Inclusion as enclosure: how educational rights are undermined in England and Brasil

This comparative ethnographic study draws on fieldwork in England and Brasil to analyse how refugee and (im)migrant children's educational rights are undermined in these two contexts. I argue that inclusion operates as enclosure: rather than guaranteeing rights, inclusion frameworks reproduce the structural conditions that sustain exclusion. In England, the hostile environment subordinates education to migration control through asylum dispersal, No Recourse to Public Funds, and the Prevent Duty’s surveillance. In Brasil, despite stronger legal protections, the humanitarianisation of Venezuelan displacement obscures the role of US sanctions and uses educational materials to reinforce donor influence. Across both contexts, systemic barriers such as housing instability, language exclusion, and policy fragmentation perpetuate enclosure. The findings challenge universal inclusion frameworks and call for justice-oriented, context-sensitive alternatives to advance educational equity for all children.