The Pitfalls and Potential of the Systematic Collection of Data on Child Soldier Recruitment

ABSTRACT

The recruitment of children to be used as soldiers by conflict actors continues to be a regular occurrence globally and is associated with numerous negative effects. The debatable efficacy of current efforts to combat child recruitment gives rise to the idea that scholars and policymakers should cultivate preventive tools, including the development of early warning systems. However, such development has been hampered by the difficulties associated with collecting precise and systematic large-scale data. In this study, we discuss three important pitfalls related to data collection and provide several potentials for overcoming these challenges in the development of early warning alerts.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the Dallaire Institute for Children, Peace and Security for all their help and insights. We especially are grateful to Dr. Catherine Baillie Abidi and Dustin Johnson for their helpful comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. An early version of this paper was presented during the Knowledge for Prevention (K4P) international symposium, 17-18 October 2019.

Disclosure statement

The views expressed are the author's own and do not represent the views of the Department of the Navy, Department of Defense, or the U.S. Government.

Notes

1. The foundation of the CSDS is the Non-State Actor (NSA) dataset by Cunningham et al. (2009, 2013). The NSA provides detailed information on the characteristics of rebel organisations such as estimates on group size, fighting capacity, the presence of foreign support, and so on.

2. The Child Soldier World Index was originally developed by Child Soldiers International (CSI) and is now being maintained by the Dallaire Institute following the closure of CSI in 2019 June.

3. For more info see: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/customary-ihl/eng/docs/v2_rul_rule136.

4. It is worth noting that language of OPAC speaks directly to the compulsory (forced) recruitment of children into state militaries. Voluntary recruitment of those under 18, but over 15 is still permissible under OPAC guidelines (though parties are expected to refrain from sending those under the age of 18 into direct combat). However, while these distinctions exist for government recruitment there is no such distinction for child recruitment by non-state armed groups. The language of OPAC fully prohibits the recruitment of those under 18, voluntary or otherwise, by non-state actors.

5. It is important to acknowledge the potential for political biases in such reports. For instance, the Eminent Persons Group’s most recent report, examining the UN Secretary-General’s annual reports from 2010–2020, highlights biases where the Secretary-General has failed to list some parties in the annual report even when clear violations against child recruitment are evident (e.g., the delisting of the Tatmadaw Kyi in 2020 despite their continued usage of children as human shields as recently as October 2020) (Eminent Persons Group 2021, p. 26).

6. At the same time, it is vitally important that researchers consider the ethical risks associated with this approach to ensure that local sources’ safety and well-being are not jeopardised.

7. https://kivusecurity.org/.

8. https://crisistracker.org/.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Christopher M. Faulkner

Christopher Michael Faulkner is an Assistant Professor at the U.S. Naval War College. His research interests include irregular warfare and human security, rebel recruitment strategies, militant financing and tactics, private military companies, and civil-military relations. [email protected].

Roos Haer

Roos Haer is Assistant Professor at Leiden University (2017–), The Netherlands. Her main research interests are children and youth in conflict, rebel recruitment, micro-level consequences of armed conflict, and survey research. [email protected].