early childhood education, children's peer cultures

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Early childhood education, children'speer cultures, and the future ofchildhoodWilliam A. Corsaro aa Indiana University, United States of AmericaVersion of record first published: 15 Jun 2007.

To cite this article: William A. Corsaro (2000): Early childhood education, children's peercultures, and the future of childhood, European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 8:2,89-102

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European Early Childhood Education Research Journal Vol. 8, No. 2, 2000

89

Early Childhood Education, Children's Peer Cultures, and the Future of Childhood 1

WILLIAM. A. CORSARO

Indiana University United States of America

SUMMARY This paper presents my theoretical perspective of interpretive reproduction which focuses on the importance of children's production of and participation in their own peer cultures for their evolving membership in society. I describe the main themes of communal sharing and control in children's peer culture and present examples of peer routines and activities which demonstrate these themes. I discuss the importance of children's peer culture for early childhood education policy, programs, and curricula. Finally, I discuss the importance of social and economic investments in young children and families in modern societies, most especially in child care and early education. Here I stress how changing demographic patterns in modern societies (most especially the increase of the proportion of elderly as compared to the very young) have crucial implications for the future of children and childhood.

RESUME Cet article prdsente ma conception thdorique de la reproduction interprdtative qui souligne l'importance des productions des enfants et de leur participation a leur propre culture enfantine, quant~ leur implication dans la socidtd. ]e ddcrirai les principaux th~mes de Ia culture enfantine et prdsenterai des exemples de routines et d" activitds partagdes par des jeunes enfants, qui illustrent ces th~mes. ]e discuterai l'importance de la culture enfantine pour les politiques d'dducation de la petite enfance, les ~quipements et les programmes. Enfin, j'insisterai sur l'importance des investissements dconomiques et sociaux pour les jeunes enfants et leurs families dans les socidtds modernes, et en particulier quanta l'accueil et l'4ducation de la petite enfance. Je montrerai, ici, les implications cruciales des nouveaux patterns ddmographiques des socidtds modernes (et plus particuli~rement l'augmentation de la proportion des afnds par rapport aux plus jeunes) quanta l'avenir des enfants et de l'enfance.

ZUSAMMENFASSUNG Dieser Artikel stellt meine theoretische Perspektive der interpretativen Reproduktion vor. Dieser Ansatz betont, wie wichtig es fiir die sich entwickelnde Mitgliedschaft von Kindern in der Gesellschaft ist, dass diese sich ihre eigene Peer Culture schaffen und daran teilnehmen. Ich beschreibe die wesentlichen Themen gemeinschaftliches Teilen und Kontrolle in der Gleichaltrigenkultur von Kindern und gebe Beispiele von Peer Routinen and Aktivitfiten die diese Themen verdeutlichen. Ich diskutiere die Wichtigkeit der Gleichaltrigenkultur von Kindern fiir politische Maflnahmen, Programme und Lehrpl?ine die die friihkindliche Erziehung betreffen. Schliefllich behandle ich die Wichtigkeit sozialer und 6konomischer Investitionen in Kinder im Vorschulalter und Familien in modernen Gesellschaflen, speziell in den Bereichen Kinderbetreuung und Friiherziehung. Hier betone ich, wie die sich verfindernden demographischen Muster in modernen Gesellschaften (insbesondere der Anstieg es A n tells der filteren im Vergleich zu den sehr jungen Bev61kerung) entscheidenden Ein.fluss auf die Zukunft von Kindern und der Kindheit haben.

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90 European Early Childhood Education Research Journal

RESUMEN Esta monografia presenta mi perspectiva te6rica sobre la reproducci6n interpretativa que estd enfocada a resaltar la importancia de la producci6n cultural infantil y de la participaci6n de sus iguales de cara a su desarrollo como miembro de la sociedad. Describo los temas principales de la cooperaci6n y control comunitario en las culturas infantiles y presento ejemplos de rutinas y actividades entre iguales que demuestran estos temas. Discuto la importancia de la cultural infantil para el desarrollo de las politicas, los programas y los currfcula de educaci6n infantil. Finalmente, discuto la importancia de la inversi6n social y econ6mica en j6venes infantiles y familias en sociedades modernas, especialmente en cuidado de ni~os y educaci6n de temprana edad. Aquf se discuten como los cambios de patrones dernogrdficos en la sociedad moderna (especialmente como el incremento de la proporci6n de poblaci6n de edad avanzadacomparado con los mas j6venes) tienen implicaciones cruciales para el futuro de los ni~os y de la de la infancia en general.

