Factors influencing children armed recruitment in Yemen

Abstract

The phenomenon of child recruitment is an alarming issue all over the world in general and in Yemeni society in particular. As a result, this research article attempts to investigate the most effective factors that stand behind the armed recruitment of Yemeni children in the current war across the country. The research design is quantitative in nature and it is based on a questionnaire which has been designed and used as the main tool of data collection. The sample consists of 55 respondents who are intellectuals, activists and politicians as a convenient sampling. The SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) has been adopted to analyze the collected data via Google forms and e-mail. The overall results and findings have shown that the educational-oriented factors represent the most effective factors among the other factors that have a significant influence on children recruitment in Yemen war with a mean of (3.64) and S.D.D (0.41). Also, the second most important factor is the economy-oriented problems that have affected the whole country with a mean of (3.57) and S.D.D (0.43). However, the least effective factor among the others was the social factor with a mean of (3.30) and S.D.SD (0.49). The findings of this study imply that the absence and care of education has to a large extent paved the way to engage and recruit children in wars. Nonetheless, the economic and financial situation of people has undoubtedly helped in engaging young children in wars to get their living. Urgent solutions and remedies are highly needed and strongly recommended in education and economy fields to avoid and reduce the armed recruitment of children in the ongoing war in Yemen.