Young women in African wars

Abstract

Young women are combatants in contemporary African wars. They also participate in a whole array of different roles. However, by and large, they remain invisible to us. In fact, our “northern” hackneyed views on women’s innate non-participation in war prevent us from seeing specific needs for young women during and in the aftermath of wars. For instance, disarmament, demobilization and reintegration programmes often fail to address appropriate needs for young women and in a variety of ways “prevent” them from partaking. Issues of stigma, safe demobilisation, individual concerns for post-war marriage, health and education, need to be addresed in both a more gendered way, but also with an apposite understanding of young women’s agency in both peace and war. In this Policy note it is argued that to improve policy and programming efforts it is necessary to broaden the understanding of young women’s roles and participation in armed conflict in Africa historically and today.