Keywords: Early chi ldhood education; Chi ldren's peer culture; Interpret ive reproduction; Global aging; Sociology of chi ldhood.

Example 1 Bologna, I taly--May, 1985

It was a br ight sunny day, and I was sitt ing with three boys who were digging in the outs ide play area of the Italian preschool. The boys were talking about mil i tary matters - - the navy, warships and the boss or il capo on such sh ips - -as they dug holes and bur ied rocks in the dirt. At some distance I saw three chi ldren marching around the yard carrying a large red milk carton and what seemed to be a bucket inside. The teachers used the carton to carry p lay materials to the outs ide yard, and I had seen the chi ldren p lay ing with it before. What I d idn ' t know was that the carton was now a forbidden object. As I was to find out later, earl ier in the year, before my arrival, a child had placed the carton on her head and chased after several other children. She eventual ly fell and suffered a minor injury. After this incident, the chi ldren were prohib i ted from playing with the carton.

But they were playing with it today. In fact, they were now marching in my direction and I could begin to make out their chant. It sounded like "Arriva la barca! Arriva la barca!" ("Here comes the boat! Here comes the boat!"). But I was not sure about the last word, it could be "barca" or "banca" (bank). They were right up close to me now, Antonio was leading the way and Luisa and Mario were helping him carry the carton. There was a bucket inside and it was fi l led with rocks.

"La barca?" I asked Antonio. "No," he responded. "La banca con soldi!" ("The bank with money!") he said as he cupped his hand in a famil iar Ital ian gesture. I was intr igued. These kids had created a whole new dimension in banking, a bank that makes house calls! "Give me some money, " I asked Antonio. The chi ldren now put the carton down, and Mario took out the small bucket with rocks and said, "I ' l l give the money to him." "How much do you want?" he asked. "There are thousands- - " "Forty thousand," I quickly responded. (This sounds like a lot, but 40,000 lire is only about twenty-f ive dollars.) Mario began counting out the rocks, doing exactly as they do in Ital ian banks by announcing the final sum as he counted out each ten thousand lire note: "Forty thousand, forty thousand, here's forty thousand." But he counted only three rocks. "No, no, three- - th i r ty thousand. I said forty!" "Four," said Luisa, "Four!" Mario then reached in the bucket to get more rocks, and counted, "Thirty, forty,

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here," and handed me three more rocks and then a fourth. "Sixty now," I said laughing, "Seventy. I said forty." "How many?" Mario asked. Luisa was now getting impatient with Mario and seemed to think she could be a better bank teller. "Four, he said four!" she exclaimed as she reached to take the bucket from Mario. The three children now begin to struggle over the bucket, and Antonio scooped the rocks from my hand and dropped them back into the bucket. "Lets go," he commanded. And the children marched off again, chanting: "Arriva la banca! Arriva la banca!"

Example 2

In a recent issue of the American periodical, The New Yorker, a cartoon appeared where a father told his young son," By the way, Sam, as someday you'll be paying for my entitlements, I'd like to thank you in advance." The cartoon captures the growing problem of global aging in developed societies: as fertility rates have dropped, medical technology has led to an increase in longevity. In fact, in most developed societies before the middle of the 21 st century, the number of adults 80 years of age or older will surpass the number of children 5 years of age and younger (Peterson, 1999).

I selected these examples to make two important points about children and childhood. First, children are active, creative social agents who produce their own unique children's cultures while simultaneously contributing to the production of adult societies. Take the Italian preschoolers. They weren't supposed to play with the milk carton. But they didn't like the adult rule, so they played with it anyway. They created a highly unique "travelling bank," an idea taken from the adult world but extended and given new meaning. (After this incident one of the teachers told me that she saw the children playing with the carton but overlooked the rule violation because, like me, she was so impressed by the children's ingenuity.)

Second, childhood--that socially constructed period in which children live their lives--is a structural form. When we refer to childhood as a structural form, we mean it is a category or part of society. In this sense children are members or incumbents of their childhoods. For the children themselves childhood is a temporary period. For society, on the other hand, childhood is a permanent structural form or category which never disappears even though its members change continuously and its nature and conception vary historically. We often take for granted that childhood is a structural form because we tend to think of childhood solely as a period when children are prepared for entry into society. But children are already a part of society from their births, as childhood is part and parcel of society.

As a structural form, childhood is, as Qvortrup (1991) has argued, interrelated with other structural categories like social class, gender, and age groups. Thus, the structural arrangements of these categories and changes in these arrangements will affect the nature of childhood. In modern societies, for example, changes in social structural arrangements of categories like gender, work, family, and social class have resulted in many mother's working outside the home and their young children spending much of their time in institutional settings like day care centres and early childhood education programs that didn't exist in the past to the degree they do today. I will argue that it is in such institutions that children in modern societies develop the first of a series of peer cultures which contribute to reproduction and change in the wider adult culture or society.

