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Thanksgiving in a Refugee Settlement: Between Fear and Gratitude in Kiryandongo, Uganda

At a time when anti-foreigner sentiments are on the rise across the world, Uganda has the highest number of refugees in Africa; it is also the third top refugee-hosting nation in the world after Turkey and Pakistan. Over one million of the 1.4 million refugees currently living in Uganda hail from neighboring South Sudan; their country has been ravaged by a brutal inter-ethnic conflict for most of the last five years. Close to sixty-thousand of these South Sudanese refugees live in Kiryandongo, a settlement 140 miles northwest of Kampala. This year, I’m spending my Thanksgiving break among them.

Kiryandongo Refugee Settlement in Bweyale, central Uganda. Credit: Marisa O. Ensor

As a Europe-born naturalized US citizen, I’ve always thought of Thanksgiving as one of the most American of holidays.  On Thanksgiving, we celebrate people emigrating to America and being welcomed by those who were already here.  What holiday could be better to welcome refugees to this country?

Celebrating and sustaining the United States’ long tradition of offering refuge to those fleeing persecution and war is now more important than ever. According to the latest UNHCR’s Report on Global Trends on Forced Displacement, we are now witnessing the highest levels of displacement on record. By the end of last year, an unprecedented 68.5 million individuals were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, or generalized violence; nearly 25.4 million of them are refugees. Approximately 85% of these refugees are hosted by developing countries.

The link between threats to peace and security and forced displacement in Sub-Saharan Africa has been a central aspect of my work as a political anthropologist and refugee rights advocate for the last 15 years. I often focus on young people’s experiences – they make up the largest demographic sector in the societies where I work. While young people face enormous challenges in conflict-affected and fragile countries like Uganda and South Sudan, they also have particular strengths and enormous resilience. The UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 2250 on Youth, Peace and Security, which was unanimously adopted in 2015, recognizes and promotes young people’s important contributions in this field.

Some of my earlier research involved a group of young South Sudanese refugees resettled in the US – the celebrated “Lost Boys of Sudan”.  I have also been both in Uganda and in South Sudan on numerous occasions. I feel particularly privileged to be able to spend time in Kiryandongo where so many young South Sudanese refugees are mobilizing to promote the peaceful transformation of their beleaguered country.

Refugees in Uganda In Uganda, refugees are hosted in designated areas called “settlements”, not camps. Refugees living in camps are typically isolated from the rest of the population and often unable to leave. In Ugandan settlements, on the other hand, refugees are granted relative freedom of movement, equal access to primary education, healthcare and other basic social services. They are provided with land to put up their own shelters and to practice some agriculture to supplement food rations. They also have the right to work and own a business. The 2016 UN Summit for Refugees praised Uganda for having one of the most progressive and generous refugee laws and policy regimes in the world.

There are 28 refugee settlements currently in operation in Uganda.  Some of them opened only in the last few years specifically to accommodate the arrival of South Sudanese refugees. A case in point is Kiryandongo Refugee Settlement, a UNHCR managed refugee hosting area in Bweyale, central Uganda. With approximately 270,000 nationals and close to 60,000 refugees living in Kiryandongo District, refugees in Kiryandongo account for 17% of the population.

Behind those numbers are personal tales of violence, uprooting, deprivation and fear, but also strength and hope for a better future. The young refugees with whom I work here have gone through major traumatic events. Some saw their parents killed before their very eyes, others suffered abhorrent sexual violence … yet, they are now asking themselves how they can move past their physical and emotional scars, and contribute to the betterment of their country. Education is almost always their answer.

Uganda’s educational model allows both refugees and nationals to attend the available public schools. The limited number of both teachers and classrooms, on the other hand, has forced some schools to offer separate morning and afternoon shifts; other times, classes are taught under trees. The large numbers of students have also resulted in overcrowding and higher than usual student-to-teacher ratios – the national ratio is 1:45. Secondary school-aged youngsters are least likely to be enrolled in school.  Refugee families cannot always afford the high tuition costs, given the limited livelihoods opportunities. Refugee girls are even more likely to drop out of school, with commonly reported early marriages and unwanted pregnancies.

