My name is Lea Coffineau

I am a graduate student in Anthropology at The New School for Social Research in New York.

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I was first brought to the reality of camps in 2015, in France. First as a journalist, then as a volunteer, I worked in Paris' makeshift tent settlements, in the Calais "Jungle", and in the camp erected by Médecins Sans Frontières near Dunkirk. 

In each of these environments, I witnessed first hand the commerce of sexual services, the incessant sexual harassment endured by female dwellers, and the palpable tension induced by precarious living conditions, overcrowdedness, waiting, boredom, and loneliness. 

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Faced with the scarcity of financial resources of humanitarian intervention and the lack of global political willingness to put an end to the camp system, I decided to develop a solution that can be carried out from the inside of the camps in order to mitigate the violences experienced by vulnerable populations.