In turn, the extensiveness and quality of early education institutions and programs are a reflection of social policies which affect the distribution of resources to and the quality of life of different age groups. The example of global aging we

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discussed earlier captures the interdependence of generations and the importance of seeing childhood as a structural form in modern societies. Continued investment in and expansion of early childhood education institutions is essential for the preservation of social welfare programs and entitlements of the elderly in the 21 st century.

In this paper I will address these two central features (children as active social agents and childhood as a structural form) of what I have termed the new sociology of childhood. I will begin with a discussion of my notion of interpretive reproduction and review some of my work on children's production of and participation in an initial peer culture in early education settings. I will then move to a more macro level to address how progressive and high quality early education programs are essential for the changing nature of childhood as well as for the equitable distribution of resources and the preservation of interdependence across age groups in modern societies.

Interpretive reproducation

In my 25 years of carrying out comparative ethnographies of young children, I have developed an approach to socialisation which brings children and childhood to the centre of analysis. I term this theoretical perspective interpretive reproduction (Corsaro, 1992, 1997).

The term interpretive captures innovative and creative aspects of children's participation in society. Children produce and participate in their own unique peer cultures by creatively appropriating information from the adult world to address their own peer concerns. The term reproductive captures the idea that children are not simply internalising society and culture, but are also actively contributing to cultural production and change. The term also implies that children are, by their very participation in society, constrained by the existing social structure and by social reproduction. I will address both of these aspects of interpretive reproduction. First, by presenting some examples of my work on the peer culture of American and Italian nursery school children and then by considering how children both contribute to and are affected by society.

Children's peer cultures

In my ethnographic work in preschools I have used a reactive method of field entry in which I enter children's play areas and let them gradually draw me into their worlds. Over time the children come to define me as an atypical adult (a sort of "big kid" in the US and sort of a "dumb big kid" in Italy given my initially limited but now improved knowledge of Italian, see Corsaro, 1985, 1996). Given this participant status, I am able to observe their interactions and participate in limited ways without being seen as an authority. Over long periods of observation and videotaping of naturally occurring play I have discovered that children as young as 3 to 5 years old construct and share their own peer culture.

I define peer culture as a stable set of activities or routines, artifacts, values, and concerns that children produce and share in interaction with peers. In my ethnographic work I have found that there are two basic themes in the peer culture of preschool children. The children make persistent attempts to gain control of their lives and to share that control with each other. Let me try to demonstrate these themes further by discussing two aspects of peer culture I have found in my work in the US and Italy.

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Secondary adjustments

I have discussed preschool children's conception and reaction to adult rules in line with Goffman's (1961) notion of "secondary adjustments." Secondary adjustments are "any arrangement by which a member of an organisation employs unauthorised means, or obtains unauthorised ends, or both, thus getting around the organisation's assumptions as to what he should do and get and hence what he should be" (Goffman, 1961: 189).

In all the preschools I have studied children were very frustrated with certain conventional or organisational rules which they see as arbitrary and restrictive. Thus, they often employed secondary adjustments to get around the rules. Over time in the course of a year in particular preschools the children's creation and participation in a wide range of secondary adjustments lead to the development of an "underlife" in preschools (Goffman, 1961). An underlife is a set of behaviours or activities that contradict, challenge, or violate the official norms or rules of an organisation or institution. The underlife exists alongside and in reaction to those organisational rules of preschools that impinge upon the autonomy of the children. In this sense the underlife is essential part of the children's group identity (Corsaro, 1997).

The underlife is perhaps most apparent in secondary adjustments carried out through the active cooperation of several children. These secondary adjustments normally involve using legitimate resources in devious ways to get around rules and achieve personal or private needs or wants--what Goffman calls "working the system" (1961, p. 210). Children frequently work the system to avoid helping at "clean-up time." In preschools I have studied in the US and Italy clean up usually occurs at transition points in the day (before snacks or meals, meeting times, and so on). There is a general rule that children stop play when clean up time is announced, and help teachers put things back in order. Children soon question the necessity and logic of cleanup time. I once overheard a child argue against putting toys away during cleanup time because "we'll just have to take' em out all over again!"