With a group of young South Sudanese refugees in Kiryandongo Settlement. Credit: Marisa O. Ensor

In spite of the enormous challenges they face, these young refugees are not giving up hope. With support from various UN agencies, several NGOs, and private benefactors, a growing number of “youth networks” are being established throughout Uganda’s refugee settlements. These networks are collectives of loosely organized youngsters working to bring back peace and reconciliation to their communities. Both girls and boys are encouraged to participate, and girls are particularly active despite their heavier burdens – e.g. household chores; younger sibling caretaking responsibilities.  I am always inspired by their interest in learning peacebuilding tools such as mediation, and conflict analysis and resolution. The important role that women and girls play in peacebuilding was reaffirmed by the unanimous adoption of the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 (UNSCR 1325 on Women, Peace and Security). Both Uganda and South Sudan have launched National Action Plans for the implementation of UNSCR 1325.

Conclusions:  From Fear of Persecution to a Glimmer of Hope I was doing fieldwork in South Sudan on September 12th, 2018, when a new peace agreement was signed by Salva Kiir, the president of South Sudan, and his major adversary, the former vice-president and rebel leader Riek Machar. Most, but not all, South Sudanese refugees will in time go back home. Special circumstances may cause some of them to still be at risk even after peace has returned to their country. These particularly vulnerable refugees are usually selected for resettlement to a safe country.

Historically the US has resettled more refugees than any other country in the world.  However, while the global refugee population has increased by about 50% over the past five years, resettlement opportunities in the US are being drastically reduced.  In 2016, the US admitted nearly 85,000 refugees; that number declined to fewer than 54,000 in 2017. For 2018, the refugee admission cap has been reduced to 45,000, the lowest since the enactment of the Refugee Act of 1980.

South Sudanese refugees in Uganda currently have a negligible chance of being resettled in the US. The majority of them just dream of going home and rebuild their lives there when it’s safe enough to do so. In the meantime, they are grateful for their relative safety in the refugee settlements. This Thanksgiving, I am grateful to these young refugees for allowing me to share with them a small part of their journeys of hope.

Marisa O. Ensor, PhD, LLM, is a GU Faculty Affiliate of the Institute for the Study of International Migration in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. Prior to joining Georgetown she taught at several universities in the US and abroad, including the American University in Cairo’s Center for Migration and Refugee Studies.

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When Children are No Longer Children: Proposed Rules to Replace the Flores Settlement Agreement

On September 7th, 2018, the Trump Administration proposed new regulations to remove central safeguards for immigrant children held in government custody. The new rules would terminate the 1997 Flores Settlement Agreement (Flores), which contains key protections for migrant children and has protected the treatment of child and families in detention. 

Flores stipulates that the United States has a “general policy favoring release” of minors from immigration detention. If no suitable release option is available, the government is then obligated to place children in the “least restrictive setting appropriate to the minor’s age and special needs.” As a result of Flores, children cannot be detained for more than 20 days, and while in detention, they are eligible for minimum standards of care including access to education, recreation, and medical and dental care. 

Below we offer a brief analysis of the administration’s proposed rules and what they mean for  children accompanied by family members and unaccompanied minor children. 

Accompanied Children

The proposed rules would significantly weaken protections for immigrant children in government custody, with distinct consequences for unaccompanied minors (UACs) vs. those entering with families (ACs). 

Although Flores did not distinguish between these two groups, and its protections were applied to all children, the new rules separate children into categories of “accompanied” and “unaccompanied” and distinguish between the protections afforded to the two groups. Thus, in contrast to their protections in the past, ACs and their families will no longer be eligible for the same protections that UACs receive. Whereas Flores aimed to safeguard all minors given their unique needs and vulnerabilities, the proposed regulations mandate that accompanied children are no longer seen as children under the law.  

For example, after the new rules are implemented, accompanied children placed in expedited removal would be held with the same parole standards as adults. These children will also no longer have a right to a bond hearing. Having children ineligible for bond or parole means that these children will be detained for longer periods. 

The proposed rules will also permit the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to operate family jails under their own self-licensing standards. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will set the minimum standards, which means that ICE will be responsible for enforcement of federal laws governing border control, customs, trade and immigration and for protecting children by developing the licensing standards for family detention centers. Although there is mention of an independent auditor to monitor how facilities integrate ICE’s licensing standards, there are few specifics about the auditing process.

Longer Detention: The new licensing arrangement that allocates ICE to set the standards for protecting children in detention will also eliminate the 20 day cap for detaining minors. As a result, children will be detained with their families throughout the asylum-seeking proceedings, a process that takes years. This change results in the indefinite detention of children. It is also likely to present new, and perhaps insurmountable, hurdles for families seeking asylum to successfully pursue their claims, given their limited access to lawyers and other advocates while in detention. 

