Introduction

Historians Corrie Decker and Elizabeth McMahon, who both specialize in the history of colonialism, development, and gender in Africa found that projects to develop Africa have substantially differed over the past two centuries. However, the development episteme, which Decker and McMahon define define as the underlying knowledge system that shaped ideas surrounding development, largely stayed the same. For these historians, the development episteme’s consistency over time further includes who gets to define what “development” means.  

The development episteme originated from Enlightenment philosophies, where Europeans developed a sense of racial and cultural superiority that led to the mission of civilizing the rest of the world. This would later morph into the “white man’s burden,” where the civilizing mission was enacted through the European colonialism of Africa. Decker and McMahon argue that despite surface benefits to Africans, development has done more to maintain systems of inequality, as “part of the legacy of European colonialism in Africa, a legacy international development has yet to shed, regardless of the intentions of development experts and advocates.”¹Corrie Decker and Elizabeth McMahon, The Idea of Development in Africa: A History, New Approaches to African History 16 (Cambridge New York Melbourne New Delhi Singapore: Cambridge University Press, 2021), 2, 4, 16. Indeed, the development episteme has molded current humanitarian efforts, which often see hegemonic and oftentimes coercive imposition of the “experts’” visions of progress, and power inequalities between the developers and undeveloped. 

Additionally, those in the development episteme often project ethnocentric beliefs about what development is and engage in unwarranted self-promotion while conducting strongly paternalistic missions of supposed benevolence. The perspectives of Africans are not valued, or if they are, their value is determined and mediated by the experts. According to Decker and McMahon, the development episteme involves an unequal discourse of power between “experts” and Africans, although it has been resisted and subverted by Africans. For two centuries, policies and programs have been made with and through the defining characteristics stemming from this system of knowledge, from French colonial policy in the 1880s or the World Bank’s structural adjustment programs a century later.²Decker and McMahon, The Idea of Development, 16, 9.

Decker and McMahon call on humanitarians in the present to reimagine development in Africa and question the underlying system of knowledge driving development for two centuries. In Educating for Durable Solutions: Histories of Schooling in Kenya’s Dadaab and Kakuma Refugee Camps, Monaghan agrees with them, saying, 

Recent developments, such as the [United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’] 2012-2016 Education Strategy… endeavor to repurpose education to help refugees prepare for uncertain futures… Do these shifts offer a break from the past? Is repurposing enough, or, regardless of what might be deemed practical or feasible, does refugee education need to be reimagined? ³Decker and McMahon, The Idea of Development 100.

As such, while one book is a history of development efforts in Africa and the other a history of refugee education for the past thirty years, both come to the same conclusion: humanitarian efforts must be reimagined. While there has been substantial change between colonial education policy from the 1920s-1950s and contemporary refugee education policy, the development episteme underscores efforts to develop education in Kakuma. When compared to colonial education history, refugee education programs in Kakuma are still trapped in the old patterns of self-aggrandizement, ethnocentrism, and paternalism, which can only be removed through greater refugee involvement. 

Methods

Methods used in this article include literature analysis on primary and secondary sources related to British colonial education in Kenya and refugee education in the Kakuma Refugee Camp. Primary sources analyzed include documents on British colonial education in Africa, UNHCR documents related to refugee education in Kakuma, and African refugees’ perspectives on community-led initiatives. Based on these documents and using Decker and McMahon’s concept of the development episteme, I considered continuity and change between colonial education and contemporary refugee education. 

The History of Colonial Education in Kenya

Colonial education policy in British Kenya was complex and evolving. Formal colonial education in Kenya began in the late 19th century with the arrival of Christian missionaries. While some missionary education predates British occupation, the establishment of the Imperial British East Africa Company in 1888 hastened the development of colonial education. The declaration of a British protectorate in 1895 and subsequent colonization efforts further solidified the role of education in the colonial project, although this would mostly be led by missionaries with limited government involvement. The formation of the Education Department in 1911 led to a more direct involvement of the colonial government in shaping education policy.⁴Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 108.

Prior to the First World War, the Colonial Office took only a limited interest in the development of schooling in Africa, with most educational activities being carried out by various Christian missionary organizations. Colonial education in Kenya, initially delivered through mission schools with increasing government involvement over time, was characterized by racial segregation and stark disparities in quality and access. European children attended well-funded schools designed to replicate the British education system. In contrast, African education was largely left to mission schools with limited resources and a curriculum focused on basic literacy, vocational skills, and Christian indoctrination.  Even after the colonial government’s involvement increased after 1911, emphasis remained on practical training rather than intellectual development for Africans. This was supported by a pseudoscientific belief that the Kenyan’s brain was “incapable of engaging in anything intellectual.”⁵Clive Whitehead, “The Historiography of British Imperial Education Policy, Part II: Africa and the Rest of the Colonial Empire,” History of Education 34, no. 4 (July 2005): 441, https://doi.org/10.1080/00467600500138147; Kilemi Mwiria, “Education for Subordination: African Education in Colonial Kenya,” History of Education 20, no. 3 (September 1991): 261, https://doi.org/10.1080/0046760910200306.

This changed in the 1920s, as the new League of Nations’ concept of trusteeship and the growing demand for education among the native populations prompted a more concerted effort by the colonial authorities to shape educational policies in African territories. Before this period, there was no cohesive state policy for British Education in Africa, as the mission schools were operated by competing denominations that lacked a unified vision. Yet in the interwar period, the Colonial Office in London, influential missionaries in Africa, veteran colonial administrators, and philanthropic organizations collaborated to design and implement models of so-called Native Education across the continent.⁶George E. Urch, “Education and Colonialism in Kenya,” History of Education Quarterly 11, no. 3 (1971): 256-257, https://doi.org/10.2307/367292; Mwiria, “Education for Subordination,” 269.

