Enabel’s Lecture Notes

War has been evident since the starting of mankind. In this post, I would like to focus on a particular group of people namely the child soldiers which have become a worldwide problem that is not subjected only to the developing countries. I first came across the term of child soldiers in a movie called “Blood Diamonds”. The African child in the movie was caught on his way to school by a rebel gang. The rigorous and inhumane training that the gang taught him which included the killing of their fellow members for the sake of survival eventually led him to be dehumanised to the end that place him in a situation that he had to kill his own respected father in the name of the gang. The movie has displayed a crude yet accurate picture of the profile and lifestyle of a child soldier.

It is common to see child soldiers wearing oversized civilian’s clothes, holding an AK-47 or M-16 rifle while carrying a pink teddy bear bag in the streets of places with regional conflicts or civil wars e.g. Africa, Liberia. Over 250,000 children under 18 are fighting in government armies and armed opposition groups. Many are abducted or recruited by force, and both often compelled to follow orders under threat of death. Others join armed groups out of desperation. In any case, it is the drive for their survival that turned them into child soldiers. They normally come from peasants or poor families that are commonly subjected to the terror of the rebel groups and government forces in armed conflict due to their vulnerabilities. They are normally living in developing and conflict-ridden countries where they are barely able to survive and threatened with the violence and poverty that filled their lives. Most child soldiers have either joined for the sake of their survival as poverty which has been partially due the problems that a war-torn country forced them to look at the armed forces as a means to ensure that they are able to sustain their survival and not die of hunger on the streets. There are also significant numbers of cases that the death threats that are issued by the groups that terrify the family into giving up the children for the security of the rest of the family. Families that do not have any economic, social or political power are most vulnerable to such treats which is to say the majority of the population of such countries as the power normally belong to only the elite few which ironically are the one using the child soldiers. Other than voluntary joining, there are plenty of cases whereby the children are kidnapped of the streets. Due to their lack of security, the streets become a hinterland for the groups to forcibly recruit members. The lack of legitimate policing of streets as well as the nonchalant attitude that the police or the authorities take up upon such cases due to the lack of status of the children makes the recruiting of new members an easy task.

These soldiers grow up without any form of education besides the knowledge of wielding a gun and a strong hatred for their supposed “enemy” which leaves them with virtually no hope for their future. The child soldiers being vulnerable both physically and mentally make them prone to brainwashing and manipulation of the violence of armed forces. They are subjected to killings, rape, injury and violence in a magnitude that leaves them traumatic for life as research has shown. Studies have shown that those with more severe symptoms of traumatic stress are less willing to consider reconciliation regards acts of retaliation as a way to overcome their experiences. The researchers said their findings underlined the urgency of dealing with the psychological effects of war on child soldiers. “Post-traumatic stress might be an important factor influencing post-conflict situations and may contribute to cycles of violence found in war-torn regions,” they said. Hence it shows that the child soldiers have an important impact on the state of conflict in the war-torn countries that they could even be the cause of the next possible conflict.

References:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6925384.stm

http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/index.htm

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4791597

http://cyberschoolbus.un.org/childsoldiers/whatsgoingon/

Crime has been a problem plaguing many societies for many years. It has been most spread and prevalent in groups that we normally consider as gangs or the mafia hence in this essay I would attempt to derive the causes behind the presence and persistence of these gangs in our modern society. In this case I intent to use the profile of 2 different gang mainly the American gang MS13 and one of the most famous gangs of Japan, Yakuza to understand the causes to why they are form and how they have been able to grow.

One of the most notorious gangs of today is actually MS13 (Masa Salvatrucha) in Central America. They were actually from an influx of El Salvadorian immigrant youths that were ostracized by the local communities depriving them from the low cost housing and job opportunities. The frustration of the inability for them to have proper housing and legitimate jobs forces them to turn to crime as the next available alternative. The changing economic pattern of America rendered the skills brought by the first generation of Salvadorian peasants as useless in an economy that was changing its focus of its workforce into an industrial and knowledge-based sector. Angered by the fact that they were stuck in low-paying unwanted jobs, together with their knowledge on warfare due to the civil war in their hometowns, they started to turn violent. They engage in crimes such as drug distribution, prostitution and robbery (for money) as well as murder, rape and kidnapping (for revenge over their mistreatment). One of the most famous incidents was the kidnapping and murder of the son of Honduras President Ricardo Maduro as Honduras was the first Central America country to adopt strong anti-gang policies. Their ability to organise violent acts against the government in turn shows their growth in power and capability to engage in such acts without putting the local government into their scope of consideration. Currently, MS13 operates in at least 42 states and have about 10000 members nationwide. It expands its membership through recruitment and migration. They use the internet to glorify the image of the gang in order to attract more members, or they would simply absorb the existing smaller gangs into their gang. They also use the pull of family members and migration of other Salvadorians to increase their membership. The technological advances and ease in transportation in today’s world enable them to spread their ideals at a much faster rate and the anonymity of their identity in the virtual world makes them even harder to trace for the authorities to stop the spread. Reports have shown that MS13 members normally work in legitimate jobs that do not require employers to scrutinise their data or details hence they are normally in lowly paid jobs such as construction, restaurant and delivery service industries. To a certain extent, we can say that they are stuck back at the same jobs their ancestors tried to break out by forming the gang in the first place. The later generation of MS13 are finding themselves in a dilemma as their involvement in the gang gets them stuck in the cycle that forces them into the gang in the first place. They are unable to break out of the cycle hence unable to break out of the gang which in turns increases their fury turning their attention on other alternatives of crime for money or their exertion of fury.

