"Active" and "Passive" Resettlement: The Influence of Support Services and Refugees' own Resources on Resettlement Style

This paper explores the process of resettlement among recent refugees in Perth, Western Australia. We propose four refugee resettlement styles created through the interaction of a number of factors. These factors can be clustered as: (1) the social features of refugees (their human, social, and cultural capital), and (2) the host society's responses to refugee settlers (Australia's resettlement policy and services and the broader influence of the host society's responses to refugees). We propose that refugees approach their resettlement in predominantly active (“achievers” and “consumers”) or passive (“endurers” and “victims”) ways and that these are differentially successful strategies. Medicalization of the refugee experience in Australia is a factor that may influence refugees to adopt a passive “victim role”, so we propose that a greater emphasis during early resettlement should be placed on refugees' own culturally defined priorities such as employment and stable housing. The argument developed in this paper is supported by data from two qualitative research projects conducted in Western Australia. The fieldwork consisted of interviews, focus groups, and participant observation, and targeted refugees from the former Yugoslavia and the Horn of Africa who arrived in Australia during the 1990s and 2000s, as well as resettlement service providers.     

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.     

From student to citizen: a survey of students from the People's Republic of China (PRC) in Australia

This article is a survey of students from the People's Republic of China (PRC) who arrived in Australia after 1986 and were still there in 1992. Students from the PRC began to enter Australia in 1972 when China and Australia established diplomatic relations. The numbers were insignificant until 1986 when Australia launched its education export policy.
The article provides statistics and analysis on the motivation of these students, their education and family backgrounds and their present conditions and aspirations. The article also addresses issues such as Australia's education export and imigration policies, the dilemma between political and economic refugees in terms of human rights and the impact of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre on PRC students in Australia at the time.
The survey results suggest that the majority of the former PRC students have settled successfully in Australia, though not without considerable difficulties and emotional cost. The question of distinction between political and economic refugees is acknowledged as a very thorny one, and it is suggested that immigration policy based on national interest, and clearly stated, would be more convincing, less hypocritical and therefore in the long run more effective.     

Immigration in two federations: Canada and Australia

The need for increasingly widespread application of a policy or program, settlement, and multiculturalism is urgent in both Canada and Australia. For both countries there is a clear pattern of coalescence and divergence and the distinct growth of immigration as a federal function. While Australia has strengthened federal functions in a area of increasingly geo-political need, Canada is moving towards a looser model of federalism. By 1918 both countries were strengthening their federal functions in immigration as discussions within the British Empire on the recommendations of the 1917 Dominions Royal Commission took root. Both countries were interested in agricultural immigration and land settlement. The Great Depression caused a major reduction in population growth rates. From 1933-1948 Canada had a poor record of providing sanctuary for Jews. In Australia, however, Jewish voluntary agencies were aiding the reception of refugees by 1937. The 1st permanent embodiment of commonwealth jurisdiction over immigration was the establishment of an Immigration Branch within the Department of Interior around 1938. Australia needed extra population for defense. The major structural link between government and the immigrant communities was through the Good Neighbor Movement, which began on a nationwide basis in 1950. Both Canada and Australia are major receiving countries for refugees. In 1973 Australia reached the position of effective, practical nondiscrimination achieved by Canada in 1967. Prime Minister Trudeau's policy was multiculturalism within a framework of bilingualism. By 1978 Australia had a new federalism policy, which in all areas concerned with immigrants, refugees and ethnicity, rationalized resources allocation and imposed a political philosophy. The foci of multiculturalism in Australia are 1) community languages; 2) creation of a tolerant, non-discriminatory society; and 3) equity and participation. In 1978 Australia specified population replacement and increase as the major aim of immigration policy. In 1984 Australia showed a significant movement forward in understanding by many, but it confirmed a resistance to change on regional, gender, race, and age criteria with others. The fundamental problem for both countries will be to combine the core federal function in immigration, needed both for international and domestic politics, with an increasingly flexible response to regional factors.     

