Christina Kwauk | The Brookings Institution (original) (raw)
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Books by Christina Kwauk
Co-authored with Gene Sperling and Rebecca Winthrop. Hard-headed evidence on why the returns fro... more Co-authored with Gene Sperling and Rebecca Winthrop.
Hard-headed evidence on why the returns from investing in girls are so high that no nation or family can afford not to educate their girls.
Gene Sperling, author of the seminal 2004 report published by the Council on Foreign Relations, and Rebecca Winthrop, director of the Center for Universal Education, have written this definitive book on the importance of girls’ education. As Malala Yousafzai expresses in her foreword, the idea that any child could be denied an education due to poverty, custom, the law, or terrorist threats is just wrong and unimaginable. More than 1,000 studies have provided evidence that high-quality girls’ education around the world leads to wide-ranging returns:
-Better outcomes in economic areas of growth and incomes
-Reduced rates of infant and maternal mortality
-Reduced rates of child marriage
-Reduced rates of the incidence of HIV/AIDS and malaria
-Increased agricultural productivity
-Increased resilience to natural disasters
-Women’s empowerment
What Works in Girls’ Education is a compelling work for both concerned global citizens, and any academic, expert, nongovernmental organization (NGO) staff member, policymaker, or journalist seeking to dive into the evidence and policies on girls’ education.
Journal Articles by Christina Kwauk
Drawing on ethnographic data collected over 12 months of field research, this paper contributes t... more Drawing on ethnographic data collected over 12 months of field research, this paper contributes to the growing body of literature on sport for development (SFD) by giving voice to alternative constructions of the educative potential of SFD. It does this by exploring the social attitudes of youth, educators, community leaders and government officials in the Pacific island nation of Sa ̄moa towards sport, education and development. Imagining sport to be like ‘school outside’, my Samoan interlocutors construct sport as an educative platform that prepares young ‘academically unfit’ men to engage an increasingly global political economy in ways classroom education cannot. Viewing international sport as a form of ‘development education’, my interlocutors perceive the educative value of SFD as being rooted in the potential for sport to help move underperforming boys into transnational flows of remittances to the family. In this way, Samoans perceive sport as enabling ‘at risk’ youth to serve their families, to learn English and to become globally minded, ultimately equipping them with the skills needed to achieve transnational futures once beyond their reach. In allowing a grassroots understanding of SFD to emerge, the paper challenges the assumption that the institutions of sport and education are compatible, mutually reinforcing and complementary. Specifically, viewing sport as an alternative to schooling may serve to reintegrate underperforming young men back into an education-to-employment pipeline, but it also carries important implications for the de-skilling of youth and the perpetuation of their positions of marginality. The paper calls into question the role of education and sport in and for development, highlighting important questions that SFD stakeholders should consider.
The Contemporary Pacific, 2014
In the midst of a noncommunicable disease (NCD) crisis, sport has emerged as a popular public hea... more In the midst of a noncommunicable disease (NCD) crisis, sport has emerged as a popular public health strategy across Oceania. Promising to turn unhealthy, obese bodies into fit, productive bodies, sport-based health programs are supposed to contribute to the economic development of Pacific Island nations. In Sāmoa, however, these efforts have been complicated by an existing web of meaning entangling sport within the transnational realities of Samoan families. Drawing from twelve months of multi-sited, ethnographic field research on sport for development (SFD) in Sāmoa, this paper demonstrates how Samoan understandings of sport reshape what it means to be a fit and productive citizen. Specifically, I illuminate (1) how sport is perceived as a “ticket” overseas and (2) how sport is perceived as a viable alternative pathway to the blessed life, especially for those (male) youth not excelling in school. Finally, I discuss (3) how SFD is a sociocultural response to a shifting transnational political economy of tautua (service) to the family, church, and village rooted in an unevenly expanding social landscape of mobility and work. This paper contributes to anthropological conversations on contemporary sporting formations in Oceania by highlighting how sport is reimagined and repackaged by Samoan youth, education leaders, and government officials as a development tool to create healthy development futures.
