Refugee Resettlement Program

Examining resettlement practices worldwide and drawing on contributions from anthropology, law, international relations, social work, political science, and numerous other disciplines, this ground-breaking volume highlights the conflicts between refugees’ needs and state practices, and assesses international, regional and national perspectives on resettlement, as well as the bureaucracies and ideologies involved. It offers a detailed understanding of resettlement, from the selection of refugees to their long-term integration in resettling states, and highlights the relevance of a lifespan approach to resettlement analysis.

Resettlement – the selection and transfer of refugees from the state where they seek asylum to another state – is considered a tool of refugee protection. In this nuanced account of Canada’s resettlement program from the Indochinese crisis of the 1970s to the Syrian crisis of the 2010s, Shauna Labman examines the role that law plays in resettlement and the impact of resettlement on asylum policies. She concludes that resettlement programs can either complement or complicate in-country asylum claims at a time when fear of outsiders is causing countries to close their borders to asylum-seekers around the world.

The United States and Canada have historically accepted approximately three-quarters of resettled refugees, leading the world in this key aspect of global refugee protection. Between 1945 and 1980, both countries transformed their previous policies of refugee deterrence into expansive resettlement programs. Explanations for this shift have typically focused on Cold War foreign policy, but there was a domestic force that propelled the rise of resettlement: religious groups. In Send Them Here Geoffrey Cameron explains the genesis and development of refugee resettlement policy in North America through the lens of the essential role played by faith-based organizations. Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish groups led advocacy efforts for refugees after the Second World War, and they cooperated with each other and their respective governments to implement the first formal resettlement programs. Those policy frameworks laid the foundation for diverging policy trajectories in each country, leading ultimately to private sponsorship in Canada and the voluntary agency program in the United States. Religious groups remain embedded in the world’s most successful refugee resettlement programs. Send Them Here draws on a rich archival record and extensive comparative research to contribute new insights to the history of refugee policy, human rights, and the role of religion in modern policymaking and global humanitarian efforts.