Children often come up with several strategies to evade cleanup time: reloca- tion (immediately moving to another area of play upon hearing the announcement of cleanup); pretending not to hear the announcement (simply ignoring the command to obey the rule for as long as possible); and using personal problem delay (claiming you cannot help clean up because of personal problems). This last strategy is particularly interesting. Children report a plethora of problems such as feigned injury ("I hurt my foot,"), pressing business ( "I have to go to the bathroom"), or role play demands ("He can't clean up because he's dead. Killed by poison!").

Once in Italy a child named Franca told one of the teachers that she could not help clean up because I was in the process of teaching her English. There was some truth to this since children often asked me how to say certain words in English, and Franca had made such a request earlier in the day. However, we clearly were not involved in such activity when clean up time ensued. Fortunately, I was not brought into the dispute because the teacher rejected Franca's excuse out-of-hand. Neverthe- less, during the course of this debate a good deal of the work of clean up was performed by other children. In fact, all of the strategies to avoid clean up are at least partially successful for this reason. Due to organisational constraints--teachers" needs to get the children to lunch, to begin a meeting time, and so on--any delaying tactic is somewhat effective. It does not take long for children to learn this and to "work the system" accordingly (Corsaro, 1997).

Children's secondary adjustments are innovative and collective responses to the adult world. Further, by sharing a communal spirit as members of peer cultures, kids come to experience how being a member of a group affects both themselves as individuals and how they are to relate to others. Through secondary adjustments, children come to see themselves as part of a group (a peer group of students) which is in some instances aligned with, while in others opposed to, other groups (teachers and adult culture).

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So far I have described children's routine resistance of adult rules in preschools and discussed the importance of such resistance in the peer culture. I have suggested that the children's collective construction of an 'underlife' (composed of a wide range of secondary adjustments) demonstrates their intricate knowledge of organisational features of the nursery school. ! have said little, however, about how children's creation and participation in peer culture affect their acquisition or appropriation of adult social representations of norms or rules (Moscovici, 1981).

In line with interpretive reproduction, children's development of social representations of adult rules can be seen as a productive-reproductive process. Children are exposed to the existence of school rules directly by teachers. The children, then, through innovative secondary adjustments, infuse meaning in the rules in line with their own productive peer culture. As a result of these activities in the peer culture the children's social representation of the adult rules have changed. The children no longer see the adult rules simply as arbitrary restrictions of their behaviour; the social organisational complexity of the rules become more apparent (Corsaro, 1990).

Some specific examples can help to illustrate these theoretical claims. In addi- tion, to rules about cleanup time, in all the preschools I have studied there were rules about the possession and use of particular objects. For example, there was a rule that prohibited children from bringing personal objects from home to school. The main reason was that the children would often get into disputes over the sharing and use of such objects. The children often got around this rule by bringing small objects that they could easily conceal. However, there were not satisfied with simply 'breaking the rule' by having the objects at school. It was important that the violation and secondary adjustment to the rule be shared with other children. In this way the individual's child's reaction to and attempt to make sense of the adult rule becomes--to use Moscovici's (1981) term--anchored in the collective security of the peer culture.

Teachers often became aware of these violations of the rule, but overlooked them because the nature of the secondary adjustments often eliminated the organisational need to enforce the rule. For example, in the incident of the travelling bank the Italian teachers told me they allowed the play to continue because they were so impressed with the children's creation. In fact, children were often creative and careful in collectively producing secondary adjustments. They often shared and played with smuggled personal objects surreptitiously to avoid detection by the teachers. If the children always played with objects brought from home this way, there would be no conflict and hence no need for the rule. Thus, in an indirect way the secondary adjustment endorses the organisational need for the rule.

The children become aware of this complexity of the relation between rules and secondary adjustments when conflicts inevitably arise. For example, in an Italian preschool I observed, a girl, Luisa, brought a small plastic replica of Superman in her pocket. At one point she showed the toy to a boy, Franco, with whom she was trying to cultivate a special friendship. Franco was very impressed and the two children played cooperatively with Superman for about half and hour. However, at one point, Luisa complained that Franco was getting Superman dirty, keeping the toy in his possession too long, and not sharing properly. Franco dismissed these complaints and continued to play with the toy.

Luisa threatened to tell the teacher on Franco and ran off in the direction where two teachers were sitting. She stopped short, however, realising that the teachers would reprimand her (and probably confiscate Superman) for bringing the toy to school in the first place. Therefore, Luisa waited patiently until Franco returned the toy to her. She then placed it back in her pocket and said that Franco could not play with it any more. Franco protested, but like Luisa, he realised that he could not go to the teachers. Resigned to the circumstances, he went off to play with some other boys, leaving Luisa alone with her Superman.