Even as the education changed, British motives for colonial education were multifaceted. Some British colonists may genuinely have believed in a humanitarian “civilizing mission” and the potential of education to uplift Africans. For instance, Sir Frederick Guggisberg, British governor of the Gold Coast, who remarked that education was a “keystone of progress” and was “what is uppermost in the thoughts of all Africans.”⁷Whitehead, “The Historiography,” 441-442; Aaron Windel, “British Colonial Education in Africa: Policy and Practice in the Era of Trusteeship,” History Compass 7, no. 1 (January 2009): 6, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1478-0542.2008.00560.x. Yet economic and political considerations also played a dominant role. Primary education was seen as a means to create a compliant workforce through promoting basic literacy and the vocational skills deemed necessary to meet the labor demands of the colonial economy. In contrast, schooling beyond the primary level was reserved for a select few who were educated to serve as intermediaries between the colonial administration and the African population. Schooling also promoted cultural assimilation and social control through instilling Western values to help Africans “adapt” to a modernizing society imposed by British colonial forces. This education would further undermine traditional African culture and social structures.⁸John A. Nkinyangi, “Access to Primary Education in Kenya: The Contradictions of Public Policy,” Comparative Education Review 26, no. 2 (1982): 200, 202; Urch, “Education and Colonialism in Kenya,” 249; Mwiria, “Education for Subordination,” 267. Kenyan society turned from largely egalitarian to one where class-based differences defined the social order, with white Europeans superior to Africans. While these motivations were not always explicitly stated or consciously recognized by those involved in colonial education, the system served British interests while perpetuating African dependency. 

Reports on Colonial Education in Kenya

During the 1920s-1950s, several major research excursions into Kenyan and African education were conducted by Europeans and Americans. These works include the 1922 Phelps-Stokes Commission’s report, Lord Hailey’s 1938 An African Survey, and the 1949 “African Education in Kenya” report from the Beecher Committee.

The Phelps-Stokes Commission’s report, authored primarily by sociologist Thomas Jesse Jones, was started by the American Baptist Foreign Missionary Society’s desire to survey and improve African education. Led by missionary and philanthropic groups in the U.S. and Britain, the Commission was one of the earliest attempts to draw connections between Africa and Black America. The report aimed to provide insight into African education through education for African Americans following the U.S. Civil War, as the commission assumed that the experience of the “Negro South” had direct relevance to Africa.⁹Edward H. Berman, “American Influence on African Education: The Role of the Phelps-Stokes Fund’s Education Commissions,” Comparative Education Review 15, no. 2 (June 1971): 133, https://doi.org/10.1086/445526; Schicho, “‘Keystone of Progress’,” 225. Several significant recommendations were made, such as a major expansion of the existing schooling into a more formally organized system and education with some emphasis on vocational, religious, and character education.

However, the report’s recommendations had some pushback among British administrators in Kenya, as they feared that Africans would rebel against such changes. Africans during this time valued the academic education that could give them access to highly prestigious and paid white-collar occupations held by Europeans and would likely revolt against a system that would keep them at the bottom of colonial society. If the report’s recommendation to shift towards vocational and character education for Africans was followed, this would have solidified the colonial hierarchy of society with Africans constrained to the working class.¹⁰Berman, “American Influence,” 144, 137; Schicho, “‘Keystone of Progress’,” 225.

In 1938, former British colonial officer Lord Hailey published An African Survey. The book provided exhaustive detail and statistics on many aspects of African society, including population, geography, African languages, and ethnic groups south of the Sahara. Hailey devoted a chapter in his work to colonial education, mostly describing the situation while also providing some recommendations based on his research findings. Hailey’s survey would become highly influential for British colonial reformers, becoming a publication as common in colonial offices as the imperial calendar. 

The aim of African education, in Hailey’s view, was to help the African adapt to a modernizing society, keeping some of their native culture while also providing the European education that would enable them to perform well in colonial society. While the Phelps-Stokes Commission focused heavily on education’s role in moral and social development, Hailey emphasized a more technocratic approach through emphasizing vocational education. These recommendations would shape subsequent British colonial education policy, especially after World War II when development gained a new focus.¹¹David Mills, “British Anthropology at the End of Empire : the Rise and Fall of the Colonial Social Science Research Council, 1944-1962,” Revue d’Histoire des Sciences Humaines 6, no. 1 (2002): 164, https://doi.org/10.3917/rhsh.006.0161.

Over a decade later, the 1949 Beecher Committee published “African Education in Kenya.” Authored by a group of colonial officials, missionaries, and educators and led by Anglican clergyman Leonard J. Beecher, it was commissioned by the British colonial government to evaluate and propose reforms to African education. The report, primarily directed at the colonial administration and missionary organizations, called on the British colonial government to centralize control of Kenyan education, reducing the partial autonomy that some native African schools had. It also called for improvements in primary education and vocational training while restricting access to secondary and higher education, perpetuating racial and social inequalities. These policies fueled African discontent, particularly among youth seeking opportunities for advancement, contributing to the frustrations that led to the Mau Mau Rebellion.¹²Pius Wanyama Muricho, “Analysis of Education Reforms and Challenges in Kenya: A Historical Perspective,” International Journal of Current Innovations in Advanced Research, April 6, 2023, 37, https://doi.org/10.47957/ijciar.v6i1.148; Leonard Beecher, African Education in Kenya: Report of a Committee Appointed to Inquire into the Scope, Content, and Methods of African Education, Its Administration and Its Finance, and to Make Recommendations (Nairobi, Kenya: Nairobi: Government Printer, 1949), vii.

