KEY LEARNING POINTS
• There are many potential threats to the development of all children and adolescents in situations of armed conflict and displacement.
• Restoring a sense of normality in their lives may be achieved by restoring community structures, by re-establishing a routine and purpose to daily life, by promoting family life and parental competence and by building on the strengths and capacities of young people and advocating for their rights.
• Protecting children and adolescents from further harm may be achieved by avoiding further separations, inappropriate “trauma” responses, the unnecessary isolation of “vulnerable groups” and the further victimization of victims.
• The presence of some risk factors may increase the vulnerability of children and adolescents to other, additional risks.
The previous Topic examined some of the more specific and critical threats to young people: Topic 5 returns to the theme introduced in Topic 2, that all children and adolescents in situations of armed conflict and forced migration face threats to their development and well-being. “Resource-focused” interventions may help to prevent risk, and enhance resilience by increasing the range of protective factors available to young people who are already at risk. A wide range of interventions can serve to promote child development by restoring a sense of normality in children’s lives and by preventing further harm. This Topic provides an introduction to some of the most important of these.
RESTORING A SENSE OF NORMALITY IN THE LIVES OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS
1. Restoring Community Structures
Situations of armed conflict - and
especially the experience of flight and displacement - are enormously
disruptive to children’s lives by creating massive change which frequently
involves significant losses, and by seriously altering the
child’s life course and sense of purpose
and direction. Displacement undermines the social networks and institutions
(family, school, religious organization, community etc.) which support normal
development, emotional security, relationships that support children’s learning
and their sense of self and identity. Forced migration tears the fabric of
society and thus the developmental consequences on children are best viewed
within their social and cultural context. Interventions which help restore
previous social structures, which facilitate the setting-up of new and adaptive
structures and which strengthen the capacity of existing social networks are
most likely to yield positive impact for children’s development: some of these
issues are elaborated in the ARC Resource Pack on Community Mobilization
- see especially Topics 3, 5 and 6.
2. Restoring a Structure, Routine
and Purpose to Daily Life
For children and adolescents, establishing predictability is enabled through the trust, purpose and meaning that comes from sustained contact with the same people, from familiar routines and from continuity of cultural practices. Daily structured activities - including play and recreation, informal and formal school and, where appropriate, work are especially important for children of all ages. Structure in daily life conveys a sense of purpose and dependability that can be a calming, stabilizing element for the whole community as well as for its children. It also helps engender feelings of responsibility and respect for other people. Activities should be responsive to the needs, concerns and resources of the population and might include some of the following:
• organized play and safe spaces for free play;
• appropriate sports activities for girls and boys;
• traditional music, songs, dance, theatre, story-telling and familiar festivals;
• acquiring traditional knowledge and skills;
• drawing and painting;
• schooling - formal and/or non-formal as appropriate, and vocational training (see ARC Resource Pack on Education, especially Topics 2 and 4);
• key health, sanitation and nutrition and safety messages, including mines awareness where appropriate;
• training in conflict resolution skills such as communication, negotiation and decision making.
Gender issues need to be acknowledged: for example, in some situations, it may be easier for girls to continue to carry out traditionally-prescribed roles than for boys – especially in situations where it is impossible for boys to carry out tasks in relation to agriculture and other areas of work. On the other hand, in some contexts, girls are much less likely to have opportunities to attend school or take part in other social activities.
3. Promoting Family Life and
Parental Competence
One of the most important contributions that can be made to improve children’s well-being is to help the adults in the family to re-build a sense of effectiveness as parents. Very often, parental capacity is affected by parents’ reactions to stressful events - depression, anxiety etc. - which, when compounded by the additional burdens which may be placed upon them, especially in refugee contexts, may serve to limit their responsiveness to their children. A wide range of different approaches can have an impact on the well-being of parents - especially mothers: from appropriate and accessible health services to economic activities; from educational opportunities to cultural and recreational activities. Some programmed may specifically aim at enhancing parental competence (e.g. homecraft groups and parenting education): others attempt more generally to improve the quality of life and opportunities for the development of men and women. An emphasis on the empowerment of women may be especially significant.
It is particularly important to promote family-based care and family tracing for children who have been separated from their parents or previous careers. See further discussion on Topic 4 of this Resource Pack, and that on Separated Children, especially Topics 3 and 4. It is also vital to take steps to avoid further and unnecessary separations of children - see discussion below.
4. Building on the Strengths and
Capacities of Young People
While it is true that children may have particular areas of vulnerability, it is important not to overlook their own capacity for active engagement in the issues affecting them. In this Resource Pack, emphasis has been placed children as agents in their own development. An over-riding image of children as “victims” emphasizes their passivity and vulnerability. While it may not have been possible to influence the events that disrupted development, young people may have a key role to play in re-building their lives, with facilitation appropriate to their ages and capacities. The strengths and capacities of children and adolescents in refugee population are seldom fully appreciated. This is discussed further in Topic 7, and reference can also be made to the important principles and approaches outlined in Community Mobilization Topic 7 on Mobilizing Young People.