In lieu of increased international attention on high rates of obesity in the Pacific Islands, thi... more In lieu of increased international attention on high rates of obesity in the Pacific Islands, this paper examines the discourse strategies employed in three international health and fitness documents that enable the international community to problematize and to govern the lifestyles of Pacific Islanders. I draw specifically upon Fairclough's [(2001). Language and power (2nd ed). Essex: Pearson Education Limited] tools of discourse analysis to help unearth a particular kind of ‘healthy living’ ideology that lies at the center of international public-health policy, targeting obesity. I also draw on Greene's [(1999). Malthusian worlds: US leadership and the governing of the population crisis. Boulder, CO: Westview Press] interpretation of the governing apparatus to help illuminate the work performed by discourse to (1) construct obesity as a public problem, (2) to convince others that it is a problem, and (3) to stabilize its status as a problem. The implications of this analysis lead us to consider the relationship between discourse and body practice in the context of a growing global health and fitness industry.
This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary school fees by... more This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary school fees by examining the recently launched school fee abolition initiative. Drawing on key texts from this initiative and two decades of WB educational policy, we suggest that the discursive work around school fees performed by the Bank is a reflection of broader historical shifts in its representation as a development institution. Our three-part analysis shows how the language of school fee abolition, its putative boldness as a policy initiative, and the careful construction of non-adversarial partnerships work to reposition the WB as a champion of global education rights without relinquishing its neoliberal policy prescriptions. The analysis demonstrates the inseparability of two strands of discourse analysis – the linguistic and the discursive – and the socially productive nature of their interaction.
“Development” has become both a watchword and a fascination in sporting circles worldwide. Yet sp... more “Development” has become both a watchword and a fascination in sporting circles worldwide. Yet sport officials, policy makers, and advocates often have relatively unsophisticated understandings of development and the role of sport therein. This can result in programs and initiatives that are unfocused, ineffective, or even counterproductive. Drawing on critical theory and informed by our own research on sport-based social programs, the authors attempt to impart clarity by distinguishing two different approaches to sport and development: a dominant vision, in which sport essentially reproduces established social relations, and an interventionist approach, in which sport is intended to contribute to more fundamental change and transformation. The authors develop a critique of the former and elaborate on the latter, focusing on normative visions of the social status quo and the role of sport as an educational tool for otherwise disempowered, marginalized young people. The overarching objective is to show that practitioners interested in using sport for development however defined must recognize these theoretical issues and create appropriate programming if their intended outcomes are to be achieved.
Pathways: Critiques and discourse in Olympic research, 2008
Intertwining a narrative about international soccer with a narrative about an illegal Mexican imm... more Intertwining a narrative about international soccer with a narrative about an illegal Mexican immigrant footballer, the new soccer film, ‘Goal! The Dream Begins’ demonstrates what it means for modern sport to be truly ‘global’ in a world where individuals are increasingly multinational. The film brings a story of immigration into the discourse, illuminating how modern sport has moved beyond the traditional notions of muscular Christianity and into a realm of the globalized games ethic. Yet in making this shift, ‘Goal!’ has altered several of the conventional theoretical tropes to accommodate markers such as cultural values, identity and the American dream. Therefore, this paper attempts to illuminate several issues that the film draws from the larger sociological discourse on sport, such as muscular Christianity, masculinity, agency and nationalism, which the film then reintegrates into a story about one man's journey from being an illegal immigrant to becoming a professional footballer.
Reports by Christina Kwauk
Co-authored with Gene Sperling and Rebecca Winthrop. Hard-headed evidence on why the returns fro... more Co-authored with Gene Sperling and Rebecca Winthrop.
Hard-headed evidence on why the returns from investing in girls are so high that no nation or family can afford not to educate their girls.
Gene Sperling, author of the seminal 2004 report published by the Council on Foreign Relations, and Rebecca Winthrop, director of the Center for Universal Education, have written this definitive book on the importance of girls’ education. As Malala Yousafzai expresses in her foreword, the idea that any child could be denied an education due to poverty, custom, the law, or terrorist threats is just wrong and unimaginable. More than 1,000 studies have provided evidence that high-quality girls’ education around the world leads to wide-ranging returns:
-Better outcomes in economic areas of growth and incomes
-Reduced rates of infant and maternal mortality
-Reduced rates of child marriage
-Reduced rates of the incidence of HIV/AIDS and malaria
-Increased agricultural productivity
-Increased resilience to natural disasters
-Women’s empowerment
What Works in Girls’ Education is a compelling work for both concerned global citizens, and any academic, expert, nongovernmental organization (NGO) staff member, policymaker, or journalist seeking to dive into the evidence and policies on girls’ education.