The knowledge produced in these major works of colonial education can be traced back to the ubiquity of the development episteme. Even when there would be calls for independence, the European or American still felt that they were in the best position to dictate how the African people should be educated. When it came to broader questions, such as how education should be structured, what the purpose of education was, and whether schools should help Africans adapt to the imposed colonial order, it was assumed that only Westerners should answer these questions. Furthermore, nearly all of the knowledge directly produced by major studies and reports on colonial education were done by Westerners, as Africans did not have the legitimacy to voice their own perspectives, a dynamic that still exists today in Kenya’s Kakuma Refugee Camp.  

Education in the Kakuma Refugee Camp

Kakuma Refugee Camp was established in 1992 in northwest Kenya by the United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees (UNHCR). Most inhabitants came from South Sudan or Somalia; however, smaller proportions of Central and East African nationalities are also represented, such as people from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Eritrea. In 2016, the Kalobeyei Integrated Settlement was established adjacent to Kakuma to help manage the population and resources within the area. As of October 2024, the population of the Kakuma-Kalobeyei refugee hosting area exceeded 296,000 refugees, making it one of the largest refugee camps in the world.¹³Elimisha Kakuma-Virginia Tech Research Group, “Barriers to Education in Kakuma Refugee Camp” (Blacksburg, VA: Center for Refugee, Migrant, and Displacement Studies, Virginia Tech, 2024), 2; “Refugees and Asylum-Seekers in Turkana,” Operational Data Portal, October 31, 2024, https://data.unhcr.org/en/country/ken/796.

As the camp has grown throughout multiple decades, Kakuma has been described as an “accidental city.” While it was meant to be a temporary destination for refugees, it evolved over decades into a more permanent settlement for refugees fleeing from  armed conflicts. The most prominent of these conflicts occurred in South Sudan and Somalia.¹⁴Bram J. Jansen, Kakuma Refugee Camp: Humanitarian Urbanism in Kenya’s Accidental City, Politics and Development in Contemporary Africa (London, UK: ZED, 2018), 14-15. Part of this permanence has come from the UNHCR’s refugee education policy. 

Education in the camp is administered primarily by the UNHCR. However, the organization partners with other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to aid in educational activities, such as the Lutheran World Federation and the Jesuit Refugee Service. Since 1992, the UNHCR had gradually created a more organized, centralized school system in Kakuma, starting with voluntary guidelines before publishing strategic plans starting in 2007. A marked shift occurred in 2012, with the agency prioritizing integration with the Kenyan education system.¹⁵Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 36, 78; Gerawork Teferra, “Fostering Education Services in Kakuma Refugee Camp,” in The Right to Research: Historical Narratives by Refugee and Global South Researchers (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2023), 64.

Refugee education in Kakuma suffers from challenges that exacerbate each other. Within the schools, overcrowded classrooms, lack of basic supplies, tuition fees, poorly trained teachers, and in some cases corporal punishment are some of the challenges students face in getting an education. However, broader issues within the camp also significantly impede educational quality for both students and teachers. Among these issues are the trauma that students and teachers endure, long walks on dirt roads to schools that can be scorching hot or flooded, discrimination faced by marginalized groups such as girls and students with disabilities, lack of access to healthcare.¹⁶Elimisha Kakuma-Virginia Tech Research Group, “Barriers to Education,” ii.

There has been progress in refugee education over the decades since Kakuma was founded in 1992, including expanded primary and secondary schools and increased education for girls. However, there have also been periods of regression, such as budget cuts following the 1997 financial crisis. In some respects, refugee education in Kakuma has seen episodes of regression, such as subjects like business, physics, and agriculture being cut in most secondary schools in 2018.¹⁷Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 65, 55; Teferra, “Fostering Education Services,” 60. Additionally, more fundamental challenges have persisted in the camp’s school system despite decades of development. Refugee and researcher Gerawork Teferra argues that there is a gap between the goals refugees have for Kakuma schools, such as meaningful identity formation and access to post-school opportunities, and the lived reality of schooling. According to Teferra, schooling often solely amounts to a social space to keep children and adolescents occupied that fails to prepare students for life post-graduation. With regards to schools being primary social spaces instead of places of learning, Teferra claims that, “In some cases, schools can even be counterproductive, as participating in a single ‘social place’ that is not well-ordered and where students see that they are not valued drives students to new harmful behaviors and actions in schools and outside.”¹⁸Teferra, “Fostering Education Services,” 52-53, 64.

The Development Episteme in Colonial Education and the Kakuma Refugee Camp

In many respects, there are substantial differences between the contexts of colonial education in Kenya and refugee education in Kakuma. While both are situated in Kenya, education is administered through different authorities. Colonial education in Kenya was carried out by missionaries and colonial authorities that claimed. In contrast, Kakuma’s education is conducted through humanitarian organizations, such as the UNHCR and partnerships with NGOs and corporations. Additionally, it and is influenced by the Kenyan government, due to the camp schools’ curriculum roots in  the national Kenyan curriculum, and Kakuma students taking the national Kenyan examinations.¹⁹Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 10. Another significant difference is that many Africans resisted colonial education while, refugees in Kakuma actively seek education supported by outsiders.²⁰William Malcolm Hailey, An African Survey: A Study of Problems Arising in Africa South of the Sahara, 1240. As such, qualities of punitive coercion are absent in Kakuma, but there remains problems from colonial-era beliefs.

