Dreaming of a Better Life: Child Marriage Through Adolescent Eyes offers fresh insights and evidence to inform efforts to end the practice of child marriage, an international commitment under Sustainable Development Goal 5. 

The volume features short chapters covering themes such as adolescent girls' agency and roles in marital decision making, teenage motherhood, sexual and gender based-violence against children, and lessons learned from trying to influence policies and implement programmes to reduce child marriage.   

Based on findings from research and intervention projects funded by Canada's International Development Research Centre (IDRC) to investigate different aspects of child marriage, the chapters span rural and urban settings across Bangladesh, Cote D'Ivoire, India, Mali, Niger, Pakistan, Peru, Senegal, Togo and Zambia. The content is designed to appeal to national policy makers, as well as resonate with others committed to supporting and empowering marginalised children and young people everywhere. 

The book is co-published by Young Lives and IDRC and is available Open Access under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License in both English and French. 

Gina Crivello and Gillian Mann (Editors) (2020) Dreaming of a Better Life: Child Marriage Through Adolescent Eyes, Oxford: Young Lives/Ottawa: International Development Research Centre

English  ISBN (YL): 978-1-912485-28-4;  IDRC e-book 978-1-55250-613-4

French  ISBN (YL): 978-1-912485-30-7;  IDRC e-book 978-1-55250-614-1