Hunger: The Silent Epidemic Among Asylum Seekers and Resettled Refugees

Refugees and asylum seekers face challenges after arriving in a host country. They carry the trauma that they may have experienced in their countries of origin, during fight, and in countries of asylum. Other stressors impact on their adjustment after arriving in the United States including basic needs such as food, clothing, and shelter. This is a retrospective review of data collected as part of a needs assessment by a program, which serves survivors of torture and refugee trauma. Asylum seekers (n=65) and refugees were compared (n=30). Asylum seekers were more apt to be from Africa (p<.001), need family reunification (p=.027), speak more languages (p<.001), suffer from political persecution (p<.001), move from place to place due to not having a permanent place to live (p=.031), and be unable to contribute to the rent (p<.001). Unadjusted, asylum seekers were also more likely than refugees to have gone to bed hungry in the previous two weeks (p<.001) or since arriving in the United States (p<.001). Refugees were more likely to be eating more food now than before feeing, and asylum seekers the opposite (p<.001). Being an asylum seeker made one 3.7 times more likely to suffer from food insecurity than being a refugee, and 5.3 times more likely to not have work authorization. Among asylum seekers, adjusting for gender, age, education, lack of permanent housing, English fluency, and self-reported health status, not having work authorization made one 5.6 times more likely to suffer from hunger. Independently, being a torture survivor made one 10.4 times more likely to suffer from hunger. Asylum seekers must wait 150 days before applying for asylum in the United States. For humanitarian reasons, mandatory-waiting periods for work authorization for asylum seekers should be eliminated.     

Iraqi refugees in Jordan: lessons for practice with refugees internationally

Asylum seekers, refugees who are resettled in third countries or those who are forced into refugee camps, present new challenges to social work practitioners. In an attempt to advance theory and develop specialised practice in the area of refugee studies within social work as an international profession, we argue that whatever the flight context, the country of asylum or of resettlement, there is a process underlying what Malkki referred to as refugeeness. This article focuses on the situation of Iraqi refugees in Jordan as an example of the challenges that confront today's refugees. We show that salient issues raised in a local community centre's needs assessment mirror those elements that are central to integration processes that have been discussed in much of the refugee studies literature across the world. We show how these concerns are closely linked to processes that resettled refugees and asylum seekers face, regardless of the country of resettlement. We introduce a framework for analysing an individual refugee's situation and show how an international phenomenon is linked to local practice.     

Group Work Practice with Australia's Asylum Seekers

Abstract

Australia's asylum seekers have been rendered voiceless by the circumstances in which they find themselves, circumstances that include being subjected to punitive government policies, denial of basic rights and needs, economic impoverishment and social disadvantage. The Asylum Seekers Centre (ASC) in Sydney provides an individualised casework service to asylum seekers. The ASC also provides opportunities for asylum seekers to improve their circumstances through attending English classes and participating in other educational and social group programmes. The present paper is concerned with small group facilitation of mutual aid processes at the ASC. It focuses on one group programme, ‘Open Forum’, to illustrate a strengths-based empowerment practice. The paper concludes with some suggestions for extending group work practice with and on behalf of asylum seekers.     

Responses of the social work profession to unaccompanied children seeking asylum in the Republic of Ireland

The Republic of Ireland is rapidly developing immigration legislation and policies to respond to its relatively new status as a destination for asylum seekers and refugees within the European Union. New political definitions of asylum seekers and refugees are being constructed in a country with its own history of mass emigration. At the same time, the economic growth that is making Ireland a more attractive destination for asylum seekers and refugees has also fuelled an unprecedented expansion in the employment of social workers. Specialized services are now being developed for unaccompanied children who are seeking asylum. This expansion in the number of social workers and growth in service provision has led to little professional debate about the role of social workers with asylum seekers and refugees. This paper examines the questions raised by the provision of social work services to these children and considers the wider implications for the development of the social work profession and social work practices in Ireland.     

Forgiveness as a positive contributing factor on the mental wellbeing of Congolese refugees and asylum seekers post-war experience

ABSTRACT

The ongoing political violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has exposed female Congolese to traumatic events and adverse situations such as sexual violence, genocide, torture, political persecution, and the loss of loved ones, which have made them to leave their country. These traumatizing experiences negatively affect the mental wellbeing of Congolese. The study explored the impact of forgiveness on mental wellbeing among Congolese refugees and asylum seekers post-war experience. Ten female Congolese refugees and asylum seekers with post-war experience were purposely selected and interviewed through semi-structured interviews. Key findings of the study showed that forgiveness resulted in the improved mental wellbeing of Congolese female refugees and asylum seekers, with reduced anger, anxiety, depression, stress, and rumination. Forgiving participants reported that their mental wellbeing improved compared to those who found it difficult to forgive rebels and state forces causing war in DRC. These findings indicate the importance of incorporating forgiveness in mental wellbeing interventions to improve the mental wellbeing of war survivors. The study provides recommendations on how mental health practitioners can incorporate forgiveness in mental wellbeing interventions.     

