The Innocenti Digests provide clear summaries of current knowledge and debate on specific child rights issues. They are written in an accessible style for use by a wide range of audiences, including policy makers, researchers, UNICEF staff, journalists and members of the public. Each Digest includes a Links Section, guiding the reader to relevant organizations and information sources.
Insights take an intensive look at a specific child rights issue, expanding on a particular perspective or argument. Insights examine emerging, complex and sometime controversial issues that have a direct bearing on the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The series Innocenti Occasional Papers, Economic and Social Policy (IOPs) has become Innocenti Working Papers as of no. 72. The numbering is consecutive. Papers 63 onwards are also available for download.
Innocenti Publications refer to other types of studies, often jointly produced with others, including case studies and policy reviews that are oriented to a wide audience.
The Centre's MONEE Project has been monitoring the impact of the social and economic changes in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States since 1992, making a major contribution to the debate on public policies on children's issues in the region. The Social Monitor reports on trends in the welfare of children, young people and women in the CEE/CIS/Baltics region, and to serve as a basis for advocacy and policy debate in the region. It partially replaces the Regional Monitoring Report series (eight of which were produced between 1993 and 2001). It is published for a non-specialist audience, and widely distributed in both English and Russian versions to policymakers, international organisations, interest groups and the international media. As of 2009 the same MONEE project functions are shifting to the UNICEF CEE/CIS Regional Office.
Methodological Briefs cover the range of options and elements available in conducting sound research and delivering reliable results. They cover impact evaluation, strategies and causal attributions and different data collection and analysis methods.
The Centre's MONEE Project has been monitoring the impact of the social and economic changes in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States since 1992, making a major contribution to the debate on public policies on children's issues in the region. The Project includes the Regional Monitoring Report, published annually in English and Russian. The Report covers every country in the region, providing authoritative statistics on the situation of children, backed by detailed analysis.
In an era of increasing dependence on data science and big data, the voices of one set of major stakeholders – the world’s children and those who advocate on their behalf – have been largely absent. A
recent paper estimates one in three global internet users is a child, yet there has been little rigorous debate or understanding of how to adapt traditional, offline ethical standards for research involving data collection from children, to a big data, online environment (Livingstone et al., 2015). This paper argues that due to the potential for severe, long-lasting and differential impacts on children, child rights need to be firmly integrated onto the agendas of global debates about ethics and data science. The authors outline their rationale for a greater focus on child rights and ethics in data science and suggest steps to move forward, focusing on the various actors within the data chain including data generators, collectors, analysts and end-users. It concludes by calling for a much stronger appreciation of the links between child rights, ethics and data science disciplines and for enhanced discourse between stakeholders in the data chain, and those responsible for upholding the rights of children, globally.
En este Report Card se evalúa el bienestar infantil en el contexto del desarrollo sostenible en 41 países de la Unión Europea (UE) y la Organización de Cooperación y Desarrollo Económicos (OCDE).
Le présent Bilan propose une évaluation du bien-être des enfants dans une perspective de développement durable dans 41 pays de l’Union européenne (UE) et de l’Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques (OCDE).
Questa Report Card offre una valutazione del benessere dei bambini nel contesto dello sviluppo sostenibile in 41 paesi dell’Unione europea (UE) e dell’Organizzazione per la cooperazione e lo sviluppo economico (OCSE).
The new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development aim to build on the achievements made under the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) by broadening their scope and building upon a consultative process. The MDGs contributed to substantial social progress in eight key areas: poverty; education; gender equality; child mortality; maternal health; disease; the environment; and global partnership. The SDGs not only include a greater number of development goals than the MDGs, but are also global in focus, including advanced economies for the first time. This paper draws attention to the main challenges the 2030 Agenda presents for rich countries, by highlighting a set of critical child specific indicators, evaluating countries’ progress towards meeting the Goals, and highlighting gaps in existing data. The paper will inform UNICEFs Report Card 14, Building the Future: Children and the Sustainable Development Goals in Rich Countries.
Target 2.1 of the Sustainable Development Goals calls for an end to hunger, in all its forms, by 2030. Measuring food security among children under age 5, who represent a quarter of the world’s population, remains a challenge that is largely unfeasible for current global monitoring systems. The SDG framework has agreed to use the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) to measure moderate and severe food insecurity. The FIES is an experience-based metric that reports food-related behaviours on the inability to access food due to resource constraints. We present the first global estimates of the share and number of children below age 15, who live with a respondent who is food insecure.
In this paper we summarize evidence on six perceptions associated with cash transfer programming, using eight rigorous evaluations conducted on large-scale government unconditional cash transfers in sub-Saharan Africa, under the Transfer Project. Specifically, we investigate if transfers: 1) induce higher spending on alcohol or tobacco; 2) are fully consumed (rather than invested); 3) create dependency (reduce participation in productive activities); 4) increase fertility; 5) lead to negative community-level economic impacts (including price distortion and inflation), and 6) are fiscally unsustainable. We present evidence refuting each claim, leading to the conclusion that these perceptions – insofar as they are utilized in policy debates – undercut potential improvements in well-being and livelihood strengthening among the poor, which these programmes can bring about in sub-Saharan Africa, and globally. We conclude by underscoring outstanding research gaps and policy implications for the continued expansion of unconditional cash transfers in the region and beyond.
Mental health is increasingly gaining the spotlight in the media and public discourse of industrialized countries. The problem is not new, but thanks to more open discussions and fading stigma, it is emerging as one of the most critical concerns of public health today. Psychological problems among children and adolescents can be wide-ranging and may include attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), disruptive conduct, anxiety, eating and mood disorders and other mental illnesses. Consistent evidence shows the links between adolescents’ mental health and the experience of bullying. Collecting internationally comparable data to measure mental health problems among children and adolescents will provide important evidence and stimulate governments to improve psychological support and services to vulnerable children.
