Origins of Child Rights Governance : The example of early Child Labour Legislation in the United States and Brazil

Kurzfassung/Abstract

Adopting a historical and comparative perspective and moving beyond the North–South divide in the historical literature on child rights governance, this article contrasts the first enduring national anti-child labour laws in the United States and Brazil – the US Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and the Brazilian Minor’s Code (Código de Menores) of 1927. It identifies key political structures that conditioned these laws, and examines how these influenced the timing, scope, clustering, and impact of early child rights legislation.