Reasons, practices and procedures that bring mothers to the streets as street beggars: Aqualitative study of mothers with twin children begging on the streets of Ghana

Abstract

The literature on street begging focuses on other categories of street beggars without paying much attention to mothers who beg on the street with their twin children. The gendered and cultural reasons for which they beg, and the activities and processes they go through before they end up on the streets are unclear. With the aid of purposive and snowball sampling, this qualitative study investigated the reasons, practices and procedures which inform street begging among mothers with their twin children in Ghana. The study reveals that the health challenges of the twin children as well as that of their mothers are the main reasons for begging on the street. The study further reveals that the activities and processes that bring women to the streets are both gendered and culturally embedded. The study discusses the complexities between cultural rights and human rights, and makes recommendations to promote the wellbeing of these mothers and their twin children who beg on the streets.