However, in different societies, the reason for the existence of criminal organisation may be different. The Yakuza in Japan has been more accepted and pervasive than in any other countries. This is due to their wide scope of members (110,000 active members) and a firm and long-standing alliance with Japan’s right-wing nationalist. Their ability to infiltrate into the political and corporate circle suggests that they do not in any sense suffer from inequality of treatment or opportunities that are common in the origins of other criminal organisation in other countries. In contrast, they are highly influential as accounted by their huge numbers as well as the amount of control they hold over their business of vice and other similar activities that accounts for quite a tidy amount of profit for the gang. The modern day Yakuza would normally be a well-dressed pure-blooded Japanese, holding a managerial post in some multinational company. He would be extremely different from his ancestors in terms of profile and background. Their ancestors were mostly social misfits that were poor and engage in criminal activities as they were forced to do so due to the lack of well-paying legitimate jobs. They engage in all sorts of criminal activities and their power grew due to the fall of the government after the World War 2.

 In different countries the background and operation of the gangs may differ. However it boils down to the fact that the origins of crime is due to the inability for the so called “criminals” to fit into the society to enable them to see themselves as part of a whole society. The sense of shame, frustration and helplessness pushes them in the direction of crime as an alternative. When their disability forces them to be discriminated against their needs to satisfy their lives (example: lodging or jobs), the fury against society grows even bigger as their hatred intensifies. Another point that I inferred from the case study of these 2 gangs is the events that occur in our history that changes the demographics of the gang and its profile. In MS13, the introduction of technology and the blurring of borders enable them to obtain power be it by capital through drug and weapon distributions or by spreading their ideals nationwide obtaining their power by numbers. Changing in economy also pushes people to the alternative of crime as seen in MS13 as the skills that the agricultural peasants own were rendered useless in the face of industrialisation and a knowledge-based economy. In Japan, due to the fall of the government in the World War 2, it has lead to the increase in the rise of the criminal gangs to take control of a turbulent society.

Reference:

www.knowgangs.com/gang_resources/profiles/ms13/

www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1347306/posts

www.fbi.gov/page2/jan08/ms13_011408.html

www.trutv.com/library/crime/gangsters_outlaws/gang/yakuza/1.html

web.telia.com/~u31302275/yakuza.htm

In our history, the rise of feminist movement was possible due to the platform of these 3 events Globalization, Industrialisation and World War 2. It triggers the rise of the movement due to several factors.  Previously there was also war and the same happening that men died and women took over the household and the economy however there wasn’t in those cases any form of the rising of female equality movement until in the early 19 century when globalisation and industrialisation took the world by storm. They still went back to a world where women were seen as a weaker sex whose only existence is to create the next generation and maintain the order of the family. It was always seen as men followed by women and family followed by personal rights hence placing women at the bottom of the social status strata.

It was only in the age of Industrialisation that women were first seen as an asset, a necessity. The rise in the amount of labour needed and the type of labour needed force people to accept the fact that women are not in the economy as a substitute of men but as a vital to the production of goods and labour. Before Industrialisation, the need for labour was not that high in demand and the type of labour are those that do not hard labour hence basically for the men to take in charge of most of the economy is reasonable. During the period of Industrialisation, the need for hard labour decrease greatly mainly taken over by the machinery, the type of labour needed requires nimble hands and prone towards mass production and the operation of machinery which can be done better by females, and the lower cost in hiring females caused the rise in paid female labour.  After coming into the economy, women realise that they could perform equal or even better that man in the economy hence leading to the expectations that they too should get the same treatment as their counterparts.

Globalisation helped in the sense that it open up countries and join the will of women all over the world together hence it create a greater impact on the motive of the movement. The movement then balled into a worldwide event having an international status means that for once the world will have to recognised that the group was a powerful force asking for changes and reforms in the way women in general is treated demanding equality with both sex.    

But the road to the equality of the both sexes is not smooth sailing. The economic changes are not in tune with the social changes. The changes in the economic structure is not reflected in the social norms men are still thinking themselves as the provider of the family and refusal to acknowledge the women results in today’s unbalance in the responsibility in both men and women. Globalisation has helped the female population in the rise of their status but it too has worsened their disposition. It has caused women to be overburdened with responsibility, because of the opening of societies women can no longer hide under the shelter of their society hence they are more prone to exploitation. Even if the women have now taken the role as the main breadwinner in the family, it doesn’t mean that their efforts are recognised in anyway. In the family, they are still expected to take on the role as the main support of the family and in terms of the economy they are being expected of the same quality of effort as the men but with lesser wages and opportunities although in terms of qualifications they are the same as men.

The challenge of today is to allow the social changes be in step economic changes. It is not so easily met as it involves the changes in the concept in work and the mindsets in the social structure itself. Men must be able to find their stance in the current workforce in order for them to not be obsolete and accept the abilities of women that they are not inferior to them. Women must also realise their limitations be it biological or emotional, there must be a clear definition of the responsibilities between the men and women. Women must not seek equality and increase in status and power just for the sake of seeking them but to look at the needs of society and compromised them with their wants. Similarly, the same has to be done by the men.