Resettlement constitutes a durable solution to ...

Resettlement constitutes a durable solution to international refugee protection. However, for it to be sustainable, the integration process of the post-resettlement phase is crucial. This volume, which is the outcome of the project “Before and After – New Perspectives on Resettled Refugees’ Integration Process”, sheds light on the integration process from a broader perspective. After briefly addressing the labour-market integration of resettled refugee groups in Sweden, the volume’s main and longest chapter addresses the role of social networks in the integration process of resettled refugees. Social networks are analysed in relation to time and space, and hence attention is paid both to the time before – spent in refugee camps – and to the patterns of mobility pre- and post-resettlement. The following two chapters move away from Sweden and focus on the situation in Australia – with an investigation into the role of ethnic social networks – and Japan, with a focus on the recent development of the country’s resettlement programme. The final chapter brings the focus back to Sweden and enriches the volume by looking at one particular aspect of the resettlement process – the Cultural Orientation Programme – from a postcolonial perspective.

MALMÖ UNIVERSITY

205 06 MALMÖ, SWEDEN

WWW.MAH.SE

isbn 978-91-7104-637-6 (print)

isbn 978-91-7104-638-3 (pdf)

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R E S E T T L E D A N D C O N N E C T E D ?

S O C I A L N E T W O R K S I N T H E I N T E G R A T I O N P R O C E S S O F R E S E T T L E D R E F U G E E S

© Malmö University (MIM) and the authors

Illustration: Arton Krasniqi

Front page image: © 2015, Luca Serazzi.

Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license

<http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/>,

Printed in Sweden by Holmbergs, Malmö 2015

ISBN 978-91-7104-637-6 (print)

ISBN 978-91-7104-638-3 (pdf)

Malmö University

Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare

(MIM)

SE-205 06 Malmö

Sweden

www.mah.se/mim

BRIGITTE SUTER & KARIN MAGNUSSON (EDS.)RESETTLED AND CONNECTED?Social Networks in the Integration Process of Resettled Refugees

Malmö University, 2015MIM

This publication is also available on www.mah.se/muep

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................ 7

PRESENTATION OF AUTHORS ........................................ 8

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ..............................................11

1. INTRODUCTION ......................................................12

Brigitte Suter and Karin Magnusson

2. RESETTLED REFUGEES IN SWEDEN: A STATISTICAL OVERVIEW ........................................... 35

Pieter Bevelander

3. BEFORE AND AFTER: NEW PERSPECTIVES ON RESETTLED REFUGEES’ INTEGRATION PROCESS ............ 55


The strength of strong ties: resettled Burmese Karen in Sweden ... 73Fragmented networks, scattered placement: recently resettled Somalis in Sweden .....................................101Findings ............................................................................121

4. CREATING COMMUNITY: KAREN REFUGEES’ STORIES OF TRANSITION TO LIVING IN AUSTRALIA .....145

Shirley Worland

5. ADDRESSING HUMANITARIAN NEEDS OR PURSUING POLITICAL PURPOSES? AN OVERVIEW OF JAPAN’S RESETTLEMENT PROGRAMME ..................180

Sayaka Osanami Törngren

6. RESETTLEMENT FROM A POSTCOLONIAL PERSPECTIVE: ENCOUNTERS WITHIN SWEDISH CULTURAL ORIENTATION PROGRAMMES ..................... 213

Mehek Muftee

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This anthology is part of a project financed by the European Refugee Fund (ERF) and MIM, Malmö University, and we are grateful to both of our funders for their financial support. We would also like to express our gratitude to three people who have been instrumental to this project – Henrik Emilsson during the application process, and Louise Tregert and Angela Bruno Andersen throughout the project.

We would like to thank the following people and institutions for their support in creating this anthology: Our reference group – Karin Davin, George Joseph and Gabriella Strååt – for their great commitment and contributions to the project; our steering group – Benny Carlson, Christina Johansson and Pieter Bevelander – for their involvement and sharing of knowledge; Oskar Ekblad and Denise Thomsson from the Migration Board for their assistance and support; our colleagues at MIM – Ioana Bunescu, Inge Dahlstedt, Christian Fernandez, Henrik Emilsson, Anders Hellström, Anna Lundberg, Erica Righard, Sofia Rönnqvist and Ioanna Tsoni – for their invaluable feedback on the texts and our fruitful discussions; Shirley Worland for her generous assistance during the trips to Thailand; and Jenny Money for the language editing.

Last but not least, we would like to thank all the resettled refugees and key informants, who have provided us with information and whose participation has been vital to this project.

Malmö, April 2015

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PRESENTATION OF AUTHORS

Pieter Bevelander is Professor of International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER) and Director of the Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare (MIM). His main research field is international migration, aspects of immigrant integration and attitudes towards immigrants and ethnic minorities. His latest research includes the socio-economic and political impacts of the citizenship ascension of immigrants and minorities in host societies. He has recently co-edited the following publications: Resettled and Included? The Employment Integration of Resettled Refugees in Sweden (Malmö: MIM, 2009) and Crisis and Migration: Implications of the Eurozone Crisis for Perceptions, Politics, and Policies of Migration (Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2014).

Karin Magnusson holds a BA in International Studies from Macalester College, USA, and an MA in International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER) from Malmö University, Sweden. Her previous research involved highly skilled labour migrants and Somali refugees’ labour market integration in Sweden. She is currently working as a Research Assistant at the Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare on projects focusing on resettlement, integration and forced return. Her latest publications include Somalier på arbetsmarknaden – har Sverige något att lära? (Stockholm: Framtidskommissionen, 2012) and The World’s Most Open Country: Labour Migration to Sweden after the 2008 Law (Malmö: MIM, 2014).

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MeheK Muftee is a Senior Researcher and Lecturer at Linköping University. She completed her PhD in Child Studies in the Department of Thematic Studies (TEMA). Her research interests revolve around postcolonial theory, refugee migration and child studies. In her dissertation she examined the Cultural Orientation Programs (COPs) for children and youth from the Horn of Africa being resettled in Sweden. One focus of her work is on how the agency of the children came about within the COP context. She has recently published “Children’s Agency in Resettlement: A Study of Cultural Orientation Programs in Kenya and Sudan”, in Children’s Geographies (2015), 13(2), 131–148.

sayaKa osanaMi törngren received her Ph.D. in Migration and Ethnic Studies from Linköping University, and is an Affiliated Researcher at MIM. Since 2014 she has been a visiting researcher at Sophia University in Tokyo and engages in research on refugee resettlement in Japan. From December 2014 to April 2015 she worked as a national policy researcher for UNHCR Tokyo, and co-authored the forthcoming report A Socio-Economic Review of Japan’s Resettlement Pilot Project (provisional title). She is also a part-time lecturer, teaching courses on race, ethnicity and international migration at different universities in Tokyo. Her latest publications include “Does Race Matter in Sweden? Challenging Colorblindness in Sweden”, Sophia Journal of European Studies (2015), 8, 125–137.

Brigitte suter is a Senior Researcher and Lecturer at the Malmö Institute for Studies of Migration, Diversity and Welfare (MIM). Her research interests include (im)mobility, social networks and processes of in/exclusion and resettlement. She has previously been engaged in several international projects coordinated by the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD). She is, inter alia, the author of “Social Networks in Transit: Experiences of Nigerian Migrants in Istanbul”, Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies (2012), 10(2), 204–222, and co-author of a chapter on migration in Dahlstedt and Neergard (2015) International Migration and Ethnic Relations. Critical Perspectives, London: Routledge.

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shirley Worland is a Lecturer at Chiang Mai University, Thailand. Since completing her PhD – which explored displaced Karen identity – in 2010 in the School of Social Work and Human Services at the University of Queensland, Australia, she has worked in a voluntary capacity for young Karen refugees. Her latest action research project aims to develop a standardised curriculum for refugee and migrant schools in Thailand to which both the Myanmar and the Thai Ministries of Education will give accreditation. She is the co-author of “Religious Expressions of Spirituality by Displaced Karen from Burma: The Need for a Spiritually Sensitive Social Work Response”, International Social Work (2013), 56(3), 384–402.

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AMIF Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund CBO Community Based OrganisationCOP Cultural Orientation ProgrammeERF European Refugee FundICCR Inter-Ministerial Coordination Council

for Refugee Issues IOM International Organization for MigrationJEURP Joint EU Resettlement Program KKBBSC Kawthoolei Karen Baptist School and College KNLA Karen National Liberation ArmyKNU Karen National UnionKRC Karen Refugee CommitteeKSC Karen Swedish CommunityKWO Karen Women OrganisationKYO Karen Youth OrganisationMSCWA Multicultural Service Centre of Western Australia NGO Non-governmental OrganisationREC Resettlement Expert CouncilRHQ Refugee Assistance HeadquartersSFI Swedish for ImmigrantsSKBF Swedish Karen Baptist FellowshipTBC The Border ConsortiumUNHCR United Nations High Commissioner for RefugeesWCEC Wyndham Community and Education Centre

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INTRODUCTION


For the first time since World War II, more than 50 million people are fleeing conflict and war (UNHCR 2014a). Since 2011, the war in Syria and the refugee crisis connected to it not only makes international headline news, but also tops international humanitarian calls for initiatives and donations. In addition to the war in Syria, the world counts more than 50 other refugee crises, with only 40 per cent of them receiving media coverage in industrialised countries (Mahoney 2014). Among these refugees, the UNHCR has identified around 1 million who are in need of resettlement (UNHCR 2014b). Resettlement constitutes one of the three durable solutions executed by the UNHCR as part of its mandate to protect refugees and seek, together with governments, sustainable solutions:

Resettlement involves the selection and transfer of refugees from a State in which they have sought protection to a third State which has agreed to admit them – as refugees – with permanent residence status. The status provided ensures protection against refoulement and provides a resettled refugee and his/her family or dependants with access to rights similar to those enjoyed by nationals. Resettlement also carries with it the opportunity to eventually become a naturalized citizen of the resettlement country (UNHCR 2011:3).

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Resettlement is commonly used when the two other durable solu-tions, local integration and repatriation, are not possible. To give a few examples, Somalis who received refugee status in Kenya, Burmese refugees in Thailand, and any non-European refugees recognised in Turkey are resettled because local integration is not possible in these countries and because a sustainable return to the country of origin is not a feasible option.

The 1 million displaced people identified as being in need of resettlement not only lack access to opportunities for local integration or repatriation; they are also deemed to be “particularly vulnerable”. There is, however, a large mismatch between the number of refugees identified to be in need of a third country willing to receive them and the actual places available; currently around 1 per cent of them receive a resettlement place (SRF 2015; UNHCR 2014b). In light of this mismatch, the UNHCR has, since the year 2000, worked towards increasing the number of both resettlement states and of the places actually available for resettlement.

Global resettlementThe United States continues to lead the resettlement figures; in 2014 alone, it resettled around 70,000 refugees, a figure similar to the number it has resettled in previous years (Refugee Processing Center 2015). The US is followed by Canada and Australia, which accepted an overall number of 13,900 and 11,000 resettled refugees respectively – both government sponsored and privately funded (UNHCR 2014c, 2014d). The EU resettled around 7,500 refugees in 2014 (European Resettlement Network n.d.a). Of the EU countries, Sweden’s annual quota of 1,900 is by far the highest. The Nordic countries, Sweden, Denmark and Finland, together accept around 75 per cent of all resettled refugees in the EU (Bokshi 2013).

Resettlement also takes place in South America. Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay conduct their resettlement in different ways (Cariboni 2014; UNHCR 2003). In Asia, Japan started a pilot programme in 2010 that was transformed into a regular programme five years later. Despite being relatively modest in the number of resettled refugees accepted, Japan’s post-resettlement programme is ambitious and comprehensive (see Osanami Törngren, this volume). Furthermore, another Asian country, Cambodia, has

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become a quasi-resettlement country. The Cambodian government sealed a deal with Australia in 2014, agreeing to accept individuals who have been recognised as refugees by Australia. These refugees are individuals who have arrived in Australia irregularly by boat and have been excluded from local integration there under the current restrictive refugee policy (BBC 2014). None of the other countries on the Asian continent1 have thus far responded to general or specific international calls for resettlement (Middle East Monitor 2014).

European developments in the field of resettlementWestern European countries have resettled refugees on an ad hoc basis throughout the past 60 years – for example, refugees from Hungary in 1956, Chile in the 1970s and Indochina in the 1970s. In recent years, European countries – most of them Western European with a long experience of receiving asylum-seekers and refugees – have responded to “special calls” by the UNHCR and/or the European Commission to resettle refugees on an ad hoc basis; among them were Iraqis in 2008, refugees displaced by the Libyan war in 2011 and, currently, Syrians. Germany is the European country that has resettled the largest number: 30,000 Syrians refugees. However, the vast majority of these latter have been accepted under a temporary form of resettlement, the Humanitarian Admission Program, or HAP.2 A handful of European countries have run regular resettle-ment programmes providing permanent resettlement for a substan-tial amount of time; Sweden since 1950, Denmark since 1978, the Netherlands since 1984, Finland since 1985 and Ireland since 1998 (European Resettlement Network n.d.b, n.b.c).

Within Europe, the EU is the main actor pushing for resettlement. Early manifestations on the policy agenda started around 2000, culminating in the adoption of the Joint EU Resettlement Program (JEURP) in 2012. Today, resettlement is a crucial element of the external dimension of the EU’s asylum policy, and thus an integral part of the Regional Protection Programs (RPP). These program-mes are generally conducted in the source regions of conflict (such as the Horn of Africa, the African Great Lakes region and Eastern North Africa) or in the transit countries of asylum-seekers, such as the Eastern European countries of Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine (European Commission 2015). Their rationale is largely to support

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the establishment of asylum systems in these countries by extending the EU’s expertise and providing the countries with the financial means to enhance their capacity-building. In return, the EU agrees to resettle some of the refugees in these countries (European Commis-sion 2005). Although resettlement is part of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS), it has never been the subject of harmonisa-tion in the way that reception and asylum procedures have been.

