Dr Anne Hilda Wiltshire, Sociology PhD, Sociology MA cum laude, Sociology BA Hons cum laude, Humanities BA cum laude.
www.drannewiltshire.com | drannewiltshire@cohere.solutions
This short essay presents the core findings of my 2025 article ‘Child work, care and neglect in farmworker homes: An empirical critique of Social Reproduction Theory’ (hyperlinked). The article draws on a rigorous empirical study which moves beyond description to identify a devastating, structurally mandated ‘child care deficit’ in society (1).
The analysis reinforces the relevance of the social theory of unpaid work in homes that is Social Reproduction Theory (SRT) ‘and supports its goal to develop a ‘unified theory of work’(Vogel, 2014; Hopkins, 2017). However, it critiques SRT’s transformative-emancipatory approach to women’s studies. Moreover, argues against SRT theorists’ abandonment of SRT (Leach, 2016; Ferguson, 2017) for the axiological approaches (Morgan, 2014) of the ethico-political theory of Social Reproduction Feminism (Crivello & Espinoza-Revollo, 2018) and the “theoretico-political” Theory of Social Reproduction (Rocha, Beltrão & Oliveira, 2025: 4). Instead, this article supports the evolution of SRT into a unified scientific theory of work by its grounding in the scientific methodology of dialectical materialism (Bhattacharya, 2017; McNally, 2017). This scientific methodology (Johnson & Onwuegbuzie, 2004; Ritzer, 2010; Greene, 2012) strengthens the scientific study of society that is sociology (Comte, 1830) and its capacity to formulate and contribute to actionable social policy and legislative solutions.
International and national social policy frameworks require all children, unless emancipated, to be under the care of primary or proxy caregivers or the de facto care of the State (United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, 2011). The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, in General Comment No. 13, reflected in national policy such as South Africa’s (Department of Social Development, 2019: 26) explicitly links a “lack of adequate substitute care”—whether due to the absence of adult supervision or supervision by children—to legal conceptualisations of child “physical neglect” (United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, 2011: 9).
The scale of the ‘social state of child neglect’ forms the central empirical contribution. The article reveals a profound, state-sanctioned misalignment between adult employment and child education mandates. While parents are typically employed for 50 hours per week, schoolchildren’s education spans 22.5 to 27.5 hours weekly, depending on age cohort. This regulatory chasm creates a legislated weekly ‘child care deficit’ ranging from 22.5 to 27.5 hours, a structural phenomenon which is the basis of the ‘social state of child neglect’.
The study finds an empirical ‘care gap’ spanning 21.2 weekly hours on average, particularly acute for younger schoolchildren (ages 6–12) whose weekly neglect averages 24.7 hours. During this unsupervised period, schoolchildren are neglected in homes compelled to conduct socially necessary work for themselves and sometimes other children. This essential work arises directly from the regulatory failure to synchronise adult and child work schedules.
A critical and poignant finding is the spatial distribution of this systemic social issue. While the care gap indicates a ‘social care deficit’, it is empirically profound in townhomes as compared to farmhomes. This paradox is attributed to employer-subsidised child after-school services on farms. In town contexts, in contrast, state social services are acutely absent, resulting in the bequeathing of the structural care deficit burden to the most vulnerable individuals: children. This neglect subjects schoolchildren to severe work and social insecurities, qualitatively manifested in poor educational outcomes, teenage pregnancy, juvenile crime, child accidents, abuse and kidnapping.
The conclusion is clear: this ‘social state of child neglect’ is a measurable, pervasive societal outcome of the structure of state-sanctioned labour and education policies—a direct consequence of the regulatory misalignments between the mandated 50-hour adult and ~25-hour schoolchild work week. This underscores the argument that the ‘social state of child neglect’ is systemic to social policy frameworks, not individual parental shortcomings. The policy requirement is therefore immediate legislative action to provide the legally mandated socially necessary child care protection to address this qualified social insecurity and quantified social crisis.
In sum, my study confirms that the sustained structurally mandated praxical ‘social state of child neglect’ is inevitable without decisive state intervention to align legislative employment and education work schedules.
Endnote:
(1) Author’s note: ‘Childcare’ is the service. ‘Child care’ is the action of providing care to children. The article notes the absence of state ‘childcare services’ and critiques the lack of ‘child care’ theorising a ‘child care gap’.
References:
Bhattacharya, T. 2017. Introduction: Mapping Social Reproduction Theory, in T. Bhattacharya (ed.). Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentering Oppression, London: Pluto Press. 1–20.
Comte, A. 1830. Cours de Philosophie Positive (The Course in Positive Philosophy). Paris: Bachelier.
Crivello, G. & Espinoza-Revollo, P. 2018. Care labour and temporal vulnerability in woman-child relations, in R. Rosen & K. Twamley (eds). Feminism and the Politics of Childhood: Friends or Foes?, London: UCL Press. 139–155.
Department of Social Development. 2019. National Child Care and Protection Policy. Pretoria: Republic of South Africa.
Ferguson, S. 2017. Children, Childhood and Capitalism: A Social Reproduction Perspective, in T. Bhattacharya (ed.). Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentering Oppression, London: Pluto Press. 112–131.
Greene, J.C. 2012. Engaging critical issues in social inquiry by mixing methods. American Behavioral Scientist. 56(6):755–773.
Hopkins, C.T. 2017. Mostly Work, Little Play: Social Reproduction, Migration, and Paid Domestic Work in Montreal, in T. Bhattacharya (ed.). Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentering Oppression, London: Pluto Press. 131–147.
Johnson, B. & Onwuegbuzie, A.J. 2004. Mixed Methods Research: A Research Paradigm Whose Time Has Come. Educational Researcher. 33(7):14–26.
Leach, N. 2016. Transitions to Capitalism. Historical Materialism. 24(2):111–137.
McNally, D. 2017. Intersections and Dialectics: Critical Reconstructions in Social Reproduction Theory, in T. Bhattacharya (ed.). Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentering Oppression, London: Pluto Press. 94–111.
Morgan, D.L. 2014. Pragmatism as a paradigm for social research. Qualitative Inquiry. 20(8):1045–1053.
Ritzer, G. 2010. Sociological Theory. 8th edn. New York: McGraw Hill.
Rocha, C.C., Beltrão, M.F.A. & Oliveira, R.N. 2025. Cinco Notas a Propósito da Teoria da Reprodução Social e Suas Contribuições ao Serviço Social (Five Notes Regarding Social Reproduction Theory and Its Contributions to Social Work). Serviço Social & Sociedade. 148(3):1–24.
United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. 2011. General comment No. 13 (2011): The right of the child to freedom from all forms of violence. Geneva: United Nations.
Vogel, L. 2014. Marxism and the Oppression of Women: Toward a Unitary Theory. S. Ferguson & D. McNally (eds). Chicago: Haymarket Books.
Wiltshire, A.H. 2025. Child work, care and neglect in farmworker homes: an empirical critique of Social Reproduction Theory. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 45(13–14):73–91. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-03-2025-0208