Invisible Consent: Unpacking Agency and Coercion in Girl Child Marriage in Marsabit County, Kenya

In communities where a girl's marriage is arranged before she can speak for herself, consent does not disappear it is simply made invisible. This study interrogates the mechanisms of agency and coercion that shape girl child marriage decisions in Korr-Ngurnit Ward, Marsabit County, Kenya, a predominantly pastoralist setting where the practice remains deeply entrenched. Drawing on a convergent parallel mixed-methods design, the study analyzed data from 296 household surveys, nine focus group discussions, and 16 key informant interviews with Rendille and Samburu community members. Quantitative findings revealed that 51% of respondents were married before the age of 18 years, and 65.5% reported that their marriages occurred without their consent. Logistic regression showed that lack of consent increased the odds of girl child marriage by 4.27 times (OR = 4.27, p < 0.001). Decision-making authority rested almost exclusively with community elders (42.9%) and fathers (30.7%), effectively institutionalizing the exclusion of girls from choices about their own futures. Qualitative narratives illuminated how coercion operates not through overt force alone, but through social stigma, fear of community gossip, patriarchal honour systems, dowry economies, and culturally sanctioned rites such as female genital mutilation and beading forces that constrain girls' agency long before any marriage negotiation begins. Grounded in Social Norms Theory and Gender and Power Theory, the study argues that consent in this context is not simply withheld but structurally pre-empted. Addressing girl child marriage in pastoralist Kenya therefore demands more than legal enforcement it requires dismantling the normative architecture that renders girls' voices inaudible before they are ever heard. Implications for policy and community-level programming are discussed.