Ethnocentrism

Ethnocentrism in Colonial Education

During colonial times, while many outsiders of Africa ethnocentrism underlaid appreciation of native tradition and autonomy. The Phelps-Stokes Commission recommended that Africans learn some aspects of their culture through education, such as the handicrafts made in their community and their native tongue. It also recommended training Native leadership, remarking that, “It is not strange that Europeans of education and power should fail to understand the possibilities of Natives as guides of their own people.”²¹Jones, Education in Africa; a Study of West, South, and Equatorial Africa by the African Education Commission, under the Auspices of the Phelps-Stokes Fund and Foreign Mission Societies of North America and Europe, 21, 25, 58. Yet the report still had ethnocentric aspects , such as its recommendation that Africans learn the language of the European power due to the benefits of learning a language from a “civilized nation.” The report also called for Africans to learn Christian doctrine as well as the productive use of leisure time, steering Africans away from “sex indulgence and wild forms of emotion.”²²Jones, Education in Africa, 26, 25, 27.

In addition to the Phelps-Stokes Commission, many outsiders also argued for a balance between helping Africans keep their cultural roots while also adapting to modernization imposed by Europeans. The desire to “uplift” Africans was echoed by the Kenyan Director of Medical Services in 1932, who said that the primary task of education was 

To enable backward peoples, whose civilization is in many respects admirably adapted to ensure their survival under primitive conditions of isolation, to function efficiently under the very different conditions which are resulting from the removal of that isolation and from their incorporation in a world community, and how to enable them to bear effectively the responsibilities which that incorporation involves.²³T. Walter Wallbank, “British Colonial Policy and Native Education in Kenya,” The Journal of Negro Education 7, no. 4 (1938): 521, https://doi.org/10.2307/2291799.

This viewpoint was common throughout the time of British colonization, as seen in contemporaneous reports. As such, colonists throughout history, believing that they knew best, sought to spread their culture  across the continent. 

Lord Hailey’s survey also discussed colonial education serving the needs of Africans, particularly to prepare the African for their changing society and even play a role in changing societal conditions. Hailey wrote that African society was being rapidly modified, necessitating that African schooling “be designed not only to equip him to deal with his existing environment, but to fit him for the new conditions which he will have to face and to help him to take his own part in shaping those conditions.”²⁴Hailey, An African Survey, 1207. However, it is unclear as to what Hailey meant by “shaping those conditions.” Hailey, viewing Africans as an “undeveloped race,” arguably would have endorsed those who advocated for increased British authority while disagreeing with those who sought to shape societal conditions in ways that upset the colonial status quo. While Hailey wrote that some respect to African culture had to be afforded, the forces of modernization that “must ensue” would require a significant transformation towards “modern” education, “however much the educationist may wish to respect native tradition.”²⁵Hailey, An African Survey, 1229, 1207.

Ethnocentrism in Contemporary Refugee Education

Refugees face xenophobia in schools outside of Kakuma and a non-culturally responsive curriculum. However, this is due to the Kenyan government and wider Kenyan culture as opposed to outside humanitarians. During the establishment of Kakuma in 1992, refugees decided to have their schools follow the Kenyan national curriculum, with English as the language of instruction, which has since persisted.²⁶Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 39. In 2015, several researchers found that restrictions made by the Kenyan curriculum and examinations significantly limited the degree of cultural relevance in refugee students’ lessons. In addition, students found learning Kiswahili difficult, a mandatory subject in the national curriculum. One pupil the researchers interviewed remarked that she did not like social studies since she lacked knowledge about Kenya to understand and connect with the lesson. As such, the researchers argued that,

Given how tightly the KCPE exam is tied to the curriculum, teachers expressed the impossibility of adapting the curriculum to specific school contexts or to their refugee pupils in any significant way…The six case study schools were inflexible about using the Kenyan curriculum, despite its reliance on unfamiliar languages and content that lacked relevance to the students, which was a serious impediment to their receiving a quality education.²⁷Mary Mendenhall, et al., “Quality Education for Refugees in Kenya: Pedagogy in Urban Nairobi and Kakuma Refugee Camp Settings,” Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies 1, no. 1 (October 2015): 118-119.

It would be mistaken to believe that refugees freely chose to have a non-culturally responsive curriculum in 1992. The choices that parents had were to follow the Kenyan curriculum, gaining knowledge necessary to succeed in Kenya after graduation, or to have a more responsive curriculum with greater autonomy, which would hinder their children’s ability to do well in Kenyan exams.

Additional ethnocentric issues were also faced by refugee students who went to schools in Kenya outside of Kakuma. Two researchers published a study in 2019 finding that refugee students faced xenophobic discrimination while attending schools outside of Kakuma. Some Somali students had been called “terrorists” both by students and teachers.²⁸Bellino and Dryden-Peterson, “Inclusion and Exclusion within a Policy of National Integration,” 232. As such, a disregard for the culture and dignity of refugee students stemming from Kenyan culture and national government is one way the development episteme has manifested in Kakuma since 1992. Knowledge produced by Kenyan authorities on what their national curriculum should be did not include the perspectives of refugees in and outside of Kakuma.  

Self-aggrandizement

Self-aggrandizement in Colonial Education

Self-aggrandizement also existed in development discourse for both colonial education and contemporary refugee education contexts. Within the colonial era, the Phelpes-Stokes Commission’s report positioned missionary educators as “pioneers” and “representatives of civilization and Christianity.” Accordingly, the report stated that “All credit must be given to those earnest representatives,” as they were willing to “sacrifice themselves in order that they might carry the lessons of health, industry, and Christian ideals to the uncivilized people of the great African continent.” In the commission’s view, these brave missionaries formed friendships with needy Africans.²⁹Jones, Education in Africa, 38.

