Between War and Peace: Monitoring Guidelines for Child Soldiers in Nepal's Peace Process

Little is known about the longitudinal effects of early age involvement of young people in armed groups and their well-being as they return to strongly affected, politicised communities. Current research and policy are often driven by the assumption of a causal relationship between participation in this war experience and psychological damage. This article explores the role of young people’s armed group experience during the Nepal People’s War, compared with post-conflict stressors, in shaping intra-psychic impact and distress, and which processes enable well-being and resilient functioning. Findings are reported from an 18-month clinical ethnography of a cohort of 17 Nepalese young subjects, where participant-observation methods were used to explore their daily lives after exiting the armed group and follow-up research conducted six years later. The findings highlighted limited evidence for on-going intra-psychic impact and distress related directly to their armed group experience; when such distress occurred, it appeared to be generated more by the structural violence of their environments. The key constituents determining their well-being included: a sense of closeness through emotional connectedness with their family, ideological proximity with the values of the armed group, closeness in their bond with the community, and the social-emotional-economic capital available to them to navigate the harsh structural constraints of post-conflict life. These data further challenge the prevailing assumption that this war experience inevitably leads to psychological damage, and the article argues that structural violence often plays a predominant role in cases where psychological distress does arise.

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“…16 See policy interpretation of international instruments concerning CAAFAG in Nepal (Shamrock, 2012; Thomas, 2010). …”

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confidence: 99%

Life after armed group involvement in Nepal: A clinical ethnography of psychological well-being of former “child soldiers” over time

Medeiros

Shrestha²,

Gaire³

et al. 2019

Transcult Psychiatry

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“…A significant body of comparative literature on gender and DDR has shown that even where gender roles became more fluid during war times, and male and female combatants fulfilled similar roles, the DDR process tends to be gender-exclusive and ignore (or overlook) that women and girls combatants encounter special challenges Nepal's peace process and the DDR have been studied extensively, with a focus on factors heading from war to peace (Gautam 2009;Pandey 2009;Thomas 2010). Much work to date highlights 'disqualified' combatant issues, i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conflict, disaster and changing gender roles in Nepal: women’s everyday experiences

Luna¹

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Challenging the Attempt to De-legitimize the Human Rights Claims of Child Soldier Victims of Genocidal Forcible Transfer

Grover

2011

Child Soldier Victims of Genocidal Forcible Transfer

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Between War and Peace: Monitoring Guidelines for Child Soldiers in Nepal's Peace Process

Cited by 5 publications

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Life after armed group involvement in Nepal: A clinical ethnography of psychological well-being of former “child soldiers” over time

Life after armed group involvement in Nepal: A clinical ethnography of psychological well-being of former “child soldiers” over time

Conflict, disaster and changing gender roles in Nepal: women’s everyday experiences

Challenging the Attempt to De-legitimize the Human Rights Claims of Child Soldier Victims of Genocidal Forcible Transfer

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