GOAL 16: PEACE, JUSTICE AND STRONG INSTITUTIONS

Violent death is widely seen at the international and national levels as the most extreme form of violent crime and gives insight into the levels of security in a given country. Monitoring intentional homicides is necessary to better assess their causes, drivers and consequences and, in the longer term, to develop effective preventive measures.

In several countries, two separate sets of data on intentional homicide are produced, respectively, from criminal justice and public health/civil registration systems. When they exist, figures from both data sources are reported. When data are not available from either criminal justice or from public health/civil registration, modelled estimates are used.

The indicator is defined as the total count of victims of intentional homicide divided by the total population, expressed per 100,000 population.

As per the International Classification of Crime for Statistical Purposes (ICCS), intentional homicide is defined as the unlawful death inflicted upon a person with the intent to cause death or serious injury.

Numerator: Number of victims of intentional homicide in a given year.
Denominator: Resident population in the same year.

Producing accurate counts on the number and causes of death among children and adolescents is particularly difficult. Such deaths may not be systematically recorded by criminal justice or vital registration systems, or age disaggregated data may not be available. Data on victims are often compiled in broad age categories that do not allow for the calculation of specific statistics on children. Additionally, determining cause of death, particularly when victims are very young, can be challenging even in countries with advanced and well-functioning health and registration systems. Registration systems that are operating effectively compile vital statistics on the occurrence of births and deaths during a given period. These data are then combined with figures obtained through medical and police records resulting from the certification of causes of individual deaths and the investigation of criminal cases. However, in many countries, administrative data pertaining to intentional injuries and deaths are not systematically collected, may not be accessible or may not be adequately compiled across sources. Calculating reliable figures from these basic counts is often not possible due to weaknesses in data collection systems, such as incomplete coverage or misrepresentation of the events.

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development seeks to strengthen universal peace and commits to redouble efforts to resolve or prevent conflict. It recognizes that there can be no sustainable development without peace and no peace without sustainable development. Counting deaths occurring in situations of armed conflict is therefore essential to the measurement of the Agenda, including and beyond its Goal 16.

This indicator measures the prevalence of armed conflicts and their impact in terms of loss of life. Together with the indicator 16.1.1 on intentional homicide, they measure violent deaths that occur in all countries of the world (intentional homicides) and in situations of armed conflict (conflict-related deaths).

This indicator is defined as the total count of conflict related deaths divided by the total population, expressed per 100,000 population.

Conflict is defined as armed conflict in reference to a terminology enshrined in international humanitarian law and applied to situations based on the assessment of the UN and other internationally mandated entities. Conflict-related deaths refer to direct and indirect deaths associated with armed conflict. These deaths may have been caused by (i) the use of weapons or (ii) other means and methods. Deaths caused by weapons include but are not limited to those inflicted by firearms, missiles, mines and bladed weapons. It may also include deaths resulting from aerial attacks and bombardments (e.g., of military bases, cities and villages), crossfire, explosive remnants of war, targeted killings or assassinations, and force protection incidents. Deaths caused by other means and methods may include deaths from torture or sexual and gender-based violence, intentional killing using starvation, depriving prisoners of access to health care or denying access to essential goods and services (e.g., an ambulance stopped at a checkpoint).

Indirect deaths are deaths resulting from a loss of access to essential goods and services (e.g., economic slowdown, shortages of medicines or reduced farming capacity that result in lack of access to adequate food, water, sanitation, health care and safe conditions of work) that are caused or aggravated by the situation of armed conflict.

By definition, these deaths should be separated from other violent deaths, which are, in principle, not connected to the situation of armed conflict (e.g., intentional and non-intentional homicides, self-defense, self-inflicted), but are still relevant to the implementation and measurement of SDG target 16.1.

Population refers to total resident population in a given situation of armed conflict included in the indicator, in a given year. Population data are derived from annual estimates produced by the UN Population Division.

Numerator: The total count of conflict- related deaths.
Denominator: The total population, expressed per 100,000 population.

Discrepancies might exist between national definitions, international statistical and legal standards, coverage and quality of data, according to the mandate, methods and capacity of data providers.

In situations of armed conflict, a large share of deaths may not be reported. Often, normal registration systems are heavily affected by the presence of armed conflict. Additionally, actors on both sides of an armed conflict may have incentives for misreporting, deflating or inflating casualties. In most instances, the number of cases reported will depend on access to conflict zones, access to information, motivation and perseverance of both international and national actors, such as UN peace missions and other internationally mandated entities, national institutions (e.g., national statistical offices, national human rights institutions) and relevant civil society organizations.

Disaggregating data by characteristics of victims and by causes of death is particularly complex and may result in limited data availability for children.

Violent discipline at home is the most common form of violence experienced by children. While teaching children self-control and acceptable behaviour is an integral part of child rearing in all cultures, many caregivers rely on the use of violent methods, both physical and psychological, to punish unwanted behaviours and encourage desired ones.

Regardless of the type, all forms are violations of children’s rights. While children of all ages are at risk, experiencing violent discipline at a young age can be particularly harmful, given the increased potential for physical injuries as well as children’s inability to understand the motivation behind the act or to adopt coping strategies to alleviate their distress.

Proportion of children aged 1 to 14 years who experienced any physical punishment and/or psychological aggression at home in the past month. The rationale for using a proxy indicator for SDG 16.2.1 is because comparable data are currently only available for a subset of children aged 1 to 14 years.

