Political Refugees Research Articles

Political Repression, Refugee Crises and Labor Migration from Post-Colonial Mali

This article zooms in on the ways in which forced migration articulates with labor migration in urban West Africa. Precisely, it reflects on how the refugee crisis contributes to labor migration and, inversely, how labor migration is used as a strategy to respond to the predicament induced by the adverse and often deeply humiliating living conditions of exile. To this end, we situate the article within broader scholarly debates on migration categories. We use the notion “exile” to refer to the social conditions induced by political persecution-related relocations from Mali to Niger and Senegal. Our discussion draws on data collected from freeborn Tuareg from Mali in Niamey and former Malian students who fled the dictatorship of Moussa Traoré. The results prompt a reflection that prioritizes the empirical connections between forced and labor migrations over their differences, something that is often taken for granted in the academic literature and in political narratives.

Migrant necropolitics in No Man’s Land camps

Abstract Through genealogical explorations of the understudied No Man’s Land camps at Rukban and Zero Point, this paper aims to contribute a decolonial, South-centric perspective to critical refugee politics literature. The two No Man’s Land camps are conceptualized here as necropolitical spaces of migrant abandonment and containment, where States effectively determine ‘who may live and who must die’ through their violent expulsion of unwanted populations, securitized border policies and restrictions on life-saving aid. Despite their immobilization, the paper highlights how the displaced migrants formed self-government and engaged in claim-making for aid, rights, and homeland political change, thus transforming the death worlds of the No Man’s Land camps into spaces of vibrant political contention. This necropolitical resistance comes with the risk of death or redisplacement, but it provides tantalizing clues of the possibilities of living, even if only momentarily, beyond the law and the State.

Hungarian Refugees in the United Kingdom in the Context of the Domestic Policy (1956–1957)

After the suppression of the 1956 uprising in Hungary, a large group of political refugees, most of them young and often highly skilled professionals, left for the West. Most of the refugees fled to Austria. Austria immediately called on countries to help both financially and physically by resettling the refugees. Most of the refugees were very quickly resettled in other countries. These facts stand in stark contrast to contemporary resettlement practice, which is characterized by a shortage of resettlement sites and a small number of resettlement countries. The scarcity of jobs and the peculiarities of the migration policies of some countries (e.g., the United Kingdom) meant that some refugees could not find a long-term place in European countries and therefore sought refuge overseas. In 1956 and 1957, Canada took in more than 37,500 Hungarian refugees. The United States was also a more common c Hungarian Refugees in the United Kingdom in the Context hoice for refugees than the United Kingdom, for example.

Greccy i macedońscy uchodźcy polityczni w Polskiej Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej a obecny kryzys migracyjny na granicy polsko-białoruskiej

The aim of the article is to conduct a comparative analysis of two different approaches to the migration problem. The first one refers to the government of the Polish People’s Republic, which agreed to accept several thousand Greek and Macedonian political refugees fleeing from Greece after the communist side lost the civil war. The policy of the Polish communist authorities brought success in the form of successful coexistence between Greeks and Macedonians with Poles. The second approach is presented by the current Polish government. This is a policy of not admitting any migrants brought to the Polish-Belarusian border by the Belarusian and Russian regimes that are hostile to Poland. The presented comparison is an original attempt to draw conclusions regarding the sources of these different approaches and their political and social consequences. The topic discussed in the article is important not only for Poland and the eastern countries of the European Union, but for the entire EU, because the destination of migrants is not countries such as Poland, Lithuania or Latvia, but wealthier Western countries.

Hindutva Politics and the Making of Extreme Precarity

Abstract This article investigates the intersection of Hindutva politics and Bharatiya Janata Party policies concerning Rohingyas in India. Analyzing the government’s approach through official statements, legislative measures, and implementation strategies, it aims to uncover the factors shaping BJP policies toward Rohingyas. Additionally, it explores the Rohingya community’s perspectives on government attitudes, political dynamics, and implemented policies, providing a nuanced understanding of the policies’ impact. By shedding light on the intricate interplay between political ideology and refugee governance, the article contributes to a deeper understanding of migration, identity politics, and governance challenges in contemporary India. Scrutinizing the interweaving threads of political philosophy and refugee management, the research not only documents the current situation but also offers insights into broader implications for India’s political landscape and the lived experiences of the Rohingya community. This exploration is a crucial step toward understanding the evolving socio-political landscape in India concerning the Rohingya refugee crisis.

