Entre progreso y desarrollo La protección de la infancia en el imaginario interamericano del siglo XX

Abstract

My aim in this article is to demonstrate the centrality of ideas of development and progress in articulating the social imaginaries that were paramount to conceptions of childhood in the Americas during the 20-century. I will discuss, through a historically-minded socio-anthropological lens, the emergence of childhood as a social problem in the Americas, taking the trajectory of the Inter-American Children’s Institute between 1916 and 1989 as my case-study. My argument is that the Institute and the ideologies of development and progress have strongly supported each other, as part of a process of mutual constitution that is itself an important element in the production of a widespread concern over childhood in the period.