In cooperation with the UNHCR, the EU has, in the past 15 years, tried to support resettlement on its territory and to encourage more member-states to resettle. This has been relatively successful, especially since the introduction of financial support for new resettlement states was introduced through the European Refugee Fund (2008–2013). Before 2003, there were five resettlement states in the EU with regular programmes; today (2015) 14 EU member-states – Belgium, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden and the UK – have regular resettlement programmes. Several others, such as Italy, Poland, Austria and Luxembourg, have resettled refugees on an ad hoc basis and responded to special calls by the UNHCR and/or the EU Commission. In addition, the non-EU states of Norway and Iceland have also responded with regular programmes, Switzerland and Iceland with pilot projects and Switzerland and Iceland with ad hoc receptions (European Resettlement Network n.d.b; Krasniqi & Suter 2015; SRF 2015; UNHCR 2014e).3

However, despite the EU’s establishment of resettlement as a tool for refugee protection and the recent increase in the number of resettlement countries, the EU’s quota of resettlement places has not substantially increased. As we saw earlier, the Union resettles considerably fewer refugees than the US, Canada and Australia. One explanation for this is that many of the newer resettlement countries accept quite modest numbers of refugees; for example, Portugal and the Czech Republic resettle around 30 persons a year. Another explanation for the low numbers of resettled refugees in the EU is that these countries receive far more asylum applications than do the US, Canada and Australia. In 2013, EU member-states processed almost 400,000 asylum applications (500,000 for European countries as a whole), compared to 90,000 for the USA, 10,000 for Canada and 26,500 for Australia (Australian Government 2014; UNHCR 2013).

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There have been concerns that EU member-states treat the reception of asylum-seekers and resettled refugees as part of the same pot, which means that, if one category is increased, the other is decreased (Bokshi 2013). Developments in France, Finland and Belgium suggest that a high number of asylum-seekers have limited the number of resettlement places available. The opposite is also feared – that a higher number of resettlement places decreases the recognition rate of asylum-seekers. However, statistical evidence shows that it is the countries that receive the highest numbers of asylum applications which also resettle the most refugees. For example, Sweden, which had the highest recognition rate of refugees between 2000 and 2011 – an estimated 120,000 – also accepted the highest number of resettled refugees, roughly 19,000 individuals.

All in all, various stakeholders and observers (inter alia, the European Commission 2005; Bokshi 2013; UNHCR 2014b; Zetter 2015) express the importance of increasing the number of resettlement places in order for resettlement to constitute a valuable tool in international refugee protection. Efforts to increase resettlement places are often supported by the argument that it will create more legal channels into the EU and “protect” asylum-seekers from a dangerous, life-endangering journey via potentially unscrupulous smugglers and traffickers (Zetter 2015). This is certainly a laudable argument. However, the drawback is that the increased emphasis on resettlement runs the risk of viewing resettled refugees as “genuine” refugees deserving of humanitarian efforts/aid, while asylum-seekers, who engage independently in mobility in order to access the asylum systems in the richer countries (“The West”), are perceived (according to recent trends) to be “less deserving”. More often, asylum-seekers are seen through the lenses of national and supra-national security and met with suspicion (Hyndman & Giles 2011; Järvinen et al. 2008). The fact that there is no legal obligation to resettle makes resettlement an opportunity for the richer countries to express “goodwill”. Scholars, for example Bokshi (2013), Hyndman & Giles (2011) or Troeller (2002), have criticised the emphasis on resettlement if it comes at the expense of asylum, arguing that there is the risk that adherence to international refugee law is eroded in the process. The challenge for the future development of the asylum system in European countries is thus to strengthen resettlement as

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a tool of solidarity towards countries of first asylum, of burden-sharing between EU member-states, and an humanitarian effort for individuals in need of protection, while simultaneously assessing and assuring the protection needs of asylum-seekers who reach EU territory by non-state-assisted means.

The future of resettlement?Given the various positive statements by major stakeholders, such as the UNHCR, the EU Commission and researchers, on resettlement, it is likely that the topic of resettlement will experience more attention in the future. This section addresses some of the discussions regarding resettlement within the field of refugee protection at international, supra-national and national levels.

For many years, the international community has responded to refugee crises by setting up camps in various countries, many of which are among the poorest in terms of GDP.4 A refugee camp usually provides protection for life, but fails to guarantee other basic human rights, such as the right to mobility, work and education. Many of these breaches of human rights are connected to the fact that the refugees do not enjoy a legal status during their time in the camps. This is accepted since refugee camps have hitherto been seen as temporary places of shelter, not intended to provide long-term solutions to refugee situations (Hyndman & Giles 2011). However, in reality, the average time a displaced person spends in a refugee camp is 17 years (UNHCR 2004). In other words, camps have become much more than just temporary shelters; instead they constitute an existential limbo in which human capabilities are wasted (Hyndman & Nylund 1998). This long-lasting displacement is often referred to as a “protracted refugee situation”, one which will be discussed throughout this anthology.

Furthermore, there has been an increased awareness among humanitarian actors and observers that international refugee law based on the 1951 Geneva Convention and its related 1967 Protocol is ill-equipped to meet contemporary demands of displacement. The factors leading up to displacement today are “complex and multicausal”, hence the current international framework fails to protect those displaced whose protection claims do not fall under the relatively narrow protection framework of the Convention

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(Zetter 2015). Not only has this left many individuals excluded from the protection they need, but many also find themselves stuck in refugee camps as their subsidiary protection status often disqualifies them from resettlement or other entitlements extended to recognised refugees under the Convention. On the receiving side, states have introduced somewhat compromised forms of protection, such as “humanitarian admission” or “subsidiary protection” status. These are protection categories in EU and EU member-states’ national laws that extend protection often on a temporary basis and often with a fraction of the entitlements extended to a person recognised as a refugee under the Convention.

Several scholars have suggested that policy-makers reconsider. Zetter (2015) advances two interrelated issues to address in the current “protection crisis”. Firstly, he points to the need to increase legal channels for migration. The enhancement of resettlement is named here as an important component. With regards to the countries of first asylum, Zetter urges states and stakeholders not only to not recognise a refugee situation as a purely humanitarian crisis, and highlights the de facto development of the border region due to the large-scale presence of refugees for the past 20 years, and attests both individual refugees and the wider aid economy surrounding the camps as being crucial for the development of the region. Furthermore, Brees (2009) advances Jamal’s (2008) suggested segmented approach, which argues for the differentiated application of durable solutions – i.e. local integration, repatriation or resettlement – for refugee sub-groups. This segmented approach is, among others, based on the realisation that, even in protracted refugee situations, some sub-groups of refugees are economically and/or socially de facto integrated, even if their legal status renders proper integration impossible. As such, instead of seeing resettlement as an overall solution to the whole refugee group of a camp or a region, a more nuanced application of different durable solutions to different refugee sub-groups could yield more beneficial results in terms of the economic, social and psychological well-being of all stakeholders involved. Allowing for (or even promoting) increased self-reliance in a situation of displacement – through greater mobility rights as well as the right to work and access education – is furthermore seen as beneficial, above all for those who eventually repatriate. Yet, until a

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return is feasible, the increased self-reliance also benefits the region where the displaced find temporary shelter: firstly, refugees, as seen above, often contribute to the revitalisation of a border region. The increased level of self-reliance also allows humanitarian donors to spend their financial contributions on development in the region rather than on feeding a dependent population (see Brees 2009; Jamal 2008).

On supra-national policy development, the EU has been – as mentioned above – a vital actor in bringing the topic of resettlement to the policy agenda and to actively promote resettlement on its territory. The areas where the EU has so far had the biggest impact or is seen to be able to play a crucial role is through the provision of financial aid – via the European Refugee Fund (2008–2013) and the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (2014–2020) – by influencing the political will of national states, and by facilitating collaboration and the exchange of knowledge and skills between the member-states (Bokshi 2013).

The financial incentives that were introduced by the European Refugee Fund (ERF) had a crucial impact on the number of resettlement countries, as several of these latter have since introduced a national resettlement programme, many of which – for example, the Bulgarian, Portuguese, Belgian, German and Hungarian programmes – are fully or partially financed by the fund (Bokshi 2013). Financial constraints – in general and with reference to the financial crisi of 2008–2012 in particular – are indeed a reason given by member-states to account for their small or absent commitment to resettlement. While, under the ERF, member-states received €4,000 per resettled refugee, the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF) increased this sum to €6,000 per individual refugee, and to €10,000 for individuals identified as particularly vulnerable: women and children at risk, separated children, persons with medical needs and persons in need of emergency resettlement (Bokshi 2013). In general, the AMIF working programme spells out its rationale to support individual member-states financially, while simultaneously working at the EU-wide level to consolidate the harmonisation of its asylum policy, including the promotion of resettlement and relocation, or intra–EU resettlement (European Commission 2014).

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Within the framework of the Joint EU Resettlement Program (JEURP), member-states are offered the possibility to show their political willingness to burden-share with other member-states and to show solidarity with first countries of asylum. Romania, furthermore, used the opportunity to resettle refugees in order to profile itself as a partner in refugee protection in an international and, even more so, EU context (Bokshi 2013). Furthermore, the political will often also has to do with public discourse. While debates around immigration have generally had a tendency to express rejection and suspicion and to call for more restrictive policies, the issue of resettlement is not well-known to the public in the member-states. In cases where resettlement was broadcast in the media, the reaction was often positive. Hence, Bokshi (2013) identifies a need to increase the general public’s awareness about and knowledge of resettlement through increased media reporting at all levels of governance.

Finally, the EU plays a crucial role in facilitating collaboration in other areas, such as selection missions.5 Increased collaboration has the advantage of enabling more cost-effective activities to be conducted which, in turn, would release more funds for increasing the resettlement capacities of the individual countries (Bokshi 2013). Further, the supranational actors can assume a prominent role in facilitating the exchange of knowledge and skills on both pre- and post resettlement processes. For resettlement to be a truly durable solution – in the sense that it attains sustainable outcomes – the post-resettlement situation of these refugees is of particular concern, and the integration of resettled refugees into the economic, political and social spheres of the member-states is thus considered to be a crucial part of resettlement (Bokshi 2013). The recently established European Asylum Support Office (EASO) in Malta has hitherto played a low-key role with regards to resettlement, but it could potentially have an important function in facilitating the exchange of experiences and the collaboration of both pre- and post-resettlement processes.

For the future of the EU resettlement programme and the enhancement of its sustainability and effectiveness, the AMIF certainly, and the EASO possibly, will play a crucial role in providing an infrastructure and financial incentives to member-states, training for staff and other post-resettlement assistance. Apart from these

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measures, there have been calls from experts (see European Parliament 2013; van Selm et al. 2004) for a joint EU quota and a specific body that would be tasked with distributing resettled refugees to member-states according to the host-country’s capacity.

The EU’s relatively short and not very extensive history of receiving resettled refugees can explain why academic contributions from a European perspective have hitherto been rare.6 Studies of integration with an explicit focus on resettled refugees are even less frequent (European Parliament 2013). There have been a number of exceptions, mostly from international organisations or think-tanks (such as the UNHCR, ECRE or the Migration Policy Institute), and by researchers (see, for example, Bevelander et al. 2009; Kohl 2015; Muftee 2014; Nibbs 2011; Robins-Wright 2014; Suter & Magnusson 2014; Tip et al. 2014).7 This anthology therefore enriches this scant number of scholarly publications on resettlement within the EU; its empirical and theoretical findings are, nevertheless, of relevance beyond the EU context.

Finally, for the future of resettlement at the national level, many of the concerns and challenges outlined above are the same. While the EU provides guidelines, directives and regulations for increased harmonisation, asylum matters still fall under the scope of the individual member-states. Resettlement is one of the least regulated aspects in the field of asylum, and as such looks – as presented above to some extent –very different in each resettling member-state. The practices of countries vary with regards to how refugees are selected, how they are prepared for resettlement, what provisions are extended to them upon arrival and which residence permit they can obtain and so forth. For example, with regards to the selection criteria, some member-states show an over-representation of women among the resettled, while others predominantly favour Christians over refugees with other religious affiliations (Bokshi 2013).8 However, what is common to all member-states is the very little awareness of the general public on the issue of resettlement, at both national and local levels. This is something that needs to be addressed at all levels if resettlement places are to increase. Furthermore, given the largely national sovereignty over asylum issues, the danger of relocation at the expense of resettlement is principally a national concern, as is the danger of trading off resettled refugees against asylum-seekers.

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With reference to the above-mentioned current protection needs on a global scale, such a trade-off would be fatal to the international protection of refugees, the brunt of which is already borne by some of the least-developed countries and ultimately, of course, the displaced refugees themselves.

The post-resettlement period: integrationSince post-resettlement integration is an essential element for resettlement to truly count as a durable solution, some considerations are provided here. Given the perceived difficulties of integrating resettled refugees, researching the topic has become part of the EU’s efforts to increase resettlement places throughout the Union. “The effectiveness of resettlement as a durable solution depends upon ensuring that resettled refugees have the opportunity to integrate” (European Parliament 2013:10).

While, in many countries, relevant statistics on the integration of resettled refugees are unobtainable, Bevelander (2009, and his 2015 chapter in this anthology) is able to demonstrate, for Sweden, that resettled refugees show the least employment integration compared to other refugee categories such as refugees’ relatives and refugees who arrived as asylum-seekers, but that, after 15–20 years they have caught up. With regards to these general results, we should point out that the findings for the different nationalities vary widely. Explanations for this can be sought in the pre-resettlement situation with regards to refugees’ (human, social and cultural) capital acquisition, their mental-health state as a result of war and displacement, the reception framework and the labour market, for example. Studies by Bevelander (2009) and Järvinen et al. (2008) offer several explanations for the slower initial integration of resettled refugees compared to those refugees who arrived as asylum-seekers in Sweden. Unlike the latter, resettled refugees had no time to get acquainted with Sweden before they started their introduction programme.9 They may still be in the early phases of cultural adaptation when they begin the programme, which might make it more difficult for them to digest the knowledge presented and thus slow down their integration (Järvinen et al. 2008). And, in most cases, resettled refugees have not themselves decided in which country to resettle. This could mean that they lack any expectations

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of the resettlement country, which has, again, been shown to negatively affect their ability to establish themselves (Järvinen et al. 2008). Furthermore, resettled refugees are often placed in smaller municipalities and in rural areas with fewer job opportunities. Resettled refugees are unlikely to be placed in municipalities with many job opportunities since there is often a lack of housing there (Järvinen et al. 2008). The geographical placement, as well as the concentration of refugees, are indeed important aspects affecting the outcome of the integration process (Brunner 2010). Finally, at least in the Swedish case, resettled refugees tend to have fewer social networks on which they can lean after arrival than other refugee groups (Järvinen et al. 2008). Even so, we should note that, while integration is important for many reasons, as outlined above, ultimately resettlement is a humanitarian practice and (usually) not a political or economic exercise.10 As such, among the resettled refugees are those perceived to be the most vulnerable from a social and health perspective, and economic performance should not, therefore, be the only aspect against which to measure their integration process.

Social networks and mobilitySocial networks based on ethnicity or nationality have been mentioned above as important, and they may, indeed, provide some explanation for the differences in the labour-market integration of resettled refugees in Sweden, and to integration in general. This anthology serves to provide more knowledge on the importance of social networks in relation to resettled refugees’ integration, as many of the chapters deal, to a certain extent, with the topic (Chapters 3, 4 and, partially, 5).

