The surveillance of children’s mobility

Abstract

The increased protection of children by monitoring them is said to be a central characteristic of modern childhood. In the field of mobility, this aspect of modern childhood is reflected in the fact that children’s everyday mobility is to a great extent kept under surveillance, e.g. by parents, kindergarten or school employees and through general traffic regulation. In this article, we investigate the surveillance of children’s mobility – primarily bicycling, walking and car usage - from three different angles. In the first, we investigate the general power relations in mobile practice that add to the surveillance and restriction of children’s mobility. In the second, we illustrate how parents monitor children’s mobility by chauffeuring them. In the third, we look into how parents remote control children’s mobility by means of behavioural restrictions and technology. By using statistical material and qualitative interviews, we illustrate how parents perceive and perform their own surveillance of children’s mobility. In addition, we comment on how children perceive their monitored mobility and how they cope with it. Finally, we reflect on the differences in parental mobile monitoring and relate this to welfare and socio-economic structures in the families.