Salvadoran Migrants in Australia: An Analysis of Transnational Families’ Capability to Care across Borders

In this paper, I focus on the transnational care practices of Salvadoran refugees living in Perth (Western Australia) and who care for their ageing parents who have remained in their home country. The analysis is based on a conceptualization of transnational care as a set of capabilities that include, but are not limited to, mobility, social relations, time allocation, education and knowledge, paid work and communication (Merla and Baldassar, 2011). I focus in particular on the impact of Salvadoran refugees’ difficult access to, and use of, these capabilities on their capacity to fulfil their culturally defined sense of obligation to care for their ageing parents. Results show that extended transnational kinship networks play a major role in helping migrants overcome obstacles to transnational caregiving.     

Citizenship Rights and Repatriation of Refugees

This article examines the relationship between access to or lack of access to citizenship rights in countries of asylum and the propensity of refugees to return. It hypothesizes that in situations where refugees enjoy civil, social and economic citizenship rights in the context of favorable structural factors ‐ relatively secure employment, self‐employment, social services such as housing, schools, health care and social security ‐ the importance of repatriation may diminish as a viable option. In North America, Western Europe, Australia and New Zealand, where refugees are able to enjoy rights of citizenship with definite prospects for becoming citizens (through naturalization) or denizens through acquisition of permanent status, and where favorable structural factors provide for the enjoyment of a decent standard of living, they tend to remain regardless of whether the conditions that prompted displacement are eliminated. The policy environments and the structural factors for refugees sheltering in Less Developed Countries (LDCs) are the antithesis of those refugees in Developed Countries (DCs). As a result, millions of refugees in the South have been ‘voting with their feet’ homewards to recoup citizenship rights which they lost in connection with displacement and which they have been unable to achieve in exile.     

The Settlement Experiences Of Refugees From The Former Yugoslavia

In the 1990s many mixed marriage refugees from what was Yugoslavia settled in Perth, Australia. A mixed marriage is one where the parties have different ethnicities. Using multiple‐case, conversational interviews, the experiences of 12 of these refugees were explored. The processes of acculturation and adaptation, the development of social support networks and community, and their ethnic identity and ethnicity, were discussed and analysed within both the sociopolitical context of the conflict in what was Yugoslavia, and their subsequent migration. The initial settlement programmes and supports to the refugees and provided by Australia's government and community groups were also analysed. The results illustrated the diversity of experiences of the participants as well as shared experiences resulting from their being in a mixed marriage. In summary, the results suggest that settlement is stressful for the refugees, that community‐based settlement programmes provide more positive settlement experiences than government programmes, and that people in mixed marriages experience particular stresses related to the political context in the former Yugoslavia, including a history of alienation and persecution. Theoretically the results indicate that the participants are moving towards an acculturation outcome of biculturalism. The complex nature of their ethnic identity and ethnicity is also discussed.     

‘All Those Stories,All Those Stories’: How Do Bosnian Former Child Refugees Maintain Connections to Bosnia and Community Groups in Australia?

Abstract

This article draws on oral histories from my PhD research to explore how six teenagers, now adults, remember their arrivals in Australia as child refugees from Bosnia. It examines their relationships with other people from Bosnia and the former Yugoslavia, including community groups, and how these relationships have changed over time. In examining these narratives, issues of intergenerational differences are highlighted, with interviewees positioning their experiences in relation to both their parents and their second-generation peers. Finally, it explores how former refugees maintain their relationships with family and friends in Bosnia, suggesting that these transnational connections provide them with as much familiarity and comfort as they do feelings of alienation.     

Resettlement and Border Crossing: A Comparative Study on the Life and Ethnicity of Vietnamese in Australia and Japan

Abstract: This paper deals with the life world and ethnic identity of Vietnamese residents who entered and settled in Australia and Japan as refugees after the end of the Vietnam War. It focuses on how social and cultural conditions in the host countries and global influences affect the lives of overseas Vietnamese and consequently transform their ethnic identities. Through this comparative research study conducted in Australia and Japan, I have focussed on Vietnamese religion, social networks, perceptions of the homeland and the host country, notions of Vietnamese identity between generations, and images of Vietnamese in the media of the host country. I explore the features of each host society in accepting refugees and also the commonalities and differences in how the overseas Vietnamese construct their life world and ethnic identity. I also discuss the “location of Vietnamese identities” in Australia and Japan. I will also rethink the meaning of “settlement” and “crossing borders” related to the politics of Vietnamese identities that confirm the importance of investigating the effects of displacement on the life of the Vietnamese diaspora in contemporary world context.     

