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Found 67 matches for Protecting
Protecting Palestinian children from political violence: the role of the international community
Drawing on extensive field and desk research, this policy brief considers the role of international and UN organisations in protecting Palestinian children. Four distinguishing features of a rights-based approach to child protection are identified: the prioritisation of child protection over national self-interest, a focus on causes and not merely effects, the need for political engagement around international legal standards, and the mobilisation of public opinion. The report concludes that international and UN organisations have allowed their protection efforts to stray a significant distance from this approach. It traces such divergence through consideration of conceptual, institutional and political factors. While the study specifically considers the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, it has important implications for child protection efforts elsewhere: raising questions about the consequences of, for example, an avowedly de-politicised, technocratic approach; institutional hierarchies; and the increasingly close and dependent relationship of child protection organisations to governmental donors.
Protecting Palestinian children from political violence: the role of the international community (Arabic)
Drawing on extensive field and desk research, this policy brief considers the role of international and UN organisations in protecting Palestinian children. Four distinguishing features of a rights-based approach to child protection are identified: the prioritisation of child protection over national self-interest, a focus on causes and not merely effects, the need for political engagement around international legal standards, and the mobilisation of public opinion. The report concludes that international and UN organisations have allowed their protection efforts to stray a significant distance from this approach. It traces such divergence through consideration of conceptual, institutional and political factors. While the study specifically considers the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, it has important implications for child protection efforts elsewhere: raising questions about the consequences of, for example, an avowedly de-politicised, technocratic approach; institutional hierarchies; and the increasingly close and dependent relationship of child protection organisations to governmental donors.
UNRWA and the Palestinian refugees: Protecting refugee rights while structurally addressing the agency’s financially unsustainable modus operandi
The 73-year-long failure to resolve the Palestinian refugee question, and the discourse around it, especially since Madrid and Oslo, combined with the unsustainability of UNRWA’s current modus operandi – essentially a means to manage the humanitarian dimension of the of the unresolved Israeli-Palestinian conflict – prompt a critical re-examination of the way the Palestinian refugee question has been approached and how UNRWA has interpreted and implemented its mandate over the past decades. This paper calls for a fundamental paradigm shift in the approach to protection of and solutions for the Palestinian refugees, comprised of three elements: (1) the search for solutions for Palestinian refugees must move from the essentially bilateral approach of the last decades, namely the Madrid/Oslo framework, back to the multilateral arena of the UN; (2) the discourse on solutions must move beyond the current constraints of perceptions or politics, and refocus on the rights of the Palestinian refugees that remain unfulfilled, including both historical rights (self-determination, return, restitution compensation) and the panoply of human rights that for many refugees, especially in UNRWA area of operation, remains suspended; (3) it is necessary to abandon the “politics of suffering”, namely the resisting belief that the refugees must continue to live in substandard conditions with limited advancement of rights and a clear residential status in host countries in order to assert and maintain their right to return. In fact, allowing refugees to have a dignified life may enable them to be political actors determining their present and future. The 2016 New York Declaration provides a unique opportunity to realize the above paradigm shift. Applicable to Palestinian refugees, it provides an UN-sanctioned mandate – with the broadest possible endorsement of the international community – for the elaboration of a comprehensive response framework (CRF) for Palestinian refugees, dealing with the various unresolved aspects of the Palestinian refugee situation, and developed through a multi-stakeholder approach. The authors propose a radical yet gradual evolution of UNRWA’s strategic direction, from providing humanitarian assistance and support for human development to a comprehensive response to all aspects of the Palestinian refugee question, including a more expanded focus on protection and durable solutions. By doing so, the agency would build on its existing mandate in protecting the rights of the Palestinian refugees and address the void left by the demise of the UN Conciliation Commission for Palestine (UNCCP), which critically complements the UN mandate toward them. Palestinian refugees need and deserve, like all other refugees, an international entity engaged not only in supporting their humanitarian needs but equally in upholding their human rights, including to return, restitution and compensation, as well as facilitating such other durable solutions as the refugees may want to pursue. These latter rights flow from the illegality of the ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Palestine and have only become stronger with the passing of time and the further advancement of international law. The development of a CRF for Palestinian refugees (CRF-PR) has the potential to reenergize the discourse in support of unmet Palestinian refugee rights, and reactivate a common front among host countries, refugees, and Palestinian leadership. By generating discussion and awareness, it would shift political attention towards the refugees and create important momentum to ‘federate’ and advocate jointly for a just and durable solution of the refugee question. Giving proper weight to a rights-based approach, centred on the refugees, and advancing the development of a CRF-PR through a multi-stakeholder platform under the aegis of the UN, has the potential to break the current impasse. Implementing the above shift – including by turning UNRWA’s registration system into a central repository of documentary evidence of the refugees’ historic claims – could gradually pave the way for a broader reconsideration of the agency’s modus operandi, moving away from parallel delivery of some services in some of its “fields” of operations. As a first step, UNRWA may wish to develop a note on its mandate as UNHCR did in 2013. The reforms and initiatives in this paper should also help inform the imminent development by UNRWA of its next Medium-Term Strategy (MTS).