Drawing on ethnographic data collected over 12 months of field research, this paper contributes t... more Drawing on ethnographic data collected over 12 months of field research, this paper contributes to the growing body of literature on sport for development (SFD) by giving voice to alternative constructions of the educative potential of SFD. It does this by exploring the social attitudes of youth, educators, community leaders and government officials in the Pacific island nation of Sa ̄moa towards sport, education and development. Imagining sport to be like ‘school outside’, my Samoan interlocutors construct sport as an educative platform that prepares young ‘academically unfit’ men to engage an increasingly global political economy in ways classroom education cannot. Viewing international sport as a form of ‘development education’, my interlocutors perceive the educative value of SFD as being rooted in the potential for sport to help move underperforming boys into transnational flows of remittances to the family. In this way, Samoans perceive sport as enabling ‘at risk’ youth to serve their families, to learn English and to become globally minded, ultimately equipping them with the skills needed to achieve transnational futures once beyond their reach. In allowing a grassroots understanding of SFD to emerge, the paper challenges the assumption that the institutions of sport and education are compatible, mutually reinforcing and complementary. Specifically, viewing sport as an alternative to schooling may serve to reintegrate underperforming young men back into an education-to-employment pipeline, but it also carries important implications for the de-skilling of youth and the perpetuation of their positions of marginality. The paper calls into question the role of education and sport in and for development, highlighting important questions that SFD stakeholders should consider.
The Contemporary Pacific, 2014
In the midst of a noncommunicable disease (NCD) crisis, sport has emerged as a popular public hea... more In the midst of a noncommunicable disease (NCD) crisis, sport has emerged as a popular public health strategy across Oceania. Promising to turn unhealthy, obese bodies into fit, productive bodies, sport-based health programs are supposed to contribute to the economic development of Pacific Island nations. In Sāmoa, however, these efforts have been complicated by an existing web of meaning entangling sport within the transnational realities of Samoan families. Drawing from twelve months of multi-sited, ethnographic field research on sport for development (SFD) in Sāmoa, this paper demonstrates how Samoan understandings of sport reshape what it means to be a fit and productive citizen. Specifically, I illuminate (1) how sport is perceived as a “ticket” overseas and (2) how sport is perceived as a viable alternative pathway to the blessed life, especially for those (male) youth not excelling in school. Finally, I discuss (3) how SFD is a sociocultural response to a shifting transnational political economy of tautua (service) to the family, church, and village rooted in an unevenly expanding social landscape of mobility and work. This paper contributes to anthropological conversations on contemporary sporting formations in Oceania by highlighting how sport is reimagined and repackaged by Samoan youth, education leaders, and government officials as a development tool to create healthy development futures.
In lieu of increased international attention on high rates of obesity in the Pacific Islands, thi... more In lieu of increased international attention on high rates of obesity in the Pacific Islands, this paper examines the discourse strategies employed in three international health and fitness documents that enable the international community to problematize and to govern the lifestyles of Pacific Islanders. I draw specifically upon Fairclough's [(2001). Language and power (2nd ed). Essex: Pearson Education Limited] tools of discourse analysis to help unearth a particular kind of ‘healthy living’ ideology that lies at the center of international public-health policy, targeting obesity. I also draw on Greene's [(1999). Malthusian worlds: US leadership and the governing of the population crisis. Boulder, CO: Westview Press] interpretation of the governing apparatus to help illuminate the work performed by discourse to (1) construct obesity as a public problem, (2) to convince others that it is a problem, and (3) to stabilize its status as a problem. The implications of this analysis lead us to consider the relationship between discourse and body practice in the context of a growing global health and fitness industry.
This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary school fees by... more This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary school fees by examining the recently launched school fee abolition initiative. Drawing on key texts from this initiative and two decades of WB educational policy, we suggest that the discursive work around school fees performed by the Bank is a reflection of broader historical shifts in its representation as a development institution. Our three-part analysis shows how the language of school fee abolition, its putative boldness as a policy initiative, and the careful construction of non-adversarial partnerships work to reposition the WB as a champion of global education rights without relinquishing its neoliberal policy prescriptions. The analysis demonstrates the inseparability of two strands of discourse analysis – the linguistic and the discursive – and the socially productive nature of their interaction.