International scholarship has generally found social networks based on family ties, nationality or ethnicity to be beneficial for the integration process of resettled refugees. These may be already established social networks to which the newly arrived have access, and which generally fulfill the function of providing information, resources and a feeling of belonging to the newcomers. In cases, however, where refugees arrive as the pioneer group – i.e. where there has not been any prior migration of their co-nationals – this type of support is lacking. Nevertheless, as is shown, in Chapter 3,

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while social networks established after arrival with individuals from the same pioneer group cannot provide the same level of support, these networks can still play an important role, as they provide a venue in which to foster bonding ties based on a sentiment of belonging, and promote migrant self-esteem. Over time, these types of network can play an important role in society, and create bridges to other networks that are richer in resources (see Chapter 3 for more details).

Mobility practices can also be crucial for integration. As such, individuals may move to where they feel they will receive the best education, or to a different municipality or country where they can make better use of the social ties they have. In the Canadian context, studies that deal with refugee resettlement specifically have identified employment as well as closeness to family and friends as the most important factors leading to secondary migration within the country after resettlement (Abu-Laban et al. 1999; Simich 2003). Resettled refugees not only rely on government assistance to navigate their way into the new society, but also on family, friends and members of the same ethnic group, who share a similar cultural background and experience of conflict, flight, refuge and refugeehood. The bureaucratic decision to split up extended families between different municipalities in the same country or even – as is the case for some of the Burmese and Somali interviewees in this study – between different countries and continents, leads not only to emotional distress, but also to secondary migration. Ultimately, secondary migration has been found to be a practice enabling refugees to maximise their social support (Simich 2003).

Structure of the anthologyThe contribution of this volume is to present multiple views on resettlement, with many chapters focusing on integration and social networks. Out of five chapters, three deal with the situation in Sweden. However, the Swedish experience is also contrasted with resettlement experiences in two other countries: Australia and Japan (chapters 4 and 5). Social networks hold a quite prominent position the chapters: 3, 4, and, 5.

In Chapter 2, Pieter Bevelander provides us with a statistical record of the demographics and socio-economic situation and,

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in particular, the employment integration, of resettled refugees, refugees and other immigrants who have arrived in Sweden over the past 15 years. He focuses on eight specific countries of origin –Afghanistan, Colombia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Myanmar and Somalia – from where each group consists of a considerable share of individuals who have arrived through resettlement. First and foremost, the results show a great variation in educational attainment and average employment levels for the different groups in 2012. For both males and females in the eight groups under study, a high correlation between educational attainment and employment level is measured. Studying their employment integration over time shows that all groups present increasing employment levels the more years they spend in the country. Refugees from Iran, Colombia, Eritrea and Ethiopia have had employment trajectories similar to those of the average immigrant in Sweden. Refugees from Myanmar and Somalia do less well and have considerably lower levels of employment over time. These two countries also have the lowest levels of education. Refugees from Myanmar mainly arrived in Sweden through resettlement, following many years in refugee camps without a regular education system.

Chapter 3, by Brigitte Suter and Karin Magnusson, is the lengthiest of the anthology and is, together with the previous chapter, the product of a two-year study financed by the European Refugee Fund (ERF 86-300). The project is a follow-up to an earlier study, “Resettled and Included?” (Bevelander et al. 2009), and aims to both deepen and broaden knowledge of resettlement and its consequent integration processes in Sweden. Suter and Magnusson’s study focuses on the integration processes of resettled refugees from Somalia and Burma in Sweden through a qualitative lens. Although the chapter’s approach to integration is based on a broad understanding of the concept, it specifically focuses on the experiences and perceptions of the refugees. Its contribution, therefore, lies in conceptualising how social networks in time and space affect the integration process after resettlement. Social networks are seen as influenced by patterns of mobility and by the acquisition, in their pre-resettlement life, of social, economic, human and cultural capital (for instance, in the form of opportunities for education, income generation and self-determination). They connect the situation and opportunities of

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the pre-resettlement time with their situation after resettlement in Sweden. In studying social networks in both time and space – at local, national and transnational levels – and in analysing their role in refugee integration, the study distinguishes itself from the majority of other studies in the field that tend to place the focus solely on the post-migration time.11

Each case study starts by shedding light on the pre-resettlement situation and has two main purposes. The first is to show how the situations of conflict and refugee camps can vary greatly in the different places and, as such, to support the literature on critical refugee studies which highlight the refugee as an individual with a history, political preferences and agency. The case study, furthermore, clarifies the fact that refugee camp situations can vary tremendously in the opportunities they offer for education, income generation and self-determination. This, of course, has direct implications for the process of capital accumulation, both at a group and at an individual level.

The case studies then move on to mobility practices, which are directly connected to the pre- and post-resettlement periods. In the refugee camps, freedom of mobility is often restricted, which has direct consequences for capital accumulation and social network formation. After the refugees’ arrival in Sweden, mobility serves as a tool enabling them to forge and maintain social networks and social-network positions. This part also points to institutional and structural factors that contribute to immobility and hinder migrants in strengthening their social ties. Of course, this – as the chapter argues – is not without consequences for the integration processes of the individual refugees.

Finally, the case studies then turn to social-network formation and maintenance. Applying a social capital approach to the discussion of integration has the benefit of being able to link the past with the present. It also serves to show how individuals can benefit from the resources of other individuals through being a member of a social network. Networks can be based on a range of factors – in this study, nationality, ethnicity or language were the basis of the social networks, and the authors highlight how these ethnic social networks are able (or unable) to forge bridging ties to other networks in Swedish society, through which the individuals who are

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part of these networks can access further resources and can establish themselves as a group in the new society.

In Chapter 4, by Shirley Worland, the focus remains on Burmese Karen refugees displaced in Thailand and their consequent resettlement experiences. Worland devotes herself to their resettlement in Australia – a traditional resettlement country – and highlights prominent aspects of the refugees’ acculturation through a transition model from the field of social psychology. Contrary to most other countries where Karen refugees from Thailand resettled after 2005, Australia already hosted a large number of Karen refugees who arrived prior to the 2000s. The Karen from this earlier migration were able to build up fully functioning informal and formal social networks and organisations, and some of the individual members also obtained influential positions in local government. The newcomers of the years 2005 and later were able to substantially benefit from these already established network structures – accessing resources and information leading to employment and eventually the purchase of the status symbol, their own house. Like Sweden, the Australian government provides the refugees with considerable welfare benefits once they have been legally admitted to the country. Nevertheless, as this chapter convincingly shows, the positive influence of the ethnic network connections is not to be ignored. In a narrative style over large parts of the chapter, the author not only provides an in-depth account of post-resettlement experiences through rich empirical data, but also convincingly shows the fruitful connections and links between the different agencies and organisations, including those based on ethnic and religious affiliation.

Japan is not known as a country of immigration, and little will change with the reading of Chapter 5, by Sayaka Osanami Törngren, who illuminates the developments that started in 2010 and made Japan the first country in Asia to launch a resettlement programme. The author traces the political and administrative origins of the resettlement programme and contextualises it in a longer history and wider frame of immigration in and to Japan. The chapter highlights the specific circumstances in which the refugees are selected, and some of the original solutions designed by stakeholders to support the self-reliance of the resettled after arrival in Japan. The relatively recent origins of the programme, the comparatively small

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numbers of refugees resettled, and the somewhat strict monitoring of the refugees’ establishment in Japanese society enable Osanami Törngren to bring the organisational experience of resettlement closer to the reader; as such, the chapter provides a unique insight into stakeholder discussions on evaluation and on how to improve the system on certain matters of integration and post-resettlement conditions. While the Japanese programme is still very young, and limited in the number and selection of source countries, some of the specific features also deserve to be highlighted as interesting from a more global perspective. For example, as a result of economic self-reliance being one of the most central aspects of the programme, on-the-job training is a crucial part of the one-year introduction programme. Apart from subsidising the employers for every refugee hired, the various stakeholders involved are also instrumental in creating contacts between the employers and the refugees. Another interesting aspect of the Japanese understanding of integration – even though very informal – is the importance placed on ethnic networks as providers of social support. The importance is seen as so crucial to the extent that the local settlement support staff actively make efforts to link together individuals with the same ethnic background. Osanami Törngren emphasises that the Japanese resettlement programme is not based on humanitarian principles; instead, it can be interpreted as constituting a measure through which to address the need for low-skilled labour and to take steps to avert the demographic decline of the population. As the government turned the five-year pilot programme into a regular programme in 2015, the question of humanitarian grounds is indeed a relevant point for consideration.

In Chapter 6, Mehek Muftee enriches this resettlement anthology through two aspects: firstly, a theoretical framework – a postcolonial perspective – that remains largely untouched by the other chapters and, secondly, directing her attention to children in resettlement and showing how they express agency. Based on an understanding of the significance of the colonial legacy, the unequal power relations between refugees from the South, and the humanitarian “good-doers” in the Global North, the chapter focuses on one central aspect of many resettlement programmes: the Cultural Orientation Programme, or COP. In the Swedish case, on which Muftee’s

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contribution is based, the COP consists of a Swedish delegation which, in the space of a few days, educates the refugees to be resettled about Swedish cultural specifities and, more generally, about what they should expect in Sweden. As the author argues, the Swedish Migration Board’s declared goal of maintaining these encounters during the COPs in a framework of dialogue is based on the false assumption of non-existing power differentials between the refugee participants and the Swedish delegation. Muftee argues that the goal of two-way communication and dialogue cannot be reached without the members of the Swedish delegation recognising their privileged position within the power hierarchy that resettlement – and the COPs – constitute. First, Muftee questions whether, upon this recognition and further reflection, the encounters within the COPs could go beyond an interaction dictated by stereotypical dichotomous images of “us” and “them”. She illustrates her chapter with excerpts from these attempts at exchange which demonstrate situations in which the youths and children show agency and thereby contribute knowledge and insights which could ultimately encourage the development of modified COPs in order to strengthen the agency and improve the integration of this particular category of refugees in their resettlement.

Notes

1. Some of them – the Gulf countries, for example – have, however, contribu-ted financially (UNHCR 2015).

2. The different admissions countries which apply are described in Krasniqi & Suter (2015).

3. Other EU countries, such as Bulgaria, Slovakia and Slovenia, have provi-sion for resettlement through either a government act or law but have not yet resettled any refugees. Finally, countries like Greece, Cyprus, Lithu-ania, Latvia and Estonia have no formal basis for resettlement, nor have they resettled thus far, either through a programme or on an ad hoc basis.

4. Not all refugees are housed in camps – around 30 per cent of all displa-ced people on the African continent, for example, live outside camps (but nevertheless in a legal limbo (Hyndman & Giles 2011). In fact, as refugee situations have become increasingly protracted, many of the displaced have opted to settle in urban areas instead (Zetter 2015). These places usually offer better economic opportunities than camps; however the refugees’ lack of legal status renders them very vulnerable to exploitation.

5. Selection missions are trips to a country of first asylum conducted by representatives of the resettlement country, with the aim of selecting the refugees to be resettled. Often, there is a pre-selection carried out by the

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UNHCR, and the selection mission serves to consolidate the UNHCR’s recommendations with the country’s national criteria for the acceptance of resettled refugees.

6. Historically, Europe has been more of a source continent of refugees than a receiver (see Krasniqi & Suter 2015 for more details).

7. Of course, the situation in resettlement-proven countries, such as the US, Canada and Australia, is much different, with a large number of studies concerned with aspects of both resettlement and integration (see, for example, Colic Peisker & Tilbury 2004; Fanjoy et al. 2005; Hyndman & McLean 2006; Neumann 2013; Simich 2003; Worland 2010).

8. Indeed, with regards to religion, Fine (2013) points to the high rate of con-version among Iranian and Afghan asylum-seekers in Turkey, and relates it to their hope that this will give them better access to resettlement.

9. The Swedish introduction programme for immigrants consists of language courses, civic orientation courses and activities to prepare them for the labour market.

10. While some countries simply adhere to the humanitarian criteria of protec-ting the most vulnerable, others apply integration criteria in the selection process, or even make economic self-reliance a prerequisite for a perma-nent residence permit.

11. One notable exception is Erdogan’s (2012) study on the identity formation and acculturation of Karen refugees in Ontario, Canada. Hyndman & Walton-Roberts’ (2000) study on Burmese resettled refugees in the Greater Vancouver area is another. They draw on a transnational concept of migra-tion in order to argue that relations to and conditions in the source country are important aspects to consider when studying refugee integration. Fur-thermore, (Swedish) practitioners also recognise the need to know more about the pre-resettlement situation of the resettled refugees whom they meet during the integration programme (County Administration Gävle-borg 2012).

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RESETTLED REFUGEES IN SWEDEN: A STATISTICAL OVERVIEW

Pieter Bevelander

IntroductionOver the last five or six years, immigration to Sweden has been at an all-time high, at close to or more than 100,000 individuals annually; net migration has fluctuated at around 50,000+ individuals yearly during this period. Compared to earlier peaks of immigration to Sweden, in the late 1970s and during the Yugoslavian Civil War in the early 1990s, these recent consecutive years well exceed those earlier years of high immigration (Bevelander 2010; Emilsson 2014).

Although migrants’ reasons for entering Sweden are very diverse, a significant proportion of the immigration to Sweden over the last 15 years, as depicted in Figure 1, consists of individuals who seek asylum and who subsequently gain residence. Equated with the total number of immigrants or refugees, the so-called resettled refugees who are the topic of this volume, are relatively few, with an annual number of 1,500 to 2,000 individuals. Last, but not least, family reunification migration forms a significant part of the yearly inflow. These migrants are, to a large extent, connected to earlier refugee migration, but the flows are also partly due to the migrants’ international marriages with natives.

Although these resettled refugees are few in number compared to other admission categories, but high in political interest, the main aim of this chapter is to map their demographic, geographic, educational and labour market status in Sweden. In order to do this,

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we use a special outlet of the Swedish register database STATIV for the year 2012. This database includes, inter alia, demographic, geographic and socio-economic information for each individual. In the case of immigrants, migrant-specific information such as the country of birth, citizenship, years since obtaining a residence permit and admission category is available. The information on admission status is quite important for this study since it makes it possible to distinguish between refugees who seek asylum at the border and subsequently gain access to a residence permit and refugees who are directly resettled through the Swedish resettlement programme. The current study is also able to track the demographic, educational and labour market status of a number of resettled refugee groups who have not previously been studied for Sweden (see Bevelander 2009). The individuals concerned are from Afghanistan, Colombia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Myanmar and Somalia and, together, they make up the majority of the resettled refugees in Sweden over the last 15 years. The employment rate is based on standard measurements by Statistics Sweden and is calculated according to whether or not an individual was employed for more than 40 hours during the month of November and had an income from work equivalent to one “base value”, about 45,000 Krona in 2012.

