Education in Times of War: Schools and Faculties in Civil War Beirut (1984-1988)

Abstract

The 15 year long Lebanese Civil War considerably altered the educational task carried out by the schools throughout the country. Schools and colleges had to face a significant array of obstacles ranging from material to human, which often diminished its activity to a merely symbolic function. The countless destructions related to armed conflict overlapped with the economical paralysis which engulfed the State during the second half of the eighties, imposing acute states of deprivation on educational establishments. Additionally, the penetration of armed organizations within the hierarchy of schools and colleges triggered a disciplinary subversion against the traditional authority figures of the classroom, with permanent humiliations for a teaching staff whose function was progressively emptied of any meaning. The abovementioned evolutions punished with particular severity the public sector, resulting in dramatic consequences for the capacity for meaningful social action on the part of the Lebanese State.