“Development” has become both a watchword and a fascination in sporting circles worldwide. Yet sp... more “Development” has become both a watchword and a fascination in sporting circles worldwide. Yet sport officials, policy makers, and advocates often have relatively unsophisticated understandings of development and the role of sport therein. This can result in programs and initiatives that are unfocused, ineffective, or even counterproductive. Drawing on critical theory and informed by our own research on sport-based social programs, the authors attempt to impart clarity by distinguishing two different approaches to sport and development: a dominant vision, in which sport essentially reproduces established social relations, and an interventionist approach, in which sport is intended to contribute to more fundamental change and transformation. The authors develop a critique of the former and elaborate on the latter, focusing on normative visions of the social status quo and the role of sport as an educational tool for otherwise disempowered, marginalized young people. The overarching objective is to show that practitioners interested in using sport for development however defined must recognize these theoretical issues and create appropriate programming if their intended outcomes are to be achieved.
Pathways: Critiques and discourse in Olympic research, 2008
Intertwining a narrative about international soccer with a narrative about an illegal Mexican imm... more Intertwining a narrative about international soccer with a narrative about an illegal Mexican immigrant footballer, the new soccer film, ‘Goal! The Dream Begins’ demonstrates what it means for modern sport to be truly ‘global’ in a world where individuals are increasingly multinational. The film brings a story of immigration into the discourse, illuminating how modern sport has moved beyond the traditional notions of muscular Christianity and into a realm of the globalized games ethic. Yet in making this shift, ‘Goal!’ has altered several of the conventional theoretical tropes to accommodate markers such as cultural values, identity and the American dream. Therefore, this paper attempts to illuminate several issues that the film draws from the larger sociological discourse on sport, such as muscular Christianity, masculinity, agency and nationalism, which the film then reintegrates into a story about one man's journey from being an illegal immigrant to becoming a professional footballer.
Abstract This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary ... more Abstract This article explores the ambiguity within the World Bank's (WB) stance on primary school fees by examining the recently launched school fee abolition initiative. Drawing on key texts from this initiative and two decades of WB educational policy, we suggest that the discursive work around school fees performed by the Bank is a reflection of broader historical shifts in its representation as a development institution. Our three-part analysis shows how the language of school fee abolition, its putative boldness as a policy initiative, ...
At the core of this dissertation is a critical examination of the disjuncture between the policy ... more At the core of this dissertation is a critical examination of the disjuncture between the policy and practice of sport for development. Drawing on a vertical case study of gender, sport, and education in the Pacific Island nation of Sāmoa, the study illuminates how a healthy islands through sport (HITS) policy world centered around using sport to create healthier bodies for a thriving nation is discursively created in inter/national policy but effectively separate and detached from the gendered logics guiding already existing translocal practices of sport for development. This practice, as described to me by my interlocutors, observed through twelve months of ethnographic fieldwork, and quantitatively surveyed, includes ideas about development centered around the translocal ʻāiga (family) rather than the territorial boundaries of the nation, tautua (service) rather than health behavior change, and alofa (love) rather than one’s body size. Locally imagined sport for development also intricately ties together notions of transnational mobility and globalization with shifting practices of masculinity and muscularity, raises important questions about the purpose and kind of education needed for development, and highlights a local field of action that ironically coexists with a prescribed policy world focused on using sport to recalibrate unruly bodies into virtuous bio-citizens. Contrasting etic and emic constructions of sport in development, this dissertation makes two arguments. First, it highlights how many Samoans view sport as a roundtrip ticket off island toward economic opportunity and the imagined good life. In this case, it is not necessarily the quest to produce a healthy body that attracts Samoan youth, especially men, to sport but rather its potential to move bodies into more central locations within a global economy of remittances that makes sport popular. Second, this study demonstrates how inter/national development policy does not drive local practice. Instead, development actors sustain policy through a strategic process of social interpretation and translation that serves to align practice with policy at the surface while concealing deeper disjunctures of practice below. By juxtaposing what sport for development policy in Sāmoa is intended to achieve with how it is actually practiced, imagined, and socially managed, this dissertation foregrounds a dialectic of development imaginations that multiply shape the ways “playing for the future” has been incorporated into the development imaginations of Samoan youth, educators, community leaders, and government officials.
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Sport for development and peace practitioners, influencers, and academics need to acknowledge tha... more Sport for development and peace practitioners, influencers, and academics need to acknowledge that relations of power within the field go beyond a global North-South dichotomy.
As an emerging field of development practice, we must improve our accountability through rigorous... more As an emerging field of development practice, we must improve our accountability through rigorous monitoring and evaluation, and we must critically reconsider how we think about sport, health and development.