tag:theconversation.com,2011:/africa/topics/malala-yousafzai-12848/articlesMalala Yousafzai – The Conversation2022-11-07T10:07:57Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1926902022-11-07T10:07:57Z2022-11-07T10:07:57ZGirls are held up as figureheads of political change, but they don’t want to do it alone<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/493233/original/file-20221103-12-dw19ne.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C8179%2C5457&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/teenage-girl-holding-megaphone-while-marching-2208012943">Jacob Lund/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Girls are at the centre of global movements for indigenous rights, climate justice, gender equality and civil rights. Educational activist <a href="https://www.unicefusa.org/press/releases/malala-yousafzai-they-thought-bullet-would-silence-us-they-failed/8266">Malala Yousafzai</a> was awarded the Nobel peace prize at 17. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-49918719">Greta Thunberg</a> has inspired millions of her peers to campaign for climate action: she began a series of school strikes when she was 15. <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-63143504">Iranian</a> and <a href="https://www.diplomaticourier.com/posts/afghanistans-girls-and-women-fight-back">Afghan</a> girls are taking to the streets to demand their rights to an education and basic freedoms.</p>
<p>But our understanding of girls’ involvement in politics is still limited, and their opportunities to participate are all too often tokenistic.</p>
<p>Girls have historically been excluded from most political institutions and movements because of both their age and their gender. While all children and young people are excluded from voting in elections and standing for government, girls and young women have to deal with the additional barrier that politics is still seen by many as a “<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/2041905818779324?journalCode=plia">man’s game</a>”. </p>
<p>Around the world, women still make up <a href="https://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/leadership-and-political-participation/facts-and-figures">just 21%</a> of government ministers and 26% of parliamentarians. Perhaps that is why research shows that girls and young women who are already involved in community organising and activism are <a href="https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/soc4.12135">reluctant to describe themselves</a> as “political”. </p>
<p>But girls are leading political change – whether on the world stage or in their own communities. In research with girls across nine different countries, my co-authors and I found that girls are taking part in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14616742.2021.1996258">everyday acts of resistance</a>, winning a bit more freedom for themselves and their friends as they navigate their way through childhood. </p>
<h2>Girls lead movements</h2>
<p>Girls push back against inequalities in their communities, challenge unfair rules that stop them from doing everything their male peers are able to and demand fairer treatment from parents and elders. </p>
<p>They set up girls’ rights or feminist clubs <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13552074.2018.1523287">in schools</a> and take action on issues they care about, even though they often experience stigma for doing so. And, of course, girls take part in, or even lead, <a href="https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2020/10/compilation-girls-to-know">global political movements</a>.</p>
<p>One <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-019-0463-3">2019 study</a> found that daughters were particularly good at convincing their parents of the evidence that our climate is changing as a result of human activity. The increase in climate concern was most dramatic among fathers and conservative parents. So, we know that girls are not just politically active, but that they are also effective political communicators.</p>
<p>But UK media coverage of girls’ activism still often misses the mark. I analysed UK media representations of Malala Yousafzai in the aftermath of her shooting by the Pakistani Taliban. I found that she was often portrayed <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1369148116631274">as younger than she was</a> and as a helpless victim of forces beyond her control. </p>
<p>Despite the fact that Yousafzai had been campaigning and blogging for some time, speaking out even after threats to her life, almost nine times out of ten, the newspapers in this study quoted somebody else’s words in explaining her story and its significance.</p>
<h2>Help – not hope</h2>
<p>While there is also plenty of positive media coverage of girl activists, it often risks presenting the issues they are campaigning on <a href="https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/girlhood-studies/13/2/ghs130203.xml">as already solved</a>. Greta Thunberg is calling for adults to urgently address climate change, but media coverage of her activism can adopt a reassuring tone, focusing on <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/50746982">Thunberg herself</a> and her amazing qualities, or her ability to inspire millions of other youth activists <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-wales-49840883">like her</a>. </p>
<p>As she raises the alarm about the need for urgent action, many adults see her as evidence that everything is going to be OK. As Thunberg said in a <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/09/23/763452863/transcript-greta-thunbergs-speech-at-the-u-n-climate-action-summit">2019 appearance</a> at the UN: “You all come to us young people for hope? How dare you?”</p>
<p>For more than two decades now, we’ve seen international institutions, governments, NGOs and transnational corporations embrace the idea of girl power. Everyone from <a href="https://www.global.girleffect.org/who-we-are/our-story/">Nike</a> to <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/adolescent-girls-initiative">the World Bank</a> has been keen to tell us of the importance of investing in girls, so that they can fulfil their spectacular potential. </p>
<p>The narrative goes that if you educate and empower a girl, she will go on to use that education for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgVwm8sl4os">the better of humanity</a>. Girls, we are told, will save the world.</p>
<p>But girls don’t want to save the world all by themselves. Nor should they have to. The issues they care most about are not problems of their making. </p>
<p>Girls need more meaningful opportunities to participate in decision-making, and they need adults to resist the temptation to feel reassured that young people have got the most important issues under control. They need support in their <a href="https://www.mamacash.org/en/report-girls-to-the-front">efforts at organising</a>, because they still face so many barriers in terms of funds and platforms to speak from. </p>
<p>As has been shown in Iran and Afghanistan in recent weeks, girls are phenomenally brave in standing up to the injustices they face. But they shouldn’t have to do it alone.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/192690/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rosie Walters receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. She is a member of the Women's Equality Party and an academic advisor to Plan International.</span></em></p>Girls are leading activist movements across the world, but don’t see themselves as political.Rosie Walters, Lecturer in International Relations, Cardiff UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1560922021-03-07T14:36:24Z2021-03-07T14:36:24ZStop telling girls to smile — it pressures them to accept the unjust status quo<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388104/original/file-20210305-19-12d6kla.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=25%2C0%2C8456%2C5646&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Global movements for social change are being led by girls, who are the most affected by environmental, labour and social justice issues.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Girls are constantly told to smile, from T-shirts sold in stores that say “<a href="https://www.walmart.com/ip/Everyone-Loves-a-Happy-Girl-YOUTH-SHORT-SLEEVE-TEE/119028349">everyone loves a happy girl</a>” to the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/02/19/807407891/artist-tatyana-fazlalizadeh-wants-you-to-stop-telling-women-to-smile">catcallers telling young women to smile when they walk down the street</a>. </p>
<p>Audrey Hepburn once famously stated that “<a href="https://www.momtastic.com/parenting/parenting-in-the-news/575251-happy-girls-are-the-prettiest/">happy girls are the prettiest girls</a>” — now this quote is reiterated in the post-feminist marketplace on T-shirts, pillow cases and stationery.</p>
<p>Perhaps the most public callout to a girl to smile was Donald Trump’s caustically sarcastic tweet that climate activist Greta Thunberg “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/sep/24/she-seems-very-happy-trump-appears-to-mock-greta-thunbergs-emotional-speech">seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!</a>”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-end-of-the-trump-years-means-for-american-and-global-girlhood-154227">What the end of the Trump years means for American and global girlhood</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But lift up the hood of this pressure to be perceived as carefree and happy and look underneath: something much more disturbing is revealed.</p>
<p>I have been studying the experiences of girls, particularly tweens aged eight to 12, with regards to consumer culture for the past 15 years. The pressure on girls to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1469540518806954">be fun, happy and smiling</a> reveals much about the cultural expectations projected onto girls and girlhood.</p>
<h2>Perpetual fun?</h2>
<p>This constant expectation of girls to be always smiling depoliticizes girls and positions them as compliant in their own subjugation. “Fun” acts as a distraction from deeper political issues, discouraging girls from considering the exploitation and violence that girls worldwide face.</p>
