World Summit for Children, 1990

On 29-30 September 1990, the largest gathering of world leaders in history assembled at the United Nations in New York to attend the World Summit for Children (WSC).3 It was fitting that first among of the series of international conferences held in the 1990s was that concerned with the well-being of children. It was recognized that children were the most vulnerable segment of society, and had suffered particularly during the 1980s, as two seminal studies by UNICEF revealed. The first had shown the full and staggering effects of the world recession of the 1980s on children in many parts of the developing world (UNICEF, 1984). The study also helped to change the perspective on development. It concluded with the view that: ‘the world needed to be confronted with the consequences of the current economic policies and the possibilities of clear alternatives. We were used to describing the flows of money and wealth, with their effects on human life seen as incidental consequences. If we instead started with the focus on people, the same international links could be traced in a wholly new light. The human consequences would be brought to the fore, with economic numbers becoming background. When this glimpse of another reality became an accepted and legitimate preoccupation of national and international policy, more hope could be taken for the welfare and future of the world’s children, the next generation’.