The Effect of Child Soldiers on Rebel Violence against Civilians

Existing work describes child soldiers as very violent towards civilians. Challenging this, I posit that children’s effect on group behaviour is conditioned by rebels’ civilian support. Because they have weak pre-existing norms, children are both prone to normalize violence and susceptible to rebel efforts to control their use of violence. They should thus closely follow group rules in their behaviour towards civilians, implying a moderating effect of these rules. I expect that child soldiering increases civilian victimization only for groups who lack incentives to show restraint towards civilians because they receive no support from them. Empirical tests support this expectation.