Of the 12 million refugees in the world, only a handful are ever considered for resettlement. Refugees have three options or “durable solutions” as a way of ending their plight: they can return home (repatriation) when conditions permit; they can be integrated into the country that initially gives them temporary protection; or they can be resettled in a third country such as the United States. Resettlement is a precious commodity available to only a few refugees.
There has traditionally been tension around the extent to which resettlement should be promoted as a “durable solution.” Some allege that a “magnet effect” causes refugees to flock to a particular country where they believe their prospects of resettlement increase. Host countries are often leery of gaining such a reputation.
Then there is the question of who deserves the opportunity to resettle. All refugees are vulnerable and all refugees are needy. So, how is a group demarcated for resettlement when so many clamor for a new life in the U.S.? The present world refugee situation makes a response more difficult than ever before.
The ideological paradigm that defined the refugee program in the 1980’s and early 1990’s is no longer operative. The East-West conflict no longer works as a framework for deciding the merits of a particular refugee’s case for resettlement. The myriad civil upheavals around the world do not lend themselves to an easy sorting out of worthy candidates. More care and precision is needed to sift through the sea of vulnerable persons to make a determination about who gets resettled.
Resettlement agencies succeeded in their advocacy for strategic field work to examine more closely groups for whom resettlement is needed. Amy Slaughter, a program manager at EMM, represented non-governmental organizations dealing with refugee protection on a team comprised of persons from the U.S. State Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees which was sent to West Africa to recommend populations for resettlement. Amy’s account provides insights into this process and the issues involved.
- Richard Parkins
Director, EMM
I am often asked how refugees are selected for the U.S. resettlement program from the millions of those in need. In April, I had the opportunity to participate in the newest evolution of the refugee selection methodology—that of “group identification.” Traditionally, refugees have been selected on a case-by-case basis according to the strength of their individual claims and the urgency of their protection needs. More recently, in recognition of the widening gap between the numbers of refugees worldwide and the resources available to interview them, the non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the State Department and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have worked together to develop a process for identifying groups of refugees, allowing greater numbers to benefit from the solution that resettlement provides.
As part of a pilot group identification exercise, I traveled to West Africa as the NGO representative along with colleagues from UNHCR, the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Together we visited a refugee camp in the remote forest region of Guinea and another on the outskirts of Accra, Ghana—both inhabited primarily by Liberian refugees who have been displaced multiple times by recurring political instability and violence in their own country as well as the neighboring countries in which they sought safety.
Identifying groups of a few hundred to a few thousand is an improvement over the time-consuming process of individual refugee selection, but still unfortunately necessitates eliminating thousands from consideration for resettlement. In the Lainé refugee camp in Guinea, our delegation identified a group of some 2,500 persons out of a total of 26,000 living in the camp presently. In the Buduburam camp in Ghana, we looked at a group of 1,000 persons from a total of 42,000 residing there.
This process is described as “drawing the circle.” With half a million refugees in West Africa, resource limitations require a designation of those most in need of a durable solution. To accomplish this task, our delegation looked at factors such as the extent of the refugees’ past persecution or exposure to violence, the likelihood of future persecution upon return home, the integration prospects in the current country of asylum, and the degree of their vulnerability. Vulnerability is a tricky quality to assess. It may involve the refugee’s gender, ethnic or religious group, family composition (or lack of a family support structure), age, or health status. Ultimately, the challenge with the group selection methodology is to identify a set of people that share characteristics which make them vulnerable in a similar way.
This may sound like a heartless, mechanical process. But my experience with the delegation in April reassured me that all of the various partners involved in refugee resettlement truly are trying to do their best to ensure the greatest amount of good is done for the greatest number of refugees, while not losing site of those individuals who have unique needs which must be dealt with separately. Those initially excluded from these group designations are not simply forgotten. They remain eligible for other solutions, possibly even future resettlement in the U.S. or other countries.
I felt privileged to be part of the delegation to Guinea and Ghana—not only for the opportunity to increase my own awareness of the situations from which refugees are coming, but also because I feel it is vitally important to bring the “NGO perspective” to bear on the identification of refugees in need of resettlement. Since we are the ones that receive these refugees when they arrive in the U.S., welcome them into our communities, and accompany them on their arduous journey towards self-sufficiency in their new homeland, we bring a unique perspective that our UNHCR and government partners cannot. NGOs can also keep issues on the table that have a tendency to get lost, such as considering resettlement for unaccompanied refugee minors for whom often the only solution pursued is endless and usually fruitless tracing of family members.
As the U.S. refugee program becomes increasingly responsive to critical humanitarian needs around the globe, a new strategy for identifying cases for resettlement in a timely manner is essential. No longer do we have large, “ready-made” caseloads from regions such as the former Soviet Union and Southeast Asia. The nature of refugee crises today finds smaller “pockets” of refugees stranded in scattered, often remote locations. This makes identifying those most in need far more challenging than ever before. The new group methodology is a positive step towards addressing this new reality.
I recently learned that the two groups we looked at on our trip are currently in the process of being approved for resettlement to the U.S., thanks to the advocacy and hard work of all of our partners that followed our visit. We look forward to welcoming these newcomers, sharing our good fortune with them, and benefiting from the gifts that they will bring our society.
