The RRN Research Digest provides a synopsis of recent research on refugee and forced migration issues from entities associated with the RRN and others.
You can download the digest in PDF format here: RRN Research Digest No. 72
Recent Publications and New Research
Clark-Kazak, C. and Reynolds, J. (2019). Refugee Sponsorship: Lessons learned, ways forward, Refuge: Canada’s Journal on Refugees, Vol 35 No 2. To complement a previous Refuge special issue focusing on the historic establishment of Canada’s private sponsorship and another forthcoming issue, this special issue focuses specifically on lessons learned from sponsorship efforts and concrete suggestions for future policy and programming. The articles in this issue make empirical and conceptual contributions to understanding the diversity and context specificity of sponsorship, particularly in relation to the variability of “success,” as well as the ways in which Canadian-specific examples can or cannot be “exported” to other countries. Available at: https://refuge.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/refuge/issue/view/2321
Segrave, M. (2019). Theorizing sites and strategies of differential inclusion: Unlawful migrant workers in Australia. Theoretical Criminology, 23(2), 194-210. This article explores the dynamic and shifting positionality of the unlawful migrant by examining several sites and strategies used to achieve differential inclusion in the Australian context, including migrant worker networks, the workplace and the broader community. The analysis reveals that the nation-state’s effort to exclude and demarcate non-belonging via law and policy is destabilized by the inclusionary bordering practices of both citizens and unlawful non-citizens. The findings point to the importance of criminologists continuing to look beyond the physical border to make sense of the configuration and reconfiguration of belonging. Available to subscribers at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1362480619827527
Blair T. Cullen & Margaret Walton‐Roberts (2019). The role of local immigration partnerships in Syrian refugee resettlement in Waterloo Region, Ontario, The Canadian Geographer. As of January 29, 2017 Canada had received 40,081 Syrian refugees. Since that time, much has changed in local resettlement policy. This research focuses on one component of these changes—the role of Local Immigration Partnerships (LIPs) in Syrian refugee resettlement—through a case study of an official refugee reception centre in the Waterloo Region of Ontario and a series of interviews with key informants from multiple sectors involved in resettlement. Results indicate Waterloo’s LIP playing a sizable role, but not acting as the sole response body to refugee resettlement. Nevertheless, participants saw the LIP as a crucial part of Waterloo’s resettlement efforts. Despite being a product of a tri‐level intergovernmental agreement, the LIP played a central role in shaping a local strategy by using local solutions. LIPs represent an example of place‐based policy that worked well during the Syrian Refugee Resettlement Initiative, but LIPs’ success may set a challenging precedent for future mass refugee resettlement events.” Available to subscribers at: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cag.12558
Report, Policy Briefs and Working Papers
Refugee Education 2030: A Strategy for Refugee Inclusion, UNHCR. This publication aims to contribute directly to the goals of the Global Compact on Refugees, particularly, to Ease the pressures on host countries, to Enhance refugee self-reliance and Support conditions in countries of origin for return in safety and dignity. The strategy arises from lessons learned about parallel education provision for refugees reflected in the 2011 Review of refugee education, and from the experience of shifting to national education service provision across a wide range of distinct contexts as a result of the guidance provided in the 2012-2016 UNHCR Refugee Education Strategy. Available at: https://www.unhcr.org/5d651da88d7
Carolyne Ndofor-Tah et. Al (2019). Home Office Indicators of Integration framework 2019 second edition. This framework is intended to be a resource for integration practitioners at all levels, offering a common language for understanding, planning, monitoring and measuring integration, and supporting better and more tailored integration services. It has been developed in collaboration with academics and with input from migrant organisations, the voluntary sector, local and national governments and, most importantly, migrants themselves. Available at:
Understanding conflict dynamics around refugee settlements in northern Uganda, International Refugee Rights Initiative (IRRI). While there are overall good relations, tensions between South Sudanese refugees and Ugandan communities around natural resources, livelihoods and land should not be ignored. A new report by International Refugee Rights Initiative highlights that frictions have sparked violent incidents, and if not properly addressed could escalate into broader conflict in northern Uganda. Between December 2018 and May 2019. International Refugee Rights Initiative (IRRI) spoke with more than 470 refugees and members of host communities in Arua, Adjumani and Lamwo, all major refugee hosting districts. Ugandan citizens living close to refugee settlement have given land to host refugees in northern Uganda, motivated by their own experiences of displacement and cultural similarities. But they had expected more development benefits in return for their generosity, fuelling frustration. More available at:
http://refugee-rights.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Understanding-conflict-dynamics-around-refugee-settlements-in-northern-Uganda-August-2019.pdf and View the video summary here: https://vimeo.com/356628569
The Contours of Crimmigration Control in India: Global Detention Project Working Paper No. 25 By Sujata Ramachandran. The paper provides an assessment of India’s principal immigration law, the Foreigners Act, to draw attention to its role in propping up the country’s crimmigration system. It reviews the workings of crimmigration through the existing legal and bureaucratic systems, highlighting the variety of hurdles detainees face, many of whom are extraordinarily vulnerable residents who have survived on the fringes of Indian society. Important, too, is the paper’s analysis of the impact of framing immigration enforcement as a matter of public and national security, which results in a veil of secrecy being drawn around many procedures. The paper underscores the important influence exerted by Hindu right-wing political forces on immigration processes, in part through the strategic manipulation of migrants’ identities. Available at: https://www.globaldetentionproject.org/the-contours-of-crimmigration-control-in-india-global-detention-project-working-paper-no-25
New reports and blog posts
How the Biloela Tamil family deportation case highlights the failures of our refugee system, by Mary Ann Kenny and Nicolas Procter, The conversation (September 19, 2019). The Sri Lankan family of four are part of a group of asylum seekers and refugees who arrived in Australia by boat between August 2012 and January 2014. Their case highlights some of the problems with the “fast-track” refugee assessment system set up by the Australian Coalition government in late 2014 to handle the flood of boat arrivals. More available at:
Statelessness is back (not that it ever went away…), by Guy Goodwin-GillIn, EJIL talk! (September 12, 2019). In this blog post the author argues that Unless international law is brought clearly and forcefully into the picture, then the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees may well miss its target of seeing statelessness abolished by 2024. Moreover, one further likely consequence will be a dramatic upsurge of asylum seekers whose claims to protection will be founded precisely in discriminatory denial or deprivation of citizenship. More available at: https://www.ejiltalk.org/statelessness-is-back-not-that-it-ever-went-away/?mc_cid=e0a359efdd&mc_eid=d3fc1fd0bc
The AU ECHO (2019). This annual magazine is produced by the Directorate of Information and Communication of the African Union. This issue contains topics such as an interview with UNHCR Representative to the African Union and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, Security-Development nexus in Sahel and its implications for economic resilience of women forcibly displaced and Shortcomings in the protection of displaced children in Africa, more available at:
https://au.int/sites/default/files/documents/37038-doc-auecho_2019_digital.pdf
Digital and social media
EJIL: Live! is the official podcast of the European Journal of International Law (EJIL). Launched in May 2014, EJIL: Live! podcasts are released in both video and audio formats to coincide with the publication of each quarterly issue of the Journal. Video episodes feature an in-depth discussion with one of the authors whose article appears in the issue. Audio episodes include a variety of news, reviews and interviews with the authors of articles. Access the full list of audio and video podcasts here: http://www.ejil.org/live.php