Through the Translingual Lens: Persian Calligraphy in Mana Neyestani’s L’Araignée de Mashhad

This article examines L’Araignée de Mashhad (Neyestani 2017), a graphic narrative by Iranian-born Mana Neyestani, now residing as a political refugee in France. Though he continues to write in Persian, his work is published in French translation, which becomes the source for translations into other languages. This article applies the framework of literary translingualism to shed new light on Neyestani’s L’Araignée de Mashhad. Literary translingualism, which encompasses “literature written in a language not native to the author, in two languages, or in a mix of languages” (Kellman and Lvovich 2015, 152), brings into sharper focus the narrative’s languaging practices, both beyond traditional approaches to graphic narratives and in relation to the global literary market. The translingual nature of L’Araignée de Mashhad emerges from its publication process, where the “original” is already a translation. This article argues that the untranslated Persian calligraphy within is neither an expression of cultural exoticism nor a form of multilingualism that a reader could overlook through glossing. Instead, it disrupts the ideology of monolingualism, redefines the meaning of “multi-” in multilingualism, and situates language within a broader spectrum of semiotic practices. It also demonstrates how those unfamiliar with Persian script may still access its aesthetic and narrative functions by drawing on the visual in the graphic narrative.

Political Regimes and Refugee Entries: The Preferences and Decisions of Displaced Persons and Host Governments

Abstracts What drives refugee movements? Focusing on host countries' domestic political institutions, we argue that refugee entry is determined by the political regimes that shape the incentives of both host governments and displaced persons. Specifically, we theorize that there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between political regimes and the volume of refugee entries. When the host country is autocratic, refugee volume becomes smaller due to displaced persons’ unwillingness to risk the high uncertainty of life under such regimes, and when the host country is democratic, refugee volume is similarly curbed due to democratic constraints on the host government. Consequently, a majority of refugees are clustered into anocratic regimes. Using a global dataset, a series of statistical analyses found strong evidence in support of our theoretical expectations regarding not only the hypothesized correlation between regime type and refugee movements but also the preferences of host governments and displaced persons that we theorize underlie this relationship.

From Human Rights to Citizens' Rights? Democratic Framing Contests and Refugee Politics in South Korea

In 2018, the South Korean government denied refugee status to all but two of the almost 500 Yemenis who, fleeing civil war in their home country, had arrived earlier in the year on the resort island of Jeju. This decision was made in the context of a short-lived but intense public backlash, even though the overall number of refugees has remained consistently low. Three years later, nearly 400 Afghans were evacuated to South Korea with government support and little controversy. What explains these different patterns of refugee politicization in South Korea? I argue that the 2018 episode of anti-refugee activism in South Korea does not follow the typical script in immigration politics which pits "natives" against "outsiders"; rather, it is a reflection of internal political divisions. In this article, I focus on political framing contests involving governmental and non-governmental actors that draw upon prior rhetorical frames of political mobilization which had developed in a broader context of state-building, development, and democratization. The 2018 Jeju "crisis" was partially a reaction against state-led multiculturalism (damunhwa), which had gained momentum since the 2000s. It also signalled a political backlash against previous decades of social and political movements that framed labour rights, migrant workers' rights, and other minority rights as a necessary expansion of human rights befitting a responsible "advanced nation." At the same time, the varied responses to the arrival of Yemenis in 2018 and Afghans in 2021 show that the coherence and resonance of competing political frames during key moments can help explain the type and degree of political mobilization on refugee policy. Furthermore, these comparative case studies show that South Korean attitudes toward refugees have not settled into stable political-economic coalitions and remain contested and in flux.

Friends and foes: the ambivalence of the use of NICT during the migratory journey

ABSTRACT The article looks at how migrants and people on the move use ‘digital tactics’ to mitigate the use of technologies deployed against them. It uses the concept of ‘social navigation’ developed by Henrik Vigh in order to understand how individuals act and mobilize different kinds of resources in a precarious and unstable environment. Based on 32 semi-structured interviews carried out with political refugees from sub-Saharan Africa, this article shows that: (1) information accessible through NICT is seen as often imprecise and unreliable by migrants; (2) the use of NICT increases the risk for migrants of being victims of racketeering, blackmailing and even kidnapping, so migrants devote time and energy to implementing strategies to limit the risks involved; (3) the use of NICT entails significant constraints for migrants with regard to budgetary and logistical organization. Therefore, rather than perceiving NITC as mere a tool to facilitate the migration of people, it is more accurate to say that they play an equivocal role, which implies a need to develop skills for improvisation, coordination and adaptation on the part of migrants.

