Apprentices in a Workshop at the Fabrica de Moreda (Asturias)

Asturian journalist and photographer Constanino Suárez took this shot of young apprentices in a workshop at the Fábrica de Moreda iron works in 1920. 

Child labour was common in agrarian societies, where it was seen as making a positive contribution to the family economy. The full dimensions of the problem were only revealed with the Industrial Revolution. In the 19th century, the horrific conditions in factories that employed thousands of children fed an intense public debate about the need to protect childhood. The first laws in this area, especially in the most advanced industrial countries like Great Britain, were aimed at regulating working hours and defining rest time as well as establishing a minimum working age.

The initial efforts in Spain came only in 1855 when Minister of Development Manuel Alonso Martínez tried to limit child labour by banning children under eight years of age from working. The law was never actually passed, and no further efforts were made until 1873, when Eduard Benot introduced a bill establishing ten as the minimum working age and setting limits on the number of hours that children could be worked. Growing concern for children’s education, together with successive labour and social reforms, particularly during the Second Republic, led to improved living conditions for children and a gradual reduction in the number of children employed in factories.

Nevertheless, child labour, especially in the rural world, was not eliminated in Spain until the transition of the 1970s when attending school became compulsory and children’s rights were strengthened. Children continue to serve as cheap labour in developing countries today.

FMP