Warfare and Schooling: The Impact of Conflict Tactics Targeting Children on Educational Enrollment

The developmental consequences of armed conflict affect millions of children, with education being one of the most severely impacted areas. While existing studies examine country-level associations and emphasise conflict intensity, we focus on analysing the specific impact of conflict tactics that target children on primary school enrolment—namely, child soldier recruitment and sexual violence against minors. We argue that these tactics can negatively affect enrolment decisions in part because of security concerns, leading parents/guardians to keep children who are vulnerable and at risk of abuse away from school. Empirically, we link 59 georeferenced Demographic and Health Surveys from 30 sub-Saharan African countries with conflict data from the UCDP Georeferenced Event Dataset, incorporating information on the use of child-targeted conflict tactics. Using linear probability models, we find that general conflict incidence is associated with a decrease in the likelihood of primary school enrolment. However, the effects are stronger for child-targeted strategies: exposure to child soldier recruitment is associated with a 3.2% reduction, and conflict-related sexual violence with a 9.5% reduction in school enrolment probability. Both these child-specific conflict tactics are especially harmful to girls’ likelihood of enrolment. These findings add important nuance to our understanding of how conflict affects education.