Polscy emigranci polistopadowi w zachodniej Francji i projekt wyprawy portugalskiej z 1833 r.

Polish Post-November refugees in western France and the 1833 Portuguese expedition project The idea produced by general officer Józef Bem and price Adam Jerzy Czartoryski to form a Polish Legion in Portugal in 1833 is an interesting subject in the context of international situation, French policy towards Polish post November refugees and as far as the situation within Polish emigration is concerned. Polish Legion was intended to participate in the Portuguese civil war on the side of the liberals and the supporters of constitutional monarchy. The Poles wanted to fight for the freedom of nations and were attracted by the perspective of military service in the Portuguese Army. French government informally supported the Poles expedition to Portugal perceiving it as a prospect of limiting expenditures on political refugees as well as an opportunity for calming down social anxiety, since the presence of Polish refugees in France caused numerous manifestations and riots. The Poles were allowed to gather on the West Coast of France. Initially, more than a dozen people went to the Breton island of Belle-Île where they spent a year and a half waiting for the opportunity to depart. Later on, the Poles were gathering in Nantes. As general officer Józef Bem’s idea was becoming less and less probable, some of them were directed to settle in Côtes-du-Nord department. Those determined to leave headed for the city of La Rochelle. The article presents the preparations for the Portuguese Expedition mostly from the perspective of the French authorities: how government decisions regulated the issues of the possible leave of the Poles and the engagement of French local authorities in this Polish project.

Hận: The Haunt of Home, Vietnamese Refugee Melancholia, and the Challenges to Asian American Critiques

Abstract: Based on writings of first-generation Vietnamese refugees, this article explores hận (a deep hatred and resentment, or a haunting anguish) through the lens of melancholia to uncover the convergence and divergence of Vietnamese refugee politics and Asian American politics. I argue that hận exposes the double forces and geographies of violence (by/in both the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the United States) that produce the constraints that refugee free wills are not just pushing against, but are also bound by, resulting in the divergence between first-generation Vietnamese refugee politics and Asian American anti-imperialism and decolonization politics.

"Gian đạo sĩ" and the trend of "Orthodoxization" of endogenous religions in Southern Vietnam

Southern Vietnam became the "good land" of Chinese immigrant groups since the late 17th century after the Ming Dynasty was overthrown by the Manchu Qing army. A part of those political refugees were members of South China folk religious sects, who used religion and religious movements as a means to gather a large number of insurgents to “fight against Qing and restore Ming” in order to realize their political intentions. This spirit of “restoring the old dynasty” influenced patriotic scholars with feudal ideology in Vietnam, who were in a similar situation when confronting the invading French colonialists, thereby transforming into the awareness of “fighting against the French and restoring the Vietnamese emperor". They were deeply influenced by the Confucian spirit of "patriotism and respect for the monarch" and were determined to embrace the religious flag with the nuances of Confucianism - Buddhism - Taoism and local traditions to gather insurgents, who fought against invaders and restored the kingship of the natives. It is the ambiguous transformation process between Confucian scholars and Taoist priests. Especially, in the context of strict surveillance and brutal repression by contemporary authorities, they were considered "gian đạo sĩ" fiercely resisting authorities. Since then, the trend of "Orthodoxization" has appeared to shape them into monks who do not care about politics, or at least submit to serve the government. Using research methods (tactics) of analyzing written documents, field surveys, ethnographic fieldwork, and logical analysis, the article analyzes the phenomenon of "gian đạo sĩ" in Southern Vietnam’s endogenous religions and also clarifies the "Orthodoxization" trend of the popular belief of Ngũ Công Vương Phật from the late 19th to early 20th century, thereby introducing an interesting cultural phenomenon in contemporary Southern Vietnam’s social life.

Abstract C082: Survival and treatment disparities of Hmong patients diagnosed with gastrointestinal cancer