'All Doors are Closed to Us': a social model analysis of the experiences of disabled refugees and asylum seekers in Britain

In this article we undertake a social model analysis of the experiences of disabled refugees and asylum seekers, who are among the most socially and economically disadvantaged members of society in the UK today. The statuses of disability, refugee and minority ethnic group are each linked to discrimination and oppression (Oliver, M. (1990) The Politics of Disablement (London, Macmillan Press); Robinson, V. (1999) Journal of Refugee Studies, 12(1), pp. 78-87; Vernon, A. (1996) in: J. Morris (Ed.) Disability Studies: past, present and future (London, Womens Press), yet little consideration has been paid to the particular cumulative constellation of oppressions experienced by disabled refugees and asylum seekers.

In this article, several models are presented that demonstrate that disabled refugees and asylum seekers experience barriers to health and safety in their country of origin, such as impairment-creation through torture and war. Once in the UK barriers to social services, benefits and social contact prove similarly insurmountable.     

Responsibility for examining an asylum

Parallel to the influx of asylum seekers during the 1980s, xenophobic tendencies have been witnessed in certain Western European countries. While directed at all foreigners, these tendencies sometimes have led to restrictive practices or methods which include both denying that asylum seekers qualify as refugees, so they may be sent home more easily, and shifting the responsibility for examining asylum claims to other countries. An analysis of the increasingly restrictive practices regarding the granting of asylum and the concept of a refugee is a complicated task, which requires a detailed investigation of the jurisprudence in a number of countries. This article, however, will not concentrate on an analysis of jurisprudence regarding asylum but rather on the tendency of various states to shift the responsibility for examining asylum requests to another country.     

Students and Refugees Together: Towards a Model of Practice Learning as Service Provision

Between 2001 and 2003, 14 assessed placements were provided for social work students through students creating a ‘virtual’ agency offering a service to refugees and asylum seekers. Drawing on research in progress regarding a unique project in South West England, this paper explores an inclusive model that creates a context for students to integrate theory and practice at the cutting edge of professional practice.

The START project is a service to refugees and asylum seekers, a group that experience acute social exclusion and media‐induced hostility, provided for two years entirely by students as part of their professional course requirements. Holistic, needs‐led assessment, cultural sensitivity and advocacy by students allow families and unaccompanied minors to access otherwise inaccessible resources.

In the current context of changing arrangements for practice assessment, emphasis on multi‐disciplinary learning and service user involvement, this offers an alternative to the ‘apprenticeship’ model for students in developing a secure professional identity. Student learning is framed as contribution rather than burden in the organisational and employment arena and service‐user outcomes have been dramatic. The focus of this paper is on the educational impact from the perspectives of students and practice teachers and an alternative model of practice learning.     

Refugee movements and Turkey

There has been a long tradition in the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic of receiving refugees. There were Jewish refugees from the Spanish Inquisition, Hungarians and Poles fleeing revolts in 1848-9, and those of Turkish descent and usually from the Balkans. Concurrent with this trend is the history of refugees and immigrants leaving Turkey, such as many Armenians, Greeks and Jews leaving at the turn of the century, and after 1923 and the Treaty of Lausanne. Little is currently published on the topic. This article defines a refugee; provides an overview of the refugee problems of the 1980's due to Bulgarian, Kurdish, and Turkish refugees; and the legal and political aspects. As a country of origin, there is discussion of the political and economic aspects of Turkish asylum seekers in Europe. The potential refugee flows to and from Turkey are also examined. I) For this study, refugees are victims of political violence and are persecuted for political or religious beliefs, ethnic or racial background, or war. In Turkey, there are national refugees, international refugees outside the Convention, and UNHCR Convention refugees. During the 1980's all 3 groups were arriving: from eastern Europe, Iranian Kurds, Iraqis, and ethnic Turks from Bulgaria and Afghanistan. The Turkish restricted acceptance of the 1951 Convention on Refugees creates serious humanitarian and security consequences for refugees other than those from eastern Europe and of Turkish ethnicity. Political considerations play an important role in treatment where security threats outweigh humanitarian need. The case is given for Kurdish refugees. II) Asylum seekers from Turkey in Western Europe was determined between 1986-90 to be 185,000 from applications. These figures have risen steadily due to the political instability and military activity of areas bordering Iraq and Syria, the Emergency Region. In addition there are economic and employment problems, and there has been a suspension of human rights. Europe in return has tightened legislation and procedures to differentiate economically motivated refugees from authentic political asylum seekers. Further research is needed to investigate refugee problems. Further refugees may come due to the promotion of a Black Sea Cooperation Region and easier crossings of borders to the former Soviet Republics. Ethnic Turks in Moldavia or Romania or Bulgaria may leave due to unrest. Factors affecting asylum seekers are improvements in Turkey's human rights record, repeal of bans of the Kurdish language, completion of the South Eastern Development Project, and the European government policy on asylum.     