Figure 1. Immigration to Sweden, 1998–2013Source: Migrationsverket.

0

20 000

40 000

60 000

80 000

100 000

120 000

140 000

1998199920002001200220032004200520062007200820092010201120122013

Asylum seekers Refugees Resettled refugees

Total immigration Family reunification

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Earlier studies Studies for Sweden which analyse the labour market integration of refugees claim that refugee integration into the labour market is dependent not only on the human capital acquired in the home country but also on the migrants’ investment in host-country human capital and, even more, in their labour market experience in the host country (Rooth 1999). Others studies stress the internal migration of immigrants/refugees as important factors related to the obtention of employment. For example, Rooth & Åslund (2006) show that choice of city and the labour market situation are important factors explaining labour market integration. Moreover, immigrants move to areas with relatively higher shares of immigrants in the popu-lation, i.e. the bigger cities (Bevelander et al. 1997). Hammerstedt & Mikkonen (2007), studying the short-term mobility of refugees from Bosnia-Herzegovina, found that males who quickly moved to another place on arrival in Sweden had a lower probability of becoming employed than those who stayed. They argue that the host-country language and knowledge of the labour market take time to acquire and that mobility, in the long run, can have a positive effect on the labour-market integration of immigrants. Moving to bigger cities mostly implies a renewed connection with a larger co-ethnic population and the opportunity to make use of ethnic networks. Bevelander & Pendakur (2009), studying the employment proba-bilities of refugees and family-reunion migrants in Sweden, show a clear difference in employment trajectories over time between resettled refugees, asylum claimants and family-reunion migrants. They discuss these differences in employment integration in terms of selection, integration policies affecting the various groups differently and social capital. Resettled refugees are housed in municipalities where housing is available but where employment opportunities are scarce and asylum-seekers have both resources and the possibility of settling where labour-market opportunities are available to them. Family-reunion migrants are likely to draw on the social capital acquired by family and friends already settled in the country (Beve-lander 2011; Bevelander & Pendakur 2009).

In direct comparison, employment probabilities for refugee groups in Sweden do not substantially differ from those measured for the same groups in Canada (Bevelander & Pendakur 2014). Using

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survey data for the Netherlands, de Vroome & van Tubergen (2010) found that education, work experience and language proficiency, all obtained in the host country, as well as contacts with the native population, enhanced labour market integration. Waxman (2001) found similar results for Sydney, Australia, tracking Bosnian, Iraqi and Afghani refugees there. Having higher-English proficiency also increases the likelihood of being employed. Evidence from the UK indicates that policies which restrict labour-market access also have a negative impact on the employment probabilities of refugees. Recent refugees in Australia are concentrated in the secondary labour market and face the non-recognition of qualifications, and discrimination on the basis of race and cultural difference by employers (Colic-Peisker & Tilbury 2006, 2007). Refugee labour-market integration is also assessed in the Canadian context. DeVoretz et al. (2004) found that refugees and family-reunion migrants had similar earnings trajectories over time. Finally, for the US, Connor (2010) found lower earnings for refugees compared to other intake categories and explains this at least partially by the refugees’ lower levels of language proficiency, schooling, family support and mental health and their residential area. Even after controlling for these factors, a gap remains – other factors not controlled for in the model are important for explaining this gap.

Overall, most studies that have assessed the labour-market status of refugees conclude that they do less well in the labour market. Only for Sweden and Canada is there earlier evidence that resettled refugees have a lesser and slower adaptation to the labour market compared to refugees who seek asylum at the border and subsequently gain residence (Bevelander & Pendakur 2014). A number of factors are presented to explain the gap in migrants’ labour-market performance compared to the native population and to other immigrant intake categories – general schooling, language proficiency, the non-recognition of educational and earlier skills, employment in less-secure segments of the labour market, housing and discrimination are the main factors shown.

Demography and geographyIn this section, some demographic aspects are mapped of the eight resettled refugee groups who are the focus of this chapter. In Table 1,

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the number of resettled refugees, and of refugees who sought asylum at the border and subsequently obtained residence, the percentage who were married and the mean age of the group are presented for individuals from the eight immigrant groups who have come to Sweden since 1998 and who were still in the country in 2012. The last column shows the total number of immigrants in Sweden in 2012 by nationality group.

The results in Table 1 show that, in a number of the groups, there is an under-representation of female individuals and that it is more often male representatives who seek refuge. Subsequent family reunification may explain why some of the groups have a more even gender balance. For the resettled refugees from Colombia and Myanmar, who are primarily resettled refugees, the more-equal gender balance could be explained by the fact that the Migration Board (Migrationsverket), the authority that chose the actual individuals, was inclined towards a gender balance. When it comes to marriage, the table shows a high rate amongst almost all groups except for those individuals who originate in Colombia. The results are mainly in line with earlier studies that show relatively high marriage rates in countries in Asia, the Middle East and South-East Asia, but lower rates in Latin American countries (Bevelander et al. 1997). All groups are relatively young and have a mean age ranging between 33 and 37 years.

Table 1 also shows the number of resettled refugees between the ages of 20 and 64 who have come to Sweden since 1998 and were still in the country in 2012. Resettled refugees from Iraq form the largest group, whereas those from Ethiopia are the smallest. Relative to the group of asylum-seekers who gained access to Sweden in the same time period, the number of resettled refugees from Colombia and Myanmar is greater than of those who sought asylum. The relevant authorities chose these groups in particular years for resettlement; this could partly explain why they outnumber asylum refugees. As we can also see in the table, during the period under study, about 10 per cent of all refugees from these eight countries were resettled refugees. Finally, for some of these countries, the number of resettled and asylum refugees makes up a large proportion of the total number of immigrants in Sweden from those countries. For individuals from Myanmar this is particularly visible.

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Table 1. Demographic indicators of refugees aged 20–64 in Sweden, by country of birth, 2012

Female%

Married%

Age(mean)

Resettled Asylum All immi-grants1

Afghanistan 46 72.5 33.5 1,838 6,525 13,248

Colombia 51 40.1 36.8 682 420 8,416

Eritrea 53 73.2 36.4 585 4,414 10,888

Ethiopia 49 72.7 35.0 379 1,072 12,799

Iran 47 71.5 36.6 1,710 4,344 57,576

Iraq 45 77.3 36.2 3,020 52,467 98,701

Myanmar 48 71.9 36.5 936 73 1,151

Somalia 50 81.4 32.9 686 18,298 30,825

Total 9,836 87,540 233,604

Source: Statistics Sweden.Note: 1Total number of immigrants from these countries in Sweden 2012, and those who entered Sweden before 1998 through other channels.

As they do in many countries, immigrants tend to settle in larger cities. However, resettled refugees in Sweden are widely dispersed among smaller cities, since both the municipalities and the counties have agreements with the Migration Board about taking in resettled refugees on arrival. Asylum claimants are able to choose where they want to settle once they have been granted asylum. Therefore we expect to see differences in settlement patterns between resettled refugees and asylum claimants. A simple cross-tabulation by county of residence and being a resettled refugee or asylum refugee shows that, in absolute numbers, the counties of Stockholm, Skåne (Malmö is the largest city) and Västra Götaland (with Gothenburg as its largest city) have the most refugees. Stockholm County and Västra Götaland County also have the highest numbers of resettled refugees. However, when comparing the percentages of the counties’ inhabitants, those of Kalmar, Värmland, Örebro, Västmanland and, even more, Gävleborg, Västernorrland, Jämtland, Västerbotten and Norrbotten, have higher percentages of resettled refugees than of asylum claimants. It is these counties in particular that receive resettled refugees when they arrive in Sweden. To a large extent this can be explained by the fact that these counties see the

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inflow of refugees as a measure to counter depopulation and create employment (Hagström 2009).

EducationAccording to human capital theory, formal education and labour-market skills are key assets for labour-market success and suggest that the higher the level of education the easier it is to obtain employment (Becker 1975). Employment is also vital for further upward occupational mobility and the attainment of income levels comparable to natives with the same education and occupation. In Table 2, the educational level is shown for the eight refugee groups, as well as, for comparison, the educational level of all immigrants and natives – the total population – who are the main competitors for the available jobs on the Swedish labour market.

Table 2. Educational level, refugees in Sweden aged 20-64, 2012 (%)

Primary education

Secondary education

University education

Afghanistan 40 34 26

Colombia 15 43 42

Eritrea 38 45 17

Ethiopia 21 46 33

Iran 11 38 51

Iraq 33 31 36

Myanmar 60 24 16

Somalia 59 21 12

Total population 13 48 39

Source: Statistics Sweden.

Note: Total number of immigrants from these countries in Sweden 2012, and those who entered Sweden before 1998 through other channels.

Table 2 shows clear differences in educational levels for the different origin groups. Whereas immigrants from Iran and Colombia have an educational level in line with or higher than the total population, other groups have much lower schooling levels. Among the immigrants from Myanmar and Somalia, a majority (60 per cent) only have primary education. Among the other countries are

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individuals from Iraq and Ethiopia who are relatively well educated, whereas of those from Afghanistan and Eritrea many, about 40 per cent, have primary education only. Our conclusion from the table is that, given the suppositions of human capital theory, immigrants from Iran and Colombia do, indeed, have the highest employment levels, followed by immigrants from Iraq, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Myanmar and Somalia.

EmploymentEmployment in the regular labour market is a key component to refugees’ further inclusion in the wider society. Having a regular income through work creates possibilities for individuals to make both personal and family decisions on how they want to live their lives, where they want to settle, and whether or not they wish to invest in education, property, etc. From a societal point of view, the increased employment integration of the incoming population broadens the welfare state basis through more tax revenue.

In this section we cover the employment position of female and male refugees, resettled refugees and all immigrants by country of birth. As earlier studies have indicated, refugees and resettled refugees have, in most countries, lower employment rates than the native population and other intake categories like labour migrants (Hatton 2011; Bevelander & Pendakur 2009 and 2014).

Table 3 shows the employment rates of female immigrants from the eight countries of origin with large numbers of resettled refugees. The table shows clearly that the employment rates for resettled refugees are lower than those of asylum claimants from the same ethnic origin. For some groups these differences are quite small and, basically, no difference in employment attachment can be measured between asylum claimants and resettled refugees from Afghanistan and Iraq. However, larger differences, about 30 percentage points, are measured between asylum claimants and resettled refugees from Colombia and Ethiopia. Comparing the employment rates of refugees who have entered Sweden in the last 15 years with the rates of all immigrants in the same group shows that refugees, in all cases, have lower employment rates. For a couple of countries, we found similar employment levels irrespective of intake category. Small differences between intake categories are found for individuals from

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Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran and could be an indication of similar educational levels between them. Comparing educational levels with employment position shows a 75 per cent correlation, indicating that general educational level is an important factor explaining the differences in employment position between these groups.

Table 3. Employment rate, female immigrants and refugees in Sweden aged 20–64, entered Sweden since 1998, observed in 2012 (%)

FEMALES All immigrants All refugees Resettled Asylum

Afghanistan 26 21 20 22

Colombia 61 52 40 72

Eritrea 43 24 14 25

Ethiopia 61 36 12 42

Iran 57 38 34 39

Iraq 33 27 26 27

Myanmar 26 23 22 38

Somalia 21 12 5 12


Note: This is the employment rate of all immigrants from this particular country of birth and of those who came before 1998.

Turning to male immigrants, the results presented in Table 4 show that resettled refugees have lower employment rates relative to asylum claimants, with the exception of individuals from Iran. Whereas resettled refugees from Colombia and Iran have close to 50 per cent employment, Somali and Eritrean resettled refugees have only about 11 and 16 per cent, respectively. Looking at the results for all immigrants, including those who entered Sweden more than 15 years ago, we can see higher results for all groups except immigrants from Myanmar and, to some extent, from Colombia. This result may indicate a time effect on employment integration which will be studied more closely in the next section. As shown for female immigrants, a comparison between educational levels and employment position shows an 85 per cent correlation, indicating that a general educational level is an important factor explaining differences in employment position between these groups.

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Table 4. Employment rate, male immigrants and refugees in Sweden aged 20–64, 2012 (%)

MALES All immigrants All refugees Resettled Asylum

Afghanistan 50 44 38 45

Colombia 63 60 53 70

Eritrea 52 36 16 40

Ethiopia 61 43 27 51

Iran 63 45 47 44

Iraq 50 46 36 47

Myanmar 37 36 34 52

Somalia 32 23 11 24


Note: Total number of immigrants from these countries in Sweden 2012, and those who entered Sweden before 1998 through other channels.

Employment and years since migrationIn the migration literature, the so-called period and cohort effects are important explanatory factors in the labour-market integration of immigrants. By period effect we mainly mean the state of the labour market on which immigrants arrive, which could have long-lasting effects on their labour-market integration. The cohort effect is basically both the credentials that individuals have obtained, and also the innate capabilities that could influence the labour-market integration of immigrants over time. In analysing this integration by years of residence, we attempt to measure the labour-market integration of an immigrant group over time but, in reality, these are different individuals who enter the country at various times. However, this does give an idea of how their employment integration looks over time, since we measure the average employment rates of groups of individuals with different arrival years. Time is seen here as a proxy for the acquisition of skills, language and professional qualifications connected to the migrants’ occupation, etc., which they need in order to obtain employment in the destination country.

In Figures 2 to 9, the employment rate for our eight immigrant groups by years since migration is presented. Both resettled refugees and asylum claimants are shown, as is their gender. The baseline employment levels are all immigrant males and females; this includes

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refugees, family-reunification migrants and labour migrants over the same period. Figure 2, which depicts the employment integration of individuals from Afghanistan, shows very low employment rates for both asylum claimants and resettled refugees, irrespective of sex, in the first years after entering Sweden. However, the levels gradually increase when Afghani immigrants have been in the country for a longer period. Whereas the overall immigrant level of employment reaches about 70 per cent after 13–15 years in Sweden, irrespective of sex, only male asylum claimants reach this level, whereas male and female resettled refugees, as well as female asylum claimants, have lower employment levels over time.

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

1-3 years 4-6 years 7-9 years 10-12 years 13-15 years

Resettled males Asylum males All immigrants males

Resettled females Asylum females All immigrants females

Figure 2. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Afgha-nistan aged 20–64, 2012

Figure 3 shows the employment pattern by years of residence for male and female Iraqi refugees. Relative to the employment levels of all immigrants, Iraqi refugees, irrespective of whether they arrived as resettled refugees or asylum claimants, have lower employment rates than the overall immigrant employment rates over time. The results for refugees from Iraq also display a gender divide whereby males have higher employment levels than females.