Abstract Purpose: This study seeks to investigate disparities in treatment and survival for Hmong patients with gastrointestinal cancers in Wisconsin. Background: The Hmong community is one of the largest resettled communities in the U.S composed of ethnic minority refugees from Southeast Asia that migrated during the Vietnam War and as political refugees. Wisconsin has the third largest Hmong population in the U.S. Compared to Non-Hispanic Whites (NHW), Hmong face greater cancer mortality rates; distinct disparities may be underappreciated, as Hmong outcomes are often grouped with Asian Americans. Thus, differences in treatment and survival between NHW and Hmong populations remain understudied. Methods: Adults with liver, pancreas, or colorectal cancer diagnosed from 2004-2018 in the Wisconsin Cancer Reporting System were included. Summary statistics comparing Hmong, NHW, and Non-Hmong Asian individuals were generated. Adjusted logistic regression models were used to test differences in treatments. Adjusted Cox proportional hazard regression models were constructed to test differences in cause-specific survival (CPS) for liver and CRC and all-cause survival for pancreas cancer. Model A (A) adjusted for sociodemographic variables only: age, sex, race/ethnicity, rurality, county, median household income and education status, insurance, and stage. Model B (B) added treatment variables chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation. Results: Of 56,163 patients, 5,822 had liver cancer with 22 (0.4%) identifying as Hmong, 8,490 had pancreatic cancer with 11 (0.001%) identifying as Hmong, and 37,851 had CRC with 50 (0.001%) identifying as Hmong. For all cancer types, Hmong patients were diagnosed at a younger age and trended toward decreased survival. The average age at diagnosis was significantly lower for Hmong patients with liver cancer compared to NHW patients (55.3 years VS 67.6 years, p<0.001). Hmong patients with liver and pancreatic cancers had lower odds of receiving chemotherapy (OR=0.28, [0.09, 0.80], OR=0.03, [0.003, 0.24], and a trend towards lower odds of receiving chemotherapy (OR=0.60, [0.27, 1.20]) for CRC. All cancers trended toward lower odds of receiving surgery (OR=0.46, [0.12, 1.74], OR=0.61, [0.06, 5.42], OR=0.62, [0.26, 1.47], respectively. Compared to NHW patients, Hmong patients with liver cancer had an increased hazard of death (HR 2.67, [1.54, 4.63]) when considering sociodemographic variables (A). Adjustment for treatment variables reduced this disparity in (B) (HR 1.56, [0.90-2.72]). Conclusions: Hmong patients across all cancers were more likely to be diagnosed at a younger age and trended toward lower survival. Those with liver and pancreatic cancer also had lower odds of receiving chemotherapy. These findings highlight inequities in healthcare with the goal to drive greater access to and acceptance of treatment and community outreach. Future efforts will focus on disseminating this information and developing community-based approaches for health screening and prevention. Citation Format: Cinthya Maldonado Avila, Andrea Schiefelbein, Margaret Walker, Kajua Lor, John Hampton, Roberto J. Vidri, Noelle K. LoConte, Melissa Skala, Nabeel Zafar. Survival and treatment disparities of Hmong patients diagnosed with gastrointestinal cancer [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 16th AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2023 Sep 29-Oct 2;Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2023;32(12 Suppl):Abstract nr C082.

“Safe Legal Pathways” or New Colonial Frontiers? A Critical Analysis of European Intervention in the Sahel and the Creation of Anomalous Legal Zones

Abstract This article critiques the increasingly popular concept of the “safe legal pathway” in refugee politics, policy and law, using European engagement and intervention in the Sahel as its primary case study. It draws upon neo-colonial studies, necropolitics, border studies and the legal literature on sovereignty and extraterritoriality to explore the function, structure, and import of the “safe legal pathway”, and its compatibility with contemporary understandings of international legal history and argumentation. Divided into four sections, the article focuses on the drivers behind Europe’s migration-development-security objectives in the Sahelout of which the pathways discourse emerges, the EU’s concomitant insistence on criminalising the illusive “people smuggling business model”, and the role which the traditional tropes of sovereignty, territory, and civilisation play in determining policy parameters. Noting the multidirectional nature and multifunctional purposes of pathways, and focusing on the policing of migrant communities both within and outside Europe, this article provides a comprehensive and critical overview of the nature, structure, function, and regulation of the pathway, its susceptibility to being leveraged for the commodification, extraction, discipline and transformation of non-European bodies and narratives, and its place in the creation of differentiated, suspended, and anomalous legal zones for the transfer and manipulation of global norms.

Jewish Threads in a Polish Life Story

Abstract This article presents the life story of a Pole with Jewish ancestry who came to the United States in the 1980s as a political refugee after the imposition of martial law and returned to Poland in the 1990s after the collapse of Communism. I explore the meaning of Jewishness in his social self, constructed and narrated within the changing sociopolitical and geographic contexts of Wrocław, New York, Mississippi, and Warsaw.

