Alexandra Ricard-Guay

Girl soldiers: towards a gendered understanding of wartime recruitment, participation, and demobilisation

Scholarship on political violence and armed conflict has long been gender-blind. Often subsumed within the category of ‘children’ (who are assumed to be male in the context of soldiery), girl soldiers have been subjected to a double invisibility. However, in the last decade the literature dedicated to the topic of girls within armed groups has grown. We now have a much clearer understanding of girls’ strengths and challenges, and clear evidence of their overall marginalisation both during wartime violence and following demobilisation. What is now needed is to implement what we have learnt, to support girls in the aftermath of violence, particularly in the long term. This article seeks to provide an overview of what is known about girl soldiers. It explores their entry into armed groups, and their multiple roles and wartime experiences, as well as their experiences of demobilisation and reintegration. To support the points raised, we highlight the voices and experiences of nine former girl soldiers from Colombia, and eight former girl soldiers from Sierra Leone, who were interviewed in 2010 and 2011. The realities of girls affected by armed conflict vary in different contexts, yet there are similarities. Girls’ options, roles, power relations, both during conflict and following demobilisation, are embedded within broader gendered power structures and identities.

Human Trafficking in Domestic Work in the EU:A Special Case or a Learning Ground for the Anti-Trafficking Field?

The field of study on trafficking in human beings (THB) has developed greatly since the adoption of the Palermo Protocol 15 years ago. It has gone through important shifts, one of which being greater attention toward forms of trafficking other than sexual exploitation, notably for forced labor and services. Yet, the expansion of the anti-trafficking field also faces new challenges and gaps in knowledge. One of the emerging areas that has gained interest and that needs further research is that of THB in domestic work (MIGS, 2015). This Special Issue precisely examines this phenomenon in six European countries: Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, and Great Britain. Contributions to this issue examine cases of severe exploitation in domestic work, analyze the conditions that are prone to exploitation, and explore why such situations of trafficking are not identified and prevented. It is timely to look at trafficking in the context of care and domestic work, not only because this area has been largely understudied, but also because in this context the private realm of interpersonal relations—a domain that has remained largely unexplored in the trafficking field of studies—are of fundamental importance. Domestic work is a perfect example of how gaps in policies (labor, immigration, welfare), social values and norms, and the relational dimension interplay in situations of trafficking. This is the point of departure, the premise, of this Special Issue. Given the peculiar nature of domestic work—being performed in private households and being at the junction of labor market and family—looking at trafficking in this context can contribute to advancing further the understanding of THB. Domestic work presents multifaceted challenges that speak to and inform a better understanding of the various areas and forms of trafficking.

Invisible students: institutional invisibility and access to education for undocumented children

Purpose In Canada, undocumented children are “institutionally invisible” – their access to education to be found in unwritten and discretionary practices. Drawing on the experience of a three-year university-community partnership among researchers, institutional and community stakeholders, the purpose of this paper is to examine how undocumented children are constructed as excluded from school. Design/methodology/approach The establishment of this collaborative research space, helped to critically understand how this exclusion was maintained, and highlighted contradictory interpretations of policies and practices. Findings Proposing the analytical framework of “institutional invisibility”, the authors argue that issues of access and entitlement for undocumented children have to be often understood within unwritten and ambiguous policies and practices that make the lives of young people invisible to the institutional entities with which they interact. Originality/value The notion of institutional invisibility allows the authors to integrate the missing link between questions of access and deservingness. The paper also reflects on the role of action research in both documenting dynamics and pathways of institutional invisibility, as well as in initiating social change – as both horizontal, and vertical mobilisation.