Juridical Analysis of Ending Child Neglect and Economic Exploitation Based on the Values of Justice

Abstract

Children are holders of human rights who possess a dual vulnerability, thereby requiring special protection from the state, society, and family. However, the empirical reality in Indonesia reveals a concerning phenomenon regarding the high rate of child neglect and economic exploitation. The practice of employing underage children, both in the formal and informal sectors such as street begging syndicates, constitutes a clear violation of children's constitutional rights to grow, develop, and receive an education. This article aims to examine in depth how Indonesia's positive legal framework responds to the crimes of child neglect and economic exploitation, and why the existing legal instruments often fail to provide substantive protection for victims. The analysis focuses on the conflict between rigid statutory provisions and the reality of structural poverty, which is often used as a justification for child exploitation. This study employs a normative legal (juridical-normative) research method using conceptual and statutory approaches. The study focuses on examining the harmonization between the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia, the Child Protection Law, and the Manpower Law. This approach was chosen to dissect the structural weaknesses in child protection provisions, which tend to be reactive and lack coercive mechanisms to directly restore children's economic rights. The results of this juridical analysis recommend a regulatory reconstruction grounded in the value of substantive justice. The law must not stop at textual certainty but should be dismantled and rebuilt to deliver distributive and restorative justice. This reconstruction includes the need to formulate new legal norms requiring the state to automatically assume responsibility for caregiving and educational financing for children who become victims of economic exploitation. In addition, harsher criminal sanctions and administrative fines are needed for corporations or syndicates proven to employ children. Through this holistic regulatory reconstruction, it is hoped that Indonesia's legal system will be able to break the cycle of child neglect and restore the sovereignty and dignity of the nation's future generations.