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Only with you this broom will fly: Rojava, magic, and sweeping away the state inside of us
About the book 'Deciding for Ourselves', C. Milstein (ed.): In a time of social and ecological crises, people everywhere are looking for solutions. States and capitalism, rather than providing them, only make matters worse. There’s a growing sense that we’ll have to fix this mess on our own. But how? Deciding for Ourselves, in the spirit of the Zapatistas, demonstrates that “the impossible is possible.” A better world through self-determination and self-governance is not only achievable. It is already happening in urban and rural communities around the world—from Mexico to Rojava, Denmark to Greece—as an implicit or explicit replacement for nations, police, and other forms of hierarchical social control. This anthology explores this “sense of freedom in the air,” as one piece puts it, by looking at contemporary examples of autonomous, directly democratic spaces and the real-world dilemmas they experience, all the while underscoring the egalitarian ways of life that are collectively generated in them.
Victim or Perpetrator? The Criminal Migrant and the Idea of ‘Harm’ in a Labour Market Context
In A. Bogg, J. Collins, M. Freedland, and J. Herring (eds) 'Criminality at Work'. From the Master and Servant legislation to the Factories Acts of the 19th century, the criminal law has always had a vital yet normatively complex role in the regulation of work relations. Even in its earliest forms, it operated both as a tool to repress collective organizations and enforce labour discipline, while policing the worst excesses of industrial capitalism. Recently, governments have begun to rediscover criminal law as a regulatory tool in a diverse set of areas related to labour law: 'modern slavery', penalizing irregular migrants, licensing regimes for labour market intermediaries, wage theft, supporting the enforcement of general labour standards, new forms of hybrid preventive orders, harassment at work, and industrial protest. This volume explores the political and regulatory dimensions of the new 'criminality at work' from a wide range of disciplinary perspectives, including labour law, immigration law, and health and safety regulations. The volume provides an overview of the regulatory terrain of 'criminality at work', exploring whether these different regulatory interventions represent politically legitimate uses of the criminal law. The book also examines whether these recent interventions constitute a new pattern of criminalization that operates in preventive mode and is based upon character and risk-based forms of culpability. The volume concludes by reflecting upon the general themes of 'criminality at work' comparatively, from Australian, Canadian, and US perspectives.
IDP-led women’s assistance: new roles for traditional groups
Despite the increased focus on forced migration worldwide, little attention has been given to the success and effectiveness of IDP- and refugee-led initiatives in addressing key challenges within their communities. Yet pre-existing traditional groups led by internally displaced people (IDPs) and refugees offer pathways for social support, self-reliance, and integration. The IDP-led initiatives we identified in our research in Adama, Ethiopia, provide long-term support with minimum resources. More attention should be paid by policymakers and assistance agencies to support and collaborate with IDP groups such as these. Our research highlights the pivotal role of social groups created by IDPs.
Migration and Human Rights in Africa: The Policy and Legal Framework in Broad Strokes
Chapter in the book ‘African Migrants and the Refugee Crisis’, edited by Olayiwola Abegunrin and Sabella O. Abidde. Since most African states gained independence, immediately then and for so long afterward, the focus was dealing with the armed conflicts that were rampant across the continent. Consequently, the legal framework that first emanated from the regional governing body, the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), with regard to migration, dealt with specific aspects of the refugee problem in Africa. Forced migration and how to deal with displaced populations was a pressing problem reflective of the political developments, thus soliciting coordinated responses from the regional political body, the OAU, which later metamorphosed into the African Union (AU). It was later recognized that while the continental legal framework recognized and sought to address aspects of external displacement, there was an even larger population of internally displaced persons (IDPs), who without any legal and policy framework, not only internationally but also domestically were virtually lacking any form of protection and standards that would compel the respective governments to respond to their needs. Thirty-nine years after the adoption of the Refugees Convention, the AU, in 2009, adopted the Convention for the protection and assistance of IDPs in Africa. A vast improvement on the Refugees Convention that tends to be very sketchy on the rights of refugees and attendant duties of the government, the IDP Convention has been lauded as an instrument that ‘provides a roadmap that dignifies the rights of peoples forced to flee at all points of their displacement’.