<p>Directing their attention to the myriad social and political issues facing girls, like the <a href="https://plan-international.org/emergencies/effects-of-climate-change-girls-rights">climate crisis</a> or <a href="https://www.mmiwg-ffada.ca/">missing and murdered Indigenous girls and women</a>, would upset the happiness and fun of girlhood.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Young girls lead a MMIWG march" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388101/original/file-20210305-13-fmuty4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Young girls walk together during the annual Women’s Memorial March in Vancouver on Feb. 14, 2021. The march is held to honour missing and murdered women and girls from the community with stops along the way to commemorate where women were last seen or found.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Feminist scholar Sara Ahmed writes that <a href="https://socialtextjournal.org/the-promise-of-happiness/">happiness is promised to those who commit to living their life in an unchallenging way that does not upset the status quo</a>. To challenge the status quo by drawing attention to these issues disrupts the fantasy.</p>
<p>If everyone loves a happy girl, as the T-shirt says, then unhappy girls are unlovable: it’s a clear warning to girls to maintain happiness or else face being “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1367549417733003">psychologically and aesthetically unappealing</a>.”</p>
<p>Fun can be had with others, but at its root is an individual endeavour to be responsible for one’s own fun. The <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/dont-tell-me-to-smile-more-provocative-proclamation-for-women-to-reclaim-ownership-of-their-smile-launched-by-undnyable-300884702.html">call to smile</a> is not an invitation to celebrate the resolution of the misogynistic and patriarchal structures that are often at the root of unhappiness.</p>
<p>Happiness and fun are forms of <a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2019/03/08/author-interview-qa-with-sarah-banet-weiser-on-empowered-popular-feminism-and-popular-misogyny/">popular feminism</a> that frame gender equality as individual empowerment eclipsing a feminist structural critique. Unhappiness deviates from the <a href="https://soundcloud.com/toprankpodcast/episode-18-commodity-feminism">post-feminist script</a> in which women — who are responsible for their own happiness and emancipation — need to think positively and be inspired to make change. The emphasis is on individual actions over collective consciousness. </p>
<p>These moral demands for happiness and fun <a href="https://2019.steirischerherbst.at/de/vorherbst/1377/the-happiness-imperative">undermine citizenship and commitments to community</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A girl holds a cardboard sign with a picture of George Floyd and text reading I CANT BREATHE" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=737&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=927&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=927&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/388102/original/file-20210305-17-1w5qsje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=927&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A girl at a protest in Washington, D.C., holds a sign featuring George Floyd.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Obi Onyeador/Unsplash)</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Girls’ leadership</h2>
<p>The call to happiness and fun lets patriarchal structures and institutions off the hook for the injustices, unhappiness and pains of girls worldwide, and posits the responsibility for their own happiness on girls’ shoulders. But girls are no longer complying, including Greta Thunberg, who brilliantly turned Trump’s own words back on him.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1351890941087522820"}"></div></p>
<p><a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/greta-thunberg-trump-tweet-happy-old-man-b1790085.html">Thunberg’s clapback</a> to Trump flips the script exposing the misogynistic and ageist rhetoric on girls to be happy.</p>
<p>A global youth movement led by girls — like water activists <a href="https://naaee.org/about-us/people/autumn-peltier">Autumn Peltier</a> and <a href="https://www.maricopeny.com/">Mari Copeny</a>, education activist <a href="https://malala.org/malalas-story">Malala Yousufzai</a> and climate activist <a href="https://www.un.org/youthenvoy/vanessa-nakate/">Vanessa Nakate</a> — are countering these narratives. They are fighting <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/01/19/797298179/you-need-to-act-now-meet-4-girls-working-to-save-the-warming-world">against climate change</a> and advocating for social change using a whole and complex range of emotions,including happiness and fun. </p>
<p>Girls are refusing to be dismissed by misogynistic critics who tell them to “smile more.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156092/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Natalie Coulter receives funding from SSHRC.</span></em></p>Telling girls to smile pressures distracts them from the very real, dangerous and sometimes deadly challenges that girls around the world face.Natalie Coulter, Associate Professor of Communication Studies, and Director of the Institute for Research on Digital Literacies, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1542272021-03-02T17:28:58Z2021-03-02T17:28:58ZWhat the end of the Trump years means for American and global girlhood<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387035/original/file-20210301-18-1y4hj2b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3272%2C2384&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Fearless Girl statue stands across from the Charging Bull statue in New York's financial district. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In Kamala Harris’s <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/11/07/kamala-harris-victory-speech-transcript/">rousing victory speech</a> in November 2020, the vice-president-elect of the United States directly addressed the country’s children — but first, she spoke specifically to girls:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“While I may be the first woman in this office, I will not be the last, because every little girl watching tonight sees that this is a country of possibilities.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Many little girls (and boys) probably did watch with rapt attention as the world contemplated the historic significance of Harris’s win as the first woman of Black and South Asian origin to be elected vice-president. Some parents attested to the significance of that moment, and the hope and inspiration that it ushered in.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1325290099194667009"}"></div></p>
<p>Did Harris’s achievement also mark a turning point for girlhood in the U.S. — and the world?</p>
<p>Donald Trump’s presidency was marked by a toxic climate of aggressive hyper-masculinity where women were often insulted, bullied, mocked and harassed. Trump’s comments and tweets <a href="https://theweek.com/articles/655770/61-things-donald-trump-said-about-women">were sometimes rampantly sexist</a>, excused as mere locker-room banter by his followers but found to have “<a href="https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/jlp.19034.sco">dangerously ingrained</a> an ideology of denigration and objectification of women” by one researcher. </p>
<p>The conservative and regressive policy decisions of the Trump administration disproportionately affected women of colour, along with anyone else who did not belong to the <a href="https://ocul-crl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01OCUL_CRL/1vru3a1/cdi_informaworld_taylorfrancis_310_1080_15564886_2019_1671284">white elite heteronormative order.</a> </p>
<p>A <a href="https://ocul-crl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/01OCUL_CRL/1vru3a1/cdi_crossref_primary_10_1080_09589236_2020_1767546">recent quantitative study</a> explored the correlation between the increase in racially motivated hate crimes following Trump’s election and the deterioration of mental health in young college women. <a href="https://theconversation.com/joe-biden-and-kamala-harris-could-transform-american-childhood-150112">Scholars have also pointed out</a> that exclusionary Trump policies like immigration bans and the separation of children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border jeopardized the “children’s safety and well-being” and particularly targeted kids from racialized and marginalized backgrounds.</p>
<h2>Girlhood under siege</h2>
<p>At the crossroads between misogyny and anti-children policies, American girlhood, unsurprisingly, came under siege during the Trump years, threatening to smother the spirit of the Fearless Girl statue facing the Wall Street Bull in New York City’s financial district. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The Fearless Girl statue wearing a pink pussy hat." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387037/original/file-20210301-20-c71mx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=628&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In this March 2017 photo, the statue of the Fearless Girl sports a pink hat, a symbol of opposition to Trump’s presidency.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When it comes to the cultural iconography of girlhood, few can match the confidence, defiance and courage exuded by the Kristen Visbal statue, installed on the eve of International Women’s Day in 2017. </p>
<p>It symbolizes an audacious resilience in girls — in the U.S. and around the world — that could not be suppressed even during Trump’s tenure. </p>