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0

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80




Figure 3. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Iraq aged 20–64, 2012

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20

30

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Figure 4. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Iran aged 20–64, 2012

The results for Iranian refugees are depicted in Figure 4. As with the refugee groups discussed earlier, Iranian refugees, irrespective of whether they entered Sweden as resettled refugees or as asylum claimants, have lower employment rates than the average immigrant

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during the first nine years in the country. However, the levels gradu-ally increase and, after ten years in the country, asylum claimants and male resettled refugees have basically “caught up” with immigrants in general. Only female resettled refugees have lower employment rates although, just like the other groups, they demonstrate an incre-asing employment level over time. Finally, male asylum claimants do have a relatively fast “catch up” and, after nine years in the country, have reached the general immigrant employment level.

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Figure 5. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Somalia aged 20–64, 2012 Note: For some groups there are too few individuals to calculate reliable employment rates, which means that some lines are not shown.

As can be seen in Figure 5, Somali refugees have very low employ-ment rates during their first six years in Sweden. Although the levels improve continuously over time, the increase is slow. Both female resettled and asylum refugees and male resettled refugees have rela-tively low levels of employment. Only between 20 and 30 per cent of these groups have obtained employment after ten to 15 years in the country. Male asylum refugees do relatively better than the other intake categories, reaching about 40 per cent employment after between seven and nine years in the country.

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0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90




Figure 6. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Ethiopia aged 20–64, 2012Note: For some groups there are too few individuals to calculate reliable employment rates, which means that some lines are not shown.

Figure 6 shows the employment trajectories of Ethiopian refugees. Besides female resettled refugees, all groups show fast “catch up” processes towards the general immigrant employment level and even above. After ten to 15 years in the country, both male and female asylum claimants and male resettled refugees have employment levels that approach 80 per cent.

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90




Figure 7. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Eritrea aged 20–64, 2012

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Figure 7 is quite similar to Figure 6 in that it shows the employ-ment rate by years since residence, though this time for Eritrean refugees. Besides female resettled refugees, who display very low levels of employment, the other refugee groups “catch up” with the general immigrant employment level in anything between four and nine years.

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40

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Figure 8. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Myanmar aged 20–64, 2012Note: For some groups there are too few individuals to calculate reliable employment rates, which means that some lines are not shown.

Refugees from Myanmar are primarily in Sweden due to the Swedish resettlement programme and their numbers are not large. Their recent arrival means that we only can calculate employment levels for Myanmar resettled refugees during their first nine years in the country. Although showing increasing levels of employment, both male and female resettled refugees from Myanmar depict lower levels of employment compared to general immigrant employment levels. About 20 per cent of the women from Myanmar are employed after between seven and nine years in the country and about 40 per cent of the males have obtained employment over the same time span.

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0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90




Figure 9. Employment rate by years since migration, immigrants from Colom-bia aged 20–64, 2012Note: For some groups there are too few individuals to calculate reliable employment rates, which means that some lines are not shown.

Finally the employment trajectories of Colombian refugees are tracked in Figure 9. Due to the small numbers, we cannot calculate all employment rates by years in the country for Colombian refugees. However, the figure clearly shows a relatively high employment level for both male and female asylum claimants and male resettled refugees. Female resettled refugees do have increasing employment rates over time, but do not reach the general female immigrant employment level.

Discussion of the resultsThe aim of this chapter was to map the demographic, geographic and educational profiles and employment levels of male and female resettled refugees compared to those of refugees who claimed asylum at the Swedish border and subsequently gained refugee status in Sweden. To some extent, a comparison is also made with all immigrants who entered Sweden. Our core statistical source is the STATIV database for the year 2012 and we study mainly a sample of individuals who entered Sweden over the last 15 years, between 1998 and 2012.

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Summarising the mapping exercise, the statistics on age and marital status of the eight studied refugee groups show similar mean levels, with the exception of individuals from Colombia, who have lower marriage rates. Clear differences to be borne in mind are the sheer numbers of each group in Sweden. Whereas immigrants from Iraq and Iran are among the largest immigrant groups in Sweden and have been substantial since the 1990s (and for Iraqis even more so since the new millennium), the Somali group has grown swiftly in more recent years, as has immigration from Afghanistan. Immigration from Eritrea and Ethiopia has been more spread out over the last 25 years, whereas immigrants from Myanmar have more recently come to Sweden due to the resettlement programme in place since 2005. Colombian immigrants are mainly non-refugees and only a small number have come through resettlement or as asylum-seekers.

An important asset in the current Swedish labour market is human capital. A comparison by educational level among our eight groups shows how obvious it is that some groups will have greater opportunities to obtain employment than others, since their general educational level is higher. Immigrants from Iran, Colombia, Ethiopia and Iraq are among those who have the highest educational levels. Immigrants from Somalia, Myanmar and Eritrea all have relatively low educational levels, which could have adverse effects when they compete for jobs on the labour market. Geographically our results indicate a comparatively higher percentage of residency in the northern part of Sweden for resettled refugees compared to asylum claimants. Since earlier studies (for example, Bevelander & Lundh 2006; Hagström 2009) show the importance of the local labour-market situation on the employment integration of immigrants and refugees, this result should be kept in mind when interpreting the employment integration of our resettled refugees in Sweden.

Lastly, our results for the employment integration of the eight refugee groups studied show mixed results. Average employment rates for resettled refugees in the year 2012 show lower employment levels compared to asylum claimants and all immigrants from the same country of origin. Since, for many groups, a substantial percentage of the total number of that group have entered Sweden quite recently, and a considerable number are still in the so-called

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introductory phase, the average employment rate is probably not the most balanced indicator of the employment integration of these groups. A fairer indicator of employment integration is therefore presented by tracking the employment rates by years of residence. The results of this exercise show that resettled refugees and asylum claimants in general have low employment rates during the first years in the country but present higher rates over time. Compared to the employment rates over time for all immigrants and asylum claimants, resettled refugees have lower employment levels, although some groups do catch up with asylum claimants and even the overall immigrant employment level. The groups who show this pattern the most clearly are refugees from Colombia, Iran and Ethiopia. However, Eritrean refugees, who have a substantially lower educational level compared to the first three groups, also have relatively fast-growing employment levels on a par with the overall immigrant employment level. Although starting with low employment levels, but gradually demonstrating higher levels, refugees from Myanmar and Somalia have the weakest employment integration. One reason for this result could be the relatively low educational levels of these groups.

That, in general, the more-educated groups also show higher employment levels is not surprising and is in line with results from earlier studies. Additional explanations for the observed differences between the groups could be that resettled refugees have, in many cases, been in refugee camps for many years, which can negatively affect their economic integration. Besides, in refugee camps, few opportunities exist to obtain or update the human capital required for their current labour-market integration. For refugees from both Somalia and Myanmar, the low educational level is probably also due to the long-lasting wars that have diminished the possibility of having a good working educational system. Last, but not least, when the employment rate is tracked over time, in other words, when individuals have been in the host country for some time, employment rates increase. The main explanation that is put forward in the literature for this phenomenon is that individuals acquire, either through an institutional system or through support from men and women from the origin country who arrived much earlier, new general and country-specific skills that facilitate labour market access.

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References

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Bevelander, P. (2009) In the Picture: Resettled Refugees in Sweden. In P. Bevelander, M. Hagström & S. Rönnqvist (eds) Resettled and Included? The Economic Integration of Resettled Refugees in Sweden (49–80). Malmö: Holmbergs.

Bevelander, P. (2010) The Immigration and Integration Experience: The Case of Sweden. In U. A. Segal, N. S. Mayadas & D. Elliott (eds) Immigration Worldwide (286–302). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Bevelander, P. (2011) The Employment Integration of Resettled Refugees, Refugee Claimants and Family Reunion Migrants in Sweden. Refugee Survey Quarterly, 30(1), 22–43.

Bevelander, P. & Lundh, C. (2006) Flyktingars Jobbchanser: Vad Betyder Lokala Erfarenheter av Tidigare Arbetskraftsinvandring? Arbetsmarknad & Arbetsliv, 12(2), 83–98.

Bevelander, P. and Pendakur, R. (2009) The Employment Attachment of Resettled Refugees, Asylum Claimants and Family Reunion Migrants in Sweden. In P. Bevelander, M. Hagström & S. Rönnqvist (eds) Resettled and Included? The Economic Integration of Resettled Refugees in Sweden (227–246). Malmö: Holmbergs.

Bevelander, P. & Pendakur, R. (2014) The Labour Market Integration of Refugee and Family Reunion Immigrants: A Comparison of Outcomes in Canada and Sweden. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 40(5), 689–709.

Bevelander, P., Carlson, B. & Rojas, M. (1997) I Krusbärslandets Stora Städer, Invandrare i Stockholm, Göteborg och Malmö. Stockholm: SNS-Förlag.

Colic-Peisker, V. & Tilbury, F. (2006) Employment Niches for Recent Refugees: Segmented Labour Market in Twenty-First-Century Australia. Journal of Refugees Studies, 19(2), 203–229.

Colic-Peisker, V. & Tilbury, F. (2007) Integration into the Australian Labour Market: The Experience of Three “Visibly Different” Groups of Recently Arrived Refugees. International Migration, 45(1), 59–85.

Connor, P. (2010) Explaining the Refugee Gap: Economic Outcomes of Refugees Versus Other Immigrants. Journal of Refugee Studies, 23(3), 377–397.

DeVoretz, D., Pivnenko, S. & Beiser, M. (2004) The Economic Experiences of Refugees in Canada. Bonn: University of Bonn, IZA Discussion Paper No. 1088.

de Vroome, T. & van Tubergen, F. (2010) The Employment Experience of Ref-ugees in the Netherlands. International Migration Review, 44(2), 376–403.

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Emilsson, H. (2014) Sweden. In A. Triandafyllidou & R. Gropas (eds) Euro-pean Immigration: A Sourcebook (351–362). Aldershot: Ashgate.

Hagström, M. (2009) Winners and Losers? The Outcome of the Disperal Policy in Sweden. In P. Bevelander, M. Hagström & S. Rönnqvist (eds) Resettled and Included? The Economic Integration of Resettled Refugees in Sweden (159–190). Malmö: Holmbergs.

Hammerstedt, M. & Mikkonen, M. (2007) Geografisk Rörlighet och Sysselsättning Bland Flyktingar. Ekonomisk Debatt, 35(3), 69–78.

Hatton, T. J. (2011) Seeking Asylum: Trends and Policies in the OECD. London: Centre for Economic Policy Research.

Rooth, D. (1999) Refugee Immigrants in Sweden: Educational Investments and Labour Market Integration. Lund: Lund University, Department of Economics.

Rooth, D. & Åslund, O. (2006) Utbildning och Kunskaper i Svenska: Framgångsfaktorer for Invandrade? Stockholm: SNS Forlag.

Waxman, P. (2001) The Economic Adjustment of Recently Arrived Bosnian, Afghan and Iraqi Refugees in Sydney, Australia. International Migration Review, 35(2), 472–505.

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BEFORE AND AFTER: NEW PERSPECTIVES ON RESETTLED REFUGEES’ INTEGRATION PROCESS


IntroductionThe representation of refugees has suffered from a lack of recognition of the history and the political and social affiliations in which they are situated (Malkki 1996).1 This has often led to a one-sided depiction of refugees as passive, helpless victims and has consequently denied them the status of (historically embedded) political, social and economic actors (see also Muftee, this volume). Refugeehood is certainly an extreme case of social, economic and emotional disruption which, however, is not characterised exclusively by disempowerment and displacement. On the contrary, a large part of the refugee experience consists of an effort at emplacement and emancipation, of rebuilding their life in new circumstances and of regaining control over it (Nibbs 2011; Turton 2003).

It is exactly this part of the refugee experience – the establishment of a new life after resettlement – on which this study focuses. We refrain, however, from viewing this integration process as solely dependent on post-resettlement circumstances. Instead of perceiving the fracture caused by refugee uprooting as irreparable, we have carefully traced the temporal and social continuity of pre-resettlement social ties that persisted throughout the rupture. Thus, the social networks that emerge from such ties and which are found to play a pivotal role in the integration process are far

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from precipitous – their foundations lay in pre-resettlement time and social contexts. Hence, illuminating the temporal perspective of the different political, economic and social aspects of such networks and their post-resettlement functions enables the recognition of resettled refugees as situated interactive, agentic individuals rather than “empty sheets” (Järvinen et al. 2008:24) or traumatised, helpless victims (Malkki 1996).

Another component of this study consists of paying attention to the refugees’ mobility practices. We recognise that mobility is far more than just a “banal” practice (Moret 2015), but is politically conditioned and socially situated, and thus stipulates the possibility of forging and maintaining social networks in time and space. Hence, following our proposition about the importance of maintaining the historicity of refugees’ social networks and mobility practices, we pay special attention to these aspects, both before and after their resettlement,

A qualitative approach was adopted which allowed the analysis to emerge in an iterative way through a continuous movement between theory and the empirical material. We conducted interviews – which form the bulk of the material collected for this study – with resettled refugees from Burma and Somalia, focusing on their efforts to build their lives in a new country after experiencing conflict and war, flight and long-term encampment. We asked the question: “How do social networks that span time and space affect the refugees’ post-resettlement integration process?”. Addressing this question requires, firstly, the delineation and problematisation of pre-resettlement social networks, as well as the tracing of their material and immaterial composition. Secondly, their role in the post-resettlement context has to be outlined, i.e. how further network formations, both in the country of resettlement and transnationally, are forged. Social networks do not appear in a vacuum, but are actuated by their constituent members, their corresponding assets, and the particular structural contexts they (re-)emerge in. The structural perspective will mainly serve as a background variable in this study, thereby allowing the individuals’ perspectives, experiences, assets and network ties to remain explicitly in focus.

Our findings provide a nuanced picture of refugees’ social network formation and sense of group belonging (here defined as an

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emotional attachment – Yuval-Davis 2006). We show that networks based on a sentiment of belonging (in this case ethnic/national) can – under specific circumstances – link individuals to broader networks connecting people from vastly different backgrounds and levels of resources. As such, ethnic social networks are deemed crucial for the wider societal integration of refugees. Practically, this means that they can have beneficial effects on the integration process, and can often fill a function which official integration institutions are not able to. At the same time, we also show how shared ethnicity alone does not guarantee the formation of social networks, but that both historical and structural factors interplay.

