Understanding the politics of inclusion, the ‘refugee’ and nation: analysis of public policies and teacher narratives in Iceland

ABSTRACT

Even though Iceland is yet to host as many refugees as other European countries, the number of young refugees seeking resettlement is growing rapidly. Little Icelandic research has been devoted to refugee youth and their social or educational inclusion to date. This study focuses on how young refugees are represented in the Icelandic context in relation to often-conflicting ideological perspectives of advanced neo-liberal discourses and ‘liberal’ multicultural approaches of inclusion. We analyse policy documents which address refugee integration, alongside teachers’ perspectives on current challenges facing refugee youth to account for these conflicts. We are interested in how these documents and perspectives respond to Hannah Arendt's concern over statelessness – the condition of not being recognised as a citizen within a host state. Findings indicate that outside of policy directly aimed at refugees there is general legislative and regulatory silence on refugee youth. Within the two documents analysed, we argue that normative multicultural frameworks are being drawn upon as an ‘integration practice’ which emphasise sameness and equality in contrast to diversity and equity. Such practices reinforce normative understandings of citizenship and national metaphors of inclusion whilst simultaneously undermining what Arendt refers to as the ‘promise of politics’ in education policy and practice.

KEYWORDS:

• Refugee youth
• education
• education policy
• statelessness

Acknowledgements

We wish to thank the teachers who participated in the study for their invaluable insight into an ever changing and demanding profession. The study was funded by EDDA Center of Excellence.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Eva Harðardóttir is a PhD candidate in education at the University of Iceland, Reykjavík. She earned her Master's degree in Education Policy and Management with honours from the University of Deusto in the Basque Country of Spain. Her PhD research focuses on the growing population of refugee youth in Iceland, inclusive education policy and practice and developing conceptions of citizenship. Eva is an experienced teacher at both upper-secondary and higher education levels specialising in migration, democracy, human rights and global citizenship. She also has substantial international policy development and implementation experience while working for the UN in Malawi.

Berglind Rós Magnúsdóttir, PhD, is an Associate Professor of educational science at the University of Iceland, Reykjavík. Her research interests lie in the fields of sociology of education; education policy, educational inequalities, social reproduction and segregation in education. Her current research is on globalisation, marketisation, and differentiation in the Icelandic education system and its impact on social justice, parental choices and practices, teachers’ professionalism, educational quality and in-/exclusion in education.

Jo-Anne Dillabough is Reader in the Sociology of Youth and Global Culture (Education), University of Cambridge, and former Chair and Convener of Education, Equality and Development. She has been a visiting scholar at universities in Australia, Argentina, Canada, the UK, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. Dillabough's current work focuses on the links between urban social housing, global human movement and displacement, economically disadvantaged youth and the politics of ‘bordering’ and securitisation in global cultures and contexts. Dillabough is also a scholar of Hannah Arendt and has sought to bring her theoretical oeuvre to questions of youth statelessness, identity, urban estrangement and political action in times of heightened austerity and mobile fears of the ‘stranger’ or the ‘foreigner’ emerging out of wider political conflicts and crises of the state.

Notes

1 It is important to note that many economies and associated education sectors have been regulated and/or pressured to for quasi-market education systems well before the 90's, such as structural adjustment in Latin America or the Middle Eastern Education systems (Dillabough et al. 2018).

2 The most support is given to immigrants from N- and W-Europe (72%) while the least support is given to immigrants from Africa (45%) and the Middle-East (43%).

3 Refugee issues in Iceland are covered under the Act on Foreigners (No. 80/2016) which does not however specifically deal with education of refugee children or young people apart from mentioning the general rights of children to education (Article 31) in line with the provision of the Child Protection Act (80/2002). The Act on Foreigners, on the other hand, authorises relevant line ministers to issue regulations regarding education and training (Article 33). In addition, there is a provision in the Act for a special regulation regarding general education, social education, and vocational training for quota refugees (Article 45). No such regulations have been developed by the Ministry of Education to date. The provision for these regulations was last discussed publicly in a report from the National Audit Office to the Icelandic Parliament in 2015, stating that work on the regulations should have taken place in 2014. It should also be mentioned that in 2016, the Icelandic Parliament adopted an action plan (Parliamentary Assembly 1692) on immigration issues for the period of 2016–2019. This was the first public document regarding migration to address issues of refugees specifically. The plan refers to the expected participation of the Ministry of Education in realising general educational support and services entitled to refugees in Iceland. However, it does not address educational and social inclusion of children and youth specifically nor do other public documents concerning issues of refugees beyond the two documents analysed in this paper.