<p>Poet and activist Maya Angelou once wrote how she would “<a href="https://mashable.com/2015/04/07/maya-angelou-stamp-quotes/">love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels</a>.” Throughout Trump’s presidency, girls rose to Angelou’s challenge, mounting sustained challenges to his inequitable and reckless policies — from gender and race issues to immigration and climate change.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Malala Yousafzai" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387028/original/file-20210301-17-1a04boi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Girls activist Malala Yousafzai has been a vocal Trump critic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">UK Department for International Development</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Malala Yousufzai, the young education activist and Nobel laureate from Pakistan, criticized Trump’s discriminatory attitude towards Muslims and called his calls for immigration bans <a href="https://time.com/4151167/malala-donald-trump-muslim-comments/">“tragic” and “full of hate”</a> in 2015, even before he was elected.</p>
<p>She also publicly <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/01/25/malala-has-a-message-for-trump-on-womens-rights/">criticized Trump’s sexism</a> and later <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/12/malala-yousafzai-slams-trump-for-cruel-child-separations">called him out for the cruel, unfair and inhumane separation</a> of more than 2,000 children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.</p>
<h2>Girls against Trump</h2>
<p>Teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg also took on Trump. As she castigated world leaders for lacking the moral fibre to tackle climate change at the World Economic Forum in Davos, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/12/politics/trump-greta-thunberg-time-person-of-the-year/index.html">Trump notoriously accused her</a> of having anger management issues.</p>
<p>The more Trump mocked and derided her, the more Thunberg upped the ante, <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/greta-thunberg-wishes-old-man-trump-a-wonderful-future-1.5274624">valiantly returning fire tweet by tweet until Trump lost the election</a> and she used his own insults against him. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1324439705522524162"}"></div></p>
<p>When the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-quietly-abandons-proposing-ideas-to-curb-gun-violence-after-saying-he-would-following-mass-shootings/2019/10/31/8bca030c-fa6e-11e9-9534-e0dbcc9f5683_story.html">Trump administration reneged</a> on the promise of gun control following mass shootings, a trenchant critique came from the Naomi Wadler, 11 years old at the time. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A girl wearing an orange scarf talks into a microphone." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387032/original/file-20210301-22-1ljutss.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Naomi Wadler, a Virginia elementary school student, speaks during the March for Our Lives rally in support of gun control in Washington, D.C, in March 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>She spoke for all the “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/the-story-behind-11-year-old-naomi-wadler-and-her-march-for-our-lives-speech/2018/03/25/3a6dccdc-3058-11e8-8abc-22a366b72f2d_story.html">African American girls whose stories don’t make the front page of every national newspaper</a>” and her orange scarf is now an artefact at the virtual exhibition called <a href="https://www.girlhoodlive.com/"><em>Girlhood: It’s Complicated</em></a> at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C.</p>
<p>It’s clear that when girls and young women are at the forefront of major movements with their tireless commitment to justice and equity, and as they form a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-56068522">formidable coalition</a> transcending borders and cultures, the old structures of patriarchy and misogyny can be challenged and hopefully dismantled.</p>
<h2>Trump impact</h2>
<p>When Trump won the U.S. election in 2016, an educator offered a strategic toolkit to the parents of girls in the U.S. to <a href="https://time.com/4672017/teach-children-donald-trump/">survive his presidency</a>. In the wake of his re-election bid in 2020, the issue of girlhood had entered the arena of political debate — a video entitled <a href="https://lincolnproject.us/news/mirror/"><em>Girl in the Mirror</em></a>, released by the conservative, anti-Trump Lincoln Project, urged American voters to imagine the impact of another presidential term marked by misogyny and sexism on girls and young women. </p>
<p>Fortunately, the U.S. and the world were spared that outcome. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Amanda Gorman, in a yellow coat, reads a poem at the inauguration." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387062/original/file-20210301-17-1cybycs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">American poet Amanda Gorman reads a poem during the 59th presidential inauguration at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 20, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It was also fitting that the inauguration of President Joe Biden and Vice-President Harris featured the powerful poetry of a talented young woman, <a href="https://theconversation.com/poet-amanda-gormans-take-on-love-as-legacy-points-to-youths-power-to-shape-future-generations-153867">Amanda Gorman, who boldly asserted</a> from the balcony of the U.S. Capitol:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“… Yet the dawn is ours</p>
<p>Before we knew it</p>
<p>Somehow we do it</p>
<p>Somehow we’ve weathered and witnessed
… </p>
<p>The new dawn blooms as we free it</p>
<p>For there is always light,</p>
<p>If only we’re brave enough to see it</p>
<p>If only we’re brave enough to be it.”</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154227/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mayurika Chakravorty received funding from SSHRC. SSHRC Connections Grant, 2019 (co-applicant) Project: Republic of Childhood: Imagining the Future of Children's Rights.</span></em></p>It’s clear that when girls and young women are at the forefront of major social justice movements, the old structures of patriarchy and misogyny can be challenged and hopefully dismantled.Mayurika Chakravorty, Instructor, Department of English and Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies (Childhood and Youth Studies), Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1481782020-10-22T18:59:20Z2020-10-22T18:59:20ZFriday essay: why we need children’s life stories like I Am Greta<p>When a young celebrity writes a memoir or has a biography written about them, a common response is: <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/24/books/review/should-there-be-a-minimum-age-for-writing-a-memoir.html">they are too young</a>. This child or adolescent cannot possibly have lived enough of a life, or have a useful perspective. Their story cannot be instructive enough to be valuable to others. </p>
<p>This point of view reveals the weight of expectation around public life storytelling. We too often dismiss the valuable contribution children make to politics and culture.</p>
<p>This week sees the release of the biographical film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt10394738/">I Am Greta</a>, directed by Nathan Grossman. The film follows Thunberg across 2018 and 2019, as she became known to the world. It reflects a close collaboration between Grossman and Thunberg, and the access he had to her life during this time. </p>
<p>I Am Greta has inevitably raised some eyebrows. Thunberg always does. Critics have suggested that <a href="https://variety.com/2020/film/reviews/i-am-greta-review-hulus-documentary-portrait-of-the-young-eco-warrior-never-quite-gets-to-know-her-1234759896/">we do not get to know the real Greta</a>; Grossman keeps <a href="https://www.filmstories.co.uk/reviews/i-am-greta-review-a-documentary-thats-a-missed-opportunity/">too much distance</a>; he does not adequately delve into Thunberg’s childhood or family to explain <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/tiff/article-tiff-2020-globe-ratings-reviews-toronto-international-film-festival/?film=38">the origins of her activism</a>.</p>
<p>Such critiques reflect a rather narrow perspective on how biographical storytelling works. I Am Greta, like many <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/raut20/32/2">contemporary life stories</a>, does not conform to the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_man_theory#:%7E:text=The%20great%20man%20theory%20is,have%20a%20decisive%20historical%20effect.">great man</a>” model for biography, where history was thought to be understood through the life of men with political or colonial achievements. As new biographical subjects are chosen, so are new ways of telling their stories. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Mwk10YGPFiM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Our leaders have failed us … we will not stop until we are done.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In choosing not to centre on Thunberg’s family and early life, I Am Greta defies genre expectations. The film centres on Thunberg’s voice, illuminating her words and her image at a particular moment in history. The focus is not on who inspired Thunberg to acquire knowledge, but how she — a young activist — developed these interests independently. </p>
<h2>A rich history</h2>
<p>Children and young people have been engaging in life storytelling for centuries. We just haven’t been paying enough attention. As Anna Poletti and I found in <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137551160">our research</a>, there are many examples through history of young women writing politically-engaged autobiography. </p>
<p>Young English housemaid <a href="https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O70506/sampler-parker-elizabeth/">Elizabeth Parker</a> embroidered her life story of cruelty and abuse in a cross-stitch sampler in 1830. This was the only way she could tell it. </p>
<p>Ukrainian-French diarist <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/13916/13916-h/13916-h.htm">Marie Bashkirtseff</a> wrote in her diary every day from age 14 until her death from tuberculosis at 25 in 1884.
