“A street child or street youth is any minor for whom the street (in the wildest sense of the word, including unoccupied dwellings, waste land, etc.) has become his or her habitual abode, and who is without adequate protection”

The reasons why children are in the streets rather than with their families may vary considerably, but the immediate cause is nearly always a dysfunctioning in the family. This is sometimes overlooked by jumping to deeper causes such as poverty. To put it differently:

as long as the family holds together, there will, by definition, be no children of the streets. The disintegration of the family may be a slow process, and the detachment of a child from his/her family may gradually become a situation of total rupture.