Lost in the System? Disabled Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Britain

This short paper calls for greater awareness of disabled refugees and asylum seekers living in Britain. Currently, policy makers, many refugee communities and the disability movement fail to consider disabled refugees and asylum seekers, perhaps because they constitute a minority about whom data are rarely available. Focussing on the particular combination of circumstances affecting disabled refugees and asylum seekers, this paper presents recent changes in support arrangements for refugees and asylum seekers. The paper also calls for greater involvement in refugee issues by the disability movement.     

The right to education of children and youngsters from refugee families in Europe#

Abstract

The right to education of children and youth from asylum seeker and refugee families is currently being threatened in Europe. Two factors explain this: the sudden and disorganised arrival of large numbers of asylum seeker families, and the inconsistent integration of those seeking refugee status and those who have gained such status. The actual implementation of the right to education for asylum seekers and refugees is a result of a complex combination of factors related to the asylum seeking process: demographic, psychological, economic, legal and sociological. Asylum seeker and refugee education are impacted significantly by these factors. This paper tries to explore whether EU Member States are coping successfully with such dimensions. We provide information on the current situation in Europe, as well as a summary of the latest policy recommendations aimed at improving the present situation.     

Social networks and the asylum cycle: the case of Iranians in the Netherlands

"This paper examines the traditional distinction between the migration of refugees and labor migrants in the context of Iranian asylum seekers in the Netherlands. The empirical strategy adopted is to apply a framework designed specifically to explain labor migration to the case of asylum migration, and the social networks approach is identified as the most appropriate. This paper examines the role of social networks through the asylum cycle, focusing on the decision to migrate, the choice of destination, and adaptation in the host society. The key conclusion is that the validity of the distinction between refugee and labor migration varies through the asylum cycle even for the same individual."     

Conversion as a Migration Strategy in a Transit Country: Iranian Shiites Becoming Christians in Turkey

The role of religion during migration processes has been overlooked by scholars in the past although the relationship between religion and migration has a long history. Normally, religion is considered as an integrating agent, but for some Iranian asylum seekers in Turkey, religion and especially religious conversion is used as a tool for migration. This article draws on the migration histories of Iranian asylum seekers in Turkey who initially intended to go further west only to have stayed in Turkey either because of the long procedures of asylum application in Turkey or because they were rejected and have become “illegal aliens” who do not want to return to Iran. Turkey still preserves geographic limitation of the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees. Therefore it does not accept non‐European asylum seekers to settle on Turkish soil. Ironically, however, most asylum applications were made by people from the Middle East, mainly from Iran. Based on the extensive fieldwork carried out in various cities in Turkey where the Iranian migrants are heavily concentrated, this article demonstrates how conversion from Shi’a Islam to Christianity is used as a migration strategy and how and to what extent these asylum seekers use religion and their newly acquired social and religious networks within churches of the transit country to reach ultimately the West as refugees. As conversion is sustained through social networks as well as churches and missionaries, this unique situation can be explained by employing the social capital theory within the context of an institutional component.     

Implementing and Rethinking the European Union's Asylum Legislation: The Asylum Procedures Directive

The Asylum Procedures Directive, which was put in place in the context of the Common European Asylum System, is expected to both harmonise the asylum procedures in the European Union and to safeguard applicants’ rights. This article explores various steps in the implementation of the directive, starting with transnational negotiations which aim to influence domestic asylum policies. Focusing on asylum systems in Germany and Sweden, the article shows that the way decision makers implement the directive is shaped by diverging domestic asylum policies. The risk of failing common standards, however, is not only a matter of implementation, but inherent in the directive's design. Furthermore, harmonisation does not necessarily improve compliance with the principles of international refugee law. Safeguarding protection seekers’ rights requires rethinking both asylum legislation and the role of the actors who intervene in its implementation.     