Hers was an ambitious social commentary on middle-class life.</p>
<p>Anne Frank’s Holocaust diary was the precursor for <a href="http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com">Riverbend</a> who blogged the Iraq war. Both <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-29565738">Malala Yousafzai</a> in Pakistan and <a href="https://twitter.com/alabedbana?lang=en">Bana Alabed</a> in Syria have been compared to Anne Frank with their diaristic recounts of war. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Photograph of Anne Frank's diary" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=345&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/364660/original/file-20201021-21-lxxje.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=433&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Diary of Anne Frank has let millions into the life of a child during the Holocaust.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When we give attention to young people’s stories, it shows respect for their lives. Children are not just adults-in-waiting: their experiences and voices are significant in themselves and worthy of our attention. </p>
<p>Reading young people’s stories recognises their citizenship and the vital role children play in the political world.</p>
<h2>‘A spokeschild’</h2>
<p>In I Am Greta, we meet Greta on the steps of Swedish parliament, complete with the now famous homemade sign, protesting global warming. She is a lone figure, but not for long. </p>
<p>In this opening scene, Thunberg’s words are juxtaposed with those of adults. We hear the voices of politicians; of adults passing by who ask her what she is doing and why she isn’t in school. These moments signal the film’s focus: the contrast between Thunberg’s voice and those of the adults who condescend or criticise her. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/misogyny-male-rage-and-the-words-men-use-to-describe-greta-thunberg-124347">Misogyny, male rage and the words men use to describe Greta Thunberg</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>I Am Greta asks us to think differently — not just about Thunberg, but about children’s voices more generally. Thunberg’s father, Svante, speculates that due to her photographic memory, Greta likely knows more about climate change than 97% of politicians. Such knowledge is possible. </p>
<p>Those who doubt Thunberg’s authority to speak on these issues most commonly argue because of her age, she <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-49291464">cannot possibly be educated enough</a> on these issues. Other critics suggest she is <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/09/why-greta-wins/598612/">her parents’ puppet</a>. She is often criticised for being an <a href="https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/9/26/20882958/greta-thunberg-climate-change-trump-attacks-right-wing">instrument of left-wing media</a>. </p>
<p>Similar accusations have been made about other young female activists like <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14484528.2017.1328299?journalCode=rlwr20">Yousafzai</a>, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09574042.2019.1676057?journalCode=rwcr20">Emma González</a>, <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1057%2F978-1-137-55117-7">Isadora Faber</a>, and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0950236X.2018.1533493?journalCode=rtpr20">Bana Alabed</a>.</p>
<p>When Yousafzai rose to prominence, critics referred to her as “the darling of Western media”, and “a tool for political propaganda”. Like Thunberg, her activism was assumed to be <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-29568637">advancing her father’s politics and career</a>.</p>
<p>Activists like Yousafzai and Thunberg are symbolic of rebellion, reconciliation and the complex spaces in between. Neither Yousafzai nor Thunberg ever intended their stories to become “master narratives”. Their activism is not an attempt to dilute the experiences or stories of other children, quite the opposite. Both have centred their careers on making connections with other young activists across the globe.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-malala-matters-the-talibans-war-on-women-continues-12947">Why Malala matters: the Taliban's war on women continues</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Young activists find themselves at the coalface of difficult histories and debates. They are writers and public speakers. But they are also children who become a consistent focus for the media. This media is not always kind. </p>
<p>The criticisms levelled at young activists reveal the mixed feelings society has around children’s voices and their capacity to act meaningfully when it comes to social change. Why does it come as such a surprise that children can hold knowledge and perspectives that are culturally and politically valuable? </p>
<p>As Thunberg speculates, international leaders talk a good talk when it comes to being inspired by her. They invite her to their castles and palaces, sites representing the kind of opulence and over-consumption Thunberg denounces. </p>
<p>They profess a commitment to change, but the change never comes. Thunberg understands her position as symbolic of the future, as a “<a href="https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/maize/mpub9739969/1:30/--life-writing-in-the-long-run-a-smith-watson-autobiography?rgn=div1;view=fulltext">spokeschild</a>” who helps leaders improve their own appearance. </p>
<h2>Condescending adults</h2>
<p>I Am Greta shows multiple incidents where powerful adults are condescending, awkward or dismissive of Thunberg. Donald Trump and Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro are amongst the more vehement critics of Thunberg, but there are many others. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KAJsdgTPJpU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Greta Thunberg told world leaders they had stolen her childhood with their empty words at the UN Climate Action Summit last year.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>And there are others again who damn Thunberg with faint praise. The French President Emmanuel Macron, in patronising tone, asks, “You read a lot on climate?” </p>
<p>She meets Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose presence pales in light of Thunberg’s.
She speaks intelligently at length, but Schwarzenegger simply repeats her final statement — “we need to join the dots” — as if lost for words.</p>
<p>Delegates at the 2018 United Nations Climate Change Conference where Thunberg offered a <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/cop24-swedish-teen-activist-tells-world-leaders-they-are-behaving-like-children">powerful oration</a>, seem adolescent in their desire to take selfies with Thunberg. There is nothing subtle in the film’s approach to this role reversal.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-will-never-forgive-you-youth-is-not-wasted-on-the-young-who-fight-for-climate-justice-123985">'We will never forgive you': youth is not wasted on the young who fight for climate justice</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Thunberg convincingly argues she has little choice but to speak publicly. She equips herself with sophisticated knowledge and trusts science. </p>
<p>She speaks readily about climate change because leaders do not. </p>
<h2>An early telling</h2>
<p>In I Am Greta, handheld camera shots bring us intimately into Thunberg’s life. We see her alone, reflecting; starting small, thinking big. </p>
<p>Being in the public eye triggers her anxiety, but so did her knowledge of climate change — when she first learnt of the enormous problems the world was facing, she could not eat, sleep, and would not even talk.</p>
<p>We see her sensitivity and quirky vulnerability. Thunberg argues that being on the autism spectrum allows her to “see through the static” and acquire deep knowledge quickly and astutely. </p>
<p>Perhaps it is confronting for some to imagine it is a young, <a href="https://www.education.sa.gov.au/supporting-students/health-e-safety-and-wellbeing/health-support-planning/managing-health-education-and-care/neurodiversity">neurodiverse</a> woman who can show us the way to a better future. </p>
<p>I Am Greta represents an early version of Thunberg’s life story. Thunberg herself has readily circulated parts of her story through <a href="https://twitter.com/GretaThunberg">social media</a>. There have been a plethora of <a href="https://www.booktopia.com.au/greta-thunberg-i-know-this-to-be-true--geoff-blackwell/book/9781922351012.html">literary</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49918719">media representations</a> of her. There is a <a href="https://www.amazon.com.au/Greta-Thunberg-Isabel-Sanchez-Vegara/dp/0711256454">biographical picture book</a>. There will be more to come. This is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14484528.2017.1328299?journalCode=rlwr20">not unusual</a> now. </p>
<p>I am Greta reveals how young people’s stories and perspectives might be received generously and potently to promote change. </p>
<p><em>I Am Greta is in cinemas now and will stream on <a href="https://www.docplay.com/">DocPlay</a> from November 14.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/148178/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Douglas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new Greta Thunberg biopic has drawn criticism from those who don’t see the value in the stories of young lives. But children’s voices matter — and Thunberg’s is potent.Kate Douglas, Professor, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1056432018-12-04T22:20:46Z2018-12-04T22:20:46ZAhed and Malala: Why we revere some girl activists and not others<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248175/original/file-20181130-194944-1kmhzku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Ahed Tamimi is in a courtroom at the Ofer military prison near Jerusalem, Feb. 13, 2018. The Israeli military judge overseeing the trial of Palestinian teenager Tamimi ordered all proceedings to take place behind closed doors.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>After <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-behind-ahed-tamimi-s-slap-her-cousin-s-head-shattered-by-idf-bullet-1.5729500">Israeli forces shot her 15-year-old cousin in the head with a rubber bullet</a> last December, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/30/ahed-tamimi-i-am-a-freedom-fighter-i-will-not-be-the-victim-palestinian-israel">Ahed Tamimi</a>, a Palestinian girl from Nabi Saleh in the West Bank, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/01/ahed-tamimi-palestinian-girl-filmed-slapping-israeli-soldier-is-charged-with-assault">stood up to the occupying Israeli forces</a> and was arrested and charged for slapping a soldier. The story of the activist <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_4mfmce49o&feature=youtu.be">went viral</a>.</p>
