Refugee Repatriation

At the start of the 1990s, there was great optimism that the end of the Cold War might also mean the end of the "refugee cycle" - both a breaking of the cycle of violence, persecution and flight, and the completion of the cycle for those able to return to their homes. The 1990s, it was hoped, would become the "decade of repatriation." However, although over nine million refugees were repatriated worldwide between 1991 and 1995, there are reasons to believe that it will not necessarily be a durable solution for refugees. It certainly has become clear that "the end of the refugee cycle" has been much more complex, and ultimately more elusive, than expected. The changing constructions and realities of refugee repatriation provide the backdrop for this book which presents new empirical research on examples of refugee repatriation and reconstruction. Apart from providing up-to-date material, it also fills a more fundamental gap in the literature which has tended to be based on pedagogical reasoning rather than actual field research. Adopting a global perspective, this volume draws together conclusions from highly varied experiences of refugee repatriation and defines repatriation and reconstruction as part of a wider and interrelated refugee cycle of displacement, exile and return. The contributions come from authors with a wealth of relevant practical and academic experience, spanning the continents of Africa, Asia, Central America, and Europe.

Examining resettlement practices worldwide and drawing on contributions from anthropology, law, international relations, social work, political science, and numerous other disciplines, this ground-breaking volume highlights the conflicts between refugees’ needs and state practices, and assesses international, regional and national perspectives on resettlement, as well as the bureaucracies and ideologies involved. It offers a detailed understanding of resettlement, from the selection of refugees to their long-term integration in resettling states, and highlights the relevance of a lifespan approach to resettlement analysis.

Voluntary repatriation is now the predominant solution to refugee crises, yet the responsibilities states of origin bear towards their repatriating citizens are under-examined. Through a combination of legal and moral analysis, and case studies of the troubled repatriation movements to Guatemala, Bosnia and Mozambique, Megan Bradley develops and refines an original account of the minimum conditions of a 'just return' process. The goal of a just return process must be to recast a new relationship of rights and duties between the state and its returning citizens, and the conditions of just return match the core duties states should provide for all their citizens: equal, effective protection for security and basic human rights, including accountability for violations of these rights. This volume evaluates the ways in which different forms of redress such as restitution and compensation may help enable just returns, and traces the emergence and evolution of international norms on redress for refugees.

The Palestinian refugee issue remains a central component of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This book explores the demographic and developmental challenges which the return of refugees to a future Palestinian state would generate.

Mollie Gerver considers when bodies such as the UN, government agencies and NGOs ought to help refugees to return home. Drawing on original interviews with 172 refugees before and after repatriation, she resolves six moral puzzles arising from repatriation using the methods of analytical philosophy to provide a more ethical framework.

How do communities grapple with the challenges of reconstruction after conflicts? In one of the first in-depth ethnographic accounts of refugee repatriation anywhere in the world, Laura C. Hammond follows the story of Ada Bai, a returnee settlement with a population of some 7,500 people. In the days when refugees first arrived, Ada Bai was an empty field along Ethiopia's northwest border, but it is now a viable—arguably thriving—community. For the former refugees who fled from northern Ethiopia to eastern Sudan to escape war and famine in 1984 and returned to their country of birth in 1993, "coming home" really meant creating a new home out of an empty space. Settling in a new area, establishing social and kin ties, and inventing social practices, returnees gradually invested their environment with meaning and began to consider their settlement home. Hammond outlines the roles that gender and generational differences played in this process and how the residents came to define the symbolic and geographical boundaries of Ada Bai. Drawing on her fieldwork from 1993 to 1995 and regular shorter periods since, Hammond describes the process by which a place is made meaningful through everyday practice and social interaction. This Place Will Become Home provides insight into how people cope with extreme economic hardship, food insecurity, and limited access to international humanitarian or development assistance in their struggle to attain economic self-sufficiency.

'The Point of No Return' explores the politics that surround refugees' return 'home'. It combines political theory historical research, and grassroots fieldwork in Latin America and Africa to present a comprehensive picture of refugee repatriation through the 20th-century.

This book provides a comparative examination of a number of different refugee return situations in order to identify pre-requisites for an effective and durable Palestinian repatriation programme. It contains contributions from members of the UN and other NGOs as well as academics.