Refugees Roles In Resolving Displacement And Building Peace

How are refugee crises solved? This has become an urgent question as global displacement rates continue to climb, and refugee situations now persist for years if not decades. The resolution of displacement and the conflicts that force refugees from their homes is often explained as a top-down process led and controlled by governments and international organizations. This book takes a different approach. Through contributions from scholars working in politics, anthropology, law, sociology and philosophy, and a wide range of case studies, it explores the diverse ways in which refugees themselves interpret, create and pursue solutions to their plight. It investigates the empirical and normative significance of refugees’ engagement as agents in these processes, and their implications for research, policy and practice. This book speaks both to academic debates and to the broader community of peacebuilding, humanitarian and human rights scholars concerned with the nature and dynamics of agency in contentious political contexts, and identifies insights that can inform policy and practice.

Since its establishment in 1951, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) has expanded from a small, regionally specific, logistically focused outfit into a major international organization involved in an almost dizzying array of activities related to human mobility. In 2016, IOM joined the UN system and has rebranded itself as the "UN migration agency." Despite its dramatic expansion and increasing influence, IOM remains understudied. This book provides an accessible, incisive introduction to IOM, focusing on its humanitarian activities and responses to forced migration – work that now makes up the majority of the organization’s budget, staff, and field presence. IOM’s humanitarian work is often overlooked or dismissed as a veil for its involvement in other activities that serve states’ interests in restricting migration. In contrast, Bradley argues that understanding IOM’s involvement in humanitarian action and work with displaced persons is pivotal to comprehending its evolution and contemporary significance. Examining tensions and controversies surrounding the agency’s activities, including in the complex cases of Haiti and Libya, the book considers how IOM’s structure, culture, and internal and external power struggles have shaped its behaviour. It demonstrates how IOM has grown by acting as an entrepreneur, cultivating autonomy and influence well beyond its limited formal mandate. The International Organization for Migration is essential reading for students and scholars of migration, humanitarianism, and international organizations.

It is an era of expansion for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), an increasingly influential actor in the global governance of migration. Bringing together leading experts in international law and international relations, this collection examines the dynamics and implications of IOM's expansion in a new way. Analyzing IOM as an international organization (IO), the book illuminates the practices, obligations and accountability of this powerful but controversial actor, advancing understanding of IOM itself and broader struggles for IO accountability. The contributions explore key, yet often under-researched, IOM activities including its role in humanitarian emergencies, internal displacement, data collection, ethical labour recruitment, and migrant detention. Offering recommendations for reforms rooted in empirical evidence and careful normative analysis, this is a vital resource for all those interested in the obligations and accountability of international organizations, and in the field of migration. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

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 Syrian refugee crisis has galvanized attention to one of the world’s foremost challenges: forced displacement. The total number of refugees and internally displaced persons, now at over 65 million, continues to grow as violent conflict spikes.This report, Forcibly Displaced: Toward a Development Approach Supporting Refugees, the Internally Displaced, and Their Hosts, produced in close partnership with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), attempts to sort fact from fiction to better understand the scope of the challenge and encourage new thinking from a socioeconomic perspective. The report depicts the reality of forced displacement as a developing world crisis with implications for sustainable growth: 95 percent of the displaced live in developing countries and over half are in displacement for more than four years. To help the displaced, the report suggests ways to rebuild their lives with dignity through development support, focusing on their vulnerabilities such as loss of assets and lack of legal rights and opportunities. It also examines how to help host communities that need to manage the sudden arrival of large numbers of displaced people and that are under pressure to expand services, create jobs, and address long-standing development issues. Critical to this response is collective action. As work on a new Global Compact on Responsibility Sharing for Refugees progresses, the report underscores the importance of humanitarian and development communities working together in complementary ways to support countries throughout the crisis†•from strengthening resilience and preparedness at the onset to creating lasting solutions.

Protracted refugee populations not only constitute over 70% of the world's refugees but are also a principal source of many of the irregular movements of people around the world today. The long-term presence of refugee populations in much of the developing world has come to be seen by many host states in these regions as a source of insecurity. In response, host governments have enacted policies of containing refugees in isolated and insecure camps, have prevented the arrival of additional refugees and, in extreme cases, have engaged in forcible repatriation. Not surprisingly, these refugee populations are also increasingly perceived as possible sources of insecurity for Western states. Refugee camps are sometimes breeding grounds for international terrorism and rebel movements. These groups often exploit the presence of refugees to engage in activities that destabilise not only host states but also entire regions.

The orthodox definition of international security put human displacement and refugees at the periphery. In contrast, this book demonstrates that human displacement can be both a cause and a consequence of conflict within and among societies. As such, the management of refugee movements and the protection of displaced people should be a part of security policy.

This fully updated third-edition of Contemporary Peacemaking is a state of the art overview of peacemaking in relation to contemporary civil wars. It examines best (and worst) practice in relation to peace processes and peace accords. The contributing authors are a mix of leading academics and practitioners with expert knowledge of a wide arrays of cases and techniques. The book provides a mix of theory and concept-building along with insights into ongoing cases of peace processes and post-accord peacebuilding. The chapters make clear that peacemaking is a dynamic field, with new practices in peacemaking techniques, changes to the international peace support architecture, and greater awareness of key issues such as gender and development after peace accords. The book is mindful of the intersection between top-down and bottom-up approaches to peace and how formal and institutionalized peace accords need to be lived and enacted by communities on the ground.