The ‘mobility turn’: economic inequality in refugee livelihoods
About the book ‘Handbook of Culture and Migration’ edited by Jeffrey H. Cohen and Ibrahim Sirkeci: Capturing the important place and power role that culture plays in the decision-making process of migration, this Handbook looks at human movement outside of a vacuum; taking into account the impact of family relationships, access to resources, and security and insecurity at both the points of origin and destination.Utilising case studies from around the world, chapters look at migration from the perspectives of a broad range of migrants, including refugees, labour migrants, students, highly educated migrants, and documented and undocumented movers. The Handbook moves beyond an understanding of the economics of migration, looking at the importance of love, skilled movers, food and identity in migrants’ lives. It analyses the assumption that migrants follow direct pathways to new destinations where they settle, recognising the dynamic ways in which movers travel, following circular routes and celebrating new opportunities. Highlighting the challenges migrants face, disputes around belonging and citizenship are explored in relation to rising nationalism and xenophobia. The insightful studies of the choices migrants make around both perceived and real needs and resources will make this Handbook a critical read for scholars and students of migration studies. It will also appeal to policy makers looking to understand the complexity of the impetus to migrant movement, and the important role that culture plays.
Empowering refugees through cash and agriculture: a regression discontinuity design
Assistance to refugees is shifting from a humanitarian model, which focuses on protection, emergency relief, and shelter, to a development model promoting refugee self-reliance through income-generating activities, market development, and cash transfers. Evidence on the effects of this paradigm shift is limited. Exploiting a regression discontinuity design, this paper tests whether the adoption of a development approach to refugee assistance in a new settlement in Kenya has a positive impact. We find that refugees benefiting from the new approach have better diets and perceive themselves as happier and more independent from humanitarian aid. We find no effect on assets and employment. These effects appear to be driven by the switch from food rations to cash transfers and by the wider promotion of small-scale agriculture. Our findings argue in favor of the development approach to refugee assistance, which is cheaper and leads to better outcomes.
Building a bed for the night: the Parisian “Yellow Bubble” and the politics of humanitarian architecture
The past decade has seen the expansion of architecture with an explicitly humanitarian purpose. This article examines the politics and functions of this movement by looking in detail at the humanitarian center at Porte de la Chapelle in Paris (the “Yellow Bubble”). Based on in-depth interviews and participant observation during 2017, the article shows how the center provided migrants with a bed for the night while at the same time serving the political imperative to clear informal settlements from the streets of Paris. The design, like many others, therefore replicated both the compassionate discourse of humanitarianism and its deeply political functions.
Success twinned by challenge: an urban IDP response in Ethiopia
This article presents a case study of the urban internally displaced people (IDP) response in Adama, Ethiopia, the former capital of the Oromia region. In 2018, approximately 1,340 registered households and many unregistered IDPs, who were mainly ethnic Oromo, arrived in Adama. Most of the IDPs arrived by way of a planned relocation scheme from camps, having fled ethnic conflict in the Somali region of the country. The article provides an overview of the response and presents four key policy-relevant findings, reflecting on both the initial success and the longer-term challenges faced in assisting and integrating urban IDPs, as well as the lack of assistance offered to undocumented IDPs in Adama, a challenge compounded by a lack of data about their existence. Specifically, the article discusses the locally-led response, the ongoing relief-development gap present in Adama, the need for better data on urban IDPs and the issues that face those IDPs lacking formal identification, and the ongoing yet often overlooked challenges in integration faced by IDPs.
Refugee livelihoods: a comparative analysis of Nairobi and Kakuma camp in Kenya
While the literature on refugee livelihoods is growing, there is a lack of comparative studies of their livelihood strategies in relation to their host communities and their living locations. Drawing upon fieldwork in Kakuma camp and Nairobi in Kenya, this article therefore provides a comparative analysis of the economic activities employed by refugees living in different contexts and highlights some of the institutional factors that distinguish the economic lives of refugees from those of their host populations. The findings suggest that while some Kenyan hosts are encumbered by challenges that are comparable to those faced by refugees, the myriad political, legal, and policy factors that characterise refugeehood are nonetheless particular in the ways that they influence livelihoods. By highlighting the multiple actors and factors that shape refugees' economic strategies, the article also reveals the political economy within which refugee livelihoods are embedded.
‘Over-researched’ and ‘Under-researched’ refugee groups: exploring the phenomena, causes and consequences
Drawing upon my fieldwork experience in East Africa, this article sheds light on emerging phenomena of ‘over-researched’ and ‘under-researched’ refugee populations. Over the past years, I have increasingly encountered ‘research fatigue’ amongst certain groups of refugees who have undergone frequent studies by numerous researchers. On the other hand, I have also noticed disappointment and frustration from groups of refugees who feel that they remain ‘under-studied’ despite their hidden challenges and vulnerabilities. While the phenomena of over- and under-research are not new, few studies are done to compare the under- and over-studied refugees and to investigate the causes and consequences of the polarisation of research interest amongst refugee populations. This article thus aims to narrow these gaps and also explores these phenomena in relation to accountability and ethics related to forced migration scholarship. I also present practical actions toward improvement of this research polarisation.