More Discretion: The new rules also offer new discretion about the conditions that ACs face while being detained or transported. For example, because Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) processing centers were never intended to house children for any period of time, the rules state that these centers should not be expected to accommodate minors – despite the fact that thousands of minors are, and have been, processed in these CBP centers and held there for up to 72 hours. The proposed changes also discuss how certain rights of children can be waived in an emergency, widening the definition of an emergency to “flexible” and “cover[ing] a wide range of possib[ilites].” Thus, these changes lower the minimum standards of care for children in CBP processing centers and, at the same time, they broaden the definition of emergency situations when detained children can be denied basic protections. 

The rules also allow discuss “operational feasibility” as a factor when considering, when DHS is required to allow contact between a detained UAC and his or her family members in the same facility. These types of benefits for children are not guaranteed whenever “possible” but rather only when “operationally feasible.”

Unaccompanied Children 

Fewer Sponsors: Although the above changes apply to ACs, UACs will not be immune from the proposed rules. In fact, they severely restrict release options for UACs who will be released from government custody only to a parent or guardian. UACs will no longer be released to other relatives such as aunts, uncles, siblings, or grandparents. The rules also require fingerprinting of sponsors, which is likely to deter undocumented persons from coming forward to sponsor their children because of fear of deportation. Together, these changes will lower the release options for children and result in their detention for longer periods of time.

New Discretion. The proposed rules also infuse new discretion in UAC treatment during the court process. For example, immigration judges will now determine whether children are UACs each time they encounter the child. Once a child no longer meets the definition of a UAC, e.g. he/she becomes 18 years of age, UAC legal protections will cease to apply. The new rules also authorize DHS to detain children again (after they had been released) without establishing a change of circumstances. 

Taken together, the proposed changes – if implemented – will dramatically shift the protections that migrant children face. Potent and powerful, the new rules treat migrant children not as children who are vulnerable and need protection. 

In a world where conflict and displacement are increasing, children deserve much better – especially in the nation of immigrants, the United States.   

Dr. Katharine M. Donato is the Donald G. Herzberg Professor of International Migration and Director of the Institute for the Study of International Migration in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. Elana King-Nakaoka is a senior at Georgetown and a member of No Lost Generation, a student group supporting refugees.  

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Ripping off the band-aid: US cuts off UNRWA funding

In cutting off aid to the 5+ million Palestinian refugees, the Trump administration has ripped the band-aid off a deep and painful wound. I wonder if the administration has thought through the consequences of its actions.  

The decision to cut $350 million in contributions to UNRWA and another $200 million to other agencies working with Palestinian refugees in the region has dire consequences for Palestinians, for UNRWA, for the political actors in the region, and indeed for people living far from the Middle East. While it is gratifying to see other countries increasing their donations to UNRWA, it is unlikely that they will be able to make up the shortfall. The US has, after all, been the largest contributor to UNRWA from the beginning and its contributions make up a third of UNRWA’s budget. And even if other countries were to re-program their funds to give more to UNRWA, it’s likely that at least some of those funds would come from other humanitarian accounts – including those intended to support refugees in other parts of the world.

Conditions for Palestinians, particularly those in Gaza, were already dire. Since Hamas came into power – eleven long years ago – Israel has imposed a siege on the territory. Last year, a UN Mission found that conditions had significantly deteriorated since the siege was imposed. Real GDP had declined, average income had fallen, there were fewer doctors per population, unemployment had increased to 42% (and youth unemployment stood at a shocking 60%+). It was hard to imagine that conditions could get even worse. And then the Trump administration knocked the legs out from under UNRWA which, for the past 68 years, has provided education and health care to millions of refugees.  

But it’s not only Gaza. UNRWA also works in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the West Bank. What happens to governments in those countries when Palestine refugees can no longer count on UNRWA for health care and education?  In Lebanon, UNRWA serves around 175,000 Palestinian refugees and runs 66 schools and 27 health centers. Who will pick up the slack when the funding stops? The Jordanian leadership has highlighted that the opportunity for 122,000 Palestinian boys and girls to attend UNRWA schools in Jordan is a matter of regional security and stability.

The pressures on host governments in the Middle East is increasing – at a time when Jordan and Lebanon are reeling under the pressures of caring for Syrian and (still) Iraqi refugees in their countries. Obviously, the Palestinian refugees can’t be sent back home, but the already mounting pressures on host governments to return Syrian refugees will undoubtedly increase. My sense is that all refugees in the region will suffer as a result of this short-sighted action to cut UNRWA funding.    

