Refugee camp design research wins prestigious award

International research led by the University of Dundee into how those living in refugee camps engage with their environment and shape it over time is to be awarded a medal of excellence from a leading engineering body. 

The research led by Professor Husam AlWaer, Chair of Urban Design at the University’s Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design (DJCAD), is set to receive the George Stephenson Medal from the Institution of Civil Engineers.

The medal will be presented at a ceremony in London in October to Professor AlWaer for his paper Design and Use of Space in Refugee Camps: A Case Study of a Contested Terrain, published in the Urban Design and Planning Journal by Emerald Publishing.

It is the fourth award Professor AlWaer has received from the Institution of Civil Engineers over an eight-year period for his research in urban design and planning, recognising his position as a leading authority in the field.

He said, “I am thrilled to win this prestigious award and proud to be recognised for making a contribution to the urban design and planning community. 

“Winning awards is really inspiring and encourages me to push the boundaries further with more intensive and innovative research efforts.”

The work for which the George Stephenson Medal has been awarded focused on changes to the set-up of accommodation units made by refugees at Al Za’atari, the largest Syrian refugee camp in the world, and the social impact of those changes, resulting in a sense of community.

As part of his research, Professor AlWaer visited the site in Jordan and found refugees had made several adaptions to the provided tents and caravans to create a more positive living space.

This included joining and repositioning them to establish more complex housing clusters with private courtyard areas. 

This allowed ‘high streets’ to emerge with businesses, shops and community centres, supporting around 82,000 people situated there who have fled the war in Syria.

It was a far cry from the original formal, military set-up in 2012, which saw tents lined up in grid structures, facing shared washing and toilet facilities.

Professor AlWaer said, “These homes were built to be temporary following a military, top-down approach. However, over time, they have become indefinite temporality.

“Neither the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) or the hosting nations know when the refugees can go back and because of that people started adjusting the camp to suit their needs.

“Refugees transferred the camp into a less formal settlement through acts of collectivism, where camp inhabitants seek to help each other as partners in adversity.

“Transforming the camp into this hybrid environment was a process of daily negotiations between space, materials and social dynamics.”

The camp is only 6km2 and has reached five times its capacity. Around 21,900 children live on site, 76% of whom are educated by UNICEF and the Ministry of Education at 32 schools.

There were more than 3,500 shops, 58 community centres, two hospitals, nine healthcare centres and around 120 community health volunteers in 2018, most recently available figures show.

Professor AlWaer said, “Refugee camps are prime examples of what happens when people suffer from a loss of cultural continuity, which is closely associated with the concept of people’s self-identity.

“Reconstructions which took place have been described as a form of psychotherapy, an attempt to quell fears and anxiety by reconstructing a place similar to their former social and physical environment, where they felt secure and comfortable.”

Professor AlWaer added that it is ‘critical’ that refugee camps are recognised as ‘profound and long-lasting social experiments’ in cultural expression which move through their own evolutionary process with time.

The judging panel for the George Stephenson Medal said of the research “The Paper makes a significant contribution to the field, challenging existing theories and providing new insights.”