War Within…. Or Without Working with Asylum Seekers

There are an estimated 100,000 refugees in Australia from around the world. A review of the literature gives an overview of how their problems may be conceptualised; possibilities for therapeutic interventions are explored. A pilot group program in Victoria called “Standing Tall” is described.     

Refugees and mass migration: Australia

Since World War II, Australia has experienced large-scale immigration, both refugee and other, averaging nearly 1% of the total population a year and totalling from 1947-1985 nearly 4.3 million persons. Despite a remigration loss of 23%, the net gain has totalled some 3.3 million. Refugees have been appreciable, totalling well over 500,000 and with a relatively low rate of remigration (about 7%), have comprised nearly 15% of total net migration. These refugees, however, have not come in a steady stream. From 1947-1951 and with the Indochinese refugees of 1976-1985, they contain a large number of unskilled workers who may have difficulty finding jobs, especially in their early months when they are still learning survival English. The refugees have not been homogenous in terms of culture, language, religion, or race. The 200,000 Eastern European refugees of 1947-1952 were mainly Slavic and Christian in origin; the Armenian, Assyrian, and Lebanese of the 1960s and 1970s were more oriental in language and religion; the Indochinese of recent years, although mainly Buddhist, are mixed in terms of language and ethnic origin. Refugee intake is now an important element in total immigration while special measures are taken to help refugees successfully resettle. After comparatively short time these refugees start to resemble other immigrants, and tend to become naturalized in relatively large numbers.     

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.     

Remembering Mum and Dad: Family History Making by Children of Eastern European Refugees

Abstract

This article explores the memory-making of descendants of post-war displaced persons from Eastern Europe now living in Australia. Their processes to uncover their parents’ wartime, refugee and settlement pasts are mediated through public and personal forums. Accordingly, this analysis is framed by a theory of post-memory, which considers the narrative effects of living in close proximity to (the sometimes concealed) stories of their parents’ displacement and family separation. This cohort search for a wider frame to articulate their parents’ pasts as Eastern European (mainly Polish and Latvian) refugees, which is lacking in public discussions around immigration to Australia. They complicate and in some cases undermine celebratory narratives of migration to Australia and of family settlement. On an intimate level, their parents’ experiences are deployed as a means to grapple with their alternative family structures and less-than-conventional childhoods within immigration centres or camps, which were influenced by discriminatory policy for non-British migrants, and single mothers in particular. When adopting a collective lens, these histories are projected onto wider historical understandings of the immigration scheme, which these descendants of displaced persons seek to complicate.     

Does Employment Status Vary by Demographics? An Exploratory Study of Former Refugees Resettled in Australia

This study examined the associations between employment status and demographic factors of former refugees from Ethiopia, Burma, and Democratic Republic of Congo resettled in Australia. Two hundred and twenty-two participants completed a survey, following which chi square analysis was conducted. The results indicated that country of origin, gender, education, English language proficiency (i.e., speaking, reading, and writing), and length of stay in Australia, were associated with being employed. Ethiopians, who had been in Australia for a longer duration, were more likely to be employed. Participants from Burma, whose resettlement was relatively recent, were focused on upskilling themselves. Education qualifications were associated with likelihood of securing employment. A moderate level of education, compared to high or low, provided participants more chances to gain employment. These outcomes help in understanding the employment-related experiences of individuals from a refugee background. Implications and future directions are discussed.

IMPLICATIONS

• Employment is fundamental to successful integration of refugees. Country of origin, gender, education, English language proficiency, and length of stay are associated with employment for former refugees in Australia from Ethiopia, Burma, and Democratic Republic of Congo.

• Understanding these factors can assist stakeholders to better focus their efforts when working with these populations.

     

Patterns of Immigrant Occupational Attainment in a Longitudinal Survey

This paper uses data from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Australia to examine the empirical relevance of a model of immigrant occupational mobility. Consistent with the model, there is a U‐shaped pattern of occupational change from the pre‐immigration occupation through to the occupation held after three‐and‐a‐half years in Australia. The U is shallower for immigrants from countries similar to Australia than it is for immigrants from countries that differ more in language, occupational requirements, and labour market structure. The U‐shaped pattern is deeper for immigrants who are refugees than for family migrants and is the least deep for economic migrants.     