This self-promotion and pride also existed in Lord Hailey’s survey and the Beecher Committee’s report. While he discussed the negative effects that colonial education had on native culture, he still wrote extensively about Africans benefitting from European civilization. For Hailey, this benefit was enough rationale to base colonial education on helping Africans adapt to their changing, modernizing society. In the Beecher Committee’s report, the writers congratulated themselves on the “remarkable achievement” of social and economic development of Africa due to colonial education and recommended several ways to establish centralized control of Kenyan education to ensure that the progress would continue.³⁰Hailey, An African Survey, 27; Beecher, African Education, 1.

This general assumption is also seen in The Remaking of Man in Africa. Authored by two leading missionaries in 1931, the book  described how the Christian missionary effort in Africa and how it should effect education. Authors J. H. Oldham and B. D. Gibson wrote proudly exclaimed, “Few things in Africa make a stronger appeal to the imagination than the awakening desire for knowledge which finds expression in the tens of thousands of little village schools that are to be found throughout the length and breadth of the continent”³¹Joseph H. Oldham and B. D. Gibson, The Remaking of Man in Africa (London: Oxford University Press, 1931), 63-64. Implicit in this narrative is the belief that Europeans were best positioned to determine what was in the best interest of the African. For Oldham and Gibson, as well as the Phelps-Stokes Commission, this belief also included the assumption that European missionaries were courageously helping the pagan Africans.

Self-aggrandizement in Contemporary Refugee Education

Self-aggrandizement has also been a part of the development of Kakuma’s education. Jeff Crisp, former senior officer at the UNHCR, argued in 2022 that the UNHCR engages in considerable self-promotion, which is unwarranted. He claimed that the UNHCR has developed, 

An external relations strategy that is dominated by fund-raising, marketing, branding, human interest stories, celebrity endorsement, social media and show-business activities… [this includes] the amount of time, effort and resources that the organization now devotes to self-promotion; in its mindless reproduction of the UNHCR logo at every conceivable opportunity; in its sometimes misleading use of statistics; in its selective use of unrepresentative refugee stories and photos; and in its efforts to cultivate closer relations with private sector companies.³²Jeff Crisp, “Protected? UNHCR’s Organizational Culture and Its Implications for Refugee Advocates and Activists,” LERRN: The Local Engagement Refugee Research Network, July 29, 2022, https://carleton.ca/lerrn/2022/unhcr-organizational-culture/.

 In Educating for Durable Solutions: Histories of Schooling in Kenya’s Dadaab and Kakuma Refugee Camps, Monaghan recounts a similar feeling among refugees, saying  

“One refugee, who was a quality assurance officer and previously a head teacher, said that, ‘For years part of my job for the NGOs was putting together reports and newsletters about the development of education to share with donors and they always wrote the refugees out. Like the agencies were the ones deciding everything and taking the credit for everything. But so much of what happened was up to us — we helped to build the education system. And people should know.’”³³Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions.

One such report that leaves out the role of the refugee is a 2019 briefing kit on Kakuma. The document, given to first time visitors learning about the camp, helps to form the first impression developed by potential funders, partners, and other interested parties. The education section (Figure 1) conveys a triumphant narrative through the prominently displayed top two statistics. According to this document, 80% of refugees passed the Kenyan Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE), Kenya’s primary school leaving exam, which is greater than the national average of 76%, and with a teaching workforce mostly composed of refugee teachers.³⁴UNHCR, “Kakuma Camp and Kalobeyei Settlement Briefing Kit” (Kakuma, Kenya: UNHCR, May 2019), 5.

Figure 1: Education Section of 2019 UNHCR Briefing Kit for Kakuma Refugee Camp (reproduced with permission from the UNHCR’s branch office in Kenya)

While the narrative told in this document is one of progress, the document does not tell the full story. Besides stating that several scholarships for secondary education were secured, there is no information on secondary education in Kakuma, even though some of the greatest challenges have been found within secondary schools. In contrast to the high pass rate of the KCPE,  between 1-8% of students recieved a C+ on the Kenyan Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE), the examination that substantially determines access to higher education, between 2014 and 2019. This figure was well below the Kenyan national average of 18% in 2019, and a C+ is often the minimum barrier to enter into higher education.³⁵Elimisha Kakuma-Virginia Tech Research Group, “Barriers to Education,” 5; Gladys Mokeira Obiero, “KCSE 2019 Performance Analysis and Statistics,” Tuko.co.ke – Kenya news., December 19, 2019, https://www.tuko.co.ke/330725-kcse-2019-performance-analysis-statistics.html. For secondary school enrollment, 6% of secondary school-aged children were enrolled in camp schools, well below the national average of 47.8%. Overall, 39% of refugee children were enrolled in camp schools compared to a national average of 63.3% of Kenyan children. Since the number of students enrolled in secondary school was much lower than the national average, the total number of Kakuma students receiving a C+ on the KCSE was much lower than the national number. Additionally, only 24% of refugees enrolled in secondary school were girls or women.³⁶“UNHCR Kakuma Education Dashboard – May 2017,” UNHCR Operational Data Portal (ODP), accessed November 27, 2024, https://data.unhcr.org/en/documents/details/58493. 

