Education in refugee camp contexts. Making School on the Margins of the Nation-States (original) (raw)

2021, OUTLINES -CRITICAL PRACTICE STUDIES

The delivery of education in refugee camps has become a key component of humanitarian programs. Since the late 1980s, camps have become the dominant way through which refugee movements are managed around the world (Agier, 2014). Children, the perfect embodiment of the innocent victim, are particularly targeted by humanitarian aid. When refugee situations become protracted and the temporary permanent, their learning structures tend to become actual schools made of an administration, a teaching staff, and a curriculum. Generally funded and coordinated by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), these camp schools contribute today to the schooling of almost 3,5 million refugee children (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2019a). Going beyond an idealized vision of education as a "basic human right" and an 1 This article is a translated version of the following paper: Fresia, M., Von Kanel, A. & Perret-Clermont A.N. (2021, in press). "Les dispositifs éducatifs humanitaires: faire l'école dans les interstices des Etats-Nations",