Breaking the Waves? Education, Youth Bulges, and Armed Conflict

# **1.0 Introduction**

Recent quantitative studies have found that large youth cohorts, or ‘youth bulges’ generally increase the risk of internal armed conflict or civil war (Cincotta et al, 2003; Staveteig 2004; Urdal 2006; 2008). Explanations for this relationship have been sought in the environmental conditions determining economic, social and political opportunities for young people. While young men are undoubtedly the main protagonists of political, as well as criminal, violence, the vast majority of young men do not engage in violent conflict. Nor are countries with very youthful age structures necessarily predestined to experience instability and conflict. In fact, given the right conditions, large youth cohorts may represent a significant resource that can boost development, a so-called ‘demographic dividend’. Recent studies in economic demography suggest that countries are better positioned to achieve economic progress if large youth cohorts precede significantly smaller cohorts (Birdsall et al., 2001).

While large youth cohorts may generally increase the risk of conflict, the contextual factors that determine when this is true, and under what conditions large youth cohorts may be a blessing, are not well understood. More generally, the realization of the demographic dividend ‘depends upon other features of the social, economic, and political environment’ (Williamson, 2001: 108). The conflict potential of large youth cohorts has been linked to the opportunity structure of youth cohorts determined by factors like economic growth, the structure of the economy, unemployment and educational attainment. Addressing the size of the cohorts merely captures limited aspects of the opportunity structure, hence the challenge lies in identifying how environmental factors may systematically influence the youth bulge and conflict nexus.

This article analyzes the potential mediating role of educational attainment and education reform on the relationship between youth bulges and conflict. Our ambition is to test prevailing hypotheses on the relationship between youth bulges, education and different forms of political violence in a global model for the 1970-2000 period. Greater levels of educational attainment are generally perceived as a positive factor, increasing the opportunity cost of young people and hence reducing the likelihood that they are recruited to rebel organizations. Indeed, large public investment in basic education is seen as an important success factor behind the realization of the demographic dividend in East Asian countries such as South Korea and Taiwan, while countries in Latin America have, among other things, invested less in education, and largely failed to take advantage of rapid demographic change (Birdsall & Sinding, 2001: 11).

However, certain forms of pressures in the educational system have been argued to potentially increase frustrations and anger among youth. Specifically, we address claims that conflict may arise due to unmet expectations in the form of low progression ratios between different education levels, as well as following rapid expansions in secondary and tertiary education presumably producing an over-capacity of highly educated youth for which there are limited employment opportunities.

Expanding access to education is a tool that countries may use in order to respond to large youth cohorts. Since, relative to most other factors that are known to affect the risk of civil war (Hegre & Sambanis, 2006), expanding education is a feasible policy-option for most governments, the study of the role of education is particularly pertinent (Thyne, 2006). But as Mack (2002) points out, policy-makers may not take a great interest in general recommendations of policies that are already widely pursued as a broader development agenda, even though 2