This book investigates how effective human rights and the inherent dignity of refugees can be secured in situations of protracted exile and encampment. The book deploys an innovative human rights-based capabilities approach to address fundamental questions relating to law, power, governance, responsibility, and accountability in refugee camps. Adopting an original theoretical framework, the author demonstrates that legal empowerment can change the distribution of power in a given refugee situation, facilitating the exercise of individual agency and assisting in the reform of the opportunity structure available to the individual. Thus, by helping to increase the capability of refugees to participate actively in the decisions that most affect their core rights and interests, participatory approaches to legal empowerment can also assist in securing other capabilities, ultimately ensuring that refugees are able to live dignified lives while in protracted exile. Ultimately, the book demonstrates that legal empowerment of refugees can bring lasting benefits in establishing trust between refugees, the state, and local communities. It will be of interest to researchers within the fields of refugee studies, international law, development studies, and political science, as well as to policy-makers and practitioners working in the fields of refugee assistance and humanitarian intervention.

"Voluntary and involuntary human mobility in the form of migration is a natural human phenomenon which has been a central feature from the ancient times into the modern times. While the boundaries between voluntary and involuntary migrants are blurred, voluntary migrants in the context of this book refer to those who migrate out of their own free choice based on socioeconomic considerations while involuntary migrants are forced to leave their country out of fear of persecution or insecurity caused by political violence or civil and military strife. In this book, the terms, 'newcomer', 'foreign born' and 'migrant' and 'immigrant' are used interchangeably and refer to those who were born in another country and later emigrated to another country as permanent residents (later becoming citizens), asylum seekers and refugees. Migration is an increasing challenge faced by countries, institutions and individuals in both sending and receiving countries. In countries where there is a large inflow of immigrants, migration has created a multiple-origin, transnationally connected, socio-economically differentiated and legally stratified demographic landscape which lends itself to a description of superdiverse societies (Jensen & Gidley, 2014; Vertovec, 2007). Most industrialized countries - mostly in the Global North - are experiencing low birth rates and are dependent on immigrants to satisfy their job market and population growth while less developed nations - mostly in the Global South - are experiencing low economic growth, inadequate socioeconomic opportunities. These social and economic challenges are presently the cornerstone of migration, transnationalism and transnationality"--

This book examines land acquisition and resettlement experience in Asian countries, where nearly two-thirds of the world’s development-induced displacement currently takes place. Faced with the complexity of balancing legal frameworks and resettlement needs, along with increasing demands for safeguarding displaced peoples, in recent years many countries within Asia have adopted integrated land and resettlement laws. This book presents a comparative review and assessment of the impact of the new land and resettlement laws and regulatory frameworks for expropriation, compensation and resettlement. Written by an international, interdisciplinary team of experts from both practice and academia, the book demonstrates the ongoing challenges and struggles associated with social and resettlement risk assessments, the social and cultural exclusion of indigenous/vulnerable groups in some countries, and the lack of institutional capacity to adequately deal with resettlement management and administration. The case studies and comparative analyses of laws and practices relating to expropriation, compensation and resettlement make significant contributions to advancing resettlement knowledge and management practices. The book will be useful as a reference for development practitioners and for researchers across the fields of global development, political science, Asian studies, planning and law. The book also has potential use as a resource for resettlement management training programs and graduatelevel courses/seminars in development studies.

This book examines how states in eight countries across Asia and the Pacific address internal displacement in the context of disasters and climate change. The Asia and the Pacific region accounts for the majority of global disaster-related displacement, but the experience of the millions of individuals displaced differs according to gender, age, ethnicity, (dis)ability, caste, and so forth and is dependent on the legal, administrative, social, and economic structures and processes in place to support them. This book adopts a human rights-based approach, investigating the role of law and policy in preventing displacement, protecting people who are displaced, and engendering durable solutions across cases drawn from Thailand, Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Nepal, Bangladesh, Vanuatu, and the Solomon Islands. The specific cases in the book also reflect critically on the term ‘displacement’ and the wider normative framework within which this phenomenon is conceptualised and addressed. The book will be of interest to students, researchers, and practitioners working at the intersection of human rights, human mobility, development, disaster risk reduction and management, and climate change adaptation.

This book presents effective long-term solutions for displacement and migration against the background of the current debates. It offers insights on practical suggestions for dealing with displacement and migration due to violence, examines ideas for the management of global migration movements and looks into the integration of refugees and migrants. Throughout the chapters, experts from science, politics and practice shed light on the causes of global migration and the consequences of migration on a political, economic and social level. The focus of the discussion is not the avoidance of migratory movements, but above all the use of positive effects in countries of origin, transit and destination. The book is a must-read for researchers, policy-makers and politicians, interested in international cooperation and in a better understanding of causes, consequences and solutions of displacement and forced migration.

