Genuine social inclusion or superficial co-existence? Former girl soldiers in eastern Congo returning home

Abstract

The article focuses on the social dimension of child soldier reintegration. It draws on an empirical qualitative study on former girl soldiers in eastern Congo, and examines how former girl soldiers fare with regard to social acceptance and re-inclusion into their families and communities. The article presents empirical data revealing that the girls experience social exclusion, stigmatisation and non-acceptance both within their families and within the wider community. It may, therefore, be argued that there is a superficial (physical) co-existence rather than a genuine social inclusion of girls returning home from armed forces or groups. The article's discussion draws attention to the weighting of the different dimensions of reintegration (social, economic, psychological) and argues that the social dimension, although receiving less attention in programming, should be what comes first in order to fulfil former child soldiers' right to reintegration.

Keywords:

• social reintegration
• social exclusion
• girl soldiers
• eastern Congo

Acknowledgements

Thanks go to the Royal Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for funding the research as well as to the former girl soldiers who shared their stories with me.

Notes on contributor

Milfrid Tonheim is a senior researcher at the Centre for Intercultural Communication (SIK) and an assistant professor II at the School of Mission and Theology (MHS) in Stavanger, Norway. Her research interests focus on the rights and well-being of the child, the socio-economic reintegration of former child soldiers, social exclusion, and peace and conflict. Tonheim recently co-edited a book entitled Filles ex-soldats du Congo: La route cahoteuse de la réintégration.

Notes

1. A child soldier, or a child associated with armed forces or groups, refers to ‘any person below 18 years of age who is or has been recruited or used by an armed force or armed group in any capacity, including but not limited to children, boys and girls, used as fighters, cooks, porters, messengers, spies or for sexual purposes’ (The Paris Principles – Principles and Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces or Armed Groups, 2007: 7). When referring to both sexes the article uses the term child soldier, and when referring to female child soldiers the term girl soldier is used.

2. UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989).

3. Ibid., Art. 39; UN Optional Protocol to the CRC on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, 2000, Art. 6.3.

4. The Paris Principles – Principles and Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces or Armed Groups, 2007.

5. Ibid., 7.

6. UN Integrated Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration Standards (IDDRS) (New York: United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations, 2006), 1.20.

7. Roy F. Baumeister and Mark R. Leary, ‘The Need to Belong: Desire for Interpersonal Attachments as a Fundamental Human Motivation’, Psychological Bulletin 117, no. 3 (1995): 506.

8. Laura Smart Richman and Mark R. Leary, ‘Reactions to Discrimination, Stigmatization, Ostracism, and Other Forms of Interpersonal Rejection: A Multimotive Model’, Psychological Review 116, no. 2 (2009): 367.

9. Anton J.M. Dijker and Willem Koomen, Stigmatization, Tolerance and Repair: An Integrative Psychological Analysis of Responses to Deviance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

10. Ibid.; Baumeister and Leary, ‘The Need to Belong’.

11. For example, Hilary Silver, ‘Social Exclusion and Social Solidarity – Three Paradigms’, Journal of Labour Review 133 (1994): 531–78; Amartya Sen, Social Exclusion: Concept, Application and Scrutiny (Social Development Papers 1. Asian Development Bank, 2000); Ruth Levitas, Christina Pantazis, Eldin Fahmy, David Gordon, Eva Lloyd and Demi Patsios, The Multi-Dimensional Analysis of Social Exclusion (Bristol: Bristol Institute for Public Affairs, University of Bristol, 2007).

12. Jane Mathieson, Jennie Popay, Etheline Enoch, Sarah Escorel, Mario Hernandez, Heidi Johnston and Laetitia Rispel, Social Exclusion: Meaning, Measurement and Experience and Links to Health Inequalities. A Review of Literature (WHO Social Exclusion Knowledge Network Background Paper 1, 2008), 13.