Despite only focusing on test-taking success, the briefing kit seems to tell a balanced story. It mentions remaining needs for education, such as insufficient number of teachers, overcrowded classrooms, and diminished educational quality due to a growth in recent school enrollment without comparable investment. However, the document gives no data on how bad the situation was, even though it exists. In primary schools, the average student-teacher ratio was 1:96 in 2017, with some classes having over 200 students. Additionally, while the report implies that these issues have been caused by greater enrollment, the reality is that over-crowdedness, along with shortages in  textbooks, benches, desks, and other supplies, have been a long-standing issue in schools.³⁷Elimisha Kakuma-Virginia Tech Research Group, “Barriers to Education,” 15.

It would be mistaken to assert that the reason for this self-aggrandizement is the same as it was for colonial education. The UNHCR depends on funding and support from partners much more than missionaries in Kenya, and thus is motivated to display a strong public image. But this does not change the fact that problematic self-aggrandizement exists or excuse the UNHCR for not including a more nuanced picture of the challenges Kakuma faced. 

Paternalism

Paternalism in Colonial Education

In colonial education, paternalism dominated efforts to improve education. This could be seen in part through who reported on colonial education. Despite the Phelps-Stokes Commission claiming that Africans could be the guides of their own people, this would not be reflected in the the commission’s actions. Historian Edward Berman wrote that when the commission created the report, “[t]he Africans had hardly been consulted. [Thomas] Jones did not reckon their opinion mattered, a conviction with which the colonial government concurred.”³⁸Berman, “American Influence,” 137. In the end, the report was created solely by Europeans. Similarly, Lord Hailey justified his recommendations by claiming these actions were in the best interest of Africans, a paternalistic assumption made by him and his (white) research team. Of the over 1800 pages of research Hailey and his team conducted, there was no survey of African opinion on colonial education. At no point in the report were Africans consulted, whether on the descriptive assessment of African education or the subsequent recommendations. 

Whatever degree of local autonomy African authorities had was minimized after the Beecher Committee’s report on Kenyan education. Following heightened desires for self-determination following World War II, the report called for Kenyan education to be more centrally controlled by the colonial government, with the British positioned as the experts on African education. All of the report’s policies were imposed onto Kenyans, which were meant to secure a “controlled, balanced development” of the commission’s objectives.³⁹Beecher, African Education, 55. The report called for stronger moral education based on Christian principles and vocational education to appease dissatisfied Kenyan employers on receiving unprepared graduates. The committee also suggested appointing an assistant director of education, more efficient inspections of Kenyan education, and stronger preliminary training for new staff.⁴⁰Beecher, African Education, 1, 58-59. All of this contained familiar paternalistic and ethnocentric qualities that plagued colonial education; namely that improved education for Kenyans had to be determined by British colonists.

Paternalism in Contemporary Refugee Education

In a similar vein, paternalistic dynamics also exist within the Kakuma Refugee Camp’s education system. However, unlike the colonized Africans,refugees have been involved in their own education in Kakuma. Monaghan wrote that 

Refugees in both camps have also made incremental changes; while not critical [decisions], over time these changes have been decisive in shaping Dadaab and Kakuma’s education programs. First, the strikes teachers have organized in both camps, with support from [local organizations], have led to increases in teachers’ incentive wages… Many refugees have taken their education from Dadaab and Kakuma’s camp schools and returned to those same schools as teachers — substantially improving the equality of instruction, which in turn has helped to increase passage rates on the KCPE and KCSE. Refugees’ role in determining, shaping, maintaining, and improving teaching and learning in Dadaab and Kakuma suggests that UNHCR and its implementing partners have effectively partnered with refugees to deliver education programming, although they seldom acknowledge this partnership as such.⁴¹Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 107-108.

As such, refugee education was not developed completely paternalistically in Kakuma. However, while Monaghan claims that the UNHCR has effectively partnered with refugees, researcher and refugee Gerawork Teferra disagrees. While community-based programs have been attempted within the camp, Teferra writes that these programs are often unsuccessful due to the lack of support they receive, saying,

As a person who has been facilitating business and community development training, I have observed many community-based adult education centres and tutorial classes that provide literacy, numeracy, and language training. Different youth groups, associations, individual alumni, youth leaders, etc. from the refugee community have been part of such initiatives. But with exception of a few, the lifespans of these initiatives have been short. The common problems they face include registration, curriculum development, management, and constraints related to teaching equipment and materials. Though the [UNHCR’s] policy allows and encourages such community-based education, a lack of sustained support makes it difficult for quality programs to take root.⁴²Teferra, “Fostering Education Services,” 68.

The root of these problems can perhaps be found in the attitudes officials take toward refugees. Monaghan cites a problematic experience that refugees had while interacting with an official from CARE, an NGO that partners with the UNHCR in helping with refugee education in Dadaab, another refugee camp in Kenya. The CARE worker said in a meeting with refugee teachers, “I hear you so called teachers think you deserve higher pay.” This dismissive attitude led to a strike by refugee teachers who felt belittled by the worker’s statement, especially since refugee teachers were and still are paid “incentive wages” that are well below the salary of Kenyan teachers.⁴³Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 73-74.

Broader aspects of Kakuma’s education have also treated refugees as if they were passive and incapable subjects. Teferra writes that refugees see the purpose of education as a way to better life prospects and help form students’ identity while they find their place in the world.⁴⁴Teferra, “Fostering Education Services,” 52. However, he also notes that this goal starkly differs with the goals outside humanitarians have for refugee education. The UNHCR focuses solely on the quantity of education (measuring number of students enrolled) rather than the quality of education (such as the refugees’ ability to access post-graduation opportunities). Teferra recounts an experience he had with an education officer where this view was laid out, saying, 

When I was complaining, as usual, about the poor quality of education offered to refugee students, [the education officer] said, ‘Camp education is for protection.’ I asked him for an explanation about what ‘education for protection’ means. He briskly said, ‘protecting them from predators.’⁴⁵Teferra, “Fostering Education Services,” 68.

