Conditional cash transfer and early marriage: a case study of Mataram City, West Nusa Tenggara

Purpose - This study aims to understand whether the implementation of Indonesian conditional cash transfer (CCT), namely, Family Hope Program (FHP), holds the potential for influencing perceptions of beneficiary households in Mataram City about children’s education and early marriage. Design/methodology/approach - This study used qualitative research methods of semi-structured in-depth interviews with beneficiary households. A total of 18 households with adolescent girls receiving FHP throughout six subdistricts in Mataram City were taken as key informants. Having mapped codes into the Capacity, Opportunity, Motivation – Behavior model, this study used thematic analysis to identify the most mentioned factors to facilitate and to hinder the efforts of early marriage prevention. Findings - This study reveals that the FHP beneficiaries had realized the importance of education for their children, which could be used as a facilitator for the FHP to prevent early marriages. On the other hand, local customary arrangement was found to be the main barrier for the government to prevent early marriage cases in Mataram City. This barrier was exacerbated with rebellious character of the children. Therefore, the implementation of local customary arrangement needs to be evaluated together with more socialization about the consequence of early marriage to the children through the role of program facilitators or teachers at school. Originality/value - Different from existing literature in CCT and early marriage which uses quantitative analysis, this study uses qualitative approach to construe the views and perceptions of the program participants. Use of the qualitative approach offers a different viewpoint and supplements the existing literature in this area.