Beyond Impoverishment? A Socio-Ecological Analysis of the Drivers of Child Trafficking and Migration Between Two Fishing Communities
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 24233133 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Bernard Koomson (0000-0003-2718-2804, University of Warwick, Coventry), Kwame Adusei (0000-0001-7405-3760, Children and Social Protection), Dawuda Abdulai (0009-0005-4951-068X, Tamale Technical University), Eric Yeboah (0000-0001-8067-3034, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology), Esmeranda Manful (0000-0002-6346-289X, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Pages | 1-20 |
| Publication date | 2026-10-11 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Human Trafficking (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2332-2705 • E-ISSN: 2332-2713 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/23322705.2026.2744570 |
| OpenAlex | W7221464647 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 58 |
Popular discourses on the drivers of child trafficking and migration are dominated by notions of household poverty and economic hardship. While these are key drivers of trafficking and migration in sub-Saharan Africa, the taken-for-granted status of these drivers within anti-trafficking discourse and intervention often obscures and/or blurs diverse contextual factors that inform practices conceptualized as trafficking in children. Drawing on a qualitative case study with 54 study participants in two fishing communities in Ghana, we explored the impoverished representation of child trafficking and migration within socio-ecological theory. Our findings reveal the contextual complexities of how systemic drivers (parental separation, familial and generational ties, poverty and high birth rates) interact to propel the trafficking of children and/or migration for work between two fishing communities. Consequently, we argue that it is important to situate popular discourses on the drivers of child trafficking and migration within the socio-ecological context of children’s daily lives.
anti-trafficking discourse · Child labor · child migration · Child trafficking · Family ties · fishing communities · Ghana · parental separation · Poverty · social ecological theory · Migration and Exile Studies · Poverty, Education, and Child Welfare · Sex work and related issues
The Trafficking of Children
Rights and Wrongs of Children's Work
Supporting best practice in reflexive thematic analysis reporting in Palliative Medicine
Breadth of the socio-ecological model
Commodifying the vulnerable
Understanding the role of structural factors and realities in normalizing child labour in urban slums of Bangladesh
Poverty with a feminine face
Ecology of the family as a context for human development
Child Trafficking, Youth Labour Mobility and the Politics of Protection
The ‘Feminisation of Poverty’ and the ‘Feminisation’ of Anti-Poverty Programmes
Examining Migrants’ Bounded Rationality in the Face of Ethiopia’s Legal Responses to Irregular Migration
From Vulnerability to Sustainability
Community-Based Child Labor Trafficking Prevention in Ghana
I agreed to go because……..examining the Agency of Children within a phenomenon conceptualised as trafficking in Ghana
Patterns of inter-state irregular migration in Africa
Shock and awe’
Putting Childhood in Its Place
Parents’ Reflections on Child Trafficking Mitigation Mechanisms in Trafficking Hotspot Communities
Work socialisation gone wrong? Exploring the antecedent of child trafficking in two Ghanaian fishing communities
Why does child trafficking policy need to be reformed? The moral economy of children's movement in Benin and Ethiopia
Is kinship failing? Views on informal support by families in contact with social services in Ghana
Moving children? Child trafficking, child migration, and child rights
Practice approaches to combat child trafficking in trafficking-sensitive areas in Ghana
From Child Labor “Problem” to Human Trafficking “Crisis”
Are working children’s rights and child labour abolition complementary or opposing realms
Community-based prevention of child trafficking in Southern Ethiopia
Child Labour Migration and Trafficking in Rural Burkina Faso
Child Trafficking or Teenage Migration? Bolivian Migrants in Argentina
Toward an experimental ecology of human development
Exploring Vulnerabilities
Determinants of Intention to Engage in Preventive Practices and Practices of Internal Child Trafficking Among the Residents of Wolaita Sodo Town
Using thematic analysis in psychology
The gift of freedom? Exploring the realities of rescue from child trafficking in Ghana
Child Migration in Africa
Child Trafficking
Child Migration and Questions of Agency
Linking young people's precarious labour, migration, and their social mobility in Ghana
Children Working Beyond Their Localities
Social Actors and Victims of Exploitation
Household Maintenance and Decision Making in Lone Female Parent Families in Ghana
| Highly cited | No |
|---|