With regards to the two groups chosen for this study – resettled refugees from Burma and Somalia – our expectation was that the previous migration of Somalis into Sweden would be beneficial for the overall integration process of newly arrived Somalis. Given the stated benefits of established ethnic networks for newly arrived co-ethnics (see, among others, Hyndman 2011; Portes 2000) spelled out later in the text, we expected the Somali group to experience a smoother process than the Burmese nationals, whose resettlement to Sweden was not preceded by earlier migration from Burma. However, our findings do not show such a clear-cut result. Instead, they present a more nuanced and complex picture of the relationship between earlier migration and established social networks, complicate our understanding of group belonging and the bonding ties between them, and direct our attention to the time before arrival – the situation in the refugee camps and the practices of mobility – which conditioned the processes of acquiring capital of various sorts and forging social ties in different settings. As such, this realisation legitimises the rather lengthy empirical sections on the time before, on mobility practices and on social networks, as they clearly constitute an important contribution in their own right.

This chapter comprises four parts: the current section serves as the overarching presentation of the study. First, it introduces the research context. It then presents the background to the Swedish resettlement and reception conditions before offering a literature overview of the role of social networks in integration processes, together with the theoretical framework for network formation and the role of social, cultural and human capital in migration. In

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the second and third sections the two case studies on Burmese and Somali refugees in Sweden respectively are laid out. We offer an extensive presentation and explication of the empirical material so as to reveal the fine nuances of the intricate interconnection between our three selected dimensions of pre- and post-resettlement refugee life which are found to affect contemporary integration processes: the conditions in the refugee camps, mobility practices and the formation and composition of social networks. The final part of the chapter highlights our comparative findings, and points to the overall contribution of this study to the fields of resettlement and immigrant integration.

MethodologyFor the larger empirical framework, this study has benefited from the expertise of a considerable number of key informants, most of whom were part of both our reference group and our Steering Committee. As such, we were able to draw on valuable insights from representatives of the UNHCR, the Swedish Migration Board, the County Administration Board Västerbotten, and Caritas, as well as from five researchers with particular expertise on integration and migration to Sweden, resettlement, and Somali migration. However, given the strong focus on a ‘perspective from below’, the bulk of the material was gathered in interviews and conversations with resettled refugees in Sweden (as well as Burmese refugees and stakeholders in Thailand). The interviews were semi-structured (and open-ended, where the language and the situation allowed) allowing for a probing of the answers in consequent discussions. The interviews were directed by an interview guide, with questions regarding the time before, and the mobility practices and social networks both before and after resettlement. It was important that participants were able to guide the interview onto the topics that were important for them, which is why the focus varied. In addition to the migrant interviews, five were conducted with municipality officials.

The study has chosen two groups defined by nationality – the Burmese2 and the Somalis. Both groups have resettled in Sweden and other countries in the past decade, both from a protracted (long-term) refugee situation. The vast majority of the nearly 60 interviewees had been living in camps before this (more information on the

Stämmer sidhänvisning?

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methodology can be found in the individual case studies, see pages 73 and 101). The resettled refugees from Burma3 have been chosen because they are a “pioneer group” in a Swedish context4 since by far the vast majority of them have arrived through resettlement since December 2004. As a pioneer group they lack ethnic support networks and the country-specific social capital that often implicitly derives from already established networks of co-ethnics (Hyndman 2011; see also Worland, this anthology). In that sense, they differ from other groups of resettled refugees, who can rely on the support of co-nationals who arrived in Sweden through various paths of earlier migration.

Between 2000 and 2012, as shown in Table 1, Sweden accepted an almost equal number of Burmese and Somali nationals (around 1,700 each) for resettlement. While the Burmese arrived in greater numbers up until 2008, resettlement of the Somalis only took off in 2010 (and continued throughout 2012–2014). In comparison to the Burmese group, the Somalis arrived not only through resettlement but also through other migration channels such as asylum. Since 1988, Sweden has received around 50,000 asylum applications from Somali citizens, more than half of them since 2005 (Migrationsverket 2014a). This more recent increase is also reflected in the statistics on the Somali-born. The number of registered Swedish residents born in Somalia was around 16,000 in 2005; by 2014 the number had increased to nearly 58,000 (SCB 2015), the majority of whom live in the major urban areas (Integration Board 1999; Johnsdotter 2002). The Somalis were thus chosen as the second group with whom to compare the experiences and findings from the Burmese interviews, since they resettled at around the same time, though there had been prior Somali migration to Sweden.

With regards to placement in Sweden, many Somalis and Burmese resettled refugees were accepted into municipalities in the middle and the northern parts of Sweden.5 Hagström (2009) notes that, for many small municipalities in the North of Sweden, receiving resettled refugees is now seen as a remedy for depopulation and unemployment. However, the placement of the two groups revealed large differences.

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Table 1. Number of Burmese/Somali nationals who received permanent resi-dency through resettlement 2000–2014

Year Burmese Somali

2000 53 1

2001 0 11

2002 8 23

2003 5 13

2004 137 40

2005 403 14

2006 195 42

2007 361 7

2008 310 50

2009 141 50

2010 50 402

2011 59 587

2012 2 501

2013 16 330

2014 0 162

Total 1,740 2,233

Source: Migrationsverket (personal communication).

As can be seen in Table 2, the resettled Somali refugees have been placed in a far greater number of municipalities (92) than the Burmese (33). Furthermore, 67 municipalities accepted up to 19 Somalis, while only 12 municipalities accepted a similarly small number of Burmese. In contrast, six municipalities welcomed more than 100 Burmese resettled refugees, while no municipality received the same number of Somali refugees. For our explicit focus on ethnic/national social networks on the basis of belonging, this is highly interesting.

The ten biggest municipalities in terms of refugees accepted had between 1,300 (Sorsele) and 140,000 (Västerås) inhabitants, with the majority counting around 20,000 inhabitants.

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Table 2. Placement of resettled Somali and Burmese nationals in Swedish municipalities, 2000–2012

No. resettled refugees accepted

1–19 20–49 50–99 100–153 Total

Burmese (1,540 total)

No. municipalities

12 10 5 6 33

Somali (1,464 total)

No. municipalities

67 20 5 0 92

Source: Migrationsverket (personal communication).

Note: The number of receiving municipalities differed between 73 in 2005 and 111 in 2010, which also impacted on the geographical distribution of resettled refugees.

Background SwedenWhile the explicit focus of this study lies with the experiences and perceptions of the individual resettled refugees themselves, and on their social networks and social capital formation from a group perspective, the national and local context in which the integration process takes place – and in which social networks are able to forge social capital – cannot be neglected (see Kindler et al. 2015). However, in this study, the national and local context takes the role of the background variable, and is only briefly presented in order for the reader to have a basic understanding of the institutional and policy framework of resettlement and integration in Sweden.

In 2013, of Sweden’s roughly 9 million inhabitants, an estimated 1,5 million were born abroad. The ten most common countries of birth were Finland, Iraq, Poland, the former Yugoslavia, Iran, Bosnia, Germany, Turkey, Denmark and Somalia (SCB 2013). The same year, the residence permit was extended to roughly 28,000 people in need of protection (including an estimated 8,000 Convention refugees), to around 20,000 labour migrants and 7,500 foreign students; residence rights were issued to around 21,000 EU citizens. Furthermore, an estimated 2,200 individuals received permanent residence permits under the resettlement programme (Migrationsverket 2014a)

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Sweden’s resettlement programme dates back to 1950, making it one of the first countries to introduce one (Krasniqi & Suter 2015). The country resettles refugees on the recommendation of the UNHCR, but usually conducts its own selection missions (see Thomsson 2009 for a detailed overview). About half of the refugees are resettled from camps, half from urban situations (European Parliament 2013). The yearly quota is decided by parliament and has been around 1,900 for the past decade. This quota is by far the highest among the EU resettlement countries, followed by Finland with around 700 and Denmark with nearly 500 places. Upon acceptance by Sweden, the refugees are provided with a permanent residence permit before entering the country. “Cultural Orientation Programmes” (COPs) are provided for some of the refugees to be resettled in order, on the one hand, to prepare them for their new life in Sweden and, on the other, to enable the authorities to gain more knowledge of the group to be resettled (Muftee 2014). These programmes present Swedish life and language to the participants (see Muftee, this volume). In Sweden it is the municipalities which provide accommodation, and the refugees can only travel to Sweden after the Migration Board (Migrationsverket) succeeds in contracting a municipality willing and able to receive the person or family. In other words, the resettled refugees cannot choose the first place they will live in Sweden, but are placed in a municipality upon an agreement between the Migration Board, the Country Administration Board and the municipalities. In contrast to other resettlement countries, in Sweden the whole resettlement, reception and integration process is not only state-financed6 but also state-executed – corresponding to the (still) dominant ideology of the strong (welfare) state (Borevi 2013). The municipalities receive a lump sum from the government for each refugee in order to cover the costs for the two initial years. They are then – together with the state-run Employment Services – tasked with organising the so-called “establishment programme”, which runs for 24 months and includes a language course (Swedish for Immigrants – SFI), a civic orientation course and activities to prepare the refugees (and other categories of migrants) for the labour market. In exchange for 40 hours per week of activities, the refugees receive an allowance that covers their basic expenses. Since the “establishment reform” in 2010,7 the allowance follows

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the participant to whichever municipality s/he wishes to settle in – as such, secondary movements within the country have been made considerably easier, allowing new arrivals to move the individual “establishment allowance” to another municipality than that originally assigned. While this allows the refugees greater choices for subsequent settlement, the municipalities are somewhat skeptical, as it complicates their task of organising not only the activities to which refugees are entitled but also other public services, such as schools, language instructors, mother-tongue instruction, daycare and so forth. The integration officers at the municipality meet the resettled refugees at the airport and take care of the very first and most urgent practical matters – such as setting up their apartment and preparing documents for their registration with the authorities – so the migrants can sign on with the Employment Services, and get help with their children’s daycare or schooling.

Social networks in immigrant integration processesThe concept of integration remains a hotly debated one, with no commonly agreed definition. Nevertheless, there is a tradition in the integration literature which often exhibits one or both of the following features: integration is often phrased as a mutual adaptation process between newcomers and residents. In practice, however, more often than not it is applied one-sidedly, as it is usually the adaptation efforts and outcomes of the newcomers in society that are assessed (see, for example, Brunner 2010; Hyndman 2011). What is more, understandings of integration are often both normative and top-down in character (see also Nibbs 2014). This normativity is, however, specific to each state and each government and thus can look quite diverse across the different countries (Ager & Strang 2008). Often a methodological nationalist approach is used for integration, which is thereby treated as a short-form of “integration into a nation-state”. In this study, our focus on integration digresses in several ways: we explicitly define integration as a wide field, thereby exceeding that of labour-market integration, which receives overwhelming attention in the integration literature. Furthermore, we understand integration as a process rather than an outcome and, last but not least, we approach this process from the point of view of the interviewed refugees.

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Whether social networks (both among migrants and non-migrants) constitute an obstacle to integration or whether they facilitate it has been a major debate in this field. While proponents see the benefits of a limited ethnic and cultural diversity in society (e.g. Putnam 2000) and thereby see bonding social capital as essential for a well-oiled trust-based society, others point to the potential negative effects of bonding ties leading to the fragmentation and isolation of ethnic groups (for an overview on European literature, see Kindler et al. 2015). There have been some important mentions, however, and these include Ager & Strang’s (2008) framework on integration, which sees social connectivity as a means to reach the more measurable outcomes of integration, such as employment, housing, health, and education.

For the social integration of (resettled) refugees, a significant number of international studies have pointed to the beneficial effects of the presence of family, as well as of social networks of co-ethnics and co-nationals (see, e.g., Simich 2003; Strang & Ager 2010; UNHCR 2013a). Importantly, social networks formed both prior to and post arrival have been recognised as critical in the creation of bonding ties and a sense of community during the initial phase of settlement (Hyndman & McLean 2006; Statistics Canada 2005). Where governments have placed larger cohorts of “pioneer group” refugees into the same city, this has led to a positive evaluation by the refugees (see Hyndman & McLean’s 2006 study on how Acehnese resettled refugees in Vancouver met and assisted later arrivals at the mosque).

Many studies have particularly focused on the role of social networks in economic integration and have generally found them to have a positive impact on labour-market access (Kindler et al. 2015). The group of migrants seen to benefit the most from ethnic social networks are the newly arrived with low levels of human capital and lack of formal qualifications (see Drever & Hoffmeister 2008; Elwert 1982). Studies from the USA (Portes 2000) and Canada (Lamba & Krahn 2003) confirm the significance and function of social capital in the settlement process of newly arrived refugees and other migrants. With financial capital mostly non-existent after a protracted refugee situation and with human capital often lost or devaluated in the process of migration, social capital becomes ever-more-important in the post-migration situation. Many of the aforementioned findings stem from the situation on the US labour market, which offers a

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comparatively high proportion of low-wage jobs. However, there is evidence that the same (though slightly diminished) effects for the economic integration of low-skilled, newly arrived immigrants occur on the much more tightly regulated German labour market, where low-wage jobs are comparatively much more scarce (Drever & Hoffmeister 2008). Sweden shows a similar labour market, where relatively high minimum wages and strong legal job security discourages employers from hiring people of “uncertain capacity” (Open Society Foundation 2014:80). Rönnqvist (2009) shows the importance of social networks (and geographical mobility) for low-skilled resettled refugees attempting to enter the labour market in this context.

Social networks and mobilityCreating, maintaining and reifying personal social networks is ultimately dependent on mobility (Moret 2015). As such, individuals’ patterns of mobility do not happen in a vacuum, but are socially and also culturally, politically and economically embedded (Adey 2010). Mobility, for example, is politically constrained or directed for some nationalities but not others; economic factors influence the way the move is travelled (e.g. direct flight, leg-by-leg or not at all) for people of different socio-economic backgrounds, and cultural and social aspects again bring with them the social legitimacy of travelling for some social groups but not others (see Oishi 2005). Mobility can also be crucial in the acquisition of contacts and skills, and is thus instrumental in forging social, cultural and human capital.

Applying the mobility lens is crucial to our study, as it helps us to better understand social network relations and capital accumulations. Mobility is crucial for social life, not the least that of refugees, both pre- and post-resettlement. Before resettlement, many refugees experience long-term encampment situations where they often suffer from a breach of their mobility rights. Interestingly, it is exactly this enforced immobility that tends to facilitate the perception of them as “real” refugees (Hyndman & Giles 2011). Consequently, refugees – who might well have the same protection needs – who turn up as asylum-seekers at the borders of post-industrial nations tend to be perceived more through a national security lens, and face suspicion and hostility from the receiving countries. Mobility, therefore, is inherently political (Hyndman & Giles 2011). Furthermore, pre-

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resettlement mobility and immobility practices significantly impact upon which social networks can be formed and what capital a refugee can accumulate.

