Richard Maclure

“I Didn't Want to Die So I Joined Them”: Structuration and the Process of Becoming Boy Soldiers in Sierra Leone

ABSTRACT Child soldiers are generally portrayed either as victims of structural forces that are beyond their control and comprehension or as knowing agents of mayhem in search of revolutionary change or personal gain. Yet these singular perspectives are bedevilled by their dialectical limitations, the one overlooking capacities of individual will, the other prone to discounting historical and socioeconomic contexts. In this paper, through the lens of structuration theory that postulates the interconnectedness of structure and agency, we examine how boys were transformed into armed and organized combatants in Sierra Leones recent civil war. Drawing from a series of interviews with a cohort of boys who fought with the rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF), we map out their experiences and perspectives in a way that highlights the juxtaposition of profound social forces and the capacity for personal agency that underlay the process of becoming child soldiers. We conclude by ruminating on the challenges of rehabilitating and reintegrating former child soldiers in the impoverished circumstances of post-war Sierra Leone.

Turnings and Epiphanies: Militarization, Life Histories, and the Making and Unmaking of Two Child Soldiers in Sierra Leone

The militarization of children and their active participation in conflict continues to be a global phenomenon affecting hundreds of thousands of children. Yet many of the realities of child soldiery remain unclear and continue to be under-researched. In particular, the process of militarization and how it impinges on the identities and actions of children who are drawn into conflict remains poorly understood. Similarly, the experiences of children undergoing demobilization and a return to post-conflict, non-militarized social circumstances are essentially undocumented. Through the use of a life-history approach, this paper examines the making and unmaking of two Sierra Leonean child soldiers, one female and one male, in relation to the militarization of social systems and subsequent efforts to demobilize belligerent social groups. The paper reviews the turnings and epiphanies of these childrens lives—particularly how these children became implicated as combatants in Sierra Leones civil war, the manner and degree to which they assumed a militarized ‘identity’, and their subsequent efforts to re-adapt to civilian life in a context of post-war demilitarization.

Youth Gangs in Nicaragua: Gang Membership as Structured Individualization

In Nicaragua the rise of urban youth gangs has led the government to adopt a crime‐control approach that focuses on containing adolescent violence. Yet efforts to foil youth gangs have been ineffectual, largely because the nature of gang membership is little understood. This article presents the results of a qualitative study of youth gang membership in the capital city of Managua. From participant observations and interviews with a cohort of youth gang members and a number of people closely attached to them, the study presents youth perspectives of gang membership in a way that underscores the dialectic between individual agency and the structural environments that impinge on youth choices. The study concludes by arguing that policies aiming to deal with urban youth gangs in Nicaragua must accommodate the perspectives of marginalized urban youth and draw upon their capacity for individual and collective agency.

Children's rights as residual social policy in Nicaragua: State priorities and the Code of Childhood and Adolescence

In enacting a legislative Code of Childhood and Adolescence in 1998, the Nicaraguan state formally endorsed the ideal of childrens rights as being a central concern of public policy. Yet, the state has done little to fulfil this commitment. In part this is the result of severe fiscal constraints, which have led to reduced public expenditures and the downsizing of social services, especially those directed towards children and youth. In part, however, there are also indications of state reluctance to actively implement the principles of change as outlined by the Code. This has been reflected in the governments reactionary response to fears of growing youth violence, and its unwillingness to collaborate with local civic groups in dealing with youth crime. We surmise therefore that, while the Code may have served to enhance state legitimacy, the cause of childrens rights remains a residual policy issue in Nicaragua.

Young offender diversion in Canada: tensions and contradictions of social policy appropriation

Under Canada’s Young Offenders Act (YOA, 1984–2003), the concept of diversion became an important feature of the youth justice system. Consisting of the formally constituted Alternative Measures program and other more informally administered procedures, diversion was developed as a means of responding to youth aged 12–17 years who have committed minor offences while minimizing their risks of stigmatization and recidivism. Although the YOA was subjected to persistent criticism concerning its ambiguity and contradictions, and was recently replaced by the new Youth Justice Criminal Act, very little research has been devoted to the implementation of young offender diversion programs. In this paper we present the results of a phenomenological inquiry into the practice of diversion in one large southern Ontario community. By regarding the implementation of diversion as a form of social policy appropriation by various professional groups, we highlight the perspectives of 17 practitioners who have had extensive experience in administering particular aspects of diversion programs. These perspectives differ in some fundamental ways, and thus help to illuminate the broad latitude that exists for discretionary decision-making in sanctioning youth who have committed minor offences. Such differences also reflect the variation of diversion practices and corresponding tensions among those responsible for this form of young offender disposition. The paper concludes by surmising that a two-tiered system of diversion is emerging that inadvertently may be diminishing the rights of minor young offenders.

Children's Rights and the Tenuousness of Local Coalitions: A Case Study in Nicaragua

Since Nicaraguas endorsement of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the legislative passage of its own Code of Childhood and Adolescence, improvements in the welfare of marginalised youth have depended largely on community-based actions that are sponsored by NGOs and civic groups, many of which function in tangent with municipal government authorities and international aid agencies. In this article we review three community initiatives that have aimed at resolving problems associated with youth alienation and violence in a poor, heavily populated district of Managua. While some modest successes have been achieved, these relatively isolated initiatives have had no evident effect on either the magnitude or the systemic nature of youth marginalisation in Managua. In a context in which the central state is severely constrained by fiscal weakness and corporatist traditions, it is questionable whether in fact the organs of civil society do in fact possess the organisational capacity to generate the structural reforms necessary for the advancement of childrens rights at community levels. Nevertheless, despite the amorphous nature of much of civil society in Nicaragua, in the long run childrens rights legislation may help to foster growing solidarity among disparate civic forces working to improve the bleak livelihoods of many children.

Non-Government Organizations and the Contradictions of Animation Rurale: Questioning the Ideal of Community Self-Reliance in Burkina Faso

ABSTRACT In francophone Africa animation rurale is a method of intervention which generally aims to foster community self-reliance through non-formal education and selective material and technical service support. A study of three foreign-funded NGO programmes in Burkina Faso reveals, however, that animation rurale tends to stimulate client-patron relations between rural communities and their aid agency benefactors, a consequence of the structures and methods of intervention and the prevailing socio-political context of subsistence village societies. A key problem is not the outcome of short-term dependency, but rather misguided assumptions about community self-reliance as a goal of development assistance. The paper argues that animation rurale programmes can be more effective if they aim to transform inevitable ties of rural dependence into relations of interdependence between village and non-village institutions.

Youth Social Capital Formation in Nicaragua: A Neighbourhood Inquiry

In many Latin American countries, stringent crime control measures have failed to stem high levels of youth crime and violence. As a consequence, there is burgeoning interest in the notion of youth social capital as a basis for policies and programmes designed to enhance the rights of young people living in circumstances of poverty and risk. Yet there is little knowledge of existing sources of youth social capital in poor urban communities in Latin America. To address this gap, the authors conducted an inquiry into the sources and aspects of youth social capital in one low-income urban neighbourhood in Nicaragua.The study revealed that despite a local context fraught with the effects of poverty, youth experienced varying benefits from family and peer relationships, and from their differentiated associations with school, church, and places of work. In recognition of these existing sources of local support, we argue that youth social capital formation, particularly through family assistance and investments in schooling, has considerable merit as both a means and an end of community development strategies in low-income neighbourhoods. We acknowledge, however, that social capital formation as a basis of youth policies and programmes must be founded on a broad civic and political commitment to children’s rights which, as yet, is far from evident in Nicaragua.