To aid research on 'Making Economic Subjects: Humanitarianism, Livelihoods Programs, and Self-Reliance in Nyarugusu Refugee Camp, Tanzania'

ADITI SURIE VON CZECHOWISKI, then a graduate student at Columbia University, New York, New York, was awarded a grant in April 2014 to aid research on 'Making Economic Subjects: Humanitarianism, Livelihoods Programs, and Self-Reliance in Nyarugusu Refugee Camp, Tanzania,' supervised by Dr. Timothy Mitchell. This dissertation investigates how the deployment of human rights in a humanitarian context reshapes ethical behavior amongst refugees in the Nyarugusu Congolese refugee camp. In operation for over seventeen years, Nyarugusu has seen a shift from emergency humanitarian aid to durable, long-term solutions. One result of this shift is the imposition of human rights education in order to ensure that refugees behave properly in the camp as well as in their country of resettlement, or upon return to the Democratic Republic of Congo, perceived as being rampant with rights abuses resulting from the absence of rule of law. This dissertation charts the emergence of a human rights pedagogy specifically linked to women's rights and framed as an antidote to 'harmful traditional practices' in the camp. It examines how human rights are 'taught,' and how refugees respond to and reflect upon this discourse in surprising new ways. Against the backdrop of contending norms of ethical behavior, it explores the birth of new ethico-political subjectivities in exile and new visions of justice, highlighting the impact of human rights interventions in everyday life and the emergence of new understandings of the human.