<p>But what Ahed was fighting for was largely buried beneath sensationalized media representations of her. </p>
<p>Her story is unlikely to circulate in the same elevated spaces granted to Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani girl who survived a brutal attack on her school by the Taliban, even though both Ahed and Malala are fighting for similar rights and freedoms. Both are young women facing down brutal military repression at the hands of fully-armed men, yet their stories could not have been received more differently.</p>
<p>The reasons for our complicated responses to Malala and Ahed’s stories are as multi-layered as the political realities that shape their lives. They encapsulate a range of ideas about gender and the girl-child, nationalism and education, and about forms of activism that are palatable and therefore deemed legitimate and those which are not.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/e_4mfmce49o?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Disrupting gender</h2>
<p>Both Malala and Ahed refuse to be victims. Malala has dedicated her life to advocating for girls’ education. Her story helps to send powerful and inspiring messages to girls around the world — girls like Ahed, who <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/30/ahed-tamimi-i-am-a-freedom-fighter-i-will-not-be-the-victim-palestinian-israel">dream of being a lawyer.</a> Ahed turned the Israeli female prison unit where she was held into a school, where she and other incarcerated Palestinian women read and studied legal texts. </p>
<p>But Malala’s platform also has the contours of a story that can buttress imperialist worldviews and <a href="https://www.gwi-boell.de/en/2010/11/24/embedded-feminism-women%E2%80%99s-rights-justification-war">justify militarized interventions in Asia</a>. The <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDnaZa8IbFo">use of rhetoric about saving women and children in the Middle East</a> by politicians is one of the ways that <a href="http://www.jadaliyya.com/Details/30991/Can-Palestinian-Men-be-Victims-Gendering-Israel%60s-War-on-Gaza#_ftn1%5C">liberalism appeals to Western emotions</a> to garner support for the U.S. led <a href="https://www.mepc.org/commentary/what-exactly-war-terror">“War on Terror,”</a> as the scholar Maya Mikdashi writes. </p>
<p>Ahed is too empowered, too unmanageable and altogether too adulterated by her community’s struggle to appeal widely to liberal sympathies in the West. She is also too blonde, according to U.K. Prof. Yosefa Loshitzky. Loshitzky characterizes Ahed as someone who completely disrupts <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/north-africa-west-asia/yosefa-loshitzky/ahed-tamimi-illegally-blond">the gendered and racial logics of the Israeli occupation.</a> </p>
<p>The point isn’t that Malala doesn’t deserve the platform she’s been given, but that while we celebrate Malala’s advocacy for girls’ education, we must ask why that platform is not extended to children like Ahed. Anything less is a disservice to them both. </p>
<h2>The liberal politics of hope</h2>
<p>Malala’s status as a worthy cause has a critical relationship to Ahed’s status as an exception to that cause. The differences between the reception of Malala and Ahed in the global cultural marketplace illustrate this point in fairly stark terms: Malala’s activism wins her the Nobel Prize, and takes her to Oxford, while Ahed’s activism landed her in an Israeli prison. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=447&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248864/original/file-20181204-34134-sg1jq3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=562&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Malala Yousafzai speaks as she sits with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in his Centre Block office during her visit to Parliament Hill for her Honorary Canadian Citizenship ceremony in Ottawa on April 12, 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Justin Tang</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Prof. Shanila Khoja-Mooji powerfully writes that Ahed’s struggle, and the way it has been sidelined in the West by feminist and human rights groups, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/west-praising-malala-ignoring-ahed-171227194606359.html">“exposes the West’s selective humanitarianism.”</a></p>
<p>Malala’s story emerged amid the <a href="http://time.com/4215851/barack-obama-springfield/">politics of hope</a> that characterized President Barack Obama’s campaign. <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2014/yousafzai/facts/">She won the Nobel Prize in 2014.</a> In 2016, the year Trump was elected, Ahed <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/12/19/israel-arrests-palestinian-girl-ahed-tamimi-over-viral-video-soldier-slapping/966542001/">was denied a visa to the United States</a> to be part of the speaking tour, “No Child Behind Bars/Living Resistance.” </p>
<p>Whether the Obama administration would have had the political courage to grant Ahed a visa is impossible to know. Obama’s gestures of support for Palestinians were largely superficial, while his financial support for the Israeli military <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/rania-khalek/obama-hands-israel-largest-military-aid-deal-history">was unwavering.</a></p>
<p>By comparing Ahed and Malala, we come closer to understanding the limits and even <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300223446/why-liberalism-failed">the failure of liberal visions of social progress in the 21st century</a>. Ahed is a classic case of how <a href="https://africasacountry.com/2018/09/obama-mandela-and-the-limits-of-liberalism">American liberalism’s blind spots</a> breed discontent around the world. </p>
<h2>Life stories in a global marketplace</h2>
<p>Malala’s advocacy circulates in a <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-exactly-is-neoliberalism-84755">neoliberal economy</a> in which much of the value of her story has become something that communicates the power of the individual to overcome extreme hardship and to effect social change against an enemy long reviled by the West. In this transaction, the politics that underwrite her suffering are managed by focusing on her personal story of survival. </p>
<p>In her story is redemption for the West, whose role in the violence that harmed her (and thousands of girls like her) is mitigated by their efforts to uplift her. </p>
<p>In Malala’s story of fighting for the right to education, as a girl, <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-women-peace-and-security-9780190638276?cc=us&lang=en&">the Western media and political machinary finds a story that chimes powerfully with arguments used to bolster the U.S. led military invasion of Afghanistan.</a></p>
<p>In this sense, Malala’s message has been co-opted by the neoliberal idea that everyone can gain access to the same opportunities, so long as they follow the proper procedures. In her case, by fighting an enemy recognizable to us, Malala gains access to recognition, including entry to the oldest university in the country that colonized what is now Pakistan.</p>
<p>By contrast, Ahed cannot perform her suffering in ways that appeal to the paternalistic liberal imagination. Ahed’s story cannot be yoked to the Janus-faced work of neoliberalism, global development and military intervention. </p>
<p>Ahed’s enemy — the Israeli army that maintains and deepens the illegal military occupation of her country — can rarely be recognized in dominant Western discussions without accusations of anti-Jewish sentiments. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/248570/original/file-20181203-194953-1pe0x3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ahed Tamimi exits an armored military vehicle as she is released by the Israeli army after serving an eight month sentence at the entrance of her village of Nebi Saleh in the West Bank, July 29, 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Nasser Shiyoukhi)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Stories like Ahed’s that insist on collective forms of liberation over individual liberation, draw our attention to diffuse and entrenched systems of oppression that cannot be remedied through individual acts of uplift.</p>
<p>“There is no justice under occupation and this court is illegal,” Ahed told her prosecutors, as she smiled and the international media captured the scene for the world to see. </p>
<p>Ahed’s smile in these photos unsettles liberal conceptions of suffering that separate the rights of the individual from their social, political and economic making. Wringing our hands and watching from the West, we are implicated in the sham of liberal justice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105643/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Kastner receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. She is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of English at York University. </span></em></p>Why do we know the story of Malala, the Pakistani student who survived a brutal attack on her school by the Taliban but not the story of Ahed, a Palestinian girl who stood up to Israeli forces?Sarah Kastner, SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/847582017-10-06T13:24:29Z2017-10-06T13:24:29ZWhy the Nobel Peace Prize brings little peace<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189277/original/file-20171007-23531-9i4k7x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Beatrice Fihn, executive director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN).</span> </figcaption></figure><p>The Nobel Peace Prize for 2017 was awarded to the <a href="http://www.icanw.org/">International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons</a>, an advocacy group that has worked to draw attention to their <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/06/world/nobel-peace-prize/index.html">“catastrophic humanitarian consequences.” </a></p>
<p>Every year, the winners of the Nobel Prizes are announced to great fanfare. And none receives more scrutiny than the <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/">Nobel Peace Prize</a>.</p>
