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Integrating refugees locally could be a durable solution

The usual response to mass refugee movements is to explore ways to send refugees home. But many refugees cannot go home as it unsafe for them to do so. The 1951 UN Refugee Convention recognises that refugee problems can be resolved through local integration. However, as refugee problems have grown, this approach has been very limited in its implementation.

A paper from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) explores how local integration and the promotion of self-reliance could, in the right circumstances, be a solution to refugee problems. Currently, voluntary repatriation is usually the first option, followed by resettlement in a third country. Local integration comes last, despite the fact that this approach to refugee problems enables them to work, improve their lives without depending on humanitarian aid and eventually gain citizenship in the country where they have settled.

Soon after independence many African countries took in large numbers of refugees, provided them with land, helped them to become self-reliant and, in some cases, to attain a high degree of economic, social and political integration. Today, however, there are fewer opportunities for that approach. Africa’s refugees generally find themselves confined to camps or designated zones where they are discouraged from becoming self-reliant. Often they are put under pressure to go back to their own country, regardless of whether or not conditions in their country of origin are unsafe or unstable.

The researcher highlights some important issues:

A number of the world’s refugees have to remain in their countries of asylum for long periods of time, due to protracted conflicts in their home countries.
Keeping refugees in camps for long periods could be problematic: for example young people could become involved in illegal and anti-social activities.
Local integration or settlement can succeed when refugees share a language, a culture or ethnicity with the host community.
Refugees may bring particular skills which could attract resources and investments not otherwise available in the area where they have settled.
Many refugees would normally be eager to return home but feel unable to do so due to the economic and social links they have established in their country of asylum, or because of the traumatic experiences they went through before leaving their own country.
Refugees are capable of settling peacefully and productively in the asylum countries: a large proportion of the refugees in Africa, for example, have always supported themselves without international assistance.

The researcher acknowledges that voluntary repatriation may continue to be the solution sought by most refugees. However, the international community may have to recognise that a comprehensive approach is required, incorporating other approaches. The researcher recommends that:

Different solutions could be pursued simultaneously depending on need: for example: refugees can be helped to integrate locally through appropriate legal and assistance measures and those who already participate socially and economically could be given a secure legal status and residence rights.
Where local integration is not viable, self-reliance and local settlement can be taken up as short-term measures: this would require the political will of host countries, financial resources from donors and the expertise of development organisations.
Local settlement and self-reliance could be regarded as an investment in both local development and in regional peace-building as this may be followed by voluntary repatriation when the problems in the country of origin have been resolved.

Source(s):
‘The local integration and local settlement of refugees: a conceptual and historical analysis’ UNHCR New Issues in Refugee Research Report 102, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, by Jeff Crisp, April 2004 Full document.

Funded by: UNHCR

id21 Research Highlight: 20 June 2005

Further Information:
Jeff Crisp
Global Commission on International Migration
GCIM Secretariat
Rue Richard-Wagner 1
1202 Geneva
Switzerland

Tel: +41 22 748 48 50
Fax: +41 22 748 48 51
Contact the contributor: crisp@gcim.org

Global Commission on International Migration

Evaluation and Policy Analysis Unit
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Case Postal 2500
1211 Geneva 2
Switzerland

Tel: +41 22 739 8249
Fax: +41 22739 7344
Contact the contributor: hqep00@unhcr.ch

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

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