Humanitarian crises are increasingly complex and affecting more people over longer periods of time. In 2021, 248.5 million people in 56 countries faced hunger, conflict, displacement, climate impacts, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Education is important in fragile contexts as it provides normalization, protection, social support, skills, and hope. Coordination of education responses is needed to empower communities and ensure children's access to opportunities, but power dynamics must be addressed to avoid harming already vulnerable populations and enable their meaningful participation.

1. Power Dynamics and Accountability to Affected Population

2. Humanitarian crises are becoming MORE FREQUENT AND MORE COMPLEX, affecting more people,
especially in so-called fragile states, and lasting longer (Wilkinson & Peters, 2015).
Global Humanitarian Overview 2021 - there are 248.5 million most vulnerable people facing hunger,
conflict, displacement, the impacts of climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic in 56 COUNTRIES.

5. Education is an important factor in fragile contexts:
- place of normalization, a protective place from trauma, from kidnapping, from forced labor;
- complementary to other sectors where health (vaccination), food, access to water and sanitation, and
even protection as a sector can be assured.
- place of encounters, socialization, and support among peers and professionals;
- hope and skills (including literacy and numeracy) so that the child can grow up and face problems and
life in security;
- teachers are the largest mass of civilians who "seek" peace or have not yet joined the battle fronts, so it is
also valuable not to abandon them.

6. Message from
Affected population
Coordination in EiE Power Dynamics
and the need for
community
empowerment
Actual situation and
findings from my
research

7. Aysha Touma, a representative of Yasaminat Syria,
says:
"my overriding wish is that humanitarian aid will
always affect me, and the entire displaced
population positively and not have a negative
impact on our lives already disrupted by the
crisis"
in, Humanitarian Accountability: Are we making aid
work better for people affected by crises? 2020

8. The coordination in an emergency setting can help to make
sense of the humanitarian aid, informing decisions,
supporting with capacity building and helping to connect the
dots.
Coordinating Education, is coordinate one of the most
powerful systems that can allow children to have
opportunities in the future.
How can we coordinate the Education Cluster in a more
powerful way? Where children can benefit the most and the
better from it?

9. Bringing together humanitarian actors to ensure a coherent
and principled education response to emergencies and
assist people when they are most in need of relief and
protection. (ODI)
When a country needs support in coordination, the
Education Cluster can be activated.

11. Power dynamics set the tone at
almost every level of human
interaction.
They influence decisions to speak up,
shape an organization’s approach,
and even guide the ways in which a
government treats its citizens, and
enforces reforms. (World Bank, 2014)
DYNAMICS
POWER

12. In Humanitarian settings, not listening actively to
the affected population can lead to
misunderstood, wrong prioritization and even DO
HARM!
So...
Do no harm principle
Conflict sensitive Education approach
Gran Bargain guidelines
Core Humanitarian Standard on Quality and
Accountability

13. In the practice:
Accountability to Affected Population
Conflict sensitive Education programming
Localization
Child Safeguarding and Child Participation
Child Protection

14. Coordination is a complex role in a complex system that act in complex context;
It's hard to find and justify funding for coordination. The situation is changing, but
in some countries, this still is a reality;
Coordinators in country have a lot of tasks and work, and Accountability to
Affected Population is not always the priority and not always effective;
The Civil Society and local organizations, as cluster members, still have very
little power, fund and presence in the decisions-making processes.