<p>With good reason. The other Nobel Prizes are given to people who have already changed our world – for their remarkable accomplishments. But, in the case of the Nobel Peace Prize, the hope of the Nobel Committee is to change the world through its very conferral. It, therefore, rewards <a href="http://arcadepub.com/titles/10942-9781611457247-nobel-prize">aspiration more than achievement</a>. </p>
<p>Francis Sejersted, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee from 1991-1999, once <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/themes/peace/sejersted/">noted</a> with pride the Nobel Peace Prize’s political ambitions: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“The Committee also takes the possible positive effects of its choices into account [because] … Nobel wanted the Prize to have political effects. Awarding a Peace Prize is, to put it bluntly, a political act.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>So, has the Nobel Peace Prize changed the world? </p>
<p>Expecting the prize to bring world peace would be an unfair standard to apply. However, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2009.tb00660.x">my research</a> shows that the winners and their causes have rarely profited from the award. Even worse, the prize has at times made it harder for them to make the leap from aspiration to achievement.</p>
<h2>History of the peace award</h2>
<p>The Nobel Peace Prize was <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/themes/peace/lundestad-review/">first awarded in 1901</a>, five years after Alfred Nobel’s death. <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred_nobel/will/will-full.html">Nobel’s will</a> defined peace narrowly and focused on candidates’ accomplishments: The prize was to be awarded “to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies, and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”</p>
<p>The committee initially remained <a href="http://arcadepub.com/titles/10942-9781611457247-nobel-prize">true to Nobel’s charge</a>. Between 1901 and 1945, over three-quarters of the prizes (33 of 43) went to those who promoted interstate peace and disarmament.</p>
<p>Since the Second World War, however, less than one-quarter of the prizes have gone to promoting interstate peace and disarmament. Just seven of the 37 winners since 1989 fall into this category. Another 11 awards have sought to encourage ongoing peace processes.</p>
<p>But many of these processes had borne little fruit at the time or still had a long road ahead. Consider that three of the most prominent winners in this category were <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1994/">then Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin</a>. Nonetheless, the Israeli-Palestinian peace process is <a href="https://www.vox.com/cards/israel-palestine/peace-process">today in a coma</a>. </p>
<p>Perhaps for this reason, in the last decade, the committee has given just two awards to encourage peace processes. In 2008 <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/oct/11/finland-unitednations">Martti Ahtisaari</a>, former president of Finland, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his various achievements in Namibia, Kosovo and Aceh. In 2016, Colombia’s President <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/world/americas/nobel-peace-prize-juan-manuel-santos-colombia.html">Juan Manuel Santos</a> was honored with the Nobel in the hope that the prize would help push through his peace deal with the <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-36605769">Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)</a> rebels, even though a popular referendum had just rejected it, and thereby end his country’s half-century-long civil war.</p>
<p>The striking change since the 1970s, and especially since the end of the Cold War, has been the Nobel Peace Prize’s growing focus on promoting domestic political change. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188805/original/file-20171004-6724-16mw6mf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=579&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Albert Luthuli, winner of the 1960 Nobel Peace Prize.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Between 1946 and 1970, the prize was awarded just twice to dissidents and activists like the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/chief-albert-john-mvumbi-luthuli">South African leader Albert Luthuli</a>, who led a nonviolent struggle against apartheid in the 1960s, and the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/big/1014.html">American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.</a>. Between 1971 and 1988, such figures received the prize <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2009.tb00660.x">five times</a>. Between 1989 and 2016, more than 40 percent of all winners fell into this category. </p>
<p>The rate has been even higher in the last decade: 57 percent of Nobel Peace Prize laureates since 2007 have been activists and advocates for equality, liberty and human development like educating women and stopping child labor. </p>
<p>These are admirable values. But their connection to interstate, and intrastate, conflict is indirect at best and tenuous at worst.</p>
<h2>Does it bring global attention to issues?</h2>
<p>The Nobel Peace Prize’s <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/themes/peace/lundestad/">defenders</a> insist that the prize works in subtle but perceptible ways to advance the winners’ causes. They say it attracts media attention, bolsters the winners and their supporters, and even focuses international pressure. </p>
<p>But there’s little evidence that the Nobel Peace Prize brings sustained global attention. </p>
<p>First of all, in many instances it is hard to tell whether the prize has made any difference, because the media glare was already intense. For example, in 2005, when the committee <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/9618236/ns/world_news-europe/t/iaea-elbaradei-win-nobel-peace-prize/#.WdOjItOGM_U">honored</a> the International Atomic Energy Agency and its director general, Mohammed El Baradei, nuclear proliferation was already of great concern. In other cases – such as South Africa’s transition from apartheid, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the troubles in Northern Ireland – the prize made little noticeable difference to international media coverage. </p>
<p>It is true that in those few cases where coverage was not already strong, there have been occasional successes. For instance, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2009.tb00660.x">I found</a> that the committee’s decision to hand the award to Aung San Suu Kyi in 1991 did draw attention to the plight of Myanmar.</p>
<p>But, in general, <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2009.tb00660.x">my research</a> found little evidence that winning the Nobel Peace Prize boosts international media coverage of the winner’s cause beyond the short run.</p>
<h2>Putting activists in peril</h2>
<p>Of greater concern is that, when the Nobel Peace Prize goes to promote political and social change – as it has so often in recent decades – it can have very real and detrimental effects on the movements and causes it celebrates. </p>
<p>Powerful authoritarian regimes will not liberalize just because the Nobel Committee has chosen to honor a dissident. This is not because regimes dismiss it as a silly award given out by international do-gooders. In fact, they take it very seriously. Fearing that domestic activists would take heart, they have <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-165X.2009.tb00660.x">ramped up repression</a>, shrunk the space for political opposition and cracked down harder than ever. </p>
<p>This is what happened in Tibet and Myanmar after the Dalai Lama and after Aung San Suu Kyi received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 and 1991, respectively. Similarly, the Iranian lawyer and human rights activist <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle_east-july-dec03-nobel_10-10/">Shirin Ebadi</a> has been forced to lived in <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jul/26/world/la-fg-iran-lawyers-20110726">exile</a> in Britain since 2009. In China, the peace award did not make the release of the dissident <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/13/world/asia/liu-xiaobo-dead.html">Liu Xiaobo</a> from prison more likely. </p>
<p>The same is true when it comes to social change. Patriarchal societies, with their deeply entrenched gender roles, will not change just because some people in the West think they should and to that end name a women’s rights activist a Nobel laureate.</p>
<h2>What’s at stake?</h2>
<p>The Nobel Committee’s intentions are honorable, but the results, I argue, can be tragic. The award raises the spirits of reformers, but it also mobilizes forces that are far greater in opposition. </p>
<p>Every October, many the world over hail the Nobel Committee for its brave and inspired choice. But it is the truly brave activists on the ground who are left to bear the consequences when anxious leaders bring the state’s terrible power down on them. </p>
<p>And what happens when the Nobel Peace Prize actually helps to promote political change? As state counsellor (prime minister) of Myanmar, Aung San Suu Kyi has presided over the bloody <a href="http://theweek.com/articles/727552/persecution-rohingya">persecution of the Rohingya</a> and a swiftly mounting <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/rohingya-migrant-crisis">international refugee crisis</a>. The admired dissident has, in power, turned out <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/18/asia/aung-san-suu-kyi-speech-rohingya/index.html">not to be so great a promoter of peace and tolerance</a>. </p>
<p>The Nobel Peace Prize Committee’s choices have been noble – but, as my research suggests, also sometimes naïve.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84758/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ronald R. Krebs does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A scholar analyzes the history of the Nobel Peace Prize to ask: What difference has it made?Ronald R. Krebs, Beverly and Richard Fink Professor in the Liberal Arts and Professor of Political Science, University of MinnesotaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/596892016-05-20T13:25:23Z2016-05-20T13:25:23ZRape, murder, forced marriage: what girls in conflict zones get instead of education<p>Education is life-changing for children and young people, but the power of education is systematically ignored in situations of humanitarian crisis – and never more than at present. This neglect is reflected in the tiny amount allocated to children’s schooling in humanitarian responses: it <a href="http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0023/002335/233557E.pdf">involves only 2% of humanitarian funding</a>. This neglect affects the lives of a generation of children and young people forever – once their education is disrupted it can never be retrieved.</p>