5. Advocacy for Children’s Rights
and Needs
Promoting child and adolescent development requires careful examination of the intersection between important child protection and child development issues, and critical legal and policy matters. Some brief examples are given below, illustrating some ways in which policies and practices can be developed so as to enhance the opportunities for children to develop:
In a camp context in South East Asia, adolescents who had violated camp regulations were routinely placed in the camp stockade or jail. They were not separated from adult inmates and were subjected to both exploitation and abuse. In an extreme case, despite the protests of a refugee worker, one refugee youth was removed from the camp and placed in the local jail. Again he was not segregated from adult inmates and upon his eventual return to the camp, medical examination revealed that he had been repeatedly sexually abused. This extreme situation prompted another review of the camp’s detention policy, and ultimately the camp authorities accepted the responsibility for dealing with disciplinary matters for youth within the confines of the camp and in consultation with the child-focused agencies who were operating there.
A group of Sri Lankan children who had lost one or both parents in the civil war were refused entry to primary school because they had no birth certificate, and insufficient money to pay the high fee demanded to obtain one. An international NGO working in the country brought the facts to the notice of the National Child Rights Coalition, which took the matter up with the education authorities. The children received their birth certificates and were able to attend school.
A national NGO, in collaboration with an international NGO, persuaded Rwandan authorities to allow women in prison to place their children with extended family outside of the prison. The establishment of a policy on regular return visits to their mothers helped maintain attachment between mother and child during the separation. For the children who remained with their mothers in prison, a stimulation programme was organized.
PROTECTING CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS
FROM FURTHER HARM
Unfortunately it is not uncommon for interventions intended to assist children and families to actually make matters worse. The following are some examples.
1. Avoiding Further and Unnecessary
Separations
Unintended separations can easily result from policies such as opening residential centers, careless documentation when children or their parents are admitted to hospital or feeding centers, or the poorly-organized evacuation of children and families from dangerous areas. The prevention of separation is considered in the ARC Resource Pack on Separated Children, Topic 2.
2. Inappropriate “Trauma” Programmed
can be Deeply Damaging
Protecting children from further harm may require a careful appraisal of the means used to support them in coping with their experience of violence and displacement. Exploring these sensitive issues and the meaning they hold for a child can be important to the process of healing and recovery: but they require expertise in therapies appropriate to the context, and should take place in a stable, supportive environment with the participation of care-givers who have a solid and continuing relationship with the child. In-depth clinical interviews intended to awake the memories and feelings associated with the child’s worst moments may be very harmful, especially if conducted with an unprepared child by a stranger with limited knowledge of the culture. This kind of interview risks tearing down a vulnerable child’s defenses and leaving him/her in a worse state of pain and agitation than before. For a child in a stressful and unsafe situation, it may be a good coping strategy to avoid recalling traumatic experiences. In any case, talking about intimate feelings and fears with anyone but one’s closest family is taboo in many cultures. These issues are explored in more detail in the ARC Resource Pack Working with Children, Topics 3, 4 and 5.
3. Avoiding the Inappropriate
Isolation of “Vulnerable Groups”
Actions to address the needs of vulnerable groups of children and adolescents should ensure their long-term reintegration into their communities, and avoid the short-term assistance that may increase the probability of their marginalization. Institutionalization, for example, frequently results in further marginalization and alienation from the wider society. Targeting separated children, orphans, former child soldiers etc. for special material assistance may be motivated by the desire to assist vulnerable categories of young people, but may inadvertently heighten the potential for stigmatization and conflict, especially in situations where material scarcity is the norm. Similarly, isolating “psychological trauma” from the other difficult and stressful aspects of the lives of children and offering a decontextualized form of “treatment” can label children unhelpfully, isolate them from their peers and ignore current aspects of children’s lives which are creating difficulties.
CASE ILLUSTRATION - TARGETING
VULNERABLE GROUPS
With support from an international NGO, a life-skills building programme was established through a local community association in a rural village in one of Mozambique's northern provinces. The programme included basic numeracy and literacy, recreation, access to viable trade skills and mentoring relationships with adult role models. The programme was opened to a wide range of economically marginalized adolescents, including those who had been internally displaced, were among returning refugees, original local residents and, recently demobilized child soldiers. As the long-term goal was to promote genuine reintegration into the local community, special programmed were not established for particular subgroups such as former child soldiers or unaccompanied children. There was a conscious attempt within the programme to address common problems and issues with support being reflective of individual needs, rather than being tied to membership of a special sub-group. Recreation programmed and cultural activities were also designed to be inclusive.
4. Avoiding the Further Victimization
of Victims
One of the most extreme examples of the need to protect children from further harm comes from insensitive responses to allegations of abuse and exploitation. It is distressingly common to find that children who have been sexually abused or exploited are not believed, or that they are blamed or even punished for the incident, and as a consequence experience not just a complete breakdown in trust in the adult world, but further marginalization. Avoiding the danger of inflicting secondary trauma on children is dealt with in the ARC Resource Pack on Exploitation and Abuse, Topics 4, 8 and 9. As indicated above, inappropriate and insensitive clinical interviewing of traumatized children can also inflict serious secondary trauma.
5. The Presence of One Risk Factor
can Increase Young Peoples’ Vulnerability to Others
Risk factors do not always occur in isolation from others, and the presence of one may make the individual children more vulnerable to others. Several examples can be cited. A child who is being abused within the family may choose to leave home and become vulnerable to exploitative work or to commercial sexual exploitation. Separated children who are not provided with adequate care and protection may be at enhanced risk of recruitment into fighting forces. A child with a learning disability may be both more vulnerable to sexual exploitation, and less able to respond to it appropriately than a child without such a disability. Finally, an absence of educational opportunities may expose children to greater risks of exploitative child labour while at the same time denying the opportunities for learning skills which they can use to protect themselves.