This education officer reflects the point of view that sees education for refugees as a way to keep children out of trouble, rather than a means for them to better themselves, a viewpoint that echoes the earlier paternalistic qualities of colonial education for Africans. The denial of incorporating or centering the perspectives of refugees aligns with one Kakuma resident who remarked, “It’s just in some people’s DNA that white people are here [in Kakuma] to solve problems.”⁴⁶Neil Bilotta, “A Critical Self-Reflexive Account of a Privileged Researcher in a Complicated Setting: Kakuma Refugee Camp,” Research Ethics 17, no. 4 (October 1, 2021): 443, https://doi.org/10.1177/17470161211037386. Just as British colonial authorities sought to solve the problem of Africans uncivilization, so are humanitarian organizations trying to solve the perceived problem of the refugees.

There is also reason to believe the UNHCR attitude towards criticism is dismissive. Crisp says that he found that the UNHCR, “finds it difficult to cope with situations in which refugees speak up for themselves and criticize the organization that claims to represent their interests.” He further argues that the UNHCR views criticism as dismissal of the work that the organization does or a lack of understanding of the situation, neither of which are true for refugees who live in the reality of the camp and its education.⁴⁷Crisp, “Protected?”

As such, a key change between the development episteme in past colonial education and contemporary refugee education is the basis on which paternalistic knowledge is touted. Under the UNHCR, knowledge about development seems to be generated solely through appeals for technical expertise, as opposed to appeals to universal Christian principles or the white man’s burden of the colonial authorities. Crisp in another piece also calls for refugees to receive greater dignity and for the UNHCR to be more humble, writing that the UNHCR should, 

Be more transparent about its limitations… moderate the relentless self-promotion of its branding and marketing campaign and give greater recognition to the efforts that refugees are making to improve their own lives. In that respect, UNHCR’s favourite hashtag, ‘We Stand #WithRefugees,’ could usefully be changed to ‘Refugees Are #StandingUpForThemselves.’⁴⁸Jeff Crisp, “As the World Abandons Refugees, UNHCR’s Constraints Are Exposed,” The New Humanitarian, September 13, 2018, https://deeply.thenewhumanitarian.org/refugees/community/2018/09/13/as-the-world-abandons-refugees-unhcrs-constraints-are-exposed.html.

A degree of paternalism can also be found in the UNHCR’s reports regarding education strategy. As mentioned, the UNHCR had voluntary guidelines for refugee education since Kakuma was founded in 1992, which would starting in 2007 be replaced by more organized, coordinated strategy documents that more prescriptively determined the trajectory for refugee education. The UNHCR’s 2007 Strategy report had lofty ambitions towards goals like universal access to primary education and safe learning environments to all, with the agency stating that it will work with virtually every potential partner except refugees themselves. Specifically, the report said,

To meet these objectives, UNHCR will be working in particular with the support and close collaboration of key partners, notably Ministries of Education, UN agencies, international NGOs and the donor community. The achievement of the objectives will also be supported within UNHCR, in close collaboration with the Regional Bureaux, other sectors within the Technical Support Section, the Community Development, Gender Equality and Children Section, the HIV/AIDS Section, Peace Building, Livelihood and Partnerships Section, PSFR and DER.⁴⁹UNHCR, “UNHCR Education Strategy 2007-2009: Policy, Challenges, and Objectives” (Geneva: UNHCR Division of Operational Services, June 2007), 19.

Throughout the UNHCR’s reports on education strategy, there were few mentions of incorporating community-based approaches. One goal in the 2007 report was to train staff on community-based approaches to education and to promote community-based monitoring and evaluation of education activities.⁵⁰UNHCR, “UNHCR Education Strategy 2007-2009,” 23, 26. In a 2009 report, participatory assessment, where all relevant stakeholders are involved in evaluating a policy, was called for to ensure that all students regardless of age, gender, and diversity were included in school. Additionally, out of several education initiatives the UNHCR listed, one initiative called for projects to be funded if there was a community based approach.⁵¹UNHCR, “UNHCR Education Strategy 2010-2012” (Geneva: UNHCR Operation Solutions and Transition Section, September 2009), 7, 42, https://www.unhcr.org/ro/wp-content/uploads/sites/23/2016/12/UNHCR_Education_Strategy_2010-12.pdf. In 2012, the UNHCR advocated for community-based early childhood education, as well as community-based workshops for creating teacher codes of conduct.⁵²UNHCR, “UNHCR Education Strategy 2012-2016” (Geneva: UNHCR Division of International Protection, January 2012), 15, 25 https://www.unhcr.org/sites/default/files/legacy-pdf/5149ba349.pdf. In its 2019 report, it proclaimed the need to have community-based structures to address mental health needs of displaced communities, as well as praised a program that had refugee youth lead the design of innovative community learning centers.⁵³UNHCR, “Refugee Education 2030: A Strategy for Refugee Inclusion” (Geneva: UNHCR, 2019), 48, 31. 

