The dominant Western narrative casts orphanages as inevitably and inherently harmful to children based on adultist Western perceptions and perspectives of childhood, while the term orphan has become synonymous with vulnerability and innocence. Kathie Carpenter's research disrupts this dominant narrative by listening to the children themselves, the experts, those who have lived in an orphanage complex. These former orphanage residents provided a rich and nuanced account of growing up in what they referred to as a safe and caring environment, as they reflected on how their lives were enhanced by this particular experience of childhood.
The Children's Opportunity Centre (COC) was chosen for the study because it was managed and staffed by Cambodians who supported the research. It was also registered with and rated highly by government assessments, and had an active volunteer programme. In order to understand the patterns and flow of daily life at the orphanage, the author conducted extensive participant observations during 2010–11, with follow-up visits in 2014 and 2015. She also conducted interviews with staff, management, volunteers and the wider village community, and obtained information and commentary from social media sites. Carpenter then returned to Cambodia in 2019 for six weeks and conducted semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions with 22 of the former residents, aged between 14 to 28 years old. The aim was to record their experiences and opinions of growing up in an orphanage and the outcomes of this experience, especially as they related to education and employment. Carpenter contends that this Western-financed NGO provided quality physical and emotional care and education that supported positive and alternate futures for the children. She also argues that given the historical, structural and cultural constraints prevalent in Cambodia, residential care was the best option available for these children at the time. Her main argument is that all orphanages are not inherently bad, and that valuable lessons can be learned from good centres with good practices in support of vulnerable children.
Life in a Cambodian orphanage begins with an examination and contextualisation of the history and practices of Cambodian orphanages. This overview brings much needed objectivity and cultural understanding to the Western condemnation of orphanages, and the opinion that children are always better off with family. Historically, out-of-family care for Cambodian children has been a common cultural practice, and regarded as a valuable opportunity to improve a child's education, social networks and life prospects. Boys were often placed in Buddhist pagodas to access an education, and girls with wealthier relatives, childless couples or in a residential dance troupe. Carpenter also explains the human dimension of Cambodia's decades of civil war, the horrors of the Khmer Rouge years, foreign occupation, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and the international humanitarian crisis and mass tourism that followed, resulting in Cambodia's orphanage and voluntourism boom.
The differing Western and Cambodian constructions of the value-laden terms ‘orphan’ and ‘orphanage’ are contrasted by Carpenter, who also traces how these terms, not easily translatable into Khmer, came to be commonly used. Contrary to Western discourse, Cambodians living in poverty regard an orphanage as a home for their children, and as a wonderful opportunity to gain an otherwise unobtainable education. The managing NGO had chosen the name Children's Opportunity Centre rather than orphanage to more accurately reflect the children's circumstances.
In their narratives, the young former residents explained the circumstances that led them to the COC. It was a decision generally supported by their family (if present), and regarded as the only way for the children to have an education and prospects for a better life. Parents had therefore prioritised their children's right to education and good health over the right to live with family. Prior to joining COC all the children had lived in poverty, experienced extreme hunger, and were unable to attend school. As is common in post-conflict societies, many had also lived with alcoholism, domestic violence, abandonment, and illness in their families, and the loss of parents through death or labour migration.
The author discusses many of the criticisms applied to orphanages in Cambodia by child rights activists and considers them in light of the COC and her own observations and the former resident's narratives. There was no evidence to suggest the children were forcibly or fraudulently enticed to COC, an accusation which is often levelled at the numerous orphanages established as businesses to make money through donations from sympathetic tourists and volunteers. Instead Carpenter found that the children were supported and encouraged (where possible), to maintain close family connections through regular phone calls and to return to their families during holidays. COC also prioritised keeping siblings together.
Contrary to the Western connotations of miserable sites of abuse, COC is described as resembling a small village rather than an institution, an atmosphere the children enjoyed because of the rural location and rigorous child protection protocols. Consistent with Cambodian culture, older children provided much of the care and support for the younger children. Physical boundaries did not exist and the local village and COC were interwoven as part of the same community. Villagers, including the Buddhist monk (who provided moral education), wandered freely through the COC grounds and were included in all activities. The COC prioritised education, including at the local government school, as a way to break the cycle of poverty. The local village children also benefited from this inclusive ethos and were included in the regular health check-ups, dance and cultural lessons and participated in games and activities with the volunteers. In their own narratives, the former residents referred to the COC as ‘home’, and explained how this experience had also provided a positive role model for their own future parenting.
The former residents spoke highly of both long and short-term Western volunteers who were fun and also provided enculturation into Western ways. Interactions with the volunteers stimulated curiosity among the children and modelled new perspectives on social issues, gender equity, the value of education and provided cross-cultural communication and understanding. The volunteers also supported the children's developing skills in the English language, which is not taught in government schools and is consistently acknowledged as the vital ingredient for entry into a modern and globalised Cambodia. The children did not appear to suffer separation anxiety after volunteers departed.
The former residents defined the success of the COC in terms of developing their educational and work aspirations, self-confidence, pride and positive future orientation, rather than in terms of their day to day care. They also referred to the diverse range of careers and ongoing educational choices they enjoyed, and their ability to now fulfil their filial obligation in support of their families. The development of a social conscience and ability to make choices about marriage and relationships were also identified benefits of their COC experience. Without the COC they said that they would have remained poor subsistence farmers and the cycle of poverty would have continued. The accounts from former residents are therefore an important contribution to discussions of young people's agency and self-efficacy which are not normally considered in discussions regarding children raised in orphanages.
The former residents provided balance as they also recounted negative emotions in their reflections of childhood at the COC. However, the child commodification often referred to by child rights activists did not appear as an issue in the narratives, or was viewed through a different perspective as a positive experience. For example, immense pride was expressed in developing the highly sought after skills in traditional dance, and the delight in performing at cultural events in surrounding villages.
News that the Cambodian Government had decided to close down orphanages in 2017 and reintegrate 30 per cent of children back to their families by the following year caused the former residents sadness and anguish. The closure of COC meant children were abruptly removed from their ‘home’ and the associated close personal relationships they had formed with the other children, staff and the wider village community; their ‘family’. Carpenter expresses concern that the Cambodian government's decision does not address the poverty, family circumstances or inability to access education that led to the children moving to an orphanage in the first place. She contends that an orphanage need not be the ‘bleak institution widespread in stereotype and fiction’ (p. 144), but can be a home and provide physical and emotional well-being in the best interests of the child.
Kathie Carpenter has provided the strategies used by one particular orphanage to mitigate harm and provide a supported and caring childhood for children whose parent/s were either dead or unable or unwilling to provide for their care. The research highlights the importance of listening to children and brings balance to the dominant perception that children in Cambodian orphanages are victims of greed, commodification and abuse. The longitudinal study with the former residents provided a voice for their experience of an alternate childhood for families living in poverty in Cambodia. I have also conducted research with children living in an orphanage in Siem Reap (Amanda Miller and Harriot Beazley, ‘“We have to make the tourists happy”: Orphanage tourism in Siem Reap, Cambodia through the children's own voices’, Children's Geographies 20, 1 [2022]: 51–63) and appreciated the thoroughness and extent of Carpenter's rich research. My own participatory research similarly revealed that the children enjoyed and considered themselves lucky to have had this experience that provided an alternative to poverty and hunger and a pathway towards a positive future. The recommendations and conclusions drawn by Kathie Carpenter are an insightful and important contribution to contemporary debates regarding child protection policy for the improved care of children living in out of family residence. The book also provides an alternative view for scholars to consider within childhood studies and international development.