Transnational abductions and transnational responsibilities? The politics of ‘protecting’ female Muslim refugees abducted from Spain
This paper proposes the importance of examining not only how and when diasporas are mobilized by political brokers, but also which members of diasporic populations are strategically engaged both according to their own characteristics (including their age) and the nature of their diasporic hosting context. It explores how Sahrawi refugee children and youth in the Algeria-based Sahrawi refugee camps, Cuba, Syria and in Spain have been mobilized by their political representatives (Polisario), asking why particular cohorts of youth have been actively encouraged to promote and protect ‘the Sahrawi cause’, while other members of the diaspora have not. Drawing on a framework that facilitates comparison both within and across cases, the paper argues that a combination of factors influence the extent to which the Polisario is able and interested in activating the support of Sahrawi children and youth, including the characteristics of the students themselves, their position within the respective host contexts, and the space and resources available to the Polisario/SADR in each location.
Invisible refugees and/or overlapping refugeedom? Protecting Sahrawis and Palestinians displaced by the 2011 Libyan uprising
This article examines the experiences of two North African and Middle Eastern refugee populations (Sahrawis and Palestinians) affected by the 2011 conflict in Libya who have remained largely invisible to the international community. The challenges that they have faced since the outbreak of violence in February 2011, and the nature of international responses to these challenges, highlight a range of interconnected issues on both conceptual and practical dimensions. After outlining the scale and nature of the internal and international displacement arising from the 2011 conflict, and the history of these refugees’ presence in Libya, the article explores whether Sahrawis and Palestinians can be categorised and conceptualised as ‘refugees’ in Libya, given their ‘voluntary’ migration to the country for educational and/or employment purposes. Drawing on a number of historical examples of protection activities by UNHCR for Sahrawi and Palestinian ‘refugee-migrants’, the article explores the potential applicability of a framework that highlights ‘overlapping refugeedoms’ without negating refugees’ agency. Given that neither population has a ‘country of origin’ or effective diplomatic protection, the article then explores which state and non-state actors could be considered to be responsible for their protection in this conflict situation. Finally, analysing the ‘solutions’ promoted for Sahrawi and Palestinian refugees in this context leads to an assessment of whether such responses can be considered to offer effective protection to these populations. Ultimately, the article examines a range of protection gaps that emerge from these groups’ experiences during the 2011 North African uprisings, arguing in favour of a critical assessment of the protection mechanisms in place to support refugees who ‘voluntarily’ migrate for economic and educational purposes. Such an evaluation is particularly important given policy-makers’ increasing interest in presenting mobility as a ‘fourth durable solution’.
Protecting people displaced by climate change: some conceptual challenges
Environmental migration is not new. Nevertheless, the events and processes accompanying global climate change threaten to increase human movement both within states and across international borders. The Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted an increased frequency and severity of climate events such as storms, cyclones and hurricanes, as well as longer-term sea level rise and desertification, which will impact upon people's ability to survive in certain parts of the world. This book brings together a variety of disciplinary perspectives on the phenomenon of climate-induced displacement. With chapters by leading scholars in their field, it collects in one place a rigorous, holistic analysis of the phenomenon, which can better inform academic understanding and policy development alike.
The securitization of asylum: protecting UK residents
This paper examines the concept of the securitization of asylum and its potential effects on the human security of the resident population of the United Kingdom. By focusing on the effects of securitization on members of the host community rather than refugees, this paper represents a perspective that has not received a great deal of attention in the existing body of literature. While it is often assumed that security measures are undertaken for the good of the resident population, it is important to note that fear is also a risk that must be taken into account. This paper argues that the association of asylum seekers with terrorism in public discourse in the UK could potentially lead to a decrease, rather than an increase, in the human security of the resident population by exacerbating their fears of both asylum seekers and terrorism.
Protecting and assisting the internally displaced: the way forward (supplement)
This supplement of Forced Migration Review is published at a crucial moment as the international community recognises the need to urgently address current failures in protection and assistance for internally displaced people. Articles from Jan Egeland (UN Emergency Relief Coordinator) and other key figures in the humanitarian community present a range of views on the future of the IDP regime.
Protecting environmentally displaced people: developing the capacity of legal and normative frameworks
Based on evidence collected in four exemplar countries – Kenya, Bangladesh, Ghana and Vietnam – the overall aim of the study is to investigate the capacity of national legal frameworks to protect and mediate the rights of people vulnerable to environmental displacement induced by climate change.