In the post-resettlement situation, migration (especially refugee migration and resettlement) from poorer countries to Europe tends to be understood from a sedentarist point of departure. Consequently, post-migration mobility practices have often escaped researchers’ and policy-makers’ interest. What is more, cross-border movement after migration tends to be perceived as a banal practice (Moret 2015). However, these movements – both permanent (i.e. secondary migration) and temporary – are significant if we are to understand the social, political and economic situatedness of migrants and refugees within and across national borders (Adey 2010; Moret 2015).8 As such, analysis of these movements provides another valuable angle shedding light on/approaching/investigating the integration process of resettled refugees and other migrants at local, national and transnational levels through social networks.

Concerning secondary movements, i.e. the move to another country, Somali-born individuals in Europe present high intra-EU mobility relative to the general trend of EU citizens with a non-refugee background (van Liempt 2011). Many Somalis left their first country of settlement once they received citizenship and hence gained the freedom to reside anywhere in Europe. Many moved to the UK, as the country is seen to provide better opportunities for Somalis on the labour market. The use of English as a world language has also been evaluated positively, as has the higher acceptance of ethnic diversity (Johnsdotter 2010; Moret 2015; van Liempt 2011).

From a policy perspective, secondary movements are often viewed negatively, as they are seen to challenge the plans made by policy-makers. Moreover, they indicate that asylum-seekers are interested in more than just safety (Moret et al. 2006; van Liempt 2011). In the Swedish context, this negative view on in-country secondary moves is captured by Hagström (2009), who gives an account of how municipal and county officials look upon refugees’ moves as “irrational”, and only motivated by closeness to friends and family, rather than by economic and social integration (with native Swedes). There is certainly a tendency to deny the overall favourable aspects of intra-group networks, which are seen as neither a beneficial nor a crucial component of the integration process.

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On refugee camps and durable solutionsAs pointed out above, in this study the time before arrival in the resettlement country is deemed crucial from the perspective of social-network formation and capital accumulation. While the empirical findings for each case study will be found in the consequent sections, this short sub-section provides a brief overview of the literature on (critical) displacement studies.

Similar to representations of refugees, there is a tendency to depict the housing of (many) refugees – the refugee camps – as places of misery, hopelessness and, following on from that, governed by passivity and dependency rather than activity and self-determination. Camps are usually seen as a temporary response to crisis. In reality, many refugee situations are protracted (long-term), however, and, as such, these short-term spaces of safety run the danger of becoming institutionalised locations of exclusion (Hyndman & Nylund 1998). However, as this study shows, refugee camps are by no means uniform places. While some are militarised – i.e. built and guarded by the military of the transit country – others appear spontaneously (such as the first Karen settlements in the 1980s and early 1990s) or are planned, e.g. by international organisations (Mahoney, personal communication, 2013). However, as Mahoney (2008) also shows, they differ greatly in four main domains – the human security context (access to water, shelter, and food differs as well as the cause of displacement, and the level of violence experienced before and after arrival in the camp), the socio-economic context (access to education differs tremendously between camps, as does access to livelihoods and the freedom of movement in and out of the camps), the cultural and community context (demographic distribution may vary considerably, and the ethnic, national and racial diversity levels may differ, as well as the shape in which a group arrived at a camp – as an intact community or dispersed), and the duration context (displacement may have been going on for longer or shorter periods of time, and durable solutions – integration, repatriation or resettlement – may be expected in a longer or shorter time frame). When researching the possibility for and the types of collective action (or self-determination, as we term it in this study) in the camps, Mahoney found these four domains – together with the level and scope of NGO activity in the camp – to influence the extent to which collective action in the camps occurs, which type of collective action

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it is (educational, political, economic, cultural, etc.), the degree of formalisation (ad-hoc informal groups or CBOs), and the initiation and leadership of collective action (refugee- or NGO-led).

Protracted refugee situations have become more and more common in the past few decades. And refugee camps, which have been one tool with which to provide temporary shelter for displaced people in many countries since World War II (Malkki 1996), have increasingly become more-permanent locations of marginalisation and lives in limbo; while they often provide the right to life, many other basic human rights – such as the right to work and the right to mobility – are severely limited, thereby rendering camps a location where human abilities are wasted (Hyndman & Nylund 1998). These developments have been increasing criticised in recent years by international scholars (see Hyndman 2000; Zetter 2015). Similarly, how the current reasons for displacement are barely met by the provision of qualifications spelled out in the 1951 Refugee Convention has also been highlighted (see Sales 2007; Zetter 2015). New and innovative solutions and approaches to refugee crises have been put forward by various scholars and organisations, some of which are presented here: Zetter (2015), for example, like the UNHCR, the EU Commission and other scholars of forced migration (see inter alia Bokshi 2013) – highlights the need to increase the legal channels to the EU to seek protection, and names resettlement as one of the ways to enable this. With regards to the countries of first asylum, Zetter urges states and stakeholders to recognise a refugee situation not purely as a humanitarian crisis but also as development potential. Indeed, researchers found that the refugee situation on the Thai–Burmese border has helped to revitalise the region, both with the help of individual refugees and with the larger aid economy around the camps (Brees 2009). Further, Jamal (2008) suggests a segmented approach to the application of durable solutions, largely based on the realisation that, even in protracted refugee situations, some sub-groups of refugees are economically and/or socially de facto integrated, even if their legal status hinders proper integration. As such, a more nuanced application of the different durable solutions to the various refugee sub-groups could yield more beneficial results in terms of economic, social and psychological well-being for all stakeholders involved. Increased self-reliance for displaced people –

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through improved mobility rights and the right to work and access education – is furthermore seen as beneficial, above all for those who eventually repatriate. Yet, until a return is feasible, the increased self-reliance also benefits the region of temporary settlement: for one, refugees, as seen above, often contribute to the revitalisation of a border region. And the increased level of self-reliance also allows humanitarian donors to spend financial means on development in the region rather than on feeding a population which is prevented from being self-reliant and self-protecting (see Brees 2009; Jamal 2008; Zetter 2015).

Theoretical framework: social networks and a capital approachThis study investigates the role of social networks in refugee integration; as shown above, social networks are of particular importance for newly arrived groups with low human and financial capital and no formal qualifications. Social capital (e.g. the benefits derived from social networks) can thus be seen as valuable for the wider integration process, and to have beneficial effects on a range of important factors for integration, such as accessing the resources and information needed to pursue socio-economic advancement or mental well-being.

Social networksSocial networks are formed by the social ties that two or more people share with each other – in other words by the relations between people. They are, in general, seen as positive for a person’s development as “the well-connected are more likely to be hired, housed, healthy, and happy” (Woolcock 2001:5). Scholars have characterised these ties in different ways. For example, Putnam (2000) and Woolcock (2001) distinguish between bonding, bridging and linking ties. Bonding ties bind sociologically similar individuals to each other, have a cohesive function, and are thus regarded as crucial for “getting by” – though they may, in some circumstances, lead to fragmentation between societal groups. Bridging ties, on the other hand, enable individuals to connect horizontally to individuals outside their immediate social sphere (Putnam 2000). Their positive aspect lies in the possibilities they offer for diffusion, which

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implies both gaining access to more-diversified resources outside the immediate sphere of intimate relations, and creating bridges between different networks, thus enabling people to “get ahead”. Linking ties, in turn, enable an individual to connect to another individual along a vertical scale of social and economic positions in society (Woolcock 2001). In many studies, including our own, these are defined as ties to institutional actors – for example, the various actors of the state-organised integration programmes.

Human, cultural and social capitalImmaterial assets, such as the various types of capital, enable the formation of networks and, in turn, can be seen in modified form as a product of participation in a network. A definition of these types of capital is needed before we proceed to the theoretical argument. To start with, the prominence of human capital is widely acknowledged by the academic literature on integration, especially the economic field. Human capital, defined as formal qualifications and work experience, is what enables a person to or prevents them from accessing the labour market in a new country. Cultural capital is closely related to human capital, but refers to informal education, i.e. the skills, knowledge, social codes and social frames of reference that cut through affinity to social class and are usually not formally measured and credited. This distinction follows a Bourdieusian tradition of distinguishing between formal qualifications and informal skills, knowledge, social codes and behaviour (Bourdieu 1986; Haug 1997). For this study, it is expedient to separate them in order to highlight the significance of informal skills and consequent modes of behaviour in accessing resources. Social capital is defined as the material and non-tangible benefits of network connections (social ties). In other words, those social ties (connections, contacts), which are mobilisable in pursuing social advantage, constitute social capital (Anthias 2007). Social capital can be derived from bonding, bridging and linking ties.

What happens to an individual’s capital in migration? The answer is not straightforward as the outcome of migration on capital is location-dependent to a large extent. Because many skills and qualifications are embedded in a specific local and national context, it is widely acknowledged that migration – especially of refugees and

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third-country nationals, whose qualifications are not immediately recognised – is detrimental to human capital, which is often lost or devaluated (see, for example, Lamba 2003). The situation may also differ radically if a migrant gets access to an already established ethnic social network upon arrival or if s/he is identified as “highly skilled”. However, upon arrival in a new country with no group-based country-specific social capital, the individual and collective social ties and social and cultural capital formed in the past are of the outmost importance, and basically constitute the major asset from which migrants can depart from and build on. However, this can be complicated, as social and cultural capital can also be difficult to transfer since it contains an inherent location-specific component and may explain why so few people actually migrate (Faist 1997). Creating new social networks or joining existing ones is, moreover, a time- (and energy-)consuming undertaking.

There are three important characteristics of social capital that are of importance for this study (see, also, Haug 1997; Kindler et al. 2015): Firstly, like other types of capital, social capital can be converted, for example, into economic (financial), cultural, human or political capital (Faist 1997). In turn, economic capital can be a way to create social capital, while cultural capital plays a vital role in forging social – and especially bridging – ties (e.g. Ryan et al. 2008; Suter 2012). Secondly, a social capital approach enables analysis at both the individual and the group level, as social capital is a group resource as much as an individual one (Faist 1997). Thus, an individual’s social capital is connected to the resources of the other members of the network, with members each contributing to and benefiting from the network differently.9 Thirdly, by tracing the processes of capital accumulation in the past, this approach is able both to highlight history, thereby feeding into Malkki’s (1996) earlier criticism of dehistorising refugees, and to provide a better understanding of an issue that migration scholars have seldom properly addressed: that of network formation after migration (Ryan 2011).

Integration: from bonding to bridging tiesCrucially, bonding and bridging ties are not mutually exclusive (Ryan 2011) although – and this is one of the main arguments made in this chapter – the establishment of bonding ties can lead to

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bridging ties. This means that what start as intra-group ties can lead to wider societal integration. In consequence, this implies that the absence of ties to people one shares a sense of belonging with can serve as an explanation for a lack of bridging capital, and hence to a lack of integration (see Elwert 1982; Nannestad et al. 2008). The rational behind this is that, for the more resource-poor members of the network, bonding ties might be the only opportunity to benefit from bridges to other networks. The network members – usually rich(er) in social and cultural capital – who create bridges for the benefit of the wider bonding network are often called “brokers”, “network nodes” or “bridge-builders” (see Granovetter 1973; Melander 2009).

As mentioned above, the role of bonding social networks is one of the controversial debates in the field of integration. Customarily, governments and institutional actors throughout many Western countries have looked upon ethnic social networks with suspicion, and have identified them more as an obstacle to integration than as a benefit. However, Kindler et al.’s (2015) conclusions, drawn from a literature overview on the role of social networks in integration, suggest a more nuanced position, as they point out the different scopes and qualities of social networks and the consequent type and level of social capital that can be derived from them.

A number of scholars support this argument: for example, Elwert (1982)10 argues that “community integration” (Binnenintegration) – or what this study conceptualises as bonding capital on a group level – often serves to provide and foster crucial tools for wider societal integration. Bonding capital in itself also has beneficial aspects for integration. For example, positive self-esteem, which is often derived from the recognition of cultural similitudes, is instrumental for formulating needs and grappling with a new society at large. Furthermore, those who have found themselves faced with the same puzzling situations before, are often in a better position to mediate everyday knowledge. And, finally, bonding capital also benefits the constitution of immigrants as a pressure group, in political and social contexts, in “securing the partaking of societal goods” (which constitutes Elwert’s (1982) socio-structural definition of integration). Similar arguments have been put forward by Johnsdotter (2010), the Open Society Foundation (2014) and Scaramuzzino (2014).

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For Somalis in Sweden, Melander (2009) shows how, in the initial phase of building a new life, so-called “bridge-builders” – individuals in a network who help other members to gain access to social capital – from the migrants’ own ethnic background are of the utmost importance in the members’ quest for an improved social and economic position in society. After a certain level of social and cultural capital acquirement, however, “bridge-builders” from a variety of backgrounds become more important for increased social mobility.

Kindler et al. (2015), like the authors mentioned above, point to how ethnic social networks can be a very pivotal (and often the only) source of bonding capital during the early years of settlement. However, they twist the argument slightly by pointing out how these ethnic networks, with time, can result in “ethnic places” such as restaurants, shops or businesses and can, by also attracting non-ethnics, come to constitute a source of bridging ties. The authors conclude that bonding social ties can lead to wider integration (bridging ties) in combination with suitable opportunity structures (the local context). On a more general level, membership in organisations – both ethnic and non-ethnic – has been found to increase wider integration and political participation in particular.

The potentially negative impacts of social capital are widely known. The downside of bonding capital is that, if there is “too much” and there are “no bridges” to other groups in society, intra-group ties can become excluding and isolationist (Brinkemo 2014; Nannestad et al. 2008), and could create disinformation and rumours (Open Society Foundation 2014). While not attempting to ignore these findings, this study explicitly highlights the beneficial impacts, as they are under-represented in contemporary Swedish debates on refugee and migrant integration.

The strength of strong ties: resettled Burmese Karen in SwedenThis section of the chapter presents the case of refugees from Burma who have resettled in Sweden. Generally speaking, the group is seen to have very little human, cultural and social capital, and thus to experience economic integration as very difficult. However, strong bonding ties established before arrival and re-established after

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resettlement show beneficial effects for the wider integration process of the group as a whole. The case study starts out by presenting some background to the conflict, and the informants’ socio-economic situation both before and in Sweden. It then focuses on the general situation of the Burmese refugee camps in Thailand, highlights mobility practices both before and mostly after resettlement to Sweden and finally sheds light on social networks, both on an individual and on a group level. It ends with concluding remarks which highlight distinct aspects of the integration process of this particular group in Sweden.

