The new geopolitics of educational aid: From Cold Wars to Holy Wars?

The paper explores shifts in the nature, volume, trajectory and content of aid to education in the wake of post-9/11 Western preoccupations with the rise of Islamic radicalism. The paper develops a framework for understanding the dynamics of how educational aid appears to be becoming increasingly politicized in strategic conflict and post-conflict countries. The approach links up with broader debates within the field of development studies on the ‘militarization of development’ while attempting to shed light on the specificity of how ‘educational aid’ becomes caught up in these processes. The paper argues that particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan educational aid is becoming submerged under the counterinsurgency strategy of the Western occupying forces with detrimental effects not only for long-term development progress but also for the personal security of development workers.