A comprehensive review of refugee and asylum studies in contemporary Hong Kong: Law,policies, and lived experiences

This review covers 46 research studies from 2007 to 2019, which examine the inflow of asylum seekers and refugees in Hong Kong after the Vietnamese refugee influx in the early 2000s. By analysing existing research studies, the authors summarise three themes, namely refugee law, asylum policies,¹ and lived experiences of refugees and asylum seekers, on refugee and asylum studies in contemporary Hong Kong. While further research is needed, scholars can examine the potential possibilities of the legal reform of statutory insufficiencies, the development trajectory of asylum policy instruments with a more appropriate framework, and the protection mechanism of refugees’ and asylum seekers’ children.     

The Economy of Seeking Asylum in the Global City

This article explores asylum seeker survival strategies and agency in relation to the structural, post‐industrial conditions that have emerged in Hong Kong. The focus is on the livelihoods of asylum seekers within spaces of illegality and social exclusion, how such spaces are formed, and how asylum seekers exploit local conditions to establish profitable networks across borders. The article considers asylum seekers' engagement in income‐generating activities and the importance of legal status in the sectors of the economy in which they most often work: recycling and trading. Far from being a burden to society or opportunistic deviants taking advantage of Hong Kong's economic prosperity, as they are normally depicted in public discourse, asylum seekers are economically productive. They act in economic spaces in which disadvantaged strata of the local resident population organize their means of survival, thereby improving the economic opportunities for locals.     

The Asylum‐Integration Paradox: Comparing Asylum Support Systems and Refugee Integration in The Netherlands and the UK

This article explores the impact of asylum support systems on refugee integration focusing on the UK and the Netherlands. Both have adopted deterrent approaches to asylum support. The Dutch favour the use of asylum accommodation centres, segregating asylum seekers from the general population. The UK disperses asylum seekers to housing within deprived areas, embedding them within communities. Both countries have been criticized for these practices, which are viewed as potentially anti‐integrative: something of a paradox given that both promote the importance of refugee integration. We analyse national refugee integration surveys in both countries and provide original empirical evidence of negative associations between asylum support systems and refugees’ health, which differ in relation to mental and physical health. The integration and asylum policy implications of these findings are discussed.     

Asylum Seeking in Australia

The rise in the number of asylum seekers in Australia presents considerable challenges to the state as they are a self‐selected, demand‐driven group, whose numbers, country of origin, ethnic background, and social demographic characteristics cannot be determined in advance of their arrival. People who apply for protection at the border are regarded primarily as illegal immigrants, and only secondarily as asylum seekers, and the illegality of their entry has become the primary factor in the way they are treated by the state, rather than their need for protection. Two streams of asylum seekers and two streams of refugees have been created. There are marked differences in the treatment given while claims for protection are examined and once decisions have been made in their favor. This article examines the development of asylum policy in Australia and sets the discussion within a review of the number of people who have applied for and been granted protection in recent years.     

Beyond control: the criminalization of African asylum seekers in Israel

ABSTRACT

This article analyzes the discursive process of criminalization of African asylum seekers in Israel. The Israeli case illuminates the way that marginalized social groups are constructed as a criminal threat, thus becoming a focal point of moral panic. Using content analysis, in-depth interviews and observations, we assert that the criminalization of asylum seekers is facilitated by their portrayal as ‘infiltrators’ who are beyond state control. State authorities’ ostensible inability to keep asylum seekers under surveillance is dialectically constructed along two main axes: the private space axis and the public space axis. On the private space axis, the asylum seekers are portrayed as unidentified people living beyond the authorities’ field of vision whose largely unreported criminality is directed against vulnerable asylum seeker women and children in the private sphere. At the same time, asylum seekers are portrayed as a prominent, faceless and animalistic presence in public space, a presence that breaches physical-spatial borders as well as social-cultural boundaries, thereby undermining the social order. Thus, asylum seekers are viewed as conspicuously invisible. This rhetoric connects border violation with criminal activity; emphasizes the pent-up potential for violence by asylum seekers; and blurs the lines between criminal threat and security threat.     

Do asylum seekers and refugees choose destination countries? Evidence from large‐scale surveys in Australia,Afghanistan, Bangladesh,Pakistan and Sri Lanka

Some literature depicts refugees as more passive than active when selecting a destination country. We draw on surveys of over 35,000 people in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Australia, to show that most potential asylum seekers and refugees of Hazara, Rohingya, Muslim and Tamil backgrounds prefer some destination countries over others and that many refugees from these groups surveyed in Australia specifically had Australia in mind as a destination country. We show how Australia's asylum seeker policy was a key reason why many refugees chose Australia in 2011 and 2012 and that subsequent restrictive asylum seeker policy changes appear to be reflected in potential asylum seeker considerations in 2014. We find that despite the restrictive asylum seeker policy changes, perceptions of Australia as a highly functioning civil society, relative to other potential destination countries, may explain why Australia remains a country of choice for asylum seekers from west and south Asia.