Abstract

Street children living in active conflict regions represent one of the most psychologically imperilled populations on earth, yet they remain among the least studied and most structurally invisible. This article draws on a narrative synthesis of peer-reviewed literature, humanitarian field data, and institutional reporting spanning 2012 to 2025 to examine the mental health burden borne by street children and conflict-displaced youth in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) - specifically the provinces of North Kivu, South Kivu, and Ituri, the three provinces at the epicentre of the 2024-2025 escalation of armed conflict and forced displacement. Drawing on neurobiological trauma theory, ecological systems frameworks, cultural formulations of distress, and moral injury scholarship, the article argues that conventional PTSD-centred diagnostic frameworks systematically underestimate the psychological damage sustained by this population, and that intervention design must be radically reoriented toward community-embedded, culturally congruent, and developmentally informed models. The findings carry urgent policy implications amid this same escalation, during which verified grave violations against children in the DRC increased by approximately 150 per cent in South Kivu alone between the December 2024 and March 2025 reporting periods. The article concludes with a five-point framework for reform and a call for the epistemic and political reorientation this crisis demands.