Empowered networks: exploring digital equity & spatial subversion in the rohingya refugee settlements

Abstract

This thesis aims to re-investigate effective placemaking in the humanitarian context, particularly in the Rohingya refugee crisis in Bangladesh. It will explore the impact of design in promoting digital equity within existing spatial subversions in the refugee camps. The empowerment of underprivileged populations through digital literacy and equity has been an emerging topic in the design field for the last two decades. On the other hand, the global crisis of refugee settlements and the geopolitical debates regarding the physical and socio-cultural rehabilitation of informal and forced migration across countries continue to persist. The Rohingya population from Myanmar, often called “the world’s most persecuted minority”1, has been forcefully displaced and is confined within the refugee camps in the coastal borders of the neighboring country Bangladesh. While they are thriving in a status quo with the repatriation in stasis, the settlements continue to grow, creating complex challenges regarding the spatial design, functioning of the community, and their empowerment within the closed boundaries. This thesis is an attempt to explore how multi scalar mapping can reveal impactful socio economic dynamics concerning the design complexities in a refugee settlement, which often gets out of focus from a top-down aerial perspective. Moreover, the prevalent practices regarding the use of digital tools in design are often indifferent to the questions of digital equity among the underprivileged population and in the accommodation of relevant needs of technology and energy sources in the camps. Although initiatives to improve Internet accessibility, such UNHCR's Connectivity for Refugees and NetHope, advance and increase programmatic research on usage and accessibility, there is still “a persistent gap between idealized visions of what digital connectivity could achieve (globally) and evidence about how new connectivities are used in specific contexts” (Smart et al., 2016).22 Design interventions have the potential to work as a subversive advocate for the refugees in this situation, to bring out their voices and needs from a bottom-up approach of spatial dissection. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the dynamics of place-making within the critical socio-cultural context of the refugee camp and the ways to promote digital equity through design. This has a major impact on shifting the socio-economic paradigm in the settlements and ensuring long-term resilience and empowerment for the refugees. The research will be conducted in the existing Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh as the case study. The final aim is to explore adaptive alternatives in placemaking, within the digital infrastructure of the camps, which will empower the refugees to create an agency for themselves that reciprocates the context specific paradoxes.