<p>Progress towards recognising education as part of a humanitarian response has been slow and the crisis has been worsening – resulting in millions more children and young people who are missing chance to go to school. There are now <a href="http://www.unhcr.org/558193896.html">more displaced people than ever before</a> – and around half of refugees are children. </p>
<p>And while the media is focused on the plight of families whose lives have been ruined by conflict in Syria, in other parts of the world millions of people have spent many years away from home. Dadaab, in northern Kenya, is the world largest refugee camp and has been in existence for more than 23 years. Strikingly, there are more than <a href="http://www.unhcr.org/4f439dbb9.html">10,000 third-generation refugees in Dadaab</a>, born to parents who were also born in the camps. Yet, while inhabitants of the camps see the importance of education as the <a href="https://gemreportunesco.wordpress.com/2011/03/15/for-refugees-in-kenya-%E2%80%98education-is-the-only-thing-we-can-take-home%E2%80%99/">only thing they can take home</a>, until recently there were no secondary school opportunities for the vast majority of young people there.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=346&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123180/original/image-20160519-30711-1a3vidh.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Adolescent girls are the biggest victims in conflict settings.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The <a href="https://www.worldhumanitariansummit.org/">World Humanitarian Summit</a> in Istanbul must be a turning point in giving prominence to education for those caught up in conflict for the sake of this and future generations of children and young people.</p>
<h2>Adolescent girls suffer most</h2>
<p>Adolescent girls’ education journeys are being blocked in four key ways, as our <a href="http://www.educ.cam.ac.uk/centres/real/researchthemes/conflictandpeace/letgirlslearn/">new infographic shows</a>. First, with <a href="http://www.unhcr.org/560be1759.pdf">just 13% of the extremely small pot of UNHCR education funding</a> allocated to secondary schooling, it is no surprise that <a href="http://www.education-inequalities.org/">just 4% of the poorest girls</a> in conflict affected areas complete secondary school. As a result, adolescent girls in conflict zones are <a href="http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0023/002335/233557E.pdf">90% more likely</a> to be out of school than elsewhere.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123181/original/image-20160519-30723-3uqfeu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Girls have limited access to secondary schools.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These girls are not only invisible casualties – they also often become targets. Unsafe journeys to school and direct attacks on school buildings mean that for many girls, most famously <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23241937">Malala Yousafzai</a>, fulfilling their right to go to schooling means risking their lives. </p>
<p>Not only have <a href="https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/">attacks on schools increased 17-fold</a> between 2000 and 2014, but there have been <a href="https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/">three times as many attacks on girls’ schools</a> than boys’ schools in recent years. It takes just one day to destroy a school, but will take years to rebuild. In <a href="http://www.unicef.org/appeals/files/HAC_2016_Syria.pdf">Syria alone 25% of schools have been destroyed</a>, damaged or occupied since the conflict started.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123182/original/image-20160519-30699-1877kyt.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Schools are unsafe for girls.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even their journeys to school place young girls at risk of physical and sexual violence. More than half of adolescent girls in the Democratic Republic of Congo <a href="http://www.unicef.org/publications/files/A_Statistical_Snapshot_of_Violence_Against_Adolescent_Girls.pdf">report experiencing physical violence</a>. And while all the 51 countries affected by conflict since 1985 have reported <a href="https://www.womensrefugeecommission.org/images/zdocs/I-m-Here-report-FINAL.pdf">sexual violence cases against adolescent girls</a>, less than 4% of the funding requested by aid agencies accounts for programmes to tackle gender-based violence. In these situations, saving lives is inseparable from changing lives through education.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123183/original/image-20160519-30723-13i58z9.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=423&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Girls face the threat of sexual violence.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Limited opportunities</h2>
<p>Early marriage is also a frequent alternative to education in contexts of severely limited opportunities and unsafe journeys to school. More than <a href="http://www.un.org/youthenvoy/armed-conflict/">half of the 30 countries</a> with the highest rate of child marriage are fragile or affected by conflict. And the transitions can be sudden – there were <a href="http://www.unicef.org/mena/media_9469.html">18 times more early marriages</a> among Syrian refugees in Jordan in 2013 compared with 2011.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=347&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123185/original/image-20160519-30694-1coe2nu.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Education or marriage?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A lack of education can also result in girls being recruited to fight in armed forces. While figures are hard to come by, on one estimate, <a href="https://www.warchild.org.uk/issues/child-soldiers?gclid=CMnu6b7zprQCFebLtAodrBEA8A">around 40% of child soldiers are young women</a>. Once recruited, their lives are disposable, <a href="http://files.unicef.org/media/files/Beyond_Chibok.pdf">three-quarters of suicide bombers</a> in some West African countries have been identified as young women. And military and terrorist organisations abduct young women: in Chibok, northern Nigeria, <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/04/video-missing-nigerian-girls-offers-hope-families-160414072054519.html">Boko Haram abducted at least 276 girls</a> – at least 219 of them are still missing.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/123186/original/image-20160519-30689-1e06cqx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Girls as child soldiers.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Education cannot wait</h2>
<p>There is an urgent need to remove the obstacles facing adolescent girls on their journey to school. The shocking statistics presented here provide clear evidence of a problem that can no longer be ignored. Facing up to the problem needs to be accompanied by taking action. </p>
<p>The launch of the <a href="https://www.odi.org/publications/10405-education-cannot-wait-fund-education-emergencies">Education Cannot Wait Fund</a> at the World Humanitarian Summit next week is a golden opportunity for world leaders to show their commitment to transforming the lives of children and young people for the future. </p>
<p>But realising change is not just about grand gestures at world summits. As commitments we have made together with others as part of the <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2015/06/16/united-states-and-united-kingdom-%E2%80%93-announcing-new-partnership-advance">US First Lady’s Let Girls’ Learn Initiative</a> highlight, change has to happen on the ground. Changing journeys of adolescent girls requires working together with communities to ensure they finally get the education they deserve.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/59689/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pauline Rose does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Abduction, sexual violence, early marriage: a few of the choices facing adolescent girls who ought instead to be in school.Pauline Rose, Professor, International Education and Director, Research for Equitable Access and Learning (REAL) Centre, University of CambridgeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/503242015-11-06T15:16:33Z2015-11-06T15:16:33ZHe Named Me Malala: the ordinary life behind an extraordinary girl<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/101071/original/image-20151106-16255-zsqnu9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Think Jam</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/malala">Malala Yousafzai</a> was shot by the Taliban in 2012 for speaking out in support of girls’ education in Pakistan. Since then, based in the UK, she has continued her advocacy. She is the youngest-ever <a href="https://theconversation.com/nobel-peace-prize-extraordinary-malala-a-powerful-role-model-32839">Nobel laureate</a>: when it was awarded last year, she was just 17. </p>
<p>No doubt, then, that Malala, who grew up in Pakistan’s Swat valley and went on to inspire the world, is a truly remarkable young woman. But <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3065132/">He Named Me Malala</a> tells her personal story, whilst also shining a light on the wider global issue of the systematic exclusion of children, and especially girls, from education. </p>
<p>David Guggenheim’s documentary captures Malala’s everyday life as both a young teenager and a global activist through poignant and often humorous interview scenes. Malala is followed around her home, through school, to television interviews and global summits to spread her message of educational equality. </p>
