This TV spot was made for us by our friends at Ogilvy. You could have heard a pin drop in the office when we first watched it - We were literally stunned into silence. Go on, take a look. You probably haven’t seen anything quite like it before.
Living with conflict
Living with conflict
In periods of insecurity, normally protective systems such as the family, community and religious institutions and rule of law can breakdown or mutate. With this erosion, the problems of social injustice, inequality, and marginalisation can become even more pronounced, yet there are fewer functioning mechanisms to help address them.
The impact of this societal breakdown can be suspension of essentials such as education, fragmented families, lost societal knowledge, and because of all this, a further entrenchment of poverty.
Courts stop working, social workers stop getting paid and families begin making survivalist priorities and breaking up. Mental health problems, psychosocial issues are highly connected to conflict and for those suffering, the breakdown of these support mechanisms and the stress of conflict on those around them can further endanger them and others. Already existing societal perspectives such as on the restrictions of women can very negatively impact women and their dependents ad lead to inequality in resource distribution.
Conflict-affected children
Children living within a conflict-affected place over a prolonged period of time may suffer from long term problems as well as displaying immediately visible symptoms. Living in a state of continual fear, dealing with bereavement, witnessing violent acts are just some of the events and elements which can induce adverse and worrying psychological reactions. With few “conflict-free” years, psychological stress is further exacerbated. The irony is that children on the whole, show extraordinary resilience to the negative elements of their environment. This resilience is increased when their essential needs are met, and when further burdens such as income generation are taken off their shoulders.
Recruitment
Conflict can indirectly and directly affect children but it also involves them. Children can become conflict actors; involved with and fighting for armed groups. There are an estimated 250,000 child soldiers in the world today, 40% of them girls. Whilst in many cases recruitment may be forced, there are many degrees of coercion and children who have been recruited or who have signed up voluntarily are often found to have been marginalised, independent from their family and were already involved in more hazardous enterprises. We need to understand that becoming “wife” or soldier can appeal to children as a legitimate livelihood choice, and increasing the opportunities for young people is one means of reducing voluntary recruitment.
However, the psychological effects of being exposed to armed conflict at a young age can be grave for future prospects. Assisting with demobilisation and reintegration is crucial if we are to stop young people keeping from taking arms again, entering into demeaning/hazardous employment, or failing to make lasting relationships with people
The psychological effects of war
The below is a blog based on a talk the War Child UK Programme Director gave to a group of NGOs specialising in child poverty in November 2011. In the following posts we will try to add more colour to the ways in which conflict affects a child’s mental health and social coping mechanisms.
Conflict in the World
War Child UK (WCUK) operates in the worst conflict-affected places in the world. The countries we work in are the infamous and the unjust. As well as operating in Iraq, Afghanistan, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, we have recently begun working in Central African Republic (CAR) which has 17 distinct armed groups (recognised as distinct from criminal groups) creating an insecure environment . CAR is in a “bad neighbourhood” surrounded by DRC and Uganda (where WCUK also works) as well as Chad, Sudan and South Sudan, the newest and one of the poorest nations on earth. One of the reasons we started working in CAR is the link to, Congo and Uganda, where the Lords Resistance Army (LRA) has been active. There has been an estimated 30,000 children abducted since their appearance in the 1990s.
Iraq, Afghanistan, Congo, Uganda, have barely been out of international news for the continual conflict their citizens have had to live through.
All these conflicts create their own warped war economies which need soldiers, porters, cooks, assets etc. Unfortunately, in a majority of cases, these roles are taken by children.In the world today there are as many as 250,000 children currently associated with, or fighting for, armed groups. With few income opportunities, being a “wife” or a “soldier” can appeal as a legitimate livelihood choice to young people. WCUK works with children who have been negatively affected by conflict and insecurity. Whilst WCUK does work with children who have been associated with the armed forces, WCUK does not, in most cases, distinguish them from the millions of vulnerable and marginalised young people negatively affected by conflict.
Before the War
Over 600 million people live in countries affected by fragility and conflict (World Bank Institute). Poverty rates in these countries average 54%, in contrast to 22% for low-income and peaceful countries. Most of these countries don’t get a 54% poverty rate overnight, instead it is the result of years or even decades of fighting and insecurity which lead to stagnation of economic growth, capital flight, fewer opportunities and increasingly disabled and incapable state apparatuses. Without accountability, taxation, and capacity some conflict affected states also become “failed” states where the rule of law and jurisdiction of institutions becomes totally absent and ineffectual.
In countries such as Afghanistan it can be hard to distinguish when “before the war” was, as the cycle of conflict has been ongoing for nearly thirty years and breathing spaces for reconstruction have been rare. However, in other countries such as Iraq and Uganda the difference is more marked. In the 1990s, Iraq had an educational system to envy, with near universal rates of primary school education, an exemplary university system and a magnet for the region. Since 2003, universities have emptied, schools have been bombed, and the percentage of students completing school has plummeted.
Whilst in many cases life “before the war” was not golden, the protective mechanisms that communities establish to help deal with the obstacles means they are able to function, and as areas become more and more insecure, the erosion of these mechanisms can have disastrous consequences for children.
