This dissertation documents the creation and use of social capital among 282 street children in Romania. Their social capital enabled them to meet their needs and face many challenges of street life. Historically, research on child welfare in Romania has focused on institutionalized children, foster care and adoption; street children are an understudied group. The research into the lives of Romanian street children that had been conducted was facilitated by large international or governmental organizations and was descriptive in nature. A lack of empirical knowledge on the lives of this vulnerable group leaves policy makers and practitioners without a clear foundation from which to base their work. Most social capital research on children has conceptualized their social capital as embedded in families and parents’ ability to invest in their children’s well-being or future; my research focused on children as actors who create social capital. How street children accessed and used resources embedded in social networks and how they maintained social capital as a collective resource explored the agency of children in the creation and use of social capital and provided insights important for the development of more appropriate policies and intervention strategies geared to this population.
Fieldwork relied on qualitative research methodologies, including participant observation on the streets of Bucharest and in-depth interviews over a 10-month period. Sixteen individual and four group semi-structured interviews were conducted
(N=28). The individual interviews allowed for the exploration of personal stories and individual strategies, while group interviews were important for gaining access to collective representations. A stratified purposeful sampling strategy was utilized in soliciting interview respondents.
Research findings demonstrate that, to varying degrees and in varying ways, street children do create and use informal networks that build opportunities for survival. Some youth formed and lived in groups leading to strong bonding social capital, affording those within the group access to a range of benefits. Furthermore, some youth were able to create robust networks of association with their formal and informal environments (bridging social capital), associations that could be leveraged to meet critical needs and open doors for opportunities. Other youth were unable to create bonding and bridging capital; their positions of exclusion left them challenged to meet basic needs and vulnerable to exploitation. These findings are significant not only for understanding how and under what circumstances children create and leverage social capital, but also highlight a need to rethink social capital theories in light of research on children.