I’ve always admired the dedication of UNRWA’s staff; 98% of its 30,000 employees are Palestinians themselves and the care and compassion they exhibit have long been an inspiration for the humanitarian community. I worry now not only about the kids who will likely not be able to go to school but about all of the Palestine refugees who will suffer. When UNRWA suspends educational programs – as they will have to do if the shortfall continues – then UNRWA staff and school teachers will lose their jobs or see a cut in their salaries (most likely both). When parents lose their jobs, children are likely to go hungry. I can’t imagine what these cuts will mean for UNRWA’s emergency assistance programs, already stretched to the limit. I ache for UNRWA staff faced with impossible choices – between education and health, between support for livelihoods and emergency aid.

As others have noted, this is an incredibly short-sighted policy shift by the US government. It’s in US interests to support UNRWA for straightforward humanitarian reasons. It’s in US interests because it contributes to political stability. It’s in US interests because we haven’t been able to make much progress on the long-term political solution that the Palestinians and the Israelis deserve. 

Humanitarian assistance is supposed to be short-term – to give time for political leaders to work out political solutions to end the conflicts that cause humanitarian crises. Humanitarian assistance isn’t supposed to last for decades. It has always been a band-aid solution. No one is happy with the fact that Palestinian refugees are still dependent on UNRWA for basic necessities (least of all the Palestinians). But it’s been 70 years and political solutions for the Palestinians seem more distant than ever. There’s a reason the band-aid has remained in place all of these years.  

Although the Trump administration has promised a new peace initiative in the region, by cutting funds to Palestinians, the US has lost whatever credibility it had as a neutral party uniquely-positioned to broker a fair agreement between Israel and Palestine. Perhaps another broker will emerge.  Perhaps Israel will lift the blockade of Gaza which limits the ability of Gazans to be self-reliant. Perhaps some other way will be found to provide education to hundreds of thousands of refugee children. Perhaps the US administration really does have a feasible solution for a dilemma that has confounded the most skilled and experienced US and European diplomats for half a century. But the likelihood is that we’re in for a very rough time in the Middle East. You’d think we would have learned from Iraq in 2003. Ripping off band-aids has consequences.  

Dr. Elizabeth Ferris is a research professor at ISIM. She has worked in the humanitarian sector for 20 years, taught at several US universities and served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.  

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The Global Compact on Migration and Kerala

I’ve been following the development of the Global Compact on Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (GCM) for the past couple of years, but the issues really hit home to me last month in Kerala, India. I traveled to Kerala and later to Tamil Nadu under the auspices of the US Speakers Program for India to give a series of lectures and presentations on various migration and refugee issues, including the Global Compacts. I knew that the GCM marks a turning point in international response to migration and, like many in the migration community, I’m anxiously awaiting its adoption in December at the Intergovernmental Conference in Marrakesh, Morocco. But talking – and learning – about migration in Kerala made it clear that this global compact will not only strengthen global governance but more importantly, will have a direct impact on the lives of millions of migrants.

With a population of about 34 million people, Kerala ranks highest among India’s states on most social development indicators – literacy, life expectancy, education. Kerala is also a large exporter of people. Some 3 million of its citizens work overseas – 90% of them in the Gulf states. The remittances they send home contribute about a third of the state’s GDP. While there is a long tradition of migration from Kerala to other parts of Asia, the migration boom really took off in the mid-1970s with the surge in oil prices – quickly followed by the construction boom in the Gulf countries.

Migration has many consequences for Kerala. Most obviously, the flow of remittances fuels development and is having a ripple effect, not only in Kerala but in other Indian states as well. Wages are now higher in Kerala, attracting migrants from other parts of India, particularly from scheduled castes and tribes. The remittances sent home by Keralites working in the Gulf are fueling development in Kerala which in turn is attracting internal migrants from lower-income states – and the remittances those internal migrants send home are helping families in their states of origin. The whole emphasis of the GCM is on supporting safe, orderly and regular migration as a driver of economic growth and prosperity. This is playing out in spades in Kerala. Objective 19 of the GCM emphasizes the importance of remittances in contribution to development while Objective 20 talks about the importance of facilitating remittances and decreasing the costs to migrants of sending money home. Implementation of both of these objectives will have immediate consequences for Keralite migrants and their families as well as for the state’s population.