The following definitions come from the MICS programme, the principal source of data for this indicator:

Physical (or corporal) punishment is an action intended to cause physical pain or discomfort, but not injuries. Physical punishment is defined as shaking a child, hitting or slapping him/her on the hand/arm/leg, hitting him/her on the bottom or elsewhere on the body with a hard object, spanking or hitting him/her on the bottom with a bare hand, hitting or slapping him/her on the face, head or ears, and beating him/her over and over as hard as possible.

Psychological aggression refers to the action of shouting, yelling or screaming at a child, as well as calling a child offensive names, such as ‘dumb’ or ‘lazy’.

The term violent discipline encompasses any physical punishment and/or psychological aggression.

‘Past month’ typically refers to the 30 days prior to the interview/data collection (in other words, has the child experienced violent discipline at any point in the 30 days prior to data collection). ‘Caregiver’ refers to any adult household member with caregiving responsibilities for the child (not just the primary caregiver or the respondent to the questionnaire).

Numerator: Number of children aged 1 to 14 years who have experienced any physical punishment and/ or psychological aggression by caregivers in the past month.

Denominator: Total number of children aged 1 to 14 years in the population.

In the third and fourth rounds of MICS, the standard indicator referred to the proportion of children aged 2 to 14 years who experienced any form of violent discipline (physical punishment and/or psychological aggression) within the past month. Beginning with the fifth round of MICS, the age group covered was expanded to capture children’s experiences with disciplinary practices between the ages of 1 and 14 years. Therefore, current data availability does not capture the full age range specified in the SDG indicator since data are not collected for adolescents aged 15 to 17 years. Further methodological work is needed to identify additional items on disciplinary practices relevant to older adolescents.

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Sexual violence is one of the most unsettling of children’s rights violations. As such, it is the subject of dedicated international legal instruments aimed at protecting children against its multiple forms. Acts of sexual violence, which often occur together and with other forms of violence, can range from direct physical contact to unwanted exposure to sexual language and images. Although children of every age are susceptible, adolescence is a period of pronounced vulnerability.

Although estimates can be found of the number of children who have experienced sexual violence, one of the biggest challenges in this field is underreporting, which stymies efforts to generate accurate statistics. In fact, most victims do not disclose experiences of childhood sexual abuse until adulthood, while many others (a number impossible to quantify) remain silent for their entire lives.

Proportion of young women and men aged 18 to 29 years who experienced sexual violence by age 18. This indicator is always reported on separately for women and men.

Sexual violence is often used as an umbrella term to cover all types of sexual victimization.19 According to General Comment No. 13 on the CRC, sexual violence against children “comprises any sexual activities imposed by an adult on a child against which the child is entitled to protection by criminal law”.20 Sexual violence is operationally defined in the indicator as sexual intercourse or any other sexual acts that were forced, physically or in any other way. This indicator captures all experiences of sexual violence that occurred during childhood (i.e., prior to age 18) regardless of the legal age of consent stipulated in relevant national legislation.

Numerator: Number of young women and men aged 18 to 29 years who report having experienced any sexual violence by age 18
Denominator: Total number of young women and men aged 18 to 29 years in the population

The availability of comparable data remains a serious challenge in this area as many data collection efforts have relied on different study methodologies and designs, definitions of sexual violence, samples and questions to elicit information. Data on the experiences of boys are particularly sparse. A further challenge in this field is underreporting, especially when it comes to experiences of sexual violence among boys and men.

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Birth registration is a first step towards safeguarding individual rights and providing every person with access to justice and social services. Thus, birth registration is not only a fundamental human right, but also key to ensuring the fulfilment of other rights.

Birth registration is an essential part of a functioning civil registration system that produces vital statistics, which are essential for sound government planning and effective use of resources. In this way, target 16.9 is linked to targets 17.18 and 17.19, both of which concern statistical capacity-building support to developing countries.

Proportion of children under 5 years of age whose births have been registered with a civil authority.

Birth registration is defined as the official recording of the occurrence and characteristics of births in accordance with the legal requirements of a country.

Civil authorities/registrars are the officials authorized to register the occurrence of vital events, including births.

Numerator: Number of children under age 5 whose births are reported as being registered with the relevant national civil authorities.

Denominator: Total number of children under age 5 in the population.

Substantial differences can exist between CRVS coverage and birth registration levels as captured by household surveys. The differences are primarily because data from CRVS typically refer to the proportion of all births that have been registered (often within a specific time frame), whereas household surveys often report on the proportion of children under age 5 whose births are registered. The latter (the level of registration among children under 5) is specified in the SDG indicator.

Data from household surveys like MICS or DHS sometimes refer only to children with a birth certificate. UNICEF methodically notes this difference when publishing country-level estimates for global monitoring.

One of the most common pitfalls with questionnaire design involves respondents’ misunderstanding of the actual registration process. For example, respondents might be unaware of the specific authorities legally tasked with birth registration and might therefore misinterpret the act of notifying a church or village chief of a birth as formal registration. To address this ambiguity, household survey questionnaires are often customized to include reference to the specific national authority responsible for registration. Similarly, respondents might confuse a birth certificate with a health card or other document and thus inaccurately report children as registered. Despite attempts to resolve such issues, confusion about the process of birth registration might still exist and result in erroneous reporting.

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