Children of the Drug Trade: A Case Study of Children in Organised Armed Violence in Rio de Janeiro.

Luke Dowdney. 2003, a publication of Viva Rio. To obtain a copy of this book, contact Viva Rio: [e-mail].

This empirical study is based on field work that investigates child and adolescent involvement in armed confrontations in the favelas (shantytowns) of Rio de Janeiro. It sheds light on a problem that belongs not only to Rio but to Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras and Jamaica, South Africa and Nigeria, and possibly many other countries.

Children of the Drug Trade examines the ways in which these children are like child soldiers in other conflicts, and also the ways in which they differ. "[T]he parallels with child soldiers are closer than to the other recognised groupings, such as 'youth gangs' or 'street children', and much of the experience (positive and negative) of trying to address the reasons why children become soldiers, and how to demobilise and reintegrate them into society, will be useful in relation to these situations hereby defined as 'children in organised armed violence.'" The hope behind this book is that the international community will begin to pay attention to and address this issue.

The book is divided into five parts: 1. Rio's Drug Trade--A Historical Perspective, 2. Faction Domination--The specificity of the Drug Trade in Rio de Janeiro, 3. Child and Adolescent Involvement in Drug Factions and Armed Combat, 4. Organized Arm Violence: Proposed Definitions and International Perspectives, and 5. Local Solutions: Dealing with the Problem of Children in Drug Trafficking in Rio de Janeiro. In his conclusions the author writes, "The seriousness of the situation is most clearly demonstrated by the fact that more people are dying in Rio de Janeiro city from armed violence than soldiers and civilians in six major armed conflicts presented here [Colombia, Sierra Leone, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Uganda, Israel], all of which have received worldwide press coverage and attention from the international community" (p. 243).

Luke Dowdney is Coordinator for Children and Armed Violence with Viva Rio. Viva Rio works with local organizations in some 350 favelas and other low-income communities to overcome violence and social exclusion throughout Rio de Janeiro.