Migration has social consequences as well, particularly for families left at home. Surveys of migrants carried out by Professor Irudaya Rajan at the Centre for Development Studies find that almost 90% of remittances are used for subsistence, with 46% supporting education. Migration also affects caste and social status. A professor at the Centre for Diaspora Studies explained that migrants will do low-level work in the Gulf that they disdain doing in Kerala because the income they receive enables them to move up in the social hierarchy back home. In fact, he said “if you see a very big house in Kerala, it’s likely to be a migrant -- or a corrupt official.” Migration is providing both education for migrants’ families and social mobility.One-third of Kerala’s population is directly affected by migration.

Muslims make up about 25% of Kerala’s population – but 40% of the migrants who go to the Gulf. Almost one in every two Muslim households has a family member working in the Gulf. “There are more flights to the Gulf,” one professor observed, “than there are to Chennai.” The growth of ties with the Gulf plays out on Trivandrum’s streets with many Arabic restaurants. My hotel in Trivandrum, for example, offered an Arabic mezza plate – in addition to a mouth-watering array of curries and South Indian dishes. 

Migration from India is overwhelmingly male; about 15% of migrants from Kerala are women, but only half of them are labor migrants. And women are often employed in occupations where they are likely to be invisible, such as domestic workers. Professor Praveen Kodoth of the Centre for Development Studies noted that while male migration is seen as natural, the Indian government has tried to discourage women from migrating, in an effort to protect them from potential abuse. And indeed abuse of domestic workers in the Gulf and elsewhere is well-known. The theme of gender runs throughout the Global Compact on Migration with an emphasis on seeing women migrants as more than victims but also as agents of social change.  

While migration has been mostly a driver of prosperity and growth, there is a dark side and I heard stories of migrants who were abused by their employers in the Gulf – and I was reminded of the Global Compact on Migration’s emphasis on improving recruitment practices and safeguarding conditions for safe and decent work (Objective 6) and suggestions that governments do more to regulate recruitment agencies operating in their jurisdiction.    

The GCM emphasizes the importance of the states of origin in supporting their migrant workers and enhancing consular protection throughout the migration cycle (Objective 14). India doesn’t have a national policy on immigration – its  National Immigration Act dates back to 1922. But the state of Kerala established the Department of Non-Resident Keralite Affairs (NORKA) to support its overseas migrants – before they travel, while they’re overseas, and when they return home. NORKA stays in close contact with the migrants and solicits their views and inputs into their programming. For example, the World Assembly of Keralites has been set up to provide a forum for Keralites in the diaspora to express their views and raise concerns to the government. Objective 16 of the GCM stresses the importance of empowering migrants to realize full inclusion and social cohesion.

The objectives included in the Global Compact on Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration are more than carefully-drafted statements hammered out by skilled diplomats. If adopted – and more importantly, if implemented – the will change the lives of millions of migrants in Kerala and around the world. 

Dr. Elizabeth Ferris is a research professor at ISIM. She has worked in the humanitarian sector for 20 years, taught at several US universities and served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.  

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Today’s Refugee Crisis: not a crisis of refugee numbers, but of responsibility-sharing and internal displacement

While political leaders and advocates alike cite record-high levels of displacement in referring to the ‘refugee crisis,’ they are missing the point. We don’t face a crisis because of the high numbers of refugees, but we do face two serious and underreported crises: a crisis of responsibility-sharing and a crisis of internal displacement. Recently the Exodus Institute and Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) organized two symposia to analyze these crises and to try to come up with some solutions.  These meetings also fed directly into the work of the World Refugee Council, which is focusing its work on broad issues of accountability, governance and finance, as well as internal displacement and responsibility-sharing for refugees.

But first, let’s look at the numbers. Just this week, UNHCR announced its latest figures on displacement – reporting that in 2017 there were 68.5 million displaced people in the world, of whom 25.4 million are refugees. UNHCR works with close to 20 million refugees while 5.4 million Palestinian refugees fall under the mandate of another UN agency, UNRWA. 20 million refugees is a large number – too large – but we live in a world of 7.6 billion people. If refugees were distributed equally around the world, it would be a tiny percentage of any country’s population and a manageable number. But refugees are not distributed equally. In fact, 85% of the world’s refugees are hosted by developing countries and more than two-thirds come from just 5 countries: Syria, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Myanmar and Somalia. Additionally, the burden of hosting refugees is similarly unbalanced. Almost 18% of the refugees in the world today are hosted by Turkey (3.5 million), with another 20% hosted by Uganda, Lebanon and Iran.  

In the aftermath of World War II, the leading powers of the world created an international system to respond to refugees, with a binding Convention on refugees and a dedicated UN refugee agency, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. They recognized that it was in their national and collective interests that people forced to flee their countries received the protection and assistance they needed. Having tens of million of people displaced in Europe after the war was a humanitarian concern, but it was also a security issue, a collective security issue. The governments of the world recognized that it was in their collective interests to care for refugees and they saw it as their collective responsibility. Today that commitment to collective responsibility seems to have broken down.   