Yet even with these mentions, it is unclear how strongly they were prioritized and successfully implemented in Kakuma. And even with community-based approaches to administering education, the UNHCR still was paternalistic. In its 2019 strategy report, the UNHCR stated, “Communities play an important role in this process by identifying local solutions and approaches for ensuring participation, especially of female students and learners with disabilities, and by providing community-based learning support.”⁵⁴UNHCR,  “Refugee Education 2030,” 24. Despite these claims, the UNHCR does not listen to refugees when they identify local problems, such as the low incentive wages of refugee teachers, which can lead to unhappiness among workers.⁵⁵Elimisha Kakuma-Virginia Tech Research Group, “Barriers to Education,” 64 In Kakuma, various teacher strikes were conducted to fight for higher pay, such as one in late 2002 that led to schools closing for two weeks and an increase in pay. As such, while the UNHCR ostensibly supports some measure of community-involvement, there is an absence of refugee voices the important the question, and refugees must fight to have their opinions listened to.

Refugee Involvement

In spite of the challenges that refugee education faces in Kakuma, many refugees in the camp still persevere to get an education, and, with it, the hope for a dignified future for themselves and their families. Far from being passive subjects, refugees in Kakuma have been active in improving their own condition and helping their community. This has included projects to start community-led education projects, refugee teachers pushing for higher wages, and refugees publishing formal research on challenges to the camp’s education.⁵⁶Rich Mathieson, “The Refugee Who Refused to Be an Untold Story,” Virginia Tech News, November 7, 2024, https://news.vt.edu/content/news_vt_edu/en/articles/2024/11/outreach-iew-mary-maker.html; Monaghan, Educating for Durable Solutions, 62, 64. As such, the negative aspects of the current development episteme in Kakuma can be counteracted partly through greater refugee involvement.

The expertise of refugees seems to be an asset in general, with researchers finding benefits to incorporating greater refugee leadership into education. One study found that in the Dadaab refugee camp, in Kenya, refugee-led schools that receive direct support, as opposed to intermediary INGOs, can result in higher quality education and better exam scores due to stronger student voice, greater oversight, and more direct parental accountability.⁵⁷Hassan Aden, “Localised Refugee Education: Understanding Nationally Accredited Refugee-Led Schools in Kenya’s Dadaab Camps,” Journal of Eastern African Studies 18, no. 3 (July 2, 2024): 398-401, https://doi.org/10.1080/17531055.2024.2377425. Studies mention the importance of the agency that refugees have, the expertise they possess in their communities, and their passion for education that makes them uniquely qualified to speak on this subject.

After narrating her extremely tumultuous childhood filled with violent war and oppressive sexism, South Sudanese refugee Mary Maker explained in a 2018 TED Talk what education meant to her while teaching in a Kakuma school:

As a teacher, I see my classroom as a laboratory that not only generates skills and knowledge but also understanding and hope. Let’s take a tree. A tree may have its branches cut, but give it water, and it will grow new branches. For the child of war, an education can turn their tears of loss into a passion for peace. And for that reason, I refuse to give up on a single student in my class.⁵⁸Mary Maker, “Mary Maker: Why I Fight for the Education of Refugee Girls (like Me) | TED Talk,” accessed November 28, 2024, https://www.ted.com/talks/mary_maker_why_i_fight_for_the_education_of_refugee_girls_like_me.

In 2021, Maker would go on to start Elimisha Kakuma with two other Kakuma refugees, a nonprofit dedicated to providing access to higher education to refugees in the camp. The organization has seen much success, notably getting over 30 refugees into universities in the United States, Europe, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Latin America with full financial aid. After gaining acceptance to universities with the help of this program, these former refugees have returned to help educate others in Kakuma. One would start the Kakuma Empowerment Program, which mentors 500 kids in Kakuma on matters related to higher education. Another would return to the camp in the summer of 2024 to start a coding boot camp. Refugee students from Elimisha Kakuma would also partner with Virginia Tech students to formally research barriers to education in Kakuma, which, according to Maker, culminated in a technical report that is helping drive systemic change.⁵⁹Mathieson, “The Refugee Who.”

Another example of refugee action would be Gerawork Teferra, a refugee who, after being a teacher for nine years and being trained in qualitative research, was able to research and publish his own narrative of refugee education in Kakuma. In his writing, he discussed the evolution of schooling over time, the issues that Kakuma schools and UNHCR policy face, and concrete recommendations for moving forward. He argues that education must now emphasize delivering quality education to refugees through providing measures, such as more classroom supplies and better prepared teachers who receive fair compensation for their work, instead of attempting to reach all children in the camp, something which would grant greater autonomy to refugees.

Conclusion

UNHCR experts must continue to play a major role in refugee education because of the technical complexity of effective humanitarian efforts. Yet taking a historical perspective on humanitarian efforts can lead us to focus on more relevant issues than is traditionally seen. Monaghan writes that the educational history of Kakuma and Dadaab can shed light on the myriad challenges these places face, but root causes are more evident when history is placed in the broader context. For that reason, it is important to let refugees be more involved, for their intimate understanding of what is needed. They know what their community’s challenges are, what education means to their community, and are passionate about securing high quality education for their communities. They hold a visceral understanding of what the value of literacy, numeracy, and other competencies are to refugees, and have in the past demonstrated that they can tell the stories of their communities and develop creative responses to their challenges. It is on the rest of the world to honor their unique perspective and expertise, and to decenter themselves from the development mission.

The author has no competing interests to declare.

Acknowledgements

I would like to express my deep gratitude to Brett Shadle for helping me with this article, including the help on finding relevant sources and providing feedback on the first draft. Additionally, I am grateful for being a student in an independent study course on the history of humanitarianism and development in Africa, of which this paper was the culminating project of. The learning I engaged in throughout the course and this project has significantly changed how I view African history, humanitarianism and development, global citizenship, Global North-Global South relations, and my philosophy as an educator, which I am grateful for.

Supplementary Files

Figure 1: Education Section of 2019 UNHCR Briefing Kit for Kakuma Refugee Camp

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