This edited volume addresses the broader aspects of the political and social landscape, human rights violations, accountability and advocacy efforts, and humanitarian challenges faced by the Rohingya from Myanmar. The work brings together different voices of legal, policy, and international affairs experts to construct a framework which addresses the complex and nuanced issues comprising the Rohingya crisis. Although there is recognition that international legal mechanisms are moving forward more quickly than anticipated, these processes do not constitute standalone sustainable solutions. Myanmar’s myriad political, social cohesion, development and security challenges are likely to persist even as justice and accountability processes move forward. Thus, this book project is premised on the consensus that the international community should complement international justice mechanisms by looking toward creative and multi-faceted approaches in addition to justice and accountability. This timely contribution will be of interest to academics, researchers, development practitioners, and human rights organizations.

This book argues that the international refugee regime and its ‘temporary’ humanitarian interventions have failed. Most refugees across the global live in ‘protracted’ conditions that extend from years to decades, without legal status that allows them to work and establish a home. It is contended that they become largely invisible to people based in the global North, and cease to remain fully human subjects with access to their political lives. Shifting the conversation away from the salient discourse of ‘solutions’ and technical fixes within state-centric international relations, the authors recover the subjectivity lost for those stuck in extended exile. The book first argues that humanitarian assistance to refugees remains vital to people’s survival, even after the emergency phase is over. It then connects asylum politics in the global North with the intransigence of extended exile in the global South. By placing the urgent crises of protracted exile within a broader constellation of power relations, both historical and geographical, the authors present research and empirical findings gleaned from refugees in Iran, Kenya and Canada and from humanitarian and government workers. Each chapter reveals patterns of power circulating through the ‘colonial present’, Cold War legacies, and the global ‘war on terror". Seeking to render legible the more quotidian struggles and livelihoods of people who find themselves defined as refugees, this book will be of great interest to international humanitarian agencies, as well as migration and refugee researchers, including scholars in refugee studies and human displacement, human security, globalization, immigration, and human rights.

This volume was first published by Inter-Disciplinary Press in 2013. This is a multidisciplinary book on crises of all kinds from different parts of the world. Interesting? Not unless crises can be made to serve as opportunities for the future. Fifteen chapters present accounts of empirical research into personal and group crises where people have not just survived their losses and grief but have in most cases gone on to meaningful future growth. Tragedy from natural calamity, war, accident; crisis in the family and at work; despair from physical and spiritual displacement; helplessness from political and economic disenfranchisement – from Australia and America to Asia and Europe. These subjects receive expert multidisciplinary scrutiny with one common goal in mind. To account for the ways in which recovery and regrowth can take place. But this is not a book about the phoenix’s fable. It is empirical, evaluative, and pragmatic. It is about turning crises into opportunities.

The Palestinian conflict has produced one of the most tragic refugee crises since World War II, with the number of refugees caused by the violence associated with the creation of the State of Israel numbering around 11 million in 2011. The much lauded first edition, in 1998, of The Status of Palestinian Refugees in International Law was the first book to comprehensively analyse the legal aspects of the Palestinian refugee crisis, yet the last two decades have seen multiple developments. New waves of conflict and displacement have affected Palestinian refugees in the Middle East, and there has been Israeli encroachment on Palestinian territory. Hamas has grown, and a schism has formed within the first Palestinian government. The so-called "Arab Spring" has impacted the life, fate, and legal status of thousands of Palestinian refugees. In international legal jurisprudence, change has been similarly rapid. In 2004, the International Court of Justice delivered a crucial advisory opinion on the Separation Wall, authoritatively elucidating the international legal framework applicable to the Israeli occupation. Numerous international human rights bodies and UN fact-finding missions have added their analysis to the mix. The possibility of the State of Palestine joining the International Criminal Court has spurred discussion relating to the applicability of international criminal law to Palestinian refugees. Clear, compelling, and authoritative, Lex Takkenberg and Francesca Albanese discuss the status quo both on the ground and in the courts, and pose future scenarios to come.

Offering nuanced insights into violence, humanitarian protection, gender relations, and coping of refugees in a Ugandan refugee camp, this book shows how risks prevail for refugees despite and partly due to their settlement in the camp and the system established to protect them, and hones in on the strategies used by people to protect themselves.