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We see that the very anchoring of developing social representations in the security of the peer culture enables their objectification and use in interaction. This objectification in turn often results in interpersonal conflicts whose resolution leads to further social representations. The productive-reproductive nature of the process is apparent.

Role play and social reproduction

A final aspect of peer culture I will discuss is children's sociodramatic role play. By sociodramatic play I mean play in which children collaboratively produce pretend activities that are related to experiences from their real life (e.g. family and occupa- tional routines) as opposed to fantasy play based on fictional narratives. Here we will consider an example of sociodramatic play as part of the process of interpretive reproduction in children's lives. My purpose is to demonstrate how young children in the production of sociodramatic play simultaneously use (as well as refine and further develop) a wide range of communicative skills, collectively participate in and extend peer culture, and appropriate features of and develop an orientation to the wider adult culture.

The episode we consider took place in an American Head Start centre (a preschool program for economically disadvantaged children) and involves two five- year old girls, Zena and Debra. The girls are pretending to be mothers talking on the telephone in the family living area of the classroom. The telephone talk is especially impressive because it is doubly meta-communicative in nature. The children are producing their own interpretation of their mothers' telephone conversations about their (the mothers') parenting demands and problems. Narratives of this type are especially rich for capturing processes of cultural production and reproduction because they often involve both the reconstruction and interpretations of past events by both the tellers and the audience. Let's consider one segment of the episode.

Zena: Debra: Zena: Debra: Zena:

Debra:

Zena:

Hah. Cookin'. Now I need to go to the grocery store. ! got to take my kids to the party store, they told me--I said-- My kids-my kids want me to take them to the park. What? My kids told me to take them to the park, and then, and then the bus had to come and get 'em. That's gonna be a long walk for to here! And then the bus would have to come and get us! Well, we have to wait for transfers, then I have to buy groceries, we have to buy some groceries. And urn- Guess where my kids told me to take them? To the store. When the bus comes by--my kids waitin' for it. I don't got time to do that.

In this exchange, Zena and Debra are not simply reproducing an actual conversation she may have heard. They are, instead, appropriating the general theme of problems in parenting. The girls' role play in this instance is striking in their ability to capture the frustrations of trying to meet the demands of one's children when you do not have a car and must deal with a limited and time-consuming bus service. These are problems their mothers face every day.

Later in the role play episode the girls continue to talk about the constant need to watch out for and discipline their children. Near the end of the episode an exchange occurs which poignantly displays the complex nature of these girls' family lives and their keen awareness of the stark realities of parenting in poverty.

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Zena:

Debra: Zena: Bill: Zena: Debra: Zena: Debra: Zena:

You know what girl? My daughter asked me for pop. Every hour and all day. I say "No more pop, you're gonna eat ice cream and cake, and water - - drink water and brush your teeth. Eat gum - - Guess what? I'm getting ready to drive over to your house. I won't let you in. Why not? 'Cause! I'll let you in. My man start in on me. [jumps up] I don't have one! He's been hittin' on me, he's been hittin" on me for ten minutes. You got one and I don't have one. My kids been askin' for "my Daddy." I say--they say "I want my Daddy, I want my Daddy," all day.

While I have no data on domestic abuse in Debra's or Zena's families, several other children in the Head Start centre volunteered descriptions of such abuse to the teachers and me over the course of the school year. Zena's response that Debra at least has a "man" while her children constantly ask for their father is striking because we know from interviews that Zena and her younger siblings have been separated from their father for long periods while they stayed in homeless shelters with their mother both before and after this particular role play episode occurred.

Zena's response to Debra clearly demonstrates her understanding of the extent of her mother's (and other single parents') problems in such demanding situations. Facing such challenging family circumstances alone can, at times, be so intolerable that even a mate who is physically abusive may be seen as better than having no one at all.

Again we can see how in line with interpretive reproduction these children's role play contributes to productive-reproductive processes in their lives. In this example Debra and Zena actively appropriate information from the adult world to create a stable and coherent role play routine. This routine includes the children's embellishment of the adult model to address both collective and personal concerns in the peer culture. Finally, in the words of the social theorist, Pierre Bourdieu, the children's "intentionless invention of of regulated improvisation" in their role play contributes to their development of a set of predispositions through which they confront the objective structures of their daily lives (Bourdieu, 1977: 79, emphasis in the original).

Although the set of developing predispositions (or habitus, Bourdieu, 1977) of these young girls seem to be, to a large degree, one of sober recognition of the difficulties of their circumstances, these predispositions are not determined in advance. Rather they are innovative and creative productions with in turn contribute to the reproduction of the dominant culture with all its strengths and clear imperfections (Corsaro, 1993).

