Navigating Crisis and Chronicity in the Everyday: Former Child Soldiers in Urban Sierra Leone

Abstract

The aftermath of war is typically referred to as ‘post-conflict’, often insinuating a stage of relative calm following a period of armed violence, upheaval and strife. However, the assumption that the post-war context brings forth peace, prosperity and stability negates the reality that conflict, violence and poverty may become embedded in the post-war social fabric. Following its decade long civil war, Sierra Leone continues to contend with a political, social and economic reality marked by widespread poverty, violence, and devastated health and social service systems, highlighting that for many, ‘crisis’ has in fact become chronic and endemic in the post-war period. Drawing on interviews with 11 former child soldiers living in an urban settlement, this article underscores the blurred distinction between periods of war and peace. Moreover, using the concept of social navigation, the paper explores the strategies the youth deliberately and tactfully employed in negotiating a volatile post-conflict terrain. Their narratives reveal their active, rather than passive, efforts in fostering their own social, economic and physical wellbeing in light of ever-changing, and unstable circumstances.