BOGDAN MUSIAL AND THE QUESTION OF JEWISH RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE POGROMS IN LVIV IN THE SUMMER OF 1941

This paper demonstrates that the rescue operations that saved thousands of Jewish lives during the Holocaust were in part the result of coordination and cooperation between the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) and the American Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), via a network of local relief organisations in Europe and worldwide. A landmark decision in building this network was the creation in 1927 of a new agency – HICEM, an abbreviation of the names of three resettlement organisations: HIAS, an American organisation with its headquarters in New York; the Paris‐based Jewish Colonisation Association, and Emigdirect, based in Berlin. During the Nazi period, as Jews were gradually pushed out of German social and economic life, HICEM was able to connect dozens of local Jewish committees throughout the world and bring thousands of Jewish refugees to safe havens in the United States, South and Central America, the Far East and Australia. The study also shows that, despite tension between HIAS and the JDC, both organisations stood firm in their mission of rescuing Jewish refugees.     

Odyssean and Rubicon Refugees: Toward a Typology of Refugees in the Land of Exile

With a focus on refugees in Western Europe, this paper seeks to establish refugees in their country of exile/settlement as social types distinct from labour migrants. It looks at the notion of ethnic groups and their strategies as a theoretical tool for better understanding refugees. The refugees' positioning within the structure of conflict of their country of origin is posited as a determining factor of their modes of settlement. It is possible to find two large categories:
1. Odyssean refugees: refugees who nurtured a collective project in the land of origin and took it with them in the land of exile.
2. Rubicon refugees: refugees who did not partake in a collective project oriented toward the homeland or who have forsaken it.     

Factors Affecting Australia's Refugee Policy: The Case of the Kosovars

This article seeks to explain Australia's refugee policy and to identify the various objectives and factors that influence the development of that policy.
Australia's refugee programme seeks to: provide a humanitarian response and protection to individual refugees; participate responsibly in the international community; honour its Convention obligations; further the interests of the people of Australia; meet high standards of administration and; acknowledge as much as possible changes in refugee populations.
In fulfilling these objectives, Australian governments must weigh and balance various competing factors. These include: humanitarian responsibility, international obligations, social, political, economic and foreign policy factors, as well as efficient administration.
In balancing the relative importance of these factors, the Federal government hopes to fulfil all its refugee and humanitarian objectives. However, the pluralistic nature of Australian society and the often conflicting ideals associated with protection of Australia's interests and the preservation of the rights of refugees, means that fulfilment of these objectives is difficult.
This article examines the Australian government's response to the Kosovar conflict, to assess the relative success Australia had in fulfilling its refugee policy objectives and identifying the various factors that produced the final result.     

Realities of life and future prospects within two cultures: unaccompanied minor refugees from South East Asia in the Federal Republic of Germany

From August 1979 on, more than 30,000 refugees from South East Asia were accepted in the Federal Republic of Germany as quota refugees in a special program; among them were 1600 unaccompanied minor refugees. About 1500 were accompanied Vietnamese children and youths who had fled their home country as 'boat people' across the South China Sea. Unaccompanied minor refugees have, like all other recognized refugees, a legal claim to family reunion in the Federal Republic. Today, only parents can join their children and vice versa, and spouses their spouses. The 1st phase of socialization in the lives of the unaccompanied minor refugees evolved in the cultural traditions of their South East Asian country of origin up to the age of 10 to 15 years. In the 2nd phase of socialization--the enculturation--the child establishes its culturally specific emotionality, language, mentality, and patterns of behavior through interaction and verbal communication with the people nearest him. The 3rd phase of socialization begins at school age and reaches full significance at the age of starting to work, with the accompanying expectations of society. Most of the minor unaccompanied refugees from South Asia had already completed their enculturation--the establishment of their cultural identity. The realities of life the young single refugees as foreigners in German society are determined by 4 special factors: 1) the great cultural differences between their country of originin South East Asia and the resettlement country, 2) the young people left their homes as refugees and their resettlement in the Federal Repulic was determined by chance events, 3) they have to live there alone and without the emotional support of their families in a situation of cultural change, and 4) because of their Asian physiognomy they will always appear as foreigners even if they have integrated well. The future prospects of the young South East Asian refugees in German society will be determined primarily by to what extent they will be able to find a satisfactory place within both cultures.