Invisible refugees: protecting Sahrawis and Palestinians displaced by the 2011 Libyan uprising
This article examines the experiences of two Middle Eastern refugee populations (Sahrawis and Palestinians) affected by the 2011 conflict in Libya. Both refugee communities and their political representatives (Polisario Front and Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) respectively) have received support from the Libyan government since the 1970s, including through the provision of scholarships to enable refugee children and youth to complete their studies in Libya.
Protecting People in Conflict and Crisis: Responding to the Challenges of a Changing World
Ten years ago the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) defined humanitarian protection as including “all activities aimed at obtaining full respect for the rights of the individual in accordance with the letter and spirit of the relevant bodies of law (i.e. human rights, humanitarian and refugee law).” Since then humanitarian protection has received growing attention within the humanitarian sector, becoming not one of the central aims of the international community but also one of its greatest challenges. This conference, which was hosted by the Refugee Studies Centre (RSC) in collaboration with the Humanitarian Policy Group (HPG) and with generous support from the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, convened over 180 participants from more than 40 countries to discuss the current state of humanitarian protection research, policy and practice, with a view to developing new ideas for the protection of people in conflict and crisis in the 21st century. The conference revolved around six thematic tracks: concepts of protection; the politics of protection; populations at risk; protection, security and the military; national and regional responsibilities to protect; protection in practice. Eighty-four papers were presented and it is impossible to represent the depth, richness and complexity of the debates that took place. With that in mind however, a number of key themes emerged strongly, particularly around the challenges faced by humanitarian practitioners seeking to deliver ‘protection’ in a hostile world and the role which academics could play in addressing these challenges. The text below provides some reflections of those themes.
Protecting Forced Migrants: A State of the Art Report of Concepts, Challenges and Ways Forward
This study, commissioned by the Swiss Federal Commission on Migration, investigates how the complex and multi-causal nature of forced displacement in the contemporary world has contributed to an increasing range of protection gaps and to the diminution of protection space for refugees, and especially the increasing number of people who fall outside the recognised refugee and asylum apparatus. The study explores the current and future challenges to the provision of protection, and makes recommendations on how these challenges might be met and how protection can be enhanced. The study report is available from the Commission in both English and French.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR): The Politics and Practice of Refugee Protection into the 21st Century
This is a concise and comprehensive introduction to both the world of refugees and the UN organization that protects and assists them. Written by experts in the field, this is one of the very few books that trace the relationship between state interests, global politics, and the work of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ (UNHCR). Looking ahead into the twenty-first century, the authors outline how the changing nature of conflict and displacement poses UNHCR with a new array of challenges and how there exists a fundamental tension between the UN’s human rights agenda of protecting refugees fleeing conflict and persecution and the security, political and economic interests of states around the world.
Protection by Persuasion: International Cooperation in the Refugee Regime
States located near crisis zones are most likely to see an influx of people fleeing from manmade disasters; African states, for instance, are forced to accommodate and adjust to refugees more often than do European states far away from sites of upheaval. Geography dictates that states least able to pay the costs associated with refugees are those most likely to have them cross their borders. Therefore, refugee protection has historically been characterized by a North-South impasse. While Southern states have had to open their borders to refugees fleeing conflict or human rights abuses in neighboring states, Northern states have had little obligation or incentive to contribute to protecting refugees in the South. In recent years, however, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has sought to foster greater international cooperation within the global refugee regime through special conferences at which Northern states are pushed to contribute to the costs of protection for refugees in the South. These initiatives, Alexander Betts finds in Protection by Persuasion, can overcome the North-South impasse and lead to significant cooperation. Betts shows that Northern states will contribute to such efforts when they recognize a substantive relationship between refugee protection in the South and their own interests in such issues as security, immigration, and trade. Highlighting the mechanisms through which UNHCR has been able to persuade Northern states that such links exist, Protection by Persuasion makes clear that refugee protection is a global concern, most effectively addressed when geographic realities are overridden by the perception of interdependence.
Human rights and the elusive universal subject: immigration detention under international human rights and EU law
The right to liberty is ubiquitous in human rights instruments, in essence protecting all individuals from arbitrary arrest and detention. Yet, in practice, immigration detention is increasingly routine, even automatic, across Europe. Asylum seekers in particular have been targeted for detention. While international human rights law limits detention, its protections against immigration detention are weaker than in other contexts, as the state's immigration control prerogatives are given sway. In spite of the overlapping authority of international and regional human rights bodies, the caselaw in this field is diverse. Focusing on the U.N. Human Rights Committee, the European Court of Human Rights, and the Court of Justice of the European Union, this Article explores how greater interaction between these bodies could produce more rights-protective standards.
