ABSTRACT
Armed conflicts, defined as ‘any organised dispute that involves the use of weapons, violence, or force, whether within national borders or beyond them, and whether involving state actors or nongovernment entities’, are said to impact one in ten children worldwide with estimates of around 230 million children living in areas affected by conflict. In this chapter, we will explore the impact of armed conflict on children’s mental health briefly, outlining community-based and trauma-based psychosocial interventions. We conclude by offering a critique of Western-focused psychosocial interventions, highlighting the importance of culturally responsive interventions, which take on board, locally socially constructed ideas of healing and trauma.