Building economies in refugee-hosting regions: lessons from Dollo Ado
Between 2011 and 2018, the IKEA Foundation invested around $100m USD in supporting infrastructure and livelihoods programmes in, and around, the remote Dollo Ado refugee camps in the Somali region of Ethiopia. It worked collaboratively with UNHCR and the Ethiopian Government. Between June and December 2019, the RSC’s Refugee Economies Programme undertook a retrospective evaluation of the impact of the interventions. In addition to leading to measurable improvements in socio-economic outcomes for the population, the programmes were pioneering in their attempt to build the economy of a remote refugee-hosting region. The lessons learned from the programmes have wider policy implications for building economies in other remote refugee-hosting regions. As part of the evaluation of the Foundation’s programmes, we developed a five-stage Sustainable Refugee Economies Framework, intended to highlight the pre-conditions for building sustainable economies in remote refugee-hosting borderlands. The elements of the framework are: 1) political will, 2) infrastructure, 3) cultural relevance, 4) comparative advantage, and 5) external inputs. The achievements and challenges faced in Dollo Ado offer an unprecedented opportunity to learn about the conditions for building sustainable refugee economies in other remote regions, within Africa and globally. Crucially, learning from the Dollo Ado experience teaches us that if refugee self-reliance is to be sustainable, livelihood programmes must also be accompanied by wider economic transformation within refugee-hosting regions.
The IKEA Foundation and livelihoods in Dollo Ado: lessons from the cooperatives model
Between 2011 and 2018, the IKEA Foundation invested around $100m USD in supporting infrastructure and livelihoods programmes in, and around, the remote Dollo Ado refugee camps in the Somali region of Ethiopia. It worked collaboratively with UNHCR and the Ethiopian Government. One of the most innovative features was a series of ‘cooperatives’, membership-based income-generating groups, typically involving an equal number of refugees and host community members. These cooperatives have been piloted in areas such as agriculture, livestock, energy, and the environment. Importantly, they have been supported with complementary infrastructure, microfinance, and training. Between June and December 2019, the RSC’s Refugee Economies Programme undertook a retrospective evaluation of the impact of the interventions. Using a mixed-methods approach to gather extensive quantitative and qualitative data, the aim of the evaluation was to inform better future programming in Dollo Ado, throughout Ethiopia, and globally. Overall, the cooperatives model has improved socio-economic outcomes for refugees and the host community, and contributed to improved social cohesion between refugees and the host community. It has also supported protection-related and environmental objectives. Some of the cooperatives have been more successful than others, the most successful being agriculture and livestock, while the energy and environmental cooperatives faced particular challenges. Our research highlights a number of conditions for future success within the cooperatives.
Responses to Urban IDPs in Adama, Ethiopia: A Case Study
In this report we highlight successful humanitarian and development responses to internally displaced people (IDPs), as well as long-term development challenges, based on research in Adama, Ethiopia, a growing city in the Oromia region close to Addis Ababa. We present findings from a little-known case of IDP relocation and resettlement to Adama, which received and settled IDPs from camps in 2018. Over 1300 registered households as well as many unregistered IDPs fled ethnic conflict in the Somali region of Ethiopia to seek safety in Adama, a city approximately 100km southeast of Addis Ababa. The IDPs, who were mainly ethnic Oromo, arrived in Adama over the course of several months. The sudden and huge influx of IDPs put immense pressure on the city’s capacity to provide the necessary support. Significant lessons can be learned from Adama’s response. In the absence of large-scale international assistance, a little-known campaign to address the needs of IDPs led to a multi-level response from federal, regional and – in particular – local urban actors. This response may be a unique instance of an entirely Ethiopian, collective and largely local effort to operate successfully at this scale and within such a short period of time. At the same time it illustrates longstanding development challenges facing both IDPs and the cities that host them, including to employment and social integration. This case study is particularly significant because increasing numbers of forced migrants move not to capital cities, but instead to secondary cities such as Adama, which often lack the resources to accommodate and integrate them.