Civilian protection in Sri Lanka under threat
The papers by Benson and Fonseka are based on presentations given at the September 2009 conference hosted by the RSC on Protecting People in Conflict and Crisis: Responding to the Challenges of a Changing World. The paper by Satkunanathan was presented in a follow-up roundtable discussion on Post War Future in Sri Lanka hosted by the RSC and the Centre for Research on Inequality, Human Security and Ethnicity. These papers contribute to the debate on humanitarianism and civilian protection. They discuss the contradictions, tensions, ambiguities and dilemmas of UN and international organisations in protecting civilians in times of conflict. Benson describes UNHCR's work on both needs and rights in Sri Lanka during the peace process, particularly with regards to IDPs, at a time when the organisation's mandate was expanding to cover more rights-based protection. Satkunanathan's paper describes the tension faced by the agencies between addressing protection and assistance needs of the displaced population. Finally, Fonseka's paper is a useful summary of the dilemmas and constraints faced by humanitarian workers and NGOs within the post-war situation, and highlights many of the problems faced by activists who are working inside Sri Lanka.
Introduction: conservation and mobile peoples (In: Conservation and Mobile Indigenous Peoples: Displacement, Forced Settlement, and Sustainable Development)
The close of the twentieth century has witnessed an upsurge in international concern about people's impact on the natural environment. As pressure on natural resources has intensified, the conventional means of protecting habitat and preventing species extinctions, through the establishment of 'protected areas', has increasingly come into question. Conventional conservation approaches have been accused of ignoring the wider forces causing environmental damage and, even, of being part of the same mind-set, which imposes land use categories from the 'top-down', classifying lands as protected areas or zones. This, say the critics, has only legitimized and encouraged unsustainable land use outside protected areas, placing further pressure on natural resources and the beleaguered protected areas them-selves. Some have, thus, demanded broader changes in national and global economies and focused attention on the underlying causes of environmental destruction - social injustice, the lack of secure land tenure, the enclosure of the commons, consumerism, the rise of corporations, global trade, and government collusion or indifference (WRM 1990; IUCN 1991; Colchester and Lohmann 1993; Ecologist 1993; Verolme and Moussa 1999; Barraclough and Ghimire 2000; Wood et al. 2000).
Asylum Policy
This policy primer examines some of the key questions underlying the UK’s asylum policy, focusing on the challenges and tensions between protecting human rights and ensuring that immigration controls are not undermined.
Refugees’ Right to Work and Access to Labor Markets – An Assessment. Part I: Synthesis
For refugees, the right to work is vital for reducing vulnerability, enhancing resilience, and securing dignity. Harnessing refugees’ skills can also benefit local economic activity and national development. But there are many obstacles. Based on a sample of 20 countries hosting 70 percent of the world’s refugees, this study investigates the role and impact of legal and normative provisions providing and protecting refugees’ right to work within the 1951 Refugee Convention as well as from the perspective of nonsignatory states. Three metrics analyze the principle determinants of the right to work and labor market access: refugee and employment law, policies and practices that facilitate or constrain the right to work, and mediating socioeconomic conditions. Overall the study finds remarkable diversity in legal provisions and constraints on refugees’ right to work. A restrictive approach to the right to work prevails, and most states are reluctant to ease these restrictions. The majority of refugees work in the informal sector, but under much less satisfactory and more exploitative conditions compared with nationals. Informal labor markets are also constrained in countries with fragile economies which often host large numbers of refugees. Based on its findings, the study concludes that more national and international coordination is required, multiple actors should share in the responsibility to deliver decent work, labor market policies as well as training and education should be harnessed to support sustainable livelihoods, and refugee social capital should be more effectively engaged.
Refugees’ Right to Work and Access to Labor Markets – An Assessment. Part II: Country Cases
For refugees, the right to work is vital for reducing vulnerability, enhancing resilience, and securing dignity. Harnessing refugees’ skills can also benefit local economic activity and national development. But there are many obstacles. Based on a sample of 20 countries hosting 70 percent of the world’s refugees, this study investigates the role and impact of legal and normative provisions providing and protecting refugees’ right to work within the 1951 Refugee Convention as well as from the perspective of nonsignatory states. Three metrics analyze the principle determinants of the right to work and labor market access: refugee and employment law, policies and practices that facilitate or constrain the right to work, and mediating socioeconomic conditions. Overall the study finds remarkable diversity in legal provisions and constraints on refugees’ right to work. A restrictive approach to the right to work prevails, and most states are reluctant to ease these restrictions. The majority of refugees work in the informal sector, but under much less satisfactory and more exploitative conditions compared with nationals. Informal labor markets are also constrained in countries with fragile economies which often host large numbers of refugees. Based on its findings, the study concludes that more national and international coordination is required, multiple actors should share in the responsibility to deliver decent work, labor market policies as well as training and education should be harnessed to support sustainable livelihoods, and refugee social capital should be more effectively engaged.