Abstract
This chapter examines how discourses on human rights and international protection are appropriated and played out with ambiguous effect in the encounters between the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) legal protection officers and urban refugees in Kampala, Uganda. These interactions are characterized by formal and informal negotiations over a set of scarce resources; urban residence permits, financial support for basic needs, refugee status and resettlement to the West. The struggle for resettlement is intense and structures much of the social life in the refugee community (Sandvik 2008). The chapter is based on the author's experience as a caseworker for UNHCR (2004), and data from fieldwork among urban refugees with the Refugee Law Project (RLP) (2005), both in Kampala. Keywords:human rights; international protection; Kampala; legal protection officers; Uganda; UNHCR; urban refugees
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