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'Repatriation is not for everyone': the life and livelihoods of former refugees in Liberia
The international refugee regime presents repatriation as the most optimal, most feasible of the three durable solutions. Nevertheless, the number of studies which have followed up the process of the reintegration of returnees to their country of origin is scant. This paper will therefore investigate the repatriation of Liberian refugees from Ghana and their economic adjustments upon return using detailed case studies.
Who receives remittances? A case study of the distributional impact on Liberian refugees in Ghana
Significant advances in transportation and communication have helped substantially expand the recent flow of transnational migration. As a result, there has been rapidly growing interest in the impact of remittances on development, and on poverty reduction in particular (see de Haas 2005). But are poor households the main recipients of remittances? Little research has been devoted to the distributional impact of remittances. This Development Viewpoint reports relevant results from extensive fieldwork in a Liberian refugee settlement in Ghana. Though the sample is small and distinctive, the research findings suggest that rich, rather than poor, households could be the main beneficiaries of remittances.
Alchemy field report on FCC micro credit programs to refugees in Mozambique
This paper is a report by an Alchemy intern at Fundo de Credito Communtario (FCC) in Mozambique for the summer of 2004. The report consists of five sections. The first section briefly outlines the current environment surrounding refugees in Mozambique and the refugee policy of Mozambican government. The next section explains micro credit lending program of FCC in Mozambique, with emphasis on its Refugee Integration Program (RIP), as well as FCC’s lending stance in its program. In the third section, the paper evaluates the impact of FCC’s micro credit lending program in Maputo based on the latest results of Alchemy interviews with FCC RIP clients and non-clients. Then, it presents recommendation and proposals for FCC and concludes with prospective direction of FCC.
The Transnationalisation of Care: Sahrawi Refugee Children in a Spanish Host Program
This study contributes to the growing body of research that seeks to document and understand the views and experiences of refugee youth. It initially began as a supplementary project aimed at enriching interview data that had already been generated with Sahrawi children in the refugee camps in Algeria. This research effort forms part of a larger study set up by Dr. Dawn Chatty on Sahrawi refugee youth in Algeria and Afghan refugee youth in Iran funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The supplementary study was centred in Spain, where thousands of Sahrawi children spend their summer vacations with Spanish families as part of the Vacaciones en Paz (Vacations in Peace) hosting programme. Forty-six children who agreed to take part in the study were interviewed on similar topics as were addressed in the camp study, including gender, education, politicisation, hosting experiences, and aspirations for the future.
Holidays in peace: Sahrawi children visit Spain
Thousands of young Sahrawis spend summer holidays with Spanish families. The Vacaciones en Paz hosting programme has grown into a transnational network which allows Sahrawi youth to partially offset the hardships of their daily lives as refugees.
Relocating: the asylum experience in Cairo
Refugees’ experiences of living in non-Western urban settings are infrequently addressed outside those particular cities. This essay presents snapshots of refugees’ experiences of asylum in one such city, Cairo, where it is UNHCR which undertakes the refugee status determination process. Following a presentation of the main institutional actors involved in Cairo’s ‘asylum scene’, it outlines some of the ‘general’ and ‘normal’ problems, vulnerabilities and risks encountered by refugees there. The remainder of the essay documents the particular difficulties experienced by three groups of sub-Saharan African refugees in this city: survivors of sexual and gender-based violence, unaccompanied minors and young men at particular risk. It demonstrates that, far from encountering peace through asylum, they discover a site characterized both by new forms of violence and by repetitions of existing abuse, and highlights the reasons why the right to legal counsel is one of the most important rights that a refugee can have.
Book Review: Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics and the War on Terror
Saviors and survivors lays the foundation for a welcome interrogation of the identity, motivations and actions of members of the United States’ Save Darfur Coalition, the selfstyled ‘saviours’ of the book’s title. Mahmood Mamdani argues that America’s domestic determination to define and intervene in the supposed Darfur genocide is based not on knowledge, but rather on historically unfounded assumptions reproduced and solidified in light of contemporary geopolitics. More controversially perhaps, Mamdani suggests that a failure to understand the complexities of the conflict ‘has turned the movement to Save Darfur into the humanitarian face of the War on Terror’ (p. 6). Nonetheless, Mamdani rightly demands the historical contextualization of the conflict, dedicating five of eight chapters to tracing the precolonial, colonial and postcolonial development of Darfuri land and tribal politics, and noting the extent to which contemporary violence is a continuation of longstanding struggles over access to and use of land.
Special Issue: Refugee and Diaspora Memories
This special issue opens up a conversation between three multidisciplinary fields: memory studies, diaspora studies and refugee studies. The introductory paper articulates an analytical framework addressing various forms of memories of displacement. It defines the concepts of exilic and diasporic memories with regard to the classical and post-modern conceptions of diasporas and shows, beyond their formal opposition, the extent to which these two notions interrelate. The article continues by highlighting four themes that cut across the collection of papers in this special issue: the relationship between individual and collective memories; the diversity of actors (re)producing memory narratives; the transmission, negotiation and contestation of memory across space and between generations; and the confrontational and syncretic dynamics which between different types of memories. To conclude, the paper addresses the political implications of the production and dissemination of memories of displacement.