                  Panelists at the April 2018 Symposium on Refugees and Responsibility Sharing 

New mechanisms for responsibility-sharing are needed. At the Exodus/ISIM Symposium on Responsibility-Sharing for Refugees, participants grappled with how to strengthen mechanisms to share responsibility – so that the burden doesn’t just fall on those countries that happen to be next door to a country experiencing conflict. The Global Compact on Refugees, which is presently being finalized – for adoption in fall 2018 – offers several such mechanisms. Participants in the Exodus Institute/Georgetown Symposium expressed support for those mechanisms, but suggested that we need to go further. For example,  we need more clarity on what responsibility-sharing means  - is it just giving money to countries hosting refugees? Or resettling refugees outside of the area? Or is it also private companies setting up businesses that employ refugees and using other migration mechanisms – such as university scholarships for refugee students? We also need indicators to be able to tell which governments are exercising their responsibility towards refugees and which are not. These – and other – suggestions are being fed into ongoing policy discussions, but more work will be needed to ensure that the good ideas for improving efforts to reform the current system.

And then there’s the crisis of internal displacement. If we go back to the figures, we see that of the 68.5 million people displaced in the world, more than 40 million -- almost two-thirds of the total number -- are displaced within their own countries. They are internally displaced persons (IDPs). They often flee for exactly the same reasons as refugees but they remain within the borders of their countries. Sometimes they choose to stay closer to home, wanting to watch over their property and usually hoping that their displacement will be temporary. Sometimes they’re unable to go very far because of an elderly or disabled relative. Sometimes they simply don’t have the resources to travel or, if they try, they find that  the borders are closed. A couple of years ago, I talked with a young Syrian refugee in Gazientep, Turkey who was teaching English and supporting her mother who had come to Turkey with her. One of her brothers had made it to the Netherlands and another was waiting to take his chances on the risky Mediterranean route. But her sister remained in Aleppo, hiding in in the basement with her four children as the barrel bombs fell. “She’d be safer in Turkey,” I commented, “why doesn’t she come here?” The young Syrian woman replied, “She doesn’t have money to rent a place in Turkey. At least in Syria, she has someplace to stay.” Different members of her family – like many displaced families – made different choices, but those who are displaced within the borders of their countries are often much more risk than those who seek protection elsewhere. 

                      Panelist speaks at the May 2018 Symposium on Internal Displacement

Under international law, it is the responsibility of the national government to care for IDPs, even when that government plays a role in displacing them in the first place, as in Syria and Myanmar. On the global level, rather than an international convention as is the case for refugees, there are important, but legally non-binding Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement for IDPs. Rather than a dedicated UN agency, there are several UN agencies – including UNHCR and IOM – that provide support for IDPs when it is possible. The Exodus/ISIM Symposium on Internal Displacement analyzed possibilities for strengthening international response to IDPs and highlighted the glaring lack of high-level political leadership for IDPs. The Symposium called for the establishment of a High-Level Panel on Internal Displacement and for the appointment of a Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Internal Displacement. This person would be able to meet with heads of state and bring together UN agencies working on humanitarian responses, long-term developments, conflict resolution and peacebuilding initiatives. It’s not enough to respond to those who are displaced – we need bold action to address the causes which are uprooting people in the first place.

Dr. Elizabeth Ferris is a research professor and ISIM’s acting director. She has worked in the humanitarian sector for 20 years, taught at several US universities and served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. 

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The Global Response to Refugees and Migrants: Perspectives from UNGA 2016

On September 19, 2016 the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) – the UN’s main deliberative and representative organ comprising all 193 Member States – hosted a High-Level Summit for Refugees and Migrants.  This unprecedented Summit was a watershed effort to address the large-scale displacement of refugees and migrants that dominates the current humanitarian landscape.  One year later, the need to continue working together towards finding global solutions to better manage human mobility was again underscored at the UNGA 2017, which ran from September 12-29.

I was fortunate to be invited to participate in several of the main migration and refugee-related events being held at UN Headquarters in New York. As a political and socio-legal anthropologist and human rights scholar and advocate with a focus on forced displacement, I have been following these developments with great professional and personal interest.

Here I briefly outline some of the key themes discussed at these events, focusing on the initial High-Level Summit held in 2016. Over the course of the next year, subsequent ISIM posts will report on further developments as the negotiation process of the Global Compacts unfolds.  