IDPs in secondary cities: good practices and ongoing challenges from Ethiopia
This research brief presents a case study of Adama, Ethiopia, to demonstrate how local government can successfully respond to urban internally displaced people (IDPs). In 2018, more people were displaced as a result of conflict, violence and disaster than ever before. The number of IDPs across the world escalated from 28 million to an estimated 41.3 million, and sub-Saharan Africa was the region most affected globally, with over 10 million people displaced. Ethiopia experienced a huge increase in its IDP population – almost double that experienced by Syria, and more than any other country across the world. This Research in Brief presents some of the major successful humanitarian and development responses, as well as the long-term development challenges that IDPs face, based on research in Adama, Ethiopia, a growing city in the Oromia region close to Addis Ababa. The authors present good practices and recommendations, and highlight key areas for further action. While most research on forced migrants in Ethiopia focuses on refugees, or on internal displacement within the Somali region, this brief presents findings from a little-known case of IDP relocation and resettlement to Adama city, one of 11 cities that received and settled IDPs from camps in 2018. This case study is significant because increasing numbers of forced migrants move not to capital cities, but instead to secondary cities such as Adama, which often lack the resources to attend to them.
Identity as a lens on livelihoods: insights from Turkana, Kenya
Livelihood surveys often categorise pastoralist households by economic activity and material assets, using measures such as herd ownership, extent of mobility and the degree of reliance on livestock vs other sources of subsistence and income. However, in contexts of high variability and uncertainty, such objective classifications may inadvertently perpetrate two distortions. First, they stabilise highly fluid economic landscapes, over-looking the ways in which people draw opportunistically from an array of livelihood strategies or move between them over time. Second, they may flatten the social field, overlooking the ways that class and kinship structure and constrain people's livelihood options. This paper argues for greater attention to subjective assessments of livelihood, such as the labels by which people self-identify or distinguish themselves from others. Drawing on over twenty months of anthropological fieldwork, I describe the notion of raiya, a polysemous identity construct that has become a salient part of everyday discourse in Turkana County, Kenya. While raiya connotes an array of conventional dichotomies – including rural/urban, traditional/modern and nomadic/sedentary – attention to the uses of this term in 'speech acts' reveals how it is used to manage relationships and access opportunities across these apparent divisions. This example demonstrates how research on identity practices can inform the study of livelihoods, not only because self-identification indicates a commitment to certain cultural values (Moritz 2012), but also because identity labels highlight the messy processes of boundary-shifting and boundary-crossing that characterise social and economic life under conditions of high variability.
Hosting Refugees as an Investment in Development: Grand Designs versus Local Expectations in Turkana County, Kenya
Chapter in Land, Investment & Politics: Reconfiguring East Africa’s Pastoral Drylands, edited by Jeremy Lind, Doris Okenwa, and Ian Scoones. About the book: More than ever before, the gaze of global investment has been directed to the drylands of Africa, but what does this mean for these regions' pastoralists and other livestock-keepers and their livelihoods? Will those who have occupied drylands over generations benefit from the developments, as claimed, or is this a new type of territorialisation, exacerbating social inequality? This book's detailed local studies of investments at various stages of development - from Kenya, Tanzania, Somaliland, Ethiopia - explore, for the first time, how large land, resource and infrastructure projects shape local politics and livelihoods. Land and resources use, based on ancestral precedence and communal practices, and embedded regional systems of trade, are unique to these areas, yet these lands are now seen as the new frontier for development of national wealth. By examining the ways in which large-scale investments enmesh with local political and social relations, the chapters show how even the most elaborate plans of financiers, contractors and national governments come unstuck and are re-made in the guise of not only states' grand modernist visions, but also those of herders and small-town entrepreneurs in the pastoral drylands. The contributors also demonstrate how and why large-scale investments have advanced in a more piecemeal way as the challenges of implementation have mounted.
Recognising refugees: understanding the real routes to recognition
Refugee status determination procedures are the gateway to refugeehood and as such are profoundly important. Various challenges arise, however, in studying these practices. Our research project ‘Recognising Refugees’ aims to understand the factors that determine who is recognised as a refugee (and who is rejected) globally.
Refugee recognition: not always sought
Some Syrian refugees in Lebanon have chosen not to register with UNHCR, believing – often with good reason – that refugee recognition will hinder their freedom and their family’s access to humanitarian assistance.
Exploring RSD handover from UNHCR to States
Handing over responsibility for refugee status determination from UNHCR to States is a complicated process that is rarely speedy or smooth. A successful handover – and the ability to meet the overarching goal of providing adequate protection for refugees – depends on many factors.