Refugee and diaspora memories: the politics of remembering and forgetting
This special issue opens up a conversation between three multidisciplinary fields: memory studies, diaspora studies and refugee studies. The introductory paper articulates an analytical framework addressing various forms of memories of displacement. It defines the concepts of exilic and diasporic memories with regard to the classical and post-modern conceptions of diasporas and shows, beyond their formal opposition, the extent to which these two notions interrelate. The article continues by highlighting four themes that cut across the collection of papers in this special issue: the relationship between individual and collective memories; the diversity of actors (re)producing memory narratives; the transmission, negotiation and contestation of memory across space and between generations; and the confrontational and syncretic dynamics which between different types of memories. To conclude, the paper addresses the political implications of the production and dissemination of memories of displacement.
Book Review: Human Rights and Refugees, Internally Displaced Persons and Migrant Workers: Essays in Memory of Joan Fitzpatrick and Arthur Helton
This book is both a tribute to the late Joan Fitzpatrick and Arthur Helton, and a reader comprising engaged, critical and policy-relevant essays on a range of contemporary debates on the protection and human rights of refugees, IDPs and migrant workers. At their best, the 22 essays contain high quality legal analysis, a strong normative commitment to protection and human rights, an awareness of the political context of the law, engagement with policy and practice, forceful critique of international institutions, and the attempt to propose and advocate concrete and realistic solutions to improve the human rights of refugees, IDPs and migrant workers—all of which reflect the values and approach of the work of Fitzpatrick and Helton.
Forced Migration Studies: ‘Who Are We and Where are We Going?’ Report on IASFM 12, Nicosia, Cyprus, June 28-July 2 2009
The theme of the conference—boundaries—reflected the venue for the conference. The call for papers and many of the presentations reflected the overall theme exploring boundaries across three areas: policy, identity and community. In many ways, though, what emerged from the conference was a reflexive turn and an introspection about what Forced Migration Studies is: it generated an analytical reflection on IASFM’s own identity, community and policies as the principal focal point for the meeting of academics, policy-makers and practitioners working on forced migration. Previous conferences had questioned and debated whether our field of study should be defined as Refugee Studies or Forced Migration Studies; at IASFM 12, the consensus had generally emerged in favour of the latter but this left open the question of what the contours of Forced Migration Studies could and should be. At a time when the dynamics of forced migration and migration in general are in transition—with declining asylum space in the North, diminishing humanitarian space in the South, and with the emergence of new meta-challenges such as the global economic crisis, the implications of climate change, and the transition in power towards China and India—the opportunity to reflect on the scope, focus, and boundaries of our own work, as an association, was particularly welcome. In offering an overview of the conference, this report therefore explores three questions: who are we, what did we learn from the conference, and where are we going?
The International Politics of Migration
International migration is an increasingly important part of world politics. However, despite its inherently political and inherently international nature, it remains relatively neglected by scholars of International Relations in comparison to other trans-boundary issue-areas. In particular, the international politics of migration remains under-theorized. Consequently, even basic International Relations concepts such as “power” and “interests” remain poorly developed in relation to migration. In order to address this gap, this article begins to develop the basis of a theory of the international politics of migration. It does so by laying out a series of heuristic frameworks for understanding the interests, interactions, and institutions that underlie state and interstate behaviour around international migration.
The International Politics of Migration
International migration is an increasingly important part of world politics. However, despite its inherently political and inherently international nature, it remains relatively neglected by scholars of International Relations in comparison to other trans-boundary issue-areas. In particular, the international politics of migration remains under-theorized. Consequently, even basic International Relations concepts such as “power” and “interests” remain poorly developed in relation to migration. In order to address this gap, this article begins to develop the basis of a theory of the international politics of migration. It does so by laying out a series of heuristic frameworks for understanding the interests, interactions, and institutions that underlie state and interstate behaviour around international migration.
ECHR and the European Union (In: ECHR and Irish Law)
Following the incorporation of the European Convention on Human Rights Act 2003 into Irish Law, legal developments in areas such as criminal, family and immigration law have raised serious questions of compatibility with the ECHR. Developments in the European Court of Human Rights have highlighted the increasing potential for using the ECHR to positive effect in Irish law. This second edition of ECHR and Irish Law examines the impact of the ECHR on Irish law and considers the actual and potential contribution of the ECHR Act to domestic law in a range of areas. The work begins with research on the impact of the Act and an examination of the relationship between the ECHR, Irish law and EU law. There follows an examination of the effect of the ECHR on individual areas of Irish law, combined with analysis of ECHR law on these subjects. The book has been revised to include new and expanded chapters on: Civil Proceedings Prisoners' Rights Suspicious Deaths and Policing Immigration, Refugee and Asylum Law Criminal law. Written by a team of leading experts in their respective fields, ECHR and Irish Law provides an authoritative account of the incorporation of the ECHR and its impact on Irish Law in practice.
Gender InJustice: Towards the Feminisation of the Legal Professions?
A comprehensive report on the rise of women in the legal professions in Ireland, and the implications for legal practice and the judiciary.