Study on the spatial changes of child friendly spaces in impelled refugee camp at Balukhali, Coxs Bazar

Abstract

Due to ongoing human rights violations and ethnic conflict, more than 26 million people globally have to live a life of refugees in camps, where the children suffer the most due to a severe childhood crisis. Since August 2017, Bangladesh alone received 7,45,000 refugee-Rohingyas following the sanguinary ethnic violence of the Myanmar army, which turns into a 1.3 million population within only four and half years – making it the largest refugee camp in the world. About 70% of the population (7,80,000) are children who faced extreme atrocities of ethnic cleansing in Myanmar. Particularly the female children undergo various forms of childhood crises experiencing abuse, rape, and life-threat in both Myanmar and the camp. As an urgent response to their psychosocial childhood crises, a large number of Child-Friendly Spaces (CFS) have been developed (especially in the Balukhali camp) as a presumptive strategy by different local and international NGOs. The research undergoes an exhaustive qualitative investigation of CFS located in three refugee camps in the Balukhali extension area, Cox’s Bazar. The aim has been to analyse the changes made to the CFS and examine how CFS, as a concept, has been changing with respect to the emerging challenges/crises of camp life. While in literature, the spatial transformation of the CFS (in camps) has been linked to community mobilization, specific conflict, gender security, violence, etc., the role of socio-spatial factors responsible in Balukhali camp on the transformation of CFS has remained significantly underexplored. This research aims to contribute to that niche by examining the changes (spatial) of CFS in the cluster and built-form level scales and analyzing the socio-spatial forces responsible for such changes. The research argues that between the years 2017 and 2022, the transformation of the CFS model shows that it has become a one-stop shop for child protection with only some ad-hoc changes in architectural makeovers, shifting from CFS’ original mission to provide comprehensive psychosocial support to traumatic children. It also argues that the Balukhali area being an impelled refugee camp, CFS remain a confined/restrictive spatial model that can be largely linked to the complex camp politics centred around ethnic identity – which the research identifies as cultural maintenance. An exploration, as such, hopes to reveal essential insights on how architecture can play a significant role in orchestrating many facets of exploitation in a contested socio-political context, whereas its holistic mission was to defy such. Keywords: Child-Friendly Space, Refugee camp, female children, Exploitation, Childhood Crisis.