The Long-Term Effects of the Rwandan Genocide on Child Work

Abstract

We estimate the long-term effect of the Rwandan genocide on the work of the children born after the genocide, using variation in genocide intensity across communes and child work incidence in the 2010 Demographic Health Survey. We instrument for the number of killings at the commune with its distance to the Ugandan border. We find evidence for a lingering effect of genocide. The genocide causes an increase in work and a decrease in school attendance of the children born after the genocide. Doubling the number of killings per capita increases the probability of a child working for someone who is not a household member by 3.35 percentage points, while decreasing the probability of a child attending school by 3.68 percentage points. Our empirical results suggest a long-term impact of the genocide on human capital development that is likely to contribute to Rwanda’s underdevelopment in the future.

Keywords: Conflict, Genocide, Child Work, Schooling, Intergenerational Effect

JEL Classification: D74, J20, I20