<p>There are also hard-hitting clinical reconstructions of Malala’s emergency surgery in the UK after she was shot, brashly juxtaposed with the animated depiction of her upbringing in the Swat Valley. The dreamy style of these animations works well to capture the nostalgia of a life to which Malala and her family can no longer return.</p>
<p>Malala’s distinctiveness and bravery is reinforced by the way the film plays off the many juxtapositions of her life – voice and silence, empowerment and oppression, the triumph over tragedy. In so doing, it blends together a palpable sense of injustice with an unwavering commitment to hope. Malala speaks eloquently about everything from her favourite books and film stars to world politics. Her personal experience of suffering, however, remains wrapped in stoic silence. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/S0j6JhJBtiQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Seemingly inconsequential, but touching moments of quotidian family life do well to pull you in emotionally to the heart-warming experiences of the Yousafzai family, who now live in the UK. Her relationship with her father, the “he” of the film’s title, is particularly focused on. Ordinary portraits of Malala’s giggling girlish coyness and childish banter with her brothers are a welcome reprise from the film’s prodigal tendencies. Indeed, these moments are crucial: they undercut the propensity of the film to romanticise Malala’s heroism. It is the very ordinariness of Malala’s everyday life, contrasted with the unnerving tenacity of her speeches to the UN, that pulls the rug from under our awe-inspired feet.</p>
<p>These touching moments are also important in the way they disrupt stereotypical imaginations of the “Islamic Other”, so often portrayed negatively in mainstream cinema and the media. The value of this simple depiction of a Muslim family being like any other family living in the UK cannot be overstated.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/101058/original/image-20151106-16253-169o40a.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Malala and director David Guggenheim.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">20th Century Fox</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>At the same time, many other wider political concerns are only hinted at. Nuggets of insight, such as Malala’s father’s claim that “the Taliban is not a person. It is an ideology”, certainly give the film a political flavour but could have been delved into in more detail. </p>
<p>Similarly, a 30-second clip of some Pakistani men agreeing with the Taliban’s threat to shoot Malala should she return is interesting, but also warranted more attention, particularly because it could have helped the audience better understand the everyday Pakistani perspective. </p>
<p>While this certainly makes for a good story, I couldn’t help but wonder about the voices of the people – in particular, the young girls – living back in Pakistan. Although the film uses Malala’s experience as a prism for thinking about the injustice of a lack of education globally, it may have been a more powerful argument for social change if the film had spent more time examining the reality of those left behind. </p>
<p>But despite this small niggle, He Named me Malala is a very important film. It does the crucial job of sharing the exceptional story of an exceptional young woman with a wider audience. And as an accomplished narrative of a heroic girl standing for what she believes in, it can do no wrong. But it is the moments of ordinariness that give the film real traction. </p>
<p>It is these moments that inspire and show us that any person, anywhere, can muster a voice. And a powerful, revolutionary one at that.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/50324/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alison Macdonald received PhD funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) UK in 2008. </span></em></p>This spellbinding documentary tells Malala’s story while shining a light on a global injusticeAlison Macdonald, Teaching Fellow in Social Anthropology, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/327942014-10-13T00:32:56Z2014-10-13T00:32:56ZAdmirable Nobel decision unlikely to spur India-Pakistan peace<p>The awarding of a shared Nobel Peace Prize award to a 17-year-old Pakistani girl, <a href="https://theconversation.com/nobel-peace-prize-extraordinary-malala-a-powerful-role-model-32839">Malala Yousafzai</a>, and a 60-year-old Indian man, <a href="http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/who-is-kailash-satyarthi/1/395118.html">Kailash Satyarthi</a>, is historic and aimed at conveying multiple messages to global policy-makers. Both awardees have worked tirelessly for the rights of an estimated 180 million children worldwide who continue to be <a href="http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/@publ/documents/publication/wcms_publ_9221124169_en.pdf">used for harsh labour</a>. The impacts on their right to schooling are crippling. </p>
<p>No doubt, the common cause of child welfare has touched the Nobel committee, but this year’s prize is not unprecedented. <a href="http://www.unicef.org/about/history/index_56072.html">UNICEF</a> was awarded the prize in 1965 for a similar cause. </p>
<p>What is perhaps more consequential is the nationality, religions and age of this year’s recipients. A collective award to nationals of two rival nuclear powers hailing from two different religious groups that harbour immense animosity for each other is noteworthy. The age difference of the recipients highlights the transgenerational importance of fighting for children’s rights and for peace-building more generally.</p>
<p>The Nobel committee has perhaps also redeemed itself by recognising Satyarthi, an intellectual protege of Mohandas Gandhi. The untimely assassination of Gandhi in 1948, and the provisions in Alfred Nobel’s will for awarding the prize to living individuals only, was <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/themes/peace/gandhi/">symbolically noted by the committee</a> in awarding no peace prize that year. </p>
<p>It is also important to recognise the hidden hands of doctors in Pakistan and the UK who saved Malala Yusufzai after her assassination attempt. If she had not survived, she too would have been deprived of this honour.</p>
<h2>History of prize is sobering</h2>
<p>Now let us get to the other matter of any peace dividends this prize might have for the ongoing <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/spotlight/kashmirtheforgottenconflict/2011/06/2011615113058224115.html">conflict between India and Pakistan</a> or between Hindus and Muslims. Unfortunately, the history of the prize in galvanising peace between acrimonious countries predicated in ethno-religious differences is very discouraging. </p>
<p>For example, the awarding of <a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1994/">the 1994 prize</a> to Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin has had absolutely no impact in moving Arabs and Israelis closer to conflict resolution 20 years on. </p>
<p>The success of the prize in motivating intrastate political peace or protecting dissidents is perhaps slightly more heartening. Yet here too the time it takes for any impact to be realised muddles any causality.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1991/">Aung San Suu Kyi</a> was perhaps protected from extreme persecution in Myanmar by her Nobel award. However, more than 22 years hence her participation in any electoral process remains elusive despite the ostensible “opening up” of the country.</p>
<h2>Sustained international engagement is needed</h2>
<p>The only way the peace dividends from this year’s prize could potentially be harnessed for Indians and Pakistanis alike would be if external powers with influence in the region played a meaningful mediating role. The asymmetry in power between the countries, both demographically and economically, trumps any nuclear equalisation factor one might envisage. Any expectations that both countries will somehow sort out their political issues and see the light of peace following the joint Nobel would be naïve. </p>
<p>India has far more economic might than Pakistan and any incentives for peace-building, despite their logic on ecological and even trade-related grounds, are easily subverted by security hawks. In such a situation, the only way to motivate a lasting peace would involve some form of international mediation on the long-standing territorial dispute between the countries. Major powers, particularly economic trading partners with India such as the United States, would need to invest political capital. </p>
<p>Gulf States such as the UAE or Saudi Arabia could exert similar influence on Pakistan and its powerful military, which maintains strong ties in the region. The Gulf states could also help counter the fundamentalist fervour and conspiratorial rhetoric that have forced Yousafzai into exile. (She lives in the UK for fear of further assassination attempts in Pakistan.)</p>
<p>Norway, which hosts the Nobel prize, tried its hand at mediation in South Asia in the case of the Sri Lankan conflict a decade ago. A military solution prevailed instead, so one may wonder how effective mediation might be. </p>
<p>India and Pakistan both realise their conflict has no long-term military solution. However, the “cool war” status quo serves the political elite in both nations. </p>
<p>Perhaps where the joint Nobel Peace Prize could make a slow but generational shift would be through changing public perceptions of regional conflicts. Both countries have to contend with abject poverty and human rights issues, which neither can afford to trivialise. A campaign to channel public funds from military expenditure towards joint human development goals could be an important next step for Yousafzai and Satyarthi.</p>
<p>However, only concerted international engagement can hope to secure lasting peace. Territorial conflict sadly continues to eclipse the collective good of securing a better future for Indian and Pakistani children.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/32794/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Saleem H. Ali does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The awarding of a shared Nobel Peace Prize award to a 17-year-old Pakistani girl, Malala Yousafzai, and a 60-year-old Indian man, Kailash Satyarthi, is historic and aimed at conveying multiple messages…Saleem H. Ali, Director, Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining and Affiliate Professor of Politics and International Studies, The University of QueenslandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.