13. Serge Paugam, La Disqualification sociale : Essai sur la nouvelle pauvreté (Paris: PUF, 1997).

14. Robert Castel, ‘De l'indigence à l'exclusion, la désaffiliation. Précarité du travail et vulnérabilité relationnelle’, in Face à l'exclusion. Le modèle français, ed. J. Donzelot (Paris: Éditions Esprit, 1991), 137–68.

15. Ibid., 16.

16. Castel, ‘De l'indigence à l'exclusion, la désaffiliation’.

17. Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda (FDLR). When referring to this group the article uses its former name ‘Interahamwe’ as this term was consistently used in the girls' narratives.

18. Congolese local defence groups.

19. Forces armées de la République Démocratique du Congo (FARDC).

20. Congrès national pour la défense du peuple (CNDP).

21. Milfrid Tonheim, ‘“Who Will Comfort Me?” Stigmatization of Girls Formerly Associated With Armed Forces and Groups in Eastern Congo’, The International Journal of Human Rights 16, no. 2 (2012): 287.

22. Macartan Humphreys and Jeremy Weinstein, ‘Disentangling the Determinants of Successful Demobilization and Reintegration’ (Working Paper No. 69, Center for Global Development, 2005); Macartan Humphreys and Jeremy Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’, Journal of Conflict Resolution 51, no. 4 (2007): 531–67.

23. Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’, 549.

24. For example, Chris Coulter, Being a Bush Wife: Women's Lives Through War and Peace in Northern Sierra Leone (Uppsala: Department of Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology, Uppsala University, 2006); Susan Shepler, ‘The Rites of the Child: Global Discourses of Youth and Reintegrating Child Soldiers in Sierra Leone’, Journal of Human Rights 4 (2005): 197–211; Joanna Boersch-Supan, What the Communities Say: Ex-Combatant Integration and Reconciliation in Sierra Leone – What Can be Learned From the Sierra Leonean Experience? (CRISE Working Paper 63, 2009).

25. For example, Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Disentangling the Determinants’; Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’; Boersch-Supan, What the Communities Say.

26. For example, Neil Boothby, ‘What Happens When Child Soldiers Grow Up? The Mozambique Case Study’, Intervention 4, no. 3 (2006): 244–59; Alcinda Honwana, Okusiakala ondalo yokalye: Let us Light a New Fire. Local Knowledge in the Post-War Healing in Reintegration of War-Affected Children in Angola (Consultancy report for the Christian Children's Fund, 1998); Alcinda Honwana, Child Soldiers in Africa (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006).

27. For example, Susan McKay and Dyan Mazurana, Where Are the Girls? Girls in Fighting Forces in Northern Uganda, Sierra Leone and Mozambique: Their Lives During and After War (Montreal: Rights & Democracy, International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, 2004); Jeannie Annan, Christopher Blattman, Khristopher Carlson and Dyan Mazurana, The State of Female Youth in Northern Uganda: Findings From the Survey of War-Affected Youth (SWAY), Phase II (2008); Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?

28. For example, Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’; Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?’

29. See Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?’

30. Milfrid Tonheim, ‘Where Are the Research Gaps? Reviewing Literature on Former Girl Soldiers’ Reintegration in the African Context’, in Culture, Religion, and the Reintegration of Former Child Soldiers in Northern Uganda, ed. Bård Mæland (Geneva; New York: Peter Lang, 2010), 13–37, 17.

31. For example, Sofie Vindevogel, Kathleen Coppens, Ilse Derluyn, Gerrit Loots, Eric Broekaert, ‘Forced Conscription of Children During Armed Conflict: Experiences of Former Child Soldiers in Northern Uganda’, Child Abuse & Neglect 35 (2011): 551–62; Ilse Derluyn, Eric Broekaert, Gilberte Schuyten and Els De Temmerman, ‘Post-Traumatic Stress in Former Ugandan Child Soldiers’, The Lancet 363, no. 9412 (2004): 861–63; K. Amone-P'Olak, ‘Psychological Impact of War and Sexual Abuse on Adolescent Girls in Northern Uganda’, Intervention 3, no. 1 (2005): 33–45.