Chi ld ren and soc ia l reproducat ion

The quality of life of children in the United States and other developed societies

The role play of Zena and Debra draw our attention to the second important aspect of interpretive reproduction--that being that children are, by their very participation in society, constrained by the existing social structure and by social reproduction. In the United States we invest very little in our families with young children compared to Western Europe. We have restricted and unpaid family leave. We provide very limited early education and only for the poorest of our children through the Head Start compensatory education program. Most Western European countries, in contrast, provide fully government supported early education for all or the majority of 3-5 year

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old children. Even today the majority of kindergarten programs (the year before first grade) which are part of elementary school education in the United States are only half day.

As much as I believe the United States can and should do much better regarding family leave, daycare and early education, many American children have other problems that are more pressing. In the richest country in the world, more than 10 million children (nearly 14%) do not have basic health care insurance. Most of these children are living in families where one or both of their parents work, but their employers do not provide health care coverage and the families are too poor to purchase such care themselves. Thus, even in a strong and vibrant economy, the number of children without health care continues to grow as we debate whether or not we can afford to provide such a basic service to our most needy children.

Our current strong economy also has done little to reduce the number of children of families living in poverty in the United States. Depending on which poverty measure you use, somewhere between 20 and 24% of American children live in poverty. As we can see in Figure 1 most other industrialised countries do much better than the United States in lifting children from poverty. Although the data for some countries are somewhat out of date-from late 80s to early 90s--later data available for several of the countries show the same general pattern. (See Figure 1)

We see that the United States has the highest rate of these 18 countries (21.5%), while 13 of the other countries have rates less than half that of the United States. Of these 13 countries, 8 have child poverty rates of less than 5%. Yes, there are several possible explanations for these differences given the population of the countries, the size of military budgets, and attitudes about taxes. However, even when we take such things into account, given the great wealth of the United States we surely can do better for our children.

I have up to now focused primarily on the United States in discussing child poverty in developed countries, but the problem runs much deeper. We can see in Figure I that several countries have child poverty rates of nearly 10% or more. Also in almost all of the countries poverty rates for children are higher (in some cases much higher) than those for adults, especially the elderly (see Sgritta, 1994, 1998). This difference is due to the fact that in most developed countries, social programs for the elderly are more extensive and do a better job of reducing poverty than those for children. Furthermore, social welfare programs for the elderly are growing more and more expensive as the proportion of the elderly in the population is increasing. As a result competition for tax based social welfare programs is intensifying and, thus, programs for children (including early childhood education) may be very vulnerable to cutbacks.

Investments in children as compared to the elderly

In the last part of this paper I want to pursue this trend and compare briefly social policies that affect children compared to those for the elderly in the United States and other developed countries. At the start I want to state that my point is not to bash the elderly or these policies. Social welfare policies for the elderly like Social Security (or pensions) and Medical Care are important. Furthermore, all societies must surely support their elderly who have sacrificed and contributed so much. However, as the make-up of the age structure changes (the elderly are living longer and longer in developed countries) and the need for a highly educated work force increases, we must carefully examine the nature and equity of how resources are invested by age.

All developed societies face the problem of increasing costs for social welfare policies for the elderly as compared to other age groups. For example in 1990 the ratio of per capita social welfare spending (including pensions, health, unemployment, and

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Finland (91)

Sweden (92)

Denmark (91)

Switzerland (82)

Belgium (92)

Luxembourg (85)

Norway (91)

Austria (87)

The Netherlands (91)

France (84)

W. Germany (89)

Italy (91)

United Kingdom (86)

Israel (86)

Ireland (87)

Canada (91)

Australia (90)

USA (91)

T 2.5

+ ~ 2 . 7

3.3

~ 3 . 3

~ 3 . 8 +

~4.1

~ 4 . 6 t

4.8

~ 6 . 2 {

6.5

~ 6 . 8 I ~ 9 . 6 ! ~ 9.9 T

..... 11 J ~ 1 2 !"

: 13.5

~ ~ 1 4

0 5 10 15 2O % of Children

21.5

25

FIGURE 1; Child poverty in 18 countries

Adapted from Rainwater & Smeeding, 1995, p. 11 Source, Corsaro, The Sociology of Childhood, 1997, p. 218

family benefits) favoured the elderly (compared to the non-elderly) by nearly 11 to 1 in the United States. The ratio was 8.5 to 1 in Japan, 7.2 to I in Germany, 6.5 to 1 in France, 6.25 to 1 in Italy, and 5.7 to 1 in the United Kingdom (Peterson, 1999: 109).

