The study Multidimensional Child Poverty in Montenegro was realized in close cooperation between researchers at the UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti in Florence and the UNICEF Montenegro Office.
It provides the knowledge required to formulate an appropriate national policy response. It reveals how child poverty and exclusion differ from deprivations faced by adults. It explains how children of different ages experience poverty – and what is needed to address these needs. It highlights existing poverty profiles in Montenegro and how different dimensions of deprivation combine and interlink. Understanding these issues is crucial to designing an effective response to child poverty – both to guarantee children’s human rights and to lay the groundwork for sustainable development. The study concludes with policy recommendations to guide the response by the government and its development partners and provides concrete suggestions on how best to invest in children.
The methodology used for the study is based on the multiple overlapping deprivation analysis (MODA) methodology developed by UNICEF’s Global Office of Research - ‘Innocenti’. MODA is a tool that envisions poverty as a multi-faceted phenomenon – well beyond monetary poverty and including other rights dimensions such as access to education, health and protection. The decision to analyse multidimensional child poverty in Montenegro resulted from discussions with representatives of the government, parliament, civil society and international organizations, who jointly defined the concept and its different dimensions in the context of Montenegro. For the first time, the original MODA methodology was enriched with qualitative insights, giving voices to children and their parents.
The research confirms that the stigma related to poverty has devastating effects on the lives of poor children – it motivates their decisions to drop out of school, to avoid denigration by peers and teachers and to give up on cherished aspirations. The MODA demonstrates that young children are the most deprived age group in Montenegro.