Political economy of refugees: How responsibility shapes the politics of education

In this theory generating article, we take up the question of what shapes the role of host governments in social service provision for refugees, using the case of education. We consider the ways in which traditional theories relevant to the political economy of education vary under a responsibility sharing model of refugee education that has developed in recent years. Under a traditional development approach, in which refugees are integrated into national systems over the long-run, like in the United States or Canada, we would expect the political economy of education to operate similarly to national or other migrant populations. Under a humanitarian model, we would expect responsibility for service provision to align clearly with humanitarian actors, with demands, purposes, and incentives distinct from and minimally entangled with those of hosting states. Under new responsibility sharing models, lines of responsibility become opaque and the political economy of education, including ideas about the purposes of education, actors and the nature of demand, and incentives for its provision become more complex.We argue that the political economy of refugees can be understood as distinct from the political economy for citizens as it requires addressing fundamental questions of responsibility and assumptions about time horizons. Our proposed conceptualization of the political economy of refugees draws on theories from political science, economics, sociology, education, and refugee studies. As host countries and the global community grapple with decisions about services for refugees across sectors, it is critical to understand ways in which factors shaping the political economy may be distinct from national citizens to ensure that approaches are equitable and effective for refugees and host communities.

Korean Christians Americanized

With the introduction of zoom and cell group Bible study and fellowship gathering with church members from 6 to 10, congregation members of each Korean church have come to appreciate the diversity within each consistory encompassing multigenerational American born Koreans, foreign expats, diplomats, immigrants from middle class and up from the greater Seoul, South Korea area, political refugees and migrant workers who categorically entered this country with Republic of Korea visa but who originally were able to date back their earlier life from Communist Regimes such as Siberia, China, Vietnam and North Korea (Ibuk chulsin) and other Asian of color looking foreigners and mix-breeds with Korean heritage and other combinations. The focus of their Christian practice has been more passive concept of God’s grace grounded on John Wesley tradition rather than their yoking and making progress in lineal fashion into the future with and by believers out of Christian love. A premium is placed in smooth transitioning from static Confucianism and Christianity embracing education, meritocracy, social harmony and order.

The League of Nations and Turkish political refugees in Greece in the early 1930s

With the signing of the Ankara Agreement in 1930 between Turkey and Greece, the Greek government withdrew its open support for Turkish political opponents of the Kemalist government and expelled such figures from Western Thrace. Among them were some Yüzellilikler, the 150 people proscribed by the Turkish government under the Protocol of the Lausanne Treaty of 1923. The Yüzellilikler, who had gained the status of refugees under the protection of the League of Nations as a result of the 1928 Arrangement, now turned to the League for support. Focusing on the cases of the ex-şeyhülislam Mustafa Sabri and former Ottoman police officer Namık Hilmi, this article discusses the role of the Athens Office of the Nansen International Office for Refugees of the League of Nations in supporting and strengthening the position of the Turkish political opposition to the Kemalist regime in Turkey in the early 1930s.

Beloved Place: A Latinx/A/O Cultural Center and Undergraduate Latino Men

ABSTRACT This study aimed to examine the role of a Latinx/a/o cultural center in the experience of undergraduate Latino men at a predominantly White institution. A qualitative case study approach was used to explore the relationship between a Latinx/a/o cultural center and six Latino undergraduate men. Each participant was interviewed three times using participant photo elicitation. Utilizing a conceptual framework of querencia, findings indicate a strong relationship between participants and the Latinx/a/o cultural center. Findings show participants experienced place-based political refuge, challenging machismo through emotional vulnerability, and environmental congruence through physical and cultural validation. The findings offer a unique understanding of the transactional relationship between a person (Latino men) and a place (Latinx/a/o Cultural Center) to become a beloved place.

Media Framing of the Refugee Crisis at the Periphery of Europe

The recent European refugee crisis, which began in 2015, has generated academic interest in how media portray and frame migrations and refugees, specifically in their influence on how “We” perceive and accept “Them” in “Our” societies. However, research primarily focuses on EU member states and destination/receiving countries. Therefore, our study examines media framing of the refugee crisis in Serbia between 2015 and 2016. Building on frames previously identified in the Western context, we pre-defined three frames: viewing the refugee crisis as a problem for the political system, society, or refugees. These frames were coded as external/internal based on whether the media text discussed the crisis outside/inside Serbia. Our deductive análisis shows that framing differs from destination countries, with a minimal emphasis on social problems in Serbia. Political issues and challenges faced by refugees were dominant but externalized, showing a slight decline over time compared to the social problem frame, which followed real events. Furthermore, our inductive thematic analysis reveals a new way of framing refugees as a problema for the free movement of our citizens. It also reveals a meta-frame of “Us” (in Serbia) as acting in a humanitarian manner amid hard circumstances created by “Them” (Western politicians) who are not handling the crisis in line with the EU values.