Not surprisingly as the proportion of elderly has grown the costs of social welfare programs for the elderly have taken up more of the gross domestic product (GDP). In 1995 public spending on pensions and health benefits for the elderly in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Japan was between 10.5% to 11.5% of total GDP compared to around 8% for spending on defence, education, and research and development combined. The disparity was much greater in France and Germany (where around 17.5% of GDP was on spending for programs for the elderly) and in Italy (where 19.7% of GDP was spending for programs for the elderly). Projections for 2030 show increases to over 17% of GDP for social welfare spending on the elderly in the United States, the United Kingdom and Japan and nearly 30% in Germany, France, and Italy (Peterson, 1999: 69).

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W. A. Corsaro 99

There are high economic costs for these increases. Present day payroll taxes to pay for pensions and health benefits range from around 36% in Italy, France, and Germany to 24% in Japan, 20% in the United Kingdom, 16% in the United States, and 13% in Canada. Projections show that such taxes would increase to a low of over 30% in the U.K. and US to 50 to 70% in France, Germany, and Italy to maintain current services as the proportion of the elderly in the population increases dramatically in these countries (Peterson, 1999: 119).

As costs and accompanying taxes for benefits for the elderly have increased in developed societies, fertility rates have dropped. Figure 2 depicts drops in fertility in several developed countries. Although the information in Figure 2 is limited to seven countries, the general trend of decreasing fertility has occurred throughout the developed world in that there has been a drop below the replacement rate of 2.1 in every developed country. There are many reasons for drops in fertility, but demogra- phers point more and more to the high cost of having and raising children in modern industrialised societies (Sgritta, 1994, 1998; Qvortrup, 1994). It is clear that much of these costs are related to social welfare policies and associated taxes for programs for the elderly.

3.5

2.5

~ 2 ~

~1.5 i

0 '

[] 1960-1965 3.6 [] 1995-2000

3.3

2.8 2.9

2.5 2.6

2

.3

USA UK France Canada Japan Germany Italy

FIGURE 2: Fertility trends in seven countries

Adapted from Peterson (1990, p. 49)

Whatever the reasons for these drops in fertility, they intensify the long term costs of social welfare programs for the elderly. Given dropping fertility and increased longevity there will be ever fewer working-age adults available to support each elder in the developed world. In fact, the downward trend in this ratio is already significant with a drop from 6.8 working age adults to every elder in 1960 to 4.5 working age adults to

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every elder today in the developed world. The prediction is for this ratio to decrease to 2.5 working age adults to every elder by the year 2030 (Peterson, 1999: 34-35).

A number of strategies for dealing with the problem of global aging have been discussed and debated. The most frequently heard plans include: an increase in the retirement age (from the early to mid sixties to seventy), individual retirement accounts, and some form of income means testing for social security and medical care for the elderly (Peterson, 1999). Such solutions will be resisted by interest groups for the elderly and the elderly themselves who have a great deal of political power. Even if enacted such changes would have only minimal long terms effects. Other strategies argue for policies to increase fertility, to make investments in young children, and to ease immigration laws and restrictions (Peterson, 1999; Qvortrup, 1994; Wattenberg, 1987). These strategies bring us to the promise of early childhood education for addressing these problems and for strengthening generational interdependence in modern societies.

The promise of early childhood education

Investments in high quality early childhood education are essential given the changing nature of childhood in modern societies and for addressing the problem of global aging for at least three reasons. The first, and perhaps most obvious, reason is in line with the frequently heard proverb "children are our future." At a time of falling fertility and global aging investment in programs for young children (most especially child care and early education) will encourage increases in fertility and provide young children with rich and valuable experiences that will prepare them to be caring and productive citizens. As I will argue more fully in my conclusion, we need to get beyond thinking only about children's futures--as adults in the making. However, to win over the political power and support of the elderly and soon-to-be elderly it is imperative to make them aware of and appreciate generational interdependence. With intense competition for government resources and programs at a time of great resistance to increased taxation, older adults must be convinced that investments in children is in their own best interests.

A second reason relates to the importance of immigration as a one of the strategies for deal with global aging and falling fertility in the developed world. Even if present fertility declines levelled off or even began to reverse in many developed countries, the problem of a depleted work force to support the growing number of elderly would still remain. In countries with government supported child care and early education, immigrant children enter these institutions and learn the language, customs, and values of their new culture prior to elementary school. I have observed this process directly in Northern Italy where the number of immigrant children in preschools and elementary school classrooms where I have carried out ethnographic work has increased dramatically.