32. See for instance, Jason Hart and Bex Tyrer, ‘Research With Children Living in Situations of Armed Conflict: Concepts, Ethics & Methods’ (RSC Working Paper No. 30, Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford, 2006); Abraham Sewonet Abatneh, Disarmament, Demobilization, Rehabilitation and Reintegration of Rwandan Child Soldiers (Master thesis in sociology, University of South Africa, 2006). http://etd.unisa.ac.za/ETD-db/ETD-desc/describe?urn=etd-05212007-081452.

33. Christopher Blattman and Jeannie Annan, ‘Child Combatants in Northern Uganda: Reintegration Myths and Realities’, in Security and Post-Conflict Reconstruction: Dealing with Fighters in the Aftermath of War, ed. Robert Muggah (London and New York: Routledge, 2009), 103–25, 113.

34. Mike Wessells, Child Soldiers: From Violence to Protection (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2006), x.

35. Blattman and Annan, ‘Child Combatants in Northern Uganda’, 113.

36. Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?’

37. Robert Muggah and Anton Baaré, ‘Negotiating Reintegration in Uganda: Dealing with Combatants during Peace Processes’, in Security and Post-Conflict Reconstruction: Dealing with Fighters in the Aftermath of War, ed. Robert Muggah (London and New York: Routledge, 2009), 226–47, 229.

38. Milfrid Tonheim, ‘La réintégration des enfants soldats: assurer la sécurité ou protéger l'enfant?’, in Filles ex-soldats du Congo: La route cahoteuse de la réintégration, ed. Gunhild Odden and Milfrid Tonheim (Paris: L'Harmattan, 2013), 215–40, 232.

39. Ibid.

40. For example, Alpaslan Özerdem and Sukanya Podder, ‘Disarming Youth Combatants: Mitigating Youth Radicalization and Violent Extremism’, Journal of Strategic Security, 4, no. 4 (2011): 63–80; Muggah and Barrée, ‘Negotiating Reintegration in Uganda’.

41. For example, Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?’; Krijn Peters, Paul Richards and Koen Vlassenroot, What Happens to Youth During and After Wars? A Preliminary Review of Literature on Africa and an Assessment of the Debate (RAWOO Working Paper, October, 2003).

42. Tonheim, ‘Who Will Comfort Me?’

43. For example, Karen J. Burnell, Peter G. Coleman and Nigel Hunt, ‘Falklands War Veterans’ Perceptions of Social Support and the Reconciliation of Traumatic Memories', Aging & Mental Health 10, no. 3 (2006): 282–9.

44. For example, Gordon Bazemore and Carsten Erbe, ‘Reintegration and Restorative Justice: Towards a Theory and Practice of Informal Social Control and Support’, in After Crime and Punishment: Pathways to Offender Reintegration, eds Shadd Maruna and Russ Immarigeon (New York: Routledge, 2011), 27–56.

45. Baumeister and Leary, ‘The Need to Belong’, 509.

46. Art Hansen, Francine Ahouanmenou-Agueh, Andre Lokisso Lu'Epotu, L. Diane Mull and Kevin Elkins, Planning Educational Response Strategies for the Reintegration of Demobilized Child Soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Final Report (Education to Combat Abusive Child Labor (ECACL) and Basic Education and Policy Support (BEPS), 2001), 28.

47. United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations, UN IDDRS.

48. Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Disentangling the Determinants’; Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’.

49. Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’, 543.

50. Alpaslan Özerdem, ‘A Re-Conceptualisation of Ex-Combatant Reintegration: “Social Reintegration” Approach’, Conflict, Security & Development 12, no. 1 (2012): 51–73, 69.

51. Ibid., 60.