long-term measure, by the selection of means or methods
in realizing the suicidal attempt. We can also note that boys,
more inaptly than girls, use them for unresolvable situations
and that is why they more often choose a radical way to solve
the problem.
b.) Malign Cults
and Sects
A severe, dangerous and to date insufficiently acknowledged
danger for the young generation is the influence of malign
sects and cults as well as the influence of other extremist
movements. Among the sects whose activities were registered
in Slovakia belong, for example, God's Children (in recruiting
and acquiring means for the sect they also offer physical
love), Witnesses of Jehovah (they do no celebrate birthdays,
Christmas or Easter; they cannot take a weapon in their hands,
go to the polls or express membership to any flag or country;
they cannot even accept a blood transfusion if their lives
or their children's lives are in danger), Hare Krishna (they
require reciting a 16-word mantra 1,728 times per day; this
gives a number of 27, 648 repeated words and a sect's member
needs about five hours per day torecite them, it is apparent
that he/she does not have time nor mental power for independent
thinking) and the Moon Sect (the sect even dares to decide
whom you should love; they select a suitable life partner
based on a photograph and for the first three years any intimate
cohabitation of such a couple is prohibited). There is a large
number of sects and cults in the world and their penetration
to our territory is only a question of time. By expanding
their membership bases all over the world, they collect immense
amounts of financial means (many members commit all or part
of their property to the sect).
c.) Negative Influences
of Mass Media
We think that a big part in the influence of negative phenomena
on young people also represents unpremeditated mass media
policy. A lot of violence is introduced daily on television
channels, with frequent use of vulgarism, erotic shots and
hard-core sex. This does not produce favorable preconditions
for children's personality formation. However, not only violence
and sex on TV screens negatively form young person's value
systems. The authors of advertisements are very well skilled
in psychology of children and through that they reach the
financial sources of parents. Children are literally manipulated.
They desire to have various toys or beverages that offer possibilities
of winning high financial amounts. Since many of the parents
cannot buy their children all that these advertisements offer,
this is manifested in the very type of delinquency composition
of children up to 15 years of age and also in juvenile perpetrators.
Thus, conveyed advertisement campaigns result in changing
children's value orientation, which then results in bias toward
the consumer way of life and its only divinity: money. Mental
manipulation of children and youth can be documented on data
that speaks about the subject of interest.
d.) Information
on the Proposal of the Children's Fund of the SR: "Complex
System of Prevention for Social Pathology of Children and
Youth"
If we analyze developmental trends in the occurrence of delinquency,
criminality and drug addiction during the last decade in Slovakia,
it is already clear that after times of a relatively stabilized
situation occurred a turn with almost a yearly dramatic increase
in the number of children and youth who violated the law by
their behavior. It is doubtless that one of the causes of
this enormous increase is the fact that at times of precipitated
social-political changes, there was not available in Slovakia
a practically realizable system for nationwide prevention
that could have worked against the trend in delinquency and
the increase in criminality.
This was the reason why the Children's Fund of the Slovak
Republic postulated, as one of the goals of its activity,
a co-participation in creating a nationwide system for prevention
against socially pathological phenomena from its start in
May 1990. Our activities in the area of delinquency and criminality
prevention were intensified, mostly since 1992, when the statutory
representative of the Children's Fund of the SR became the
only representative of NGOs in the Council for Criminality
Prevention of the government of the Slovak Republic. In 1993,
the Children's Fund of the Slovak Republic (in cooperation
with the Research Institute for Child Psychology and Pathopsychology
in Bratislava) elaborated and submitted in the above-mentioned
Council of the Government a proposal that became an outcome
in legislative delimitation of centers for educational and
psychological prevention that can be constituted under ¤
11 of the Law of NR SR no. 279/1993 on school facilities.
It is possible
to realize, in these centers, multidisciplinary and multi-institutional
prevention. However, only 15 of them are presently in practice;
growth and development of other centers is impeded mostly
by lack of state financial resources. Three years ago, the
representative of the Children's Fund of the SR, in the Government
Council of the SR for Struggle with Antisocial Activity, was
appointed to manage the expert committee for the area of socially
pathological phenomena in children and youth. Their task will
be multidisciplinary development and assessment of resort
and multiresort programs for prevention against individual
socially pathological phenomena.
This goes hand
in hand with their mutual coordination that resulted in the
elaboration of the Proposal of Complex Model for Nationwide
Prevention Against Antisocial Phenomena in Children and Youth.
Practical experience of all bodies and institutions that presently
deal with care for families, children and youth endangered
by social pathology (health care professionals, educational
workers at schools and school facilities, socialworkers, workers
in pedagogic-psychological counseling centers, policemen,
prosecutors, judges and so forth) confirm that their preventative
activity is not sufficiently coordinated; there is a lack
of effective information channels and chains, work of individual
subjects for prevention does not correspond with one another,
and there is a dominance of administration above concrete
practical care. We consider the respective system of prevention
of social pathology to be complex, coordinated and continual
application of psychological, psychotherapeutic, educational
and resocialization methods.
Back
to Top
Copyright
for the I.U.C. Journal of Social Work Theory and Practice
is owned by the Social Work Program, Department of Social
Relations and Services, Bemidji State University, Bemidji,
Minnesota, USA. One copy may be made (printed) for personal
use; teachers may make multiple copies for student use if
the copies are made available to students without charge.
Permission must be secured from the editors for sale of any
copies of articles or for any commercial use of the material
published in the Journal.
