At least 350 million young people living in rural areas are exposed to conflict each year. Despite the disproportionate levels of exposure to violence this implies, surprisingly little is known about how rural young people experience conflict, and in turn, about the programmes that can help to mitigate associated adversities.

We link employment to stability in five African countries to test if standard interventions influence complex outcomes. We show positive impacts on some indicators but negative externalities also arise. There are, thus, grounds for optimism but further work is required.

We explore the micro-foundations of fragility by discussing how to measure the exposure to fragility at the individual level.