This report, which was commissioned by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, is an overview of the situation concerning current and future trends in international migration in Europe. The most important components of the current scene are identified as "(i) persisting unemployment despite the economic recovery in Europe, (ii) the continued internationalisation of the national societies in conjunction with overt tendencies to xenophobia, (iii) the strengthening of European political and economic integration, and (iv) the increasing pressure for immigration from the third world."
This is the 2nd in a series of 3 papers concerning refugees in Eastern and Southern Africa. It contains in-depth information on the refugee situations in Djibouti, Somalia, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. In Djibouti, political and material constraints have made all 3 durable solutions--voluntary repatriation, local integration, and resettlement to a 3rd country--problematic. Djibouti may be a harbinger for a danger that could face refugees in many other countries of the world, the danger that the inability to find durable solutions for the refugees, or even any viable self-sufficiency programs, may lead to frustration with their presence, which could turn into erosion of support for the provision of asylum itself. If only to avoid the creation of such extreme solutions as "humane deterrence," there is a need for increased attention to problems created in the care-and-maintenance phase of refugee operations rather than just to the difficulties of relief assistance and attaining durable solutions. Because Somalia contains 1 of the world's largest care-and-maintenance populations, there has been considerable discussion of how to help the refugees attain self-sufficiency. What successes there have been so far have been in agriculture; other income-generating projects have been unsuccessful, often producing inferior goods of higher price. A possible rapprochement between Somalia and Ethiopia may lead to changed circumstances which could draw refugees back home to Ethiopia or it may merely lead to their chilly reception by the Somali government. Tanzania has long been looked to for positive models concerning how to promote local integration of refugees through rural settlements. The approaches taken in Tanzania have been much more successful in dealing with economic viability than they have been in dealing with integration. It is rare to hear an assistance official in a settlement mention any concrete steps that are being taken to promote integration, as opposed to not angering the local population by excluding them from the benefits of the settlement's infrastructure. The durable solution which has been applied to most of the refugees in Zambia has been local integration, either spontaneously among ethnic kin, or through living in one of the official settlements. The 4 camps which exist at present in Zimbabwe are all fairly small; this small size, along with the competence of both government and UN officials and the positive relationship between Zimbabweans and Mozambicans in general and the energy of the refugees themselves, have all contributed to giving the camps the reputation of being well-run, leading to the concern that they are run, too well.
Immigrants have long formed voluntary associations to help members adapt to their new homeland. Between 1975 and 1980, some 500 self-help groups called Mutual Assistance Associations (MAAs), organized among the various Southeast Asian nationalities. Federal and state governments soon recognized that the newly formed MAAs could be effective partners in the US refugee resettlement program. In 1980, through direct grants to 22 MAAs nationwide, the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) supported a variety of activities ranging from orientation and counseling to translation and interpreting services to employment-related services. In 1982, ORR launched the MAA Incentive Grant Initiative to encourage states to fund MAAs as part of their general refugee social services programs and to help MAAs survive beyond the period of federal support for refugee programs. To date, the federal initiatives to encourage MAA development have been successful in 1) encouraging state committment to MAAs; 2) developing organizational and service capacity in many MAAs funded with incentive grants; and 3) institutionalizing MAAs as part of the US resettlement system. What seems less promising is the attainment of the long-range intent of the initiative--to increase the institutional and financial stability of MAAs so they can continue to provide services to the members of their ethnic communities even if ORR funding were to be sharply reduced or deleted.
For most of the 4 decades since World War II, US refugee and asylum policy has been generous but ad hoc, discretionary, and highly variable favoring some refugee groups and discriminating against or ignoring others. This paper: 1) tries to clarify some of the terminology of the refugee field and explains the distinctions between asylum and resettlement, 2) provides some of the historical background that has brought the US to its present condition and chronicles the US overseas refugee admission policy, and 3) examines some asylum issues and other refugee issues. Asylum is far more difficult to control than refugee resettlement. As a result of what is perceived to be abuse of the asylum system, the US has joined the growing tendency of states to treat asylum-seekers as illegal migrants. The greatest problem with American asylum policy is its lack of fairness of application; many critics believe that foreign policy factors dominate asylum hearings rather than the individual merits of the case. The 3 classic solutions to this problem are resettlement, voluntary repatriation, and settlement in a country of 1st asylum. Only in the Indochinese refugee crisis has resettlement been widely used as a solution for 3rd World refugees. Nationalism and nation-building conflicts are at the root of many refugee movements; hosts are often no less nationalistic than source countries, thus many non-integrated refugees live in peril. Developed country political will and statesmanship are needed to revive resettlement as a durable solution. Resettlement may be difficult and costly, but the pluralistic western societies do offer an integrated new life.
An analysis of rural-urban migration in Peru is presented, with the focus on women migrating to obtain work as domestic servants. Data are from published studies and a survey of 104 domestic servants interviewed in 1984.