The New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants

The main outcome of the 2016 High-Level Summit was the unanimous adoption of the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants. This document responds to the UN Secretary-General’s (SG) call for “collaborative global efforts to be guided by international refugee law, human rights and humanitarian law”.  While not legally binding, the New York Declaration nonetheless represents a global consensus on the need to improve the way in which the international community responds to large movements of refugees and migrants, and manages protracted refugee situations.  I believe that this declaration constitutes a promising development at the normative level, and has the potential to guide the response of the UN system, Member States, civil society and partners as they endeavor to provide day-to-day support to migrants and refugees. Further steps must be taken to translate these initial standards-setting efforts into actual implementation.  

The New York Declaration includes provisions to start negotiations leading to an international conference, to be held in 2018, and the adoption of two Global Compacts: the Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, and the Global Compact for Refugees.  The main areas identified as requiring focused attention include the following:

Protecting the human rights of all refugees and migrants, regardless of status. This includes the rights of women and girls whose full, equal and meaningful participation in finding solutions is to be promoted;

Preventing and responding to sexual and gender-based violence;

Ensuring that all refugee and migrant children start receiving education shortly upon arrival;

Working towards ending the practice of detaining children for the purposes of determining their migration status;

Supporting those countries receiving and hosting large numbers of refugees and migrants;

Finding new homes for all refugees identified by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) as needing resettlement;

Expanding the opportunities for refugees to relocate to other countries through, for instance, labor mobility or education schemes; and

Strengthening the global migration governance by bringing the International Organization for Migration (IOM) into the UN system.

Overall, the 2016 New York Declaration reaffirms the importance of the international refugee regime, represents a commitment by Member States to strengthen the global governance of international migration, and constitutes a unique opportunity for creating a more responsible and predictable system for responding to large flows of people on the move

The 2017 High-Level Meeting on the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants – One Year On convened as part of UNGA 2017 that revisited these commitments will be discussed in my next ISIM post.

Marisa O. Ensor, PhD, LLM, is a GU Faculty Affiliate of the Institute for the Study of International Migration in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. Prior to joining Georgetown she taught at several universities in the US and abroad, including the American University in Cairo’s Center for Migration and Refugee Studies.

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The Future of DACA on Labor Day 2017

Like many people on this 2017 Labor Day Weekend, I am consumed with thoughts about the many young immigrants who have temporary legal status as part of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) Program. In the next few days, the White House has announced that it will make a decision about the future of DACA. Will it continue, terminate, or expand? No one yet knows.

On this precipice, the future of more than 800,000 young adults sits. They were brought to the United States as children without legal authorization, and after registering with the federal government via the DACA program, they have a renewable work permit and cannot be deported.

Millions of people and many organizations have called for DACA to continue and be expanded. Some are also behind the Dream Act, introduced in Congress earlier this year. With bipartisan support, the Dream Act offers a path to U.S. citizenship for those who are undocumented, have DACA or Temporary Protected Status, and who graduate from U.S. high schools and attend college, enter the workforce, or enlist in the military. Those supporting this bill argue that while DACA has offered protection and removed obstacles to insure that those who are eligible have a better future than they would have had without it, DACA does not include a path toward lawful permanent residence. The Dream Act will do just that, and I hope that Congress passes it if DACA is ended.

I have met hundreds of DACA recipients. Their stories are about resilience and struggle. They are undergraduates, medical students, young professionals, and others, born in nations near and far. They have lived in the United States for the majority of their lives, and they are like so many of us, seeking a better life than their parents.

Like DACA recipients, others are also seeking security and better lives this Labor Day weekend. Among them are approximately 60,000 Rohingya, an ethnic minority from western Myanmar who – in the last week – have crossed into Bangladesh fleeing violence by Myanmar’s army. The photographs of these Rohingya reveal desperation and hardship, families searching for safety. Then there are the Texans and Louisianans displaced by Hurricane Harvey and its aftermath. For the last eight days, news outlets have described their desperation, determination, and resilience as they attempt to recover, rebuild, and improve their lives.

All these experiences – whether protracted, sudden, and/or unforeseen – demand a humanitarian response that involves combining political, economic, and operational capital in creative ways. Although much work remains to be done, it is time to develop comprehensive humanitarian responses to these situations. So let us expand protections for DACA recipients, assist Bangladesh as the Rohingya enter seeking safety and refuge, and aid the areas and people in Texas and Louisiana as they rebuild their communities affected by Hurricane Harvey. No one would choose to be in these situations, but given that they are, let us remove as many obstacles as possible and lead the way.

