Conclusion
This paper has illustrated how children take purposeful actions to further their desired goals and meet their own needs, enhancing and preserving their well-being despite the living contexts characterized by ongoing military violence and oppression. The children interviewed displayed a real determination to find their own ways of regaining control over their environment, showing that their adverse living conditions were not enough to stop them from creating strategies to survive and imagine a better future for themselves and their communities. Moreover, acknowledging the complementary role of structure and agency, it has shown how the ability of young people to exert agency is strongly shaped and influenced by the fields of social and environmental structures in which their lives are embedded.
We should acknowledge and discuss the limitation of this study. Firstly, the gender imbalance in the group of participants prevents us from providing a more detailed picture of the gendered features of agency. A second limitation is related to the contradictory aspect of children’s agency that we were unable to explore within the study. Agency should also be assessed within its ‘negative forms,’ as children may exercise it against their own best interests as well as against those of others (Bordonaro & Payne, 2012; Spyrou, 2018, Valentine, 2011). Perhaps because our focus was directed at detecting those practices of agency by which children preserve and enhance their well-being, we may have overlooked possible self-destructive practices (Abebe, 2019; Gigengack, 2014). Further studies should pay close attention to examining the potential forms of ‘negative’ agency exerted by children, with reference to both gender and geographical origins.
Despite these limitations, the present study suggests possible directions to follow in order to design policies and interventions in contexts affected by political violence. A focus on agency allows us to pay attention to the children’s many ways of comprehending and responding to the challenging situations in which they live (Habashi, 2011). It means emphasizing the ability of children to participate in the promotion and safeguarding of their own well-being by addressing the personal, local, and cultural notions of ‘best interest’ and well-being. Moreover, in acknowledging children’s agency within structures, our study highlights the role of social, economic, political, and material constraints that effectively limit and shape the extent by which children’s agency can be exerted. In accordance with others scholars (Bordonaro, 2011; Hoggett, 2001; Punch, 2007), this is a fundamental step in order not to overemphasize agency, which might ‘deflect attention away from those with moral and legal responsibilities to improve children life chances’ (Abebe, 2019, p.8) and lead to the erroneous assumption that children ‘are not simultaneously victims of larger political and economic machinations that severely impact their lives’ (Kovats-Bernat, 2006, p.7).