Vocational training for demobilized ex-combatants with disabilities in Rwanda

ABSTRACT Disability-inclusive development is receiving growing attention as a pressing international development issue. Disability-inclusive development is especially urgent and complicated in post-conflict countries. This paper examines the impacts of vocational training on economic empowerment and social reintegration among demobilised ex-combatants with disabilities in Rwanda. This is the first quasi-experimental study on vocational training for disabled ex-combatants. Exploiting the variation in the timing of training uptake within the same training course, we employ a pipeline approach in the following three steps: (1) trimming to guarantee common support within courses, (2) exact matching on key covariates within courses, and (3) regression controlling for covariates within courses based on the matched sample. The results show that the training greatly increased not only employment and earnings, but also trainees’ reintegration into the family and community. The results are robust to potential omitted variable bias and attrition bias according to a coefficient stability test and bound analysis, respectively. Our findings suggest a significant potential of vocational training for disabled ex-combatants in disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration programmes. Our study exemplifies the utility of a credibly designed pipeline approach, which can be applied in a wide range of development projects in practice.