Education and Fragility

Threats posed by fragility have increasingly been considered as barriers to development and are now a high priority for international policy-makers. The definition of fragility used by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)–Development Assistance Committee (DAC) Fragile States Group emphasizes the lack of capacity and willingness of a government to perform key state functions for the benefit of all. The effects of fragility stretch beyond poor services to include conflict, state collapse, loss of territorial control, extreme political instability, clientelist policies and repression or denial of resources to subgroups of the population. The level of state capacity and will is categorized by the following phases of fragility: arrested development, deterioration, post-conflict transition, and early recovery. Organized violence, corruption, poverty, exclusion, and poor governance are all common conditions and indicators of fragility.

INEE Working Group on Education and Fragility

In early 2008, a Working Group on Education and Fragility was established within INEE, as an inter-agency mechanism to coordinate diverse initiatives and catalyze collaborative action on education and fragility. The Working Group’s goals are to:

  • Strengthen consensus on what works to mitigate fragility through education while ensuring equitable access for all.
  • Support the development of effective quality education programmes in fragile contexts.
  • Promote the development of alternative mechanisms to support education in fragile contexts in the transition from humanitarian to development assistance.


Please click here to learn more about the about the Working Group on Education and Fragility.

Please click here to download the presentation on the Working Group on Education and Fragility.

The Working Group on Education and Fragility is continuing to support research and policy related to understanding education’s role in conflict and fragility and to advocating for its wide recognition and consideration with the aim to ensure that education, at a minimum, does no harm and, at its best, contributes to conflict prevention and long-term peacebuilding. As part of this research and advocacy efforts, the INEE Working Group has produced a paper entitled “The multiple faces of education in conflict-affected and fragile contexts”, as contribution to the EFA Global Monitoring Report.

Please click here to read more about “The multiple faces of education in conflict-affected and fragile contexts”.

Key Background Documents and Resources


Announcements

The next biannual meeting of the Working Group on Education and Fragility will take place during the first week of October 2010 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, hosted by UNICEF.