Dr. Katharine M. Donato is the Donald G. Herzberg Professor of International Migration, and Director of the Institute for the Study of International Migration, in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

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Harvey’s Displaced: A Long Haul to Recovery

The devastation wreaked by Hurricane Harvey fills our TV screens and our twitter feeds. The photos of flooded communities, of people rescued from water-logged homes, and of exhausted first responders are compelling human stories. They generate strong emotions of empathy, compassion and solidarity – emotions in stark contrast to the recent divisiveness of Charlottesville. 

Millions of people have been affected by this hurricane. Thousands – perhaps soon to be tens of thousands – of people are displaced and seeking refuge with family and friends and in shelters. Once again, the United States has a new group of internally displaced persons – IDPs. The Texas IDPs join millions displaced worldwide every year by sudden-onset disasters. Indeed, according to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, 4.5 million people were displaced by disasters in the first six months of 2017. Just in the past month, flooding in South Asia displaced a million people and affected  over 16 million in India, Bangladesh and Nepal.  

Many of the lessons from other disasters are playing out with Hurricane Harvey. For example, we know that most lives are saved in the immediate aftermath of a disaster by local responders. In every sudden-onset disaster, it is local responders – people in the neighborhood -- who pull people to safety – whether from the rubble of an earthquake in Haiti or from suburban homes in Houston. 

We know that while disasters affect rich and poor alike, those who are marginalized and vulnerable before a disaster tend to become even more vulnerable and marginalized afterwards. Losing one’s home is always a horrific experience, but if you don’t have insurance it is catastrophic. Early reports indicate that only about 40% of the economic losses may be covered by insurance and that less than 15% of Houstonians had flood insurance.  

Disasters cause poverty. Last year a World Bank study of 117 countries found that disasters push 26 million people into poverty each year. For people living on the edge – whether in Nepal or in Houston or Rockport -- the economic losses of disasters are catastrophic.

People are displaced suddenly. Harvey wasn’t even a named storm two weeks ago. People leaving their homes in Houston didn’t expect to be displaced and undoubtedly harbor hopes of soon returning to their homes. But experience has shown that although displacement can happen in a flash, finding solutions can be agonizingly slow. People grab a few things to take with them to a shelter, not thinking that this may be all that they will have of ‘home’ for weeks or months or longer. Did they bring their car titles or deeds or lists of passwords to their shelters?  Did they bring treasured baby photos and family mementoes? Did they think to take their children’s immunization records or report cards?

My initial impressions of the Harvey response are positive: government officials were prepared, the Red Cross had pre-positioned supplies and shelters were ready, the community response was impressive. But, believe it or not, disaster response is often the easiest phase of disaster management. Recovery planning is more complex and draws on a different range of governmental actors. It is also a more political process and tends to drag on for far longer than anyone expects. What solutions will be found for people who have lost their homes? Where will they stay while homes are re-built? Will they be able to resume their jobs? Where will their kids go to school? Will priority be given to helping homeowners rebuild (which is almost always the case)? What about renters? Houston is the most ethnically diverse city in the US and has a reputation as a city that welcomes refugees. How will recovery affect undocumented residents of Houston? More broadly, what does this say about the flood insurance program – which has only about $5 billion or so left in its coffers as the program is due for re-authorization by the end of September Where will the funds come from to rebuild infrastructure destroyed by the floods? Will this tragedy trigger renewed interest in looking at aging dams in Texas – and elsewhere?

Unfortunately another lesson from other disasters is that the television cameras and legions of journalists will move on. Even though recovery is a long and painful process, we are unlikely to see the heart-rending human interest stories of people living in crowded temporary accommodations while politicians haggle over funding packages. I wish that we could bottle all the good will, compassion and solidarity now being expressed nationally and globally for Harvey’s victims. I suspect that we could use that bottle of good will later when the news cycles have changed and Texas residents are still struggling to get the help they need. Too often after disasters, people feel abandoned by their governments. I hope that Texas is different.

President Trump said yesterday that Houston would recover very, very quickly.  I hope with all my heart that he is right, but experience suggests that it will be a long tough road to recovery, with important political decisions to be made at every step of the way. We need to mobilize for the long haul. This is going to be a marathon.

Dr. Elizabeth Ferris is a research professor at ISIM, teaching courses on humanitarian crises. She has worked in the humanitarian sector for 20 years, taught at several US universities and served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.