Here is where quality of early education counts just as much as quantity or availability. Preschools in Modena, Italy where I have worked have developed innovative projects which go beyond enculturation to build on and celebrate cultural diversity. Many of these projects carry over from the general policies of parental involvement to bring parents of immigrant children into the schools to describe, demonstrate, and share the values and customs of their home cultures with the children, teachers, and parents. I am sure many of you are aware of other such programs in other European countries.

A final reason for investing in quality early education is that such investments enrich the lives of children's childhoods. Quite simply in terms of distributive justice, children deserve their fair share of societal resources. As adults live longer and longer lives (often of high quality even in the final years) and depend and expect societal support,

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W. A. Corsaro 101

should not the period of support for children also increase. In American society we provide public education for 12 years (no direct preschool support except for the poorest children). However, average life expectancy has now increased beyond the first 12 years of retirement (usually around 77), and many people are living into their 80s and even 90s. At the same time there has been a trend toward increasing benefits for this age group and limits and cutbacks are vigorously resisted often by the most wealthy of the elderly. Surely, the United States can offer at least one or two years of government supported universal early education and in some states there is a trend in this direction.

Again, however, I want to argue that the quality early education must be stressed. Quality early education not only enriches the lives of children's childhoods, it can also help to overcome age segregation and separation in developed countries. When members of differing age groups are brought together in communal activities all benefit. Children do much to enrich the lives of adults. I can testify to the fact that young children have taught me a lot in my research in preschools, and they have also brought me great joy. I am very fortunate to have such great friends.

The future of chi ldhood

Our children are our future. How often we hear this obvious but true proverb. Cultures that invest in their children, that shelter, nourish and challenge their young, that hold high expectations for their future generations will survive and flourish. All too often, however, individuals and societies try to justify their actions in terms of their effects on children's futures as adults. This focus on the future, on what our children will become, can often blind us to how we treat and care for our children in the present. Enriching the lives of all our children will produce better adults and will enable our children to participate actively and fully in their own childhoods and to contribute to the quality of our adult lives.

Cultures that appreciate and celebrate their children for who they are as well as who they will become are the cultures that will lead us most successfully into a new century. Yes, our children are our future. And if there is one point, moral, or insight that I would have you take from this paper it is: The future of childhood is the present.

NOTES

[1] Some parts of this paper first appeared in Corsaro (1990, 1993, 1997).

REFERENCES

BOURDIEU, P. (1977) Outline of a Theory of Practice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

CORSARO, W. (1997) The Sociology of Childhood (Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press).

CORSARO, W. (1996) Transitions in Early Childhood: The Promise of Comparative, Longitudinal Ethnography, in: JESSOR, R., COLBY, A. & SHWEDER, R., Ethnogra- phy and Human Development (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).

CORSARO, W. (1993) Interpretive Reproduction in Children's Role Play, Childhood 1: 64-74.

CORSARO, W. (1992) Interpretive Reproduction in Children's Peer Cultures, Social Psychology Quarterly, 55: 160-177.

CORSARO, W. (1990) The Underlife of the Nursery School: Young Children" Social

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Representations of Adult Rules, in: DUVEEN, G. & LLOYD, B., Social Representa- tions and the Development of Knowledge (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

CORSARO, W. (1985) Friendship and Peer Culture in the Early Years (Norwood, N.J.: Ablex).

GOFFMAN, E. (1961) Asylums (Garden City, N.J.: Anchor Press). MOSCOVICI, S. (1981) On Social Representations, in: FORGAS, J., Social Cognition

(London: Academic Press. PETERSON, P. (1999) Gray Dawn (New York: Random House). QVORTRUP, J. (1994) A New Solidarity Contract? in: QVORTRUP, J., BARDY, M.,

SGRITTA, G. & WINTERSBERGER, H., Childhood Matters (Aldershot: Avebury). QVORTRUP, J. (1991). Childhood as a Social Phenomenon : An Introduction to a Series

of National Reports, Eurosocial Report No. 36. (Vienna: European Centre for Social Welfare Policy and Research).

SGRITTA, G. (1998). Inconsistencies: Childhood on Economic and Political Agenda, in: MOURITSEN, F., A Collection of Papers from the International Conference: Childhood and Children's Culture (Odense, Denmark: Odense University)

SGRITTA, G. (1994). The Generational Division of Welfare: Equity and Conflict, in: QVORTRUP, J., BARDY, M., SGRITTA, G. & WINTERSBERGER, H.,Childhood Matters (Aldershot: Avebury).

WATTENBERG, B. (1987). The Birth Dearth (New York: Pharos Books).

Correspondence about this paper should be addressed to:

William A. Corsaro Department of Sociology

Indiana University Bloomington Indiana 47405

USA

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