The conflict in BurmaThe history of Burma is, as for many other conflict-ridden countries today, heavily intertwined with the expansion of European empires and, hence, colonialism. This resource-rich South-East Asian country has a population of around 50 million, consisting of eight main ethnic groups which are further diversified into more than 100 sub-groups (Phan 2009). The British Empire invaded the country at the beginning of the nineteenth century and officially annexed it in 1886 (Marshall 2003). Christian missionaries – mainly American Baptists and, to some extent, British Adventists – followed in their footsteps (Worland 2010). The Karen ethnic group, who suffered oppression by the Burman (or Bamar) majority, welcomed the colonisers and many converted to Christianity. Their loyalty was rewarded with prominent positions in society. During the War of Independence, 1941–1945, the Karen allied with the British Empire against the Burman and Japanese coalition. In 1947, Britain granted Burma independence, and civil war has raged ever since (Worland 2010). The Karen National Union (KNU), the quasi-government of the Karen – still recognised nowadays as such by many Karen – was founded in 1947, their armed wing, the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA), soon after, and the war for an independent Karen State or Kawthoolei officially began in January 1949.

Over the next 60 years, the KNU suffered both externally, from the Burmese regime, and internally, from divisions between Buddhist and Christian Karen.11 Refugees – many of them Christian Karen, but also Buddhist Karen, Muslims, oppositional Burmans, and individuals from other ethnicities such as Karenni, Kachin, Chin,

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Shan and Mon – sought protection across the border in Thailand throughout the war. There were some peaks, with very high numbers in 1984 when the Burmese regime intensified their four-cuts policy,12 in 1988 after the student uprising in Rangoon13 and in 1995 after the fall of the KNU headquarters in Mannerplaw.14 It is estimated that at least 2 million refugees from Burma live in neighbouring countries, with another 2 million being internally displaced (Worland 2010).

Resettlement from the Burmese camps in ThailandThe UNHCR has been resettling Burmese refugees in Thailand since 2005 (UNHCR 2014a). A total of 15 countries have been involved in the resettlement scheme, among which the USA, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway, the Czech Republic, the UK and Japan (since 2010). Over the years, more than 90,000 refugees have been resettled, with around 73,000 of them to the US (UNHCR 2014a). Eligibility for resettlement depends on registration by the UNHCR. The refugee protection agency conducted registrations in 1999 and in 2005. In January 2005, when resettlement started, there were roughly 144,000 camp residents, with 83 per cent of them registered (TBC 2005). Due to ongoing conflicts in Myanmar, people have kept arriving in search of protection and, in 2014, the camp population still counted around 117,000 refugees, with, however, only every third person registered with the Thai government and the UNHCR (TBC 2014).15 The large majority (65 per cent) belonged to the Karen ethnicity, 18 per cent were Karenni, and the remainder included members of other ethnic groups such as the Burman, Tenasserim, Mon, Shan, Rakhine, Chin and Kachin (TBC 2005).

Setting for the study and profile of the intervieweesAs stated initially, we were able to take advantage of the expertise of various key informants for this study, including a number of stakeholders at the regional, national and international levels. The main empirical part, however, consists of 29 interviews with resettled refugees and closely related stakeholders, both in Sweden and Thailand (see Table 3). In Sweden, 15 resettled refugees from Burma were interviewed during visits to three municipalities and to the Karen Summer Camp in July 2014. Ten of the interviews were

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conducted in Swedish or English, without an interpreter while, in five cases, a family member assisted with the interpretation. One further interview was conducted with an integration officer at one of the municipalities receiving refugees from Myanmar, and another with a representative of a Swedish NGO which runs relief operations at the Thai–Burmese border. In addition, 12 interviews were held in Thailand. Three of the participants were the relatives of informants in Sweden, and were either ineligible for resettlement or were awaiting resettlement to a different country. Five other interviewees were representatives of Karen community organisations (CBOs), a school and a health clinic. Furthermore, two interviewees worked for major NGOs in the area and both had long-term experience of the conflict and the relief work carried out by various actors along the border. Finally, the last two interviewees were international scholars who were very familiar with topic. The interviews lasted between one and three hours depending on the participants’ English or Swedish language skills. Interviews with those who enjoyed a certain position of importance among the Karen in Sweden usually spoke on behalf of a group in addition to providing individual information, hence the interviews were lengthy and extensive.

Background of the interviewees and their situation in SwedenEleven of the 15 interviewees in Sweden arrived around 2005, con-siderably earlier than the Somali respondents in our study. Most went as a family (either as a spouse, a parent or a child), while two children were later reunited with their parents. Although six (who arrived in Thailand in the 1980s) spent between 16 and 21 years in camps, those who arrived in the 1990s spent an average of eight years in camps (though often on an on-and-off basis); the overall average was 13 years. Thirteen interviewees and their families were religiously affiliated with Christianity (either Baptist or Adventist) while one was Muslim and one Buddhist. All were of Karen ethnicity and reflected the diversity among the Karen (Pwo, Sgaw, Black16). Nine of the interviewees were female and six male. Table 3 shows their age distribution at the time of interview in Sweden, on arrival in Sweden and on arrival in Thailand (see Appendix 1 for further characteristics).

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Table 3. Age of Karen interviewees at time of interview, at arrival in Sweden, and at arrival in camp (N = 15)

Age At interview On arrival in Sweden

On arrival in camp/Thailand

> 4 - - 7 (born there)

5–15 - 3 4

16–25 5 4 4

26–40 5 4 -

41–50 5 4 -

Most interviewees in Sweden stayed in one of the refugee camps in Thailand – many in more than one – though one family was never based in a camp but arrived in Thailand in the 1970s and found other ways to secure their stay at the border. Some changed camp when they started an educational course, while others had to move for security reasons. Some interviewees had already arrived in Thailand in 1984, when the Burmese junta intensified their attacks on ethnic militarised groups, while others came in 1988 after the student uprising (and massacre) in Rangoon, which caused many people to join the KNLA or flee to the border. Yet others came after the fall of the KNLA headquarters in Mannerplaw in February 1995. Those who arrived in the 1980s first found shelter in tem-porary settlements close to the border, before moving to the bigger, and more secure camps (Mae La and others) established by the Thai government at the beginning of the 1990s.

Interviewees who spent their childhood in the camps received schooling up to tenth grade. Many (though not all) continued to enrol in vocational education – mostly in the medical field, receiving their medical education through the KNU17 directly –while others studied courses offered by international NGOs or by the local Mae Tao Clinic (located in Mae Sot), which is funded to a large extent by international donors.

While this study attempted to solely focus on refugees who spent their time in a refugee camp, one issue to highlight is that many of the people interviewed left the camps on a regular basis. Despite the overall prohibition by the Thai authorities (although this has

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been implemented on a less or more strict basis over the years – County Administration Gävleborg 2012), the interviewees had different reasons why they left the camps. Only seven interviewees stated that they never left the camp. The interviews with the refugees from Burma based in Sweden showed that educational pursuits or a job were the usual reasons for leaving. For example, Interviewee 1 (henceforth I-1 etc.) continued post-10 education in a migrant school18 outside the camp, I-8 went to Mae Sot to be trained as a medic, and I-14 received her medical education from the KNU and subsequent early practice with an international NGO in Burma. I-7 left for Mae Sot to get an education, but ended up working for the KNU while I-5 left the family in the camp and went back to work with the KNU in Burma. I-13 left the camp after finishing tenth grade to work outside the border region as a nurse and a nanny in different major Thai cities for ten years before returning to the border and travelling to Sweden for resettlement.

Four of the interviewees were directly and seven indirectly – through a family member – involved with the KNU, both during their time in Burma and later during their time in Thailand. It was not uncommon that part of the family lived in one of the camps while a family member (usually the father/husband or a brother/uncle) kept on working for the KNU with operations in Burma. Only two people stated that they had nothing to do with the political struggle. People who were involved with the KNU usually had medical, logistical or organisational skills. Through their involvement, they also enjoyed a certain social status, and their family members would usually receive beneficial treatment (protection, financial support) in the camps in case they lost their life in combat (I-14).

The Karen interviewees in Sweden stated that they were engaged in quite a number of income- or status-generating activities when living in and around the refugee camps in Thailand. While five were of school age and five stated they did “nothing”, two were involved in camp leadership, two worked as medics in and outside the camps, two for CBOs in and outside the camps, one for an international NGO, one as a domestic worker in Thai cities, and one worked in Burma on a regular basis; several had more than one position.

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Employment situation in SwedenMaybe unsurprisingly, obtaining employment was one of the most prominent topics brought up during the interviews. While some had employment, the majority struggled to find it; indeed, Beve-lander (2009; and this volume) found that resettled refugees found this harder than other refugee and family migrants. Many of those struggling expressed the wish to be self-reliant and lamented the fact that they were not. While some uttered frustratedly “Always intern-ships, internships, internships (never leading to anything)”, others remarked bitterly “In Thailand, I was able to help myself and others; here I cannot even help myself”, and questioning vividly whether resettlement had been the best decision for them (I-12).

In Sweden, refugees from Myanmar (like Somalis) are regarded as a refugee group with very little human capital, and thus many struggle with unemployment (I-28, Sweden). Karen interviewees identified that former KNU soldiers are more prone to being employed. Furthermore, those who used to have a position before – either in a community organisation like the KNU, KWO or KYO, in camp leadership or in an international NGO as a translator or as part of an NGO team – had on average a greater likelihood of obtaining employment. However, some complained that they worked below their qualifications and felt that they had been victims of deskilling since arriving in Sweden. Those who were the least likely to find employment in Sweden were those who lived exclusively in remote rural areas working as small-scale farmers while in Burma, and as refugees in the camps in Thailand, without much opportunity to engage with the outside world. Most were illiterate, or went to school for only a few years. Many of those employed in Sweden worked in low-skilled jobs in warehouses, factories, or gardens. Many with previous medical training (either through the KNU or an NGO in Thailand) found work in the care and health sectors, as nursing assistants or caregivers in elderly homes. Other (rare) jobs included translator, mother-tongue instructor, municipal office employee or university lecturer at university.

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Table 4. Job situations of interviewed refugees from Burma in Sweden

Job situation

Employed According to previous training 3

Other 7

Partly self-employed 2

Unemployed Doing internships 4

Enrolled in language courses & other educational programmes 3

High school 1

Note: As the table shows job situations, the number is higher than that of interviewees since one individual can hold more than one position.

Several interviewees offered personal analyses about the living conditions for Karen in Sweden. Taken together, they identified several areas where they perceived the Karen resettled refugees in Sweden to differ from other refugee groups. These were a general low level of education, a lack of exposure to the outside world, low self-esteem, and only a short time in Sweden, resulting in the absence of contacts (no labour-market-related social capital); on a more structural basis, they spoke of the lack of jobs in Sweden. The following self-analysis thus offers a “bottom-up” perspective, which also takes into account human (education) and cultural (exposure, self-esteem) capital. I-5, I-8 and I-12 pointed out that most Karen in Sweden had very little education and therefore lacked skills. I-12, in the quote below, identifies this as a result of the Burmese regime’s strategy over roughly 70 years of civil war – low education makes it easier for the regime to control the insurgent Karen and the territory they are defending (see also Worland, this volume).

So we didn’t have the possibility to go to school, we had to hide all the time in the forest. When the Burmese soldiers came to our villages, they burned the houses, they raped women, they killed people, they did what they wanted. And we, we had to run, run, run the whole time.

For this reason, many refugees arriving in Sweden were illiterate, only spoke Karen, and were not used to studying, especially not in a Western way (I-16, Thailand).

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Furthermore, while there is considerable diversity among some of the Karen in terms of exposure to other geographical locations, other nationalities, occupations and languages, the majority of the Karen did not have the opportunity to see or experience anything other than the forest villages in Burma and the refugee camps in Thailand due to their relatively strict confinement (as mentioned by I-7, I-12 and I-14 in Sweden; I-16 and I-17 in Thailand). This is linked to the third reason: that – according to I-12 in Sweden – the Karen/Burmese in Sweden have, on average, a low level of self-esteem, stemming from their awareness of their low educational level, their lack of exposure to the world and their difficulties in mastering the Swedish language at a conversational level. This constitutes a significant challenge when trying to interact with people outside the immediate ethnic group.

Another reason why Burmese nationals perform worse than other immigrant groups on the labour market in Sweden (I-12) is that they have only lived in Sweden for a relatively short period and, when they arrived, there were no co-nationals providing jobs, information or contacts (though some small-scale entrepreneurial projects have since emerged) as evidenced by I-8 below:

In Sweden you need documents to get a job; that is the downside with this country. Even for a job as a cleaner you need documents. But at my work I meet cleaners from different countries and they don’t speak Swedish, but they have a friend or so that worked there and through that contact they got the job. So in Sweden, you need either the right papers to get a job or contacts. If you, for example, come from Iraq, then you have many other Iraqis who have lived in Sweden for a long time, they own shops, and they can arrange for a job. We Burmese, we cannot do that.

Here, I-8 identifies the lack of contacts of the Karen/Burmese as a group with Swedish employers as an additional component accoun-ting for their employment problems. Learning the language was also very difficult at first, especially since, in 2005, no Karen–Swedish dictionary existed. Those who could speak English or even Thai had a considerable advantage as there were dictionaries available in these languages (I-6, I-12, I-7, I-14). One interviewee took the initiative, and developed a Karen–Swedish dictionary a few months after arrival.

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Another reason given for the refugees’ slow (labour market and social) integration into Sweden is the fact that they had previously been living in camps, where different international organisations came to help and brought food (TBC), skills (ZOA – a Dutch Christian NGO engaged at the Thai–Burmese border for 30 years and focusing on education) or medicine (for example, Médécins Sans Frontières).19 As I-12 again states, “We are like a small bird that is fed by mamma and pappa”. From this, new traditions are developed. “We get used to being helped so, instead of acting ourselves, we say ‘Ok, we will wait until others come and help us’.” Camp life, she argues, has eradicated the refugees’ ability to help themselves. And she sees this helplessness – or aid dependency - as a new culture that people adopt. Interestingly, she sees the integration programme in Sweden, and the overall welfare system, as a continuation of the helping-syndrome in the refugee camps of which she is utterly critical. She explains:

And when they come to Sweden, the first two years the munici-pality helps them, even if they don’t get a job. And after that the social services help. (…) They don’t think that they have to fight themselves. Because of helping, helping, helping all the time, this is also one reason why we [as an ethnic group] don’t develop.

Finally, another problem – on a more structural level – that hinders the resettled refugees’ entrance onto the labour market is the scarcity of jobs in some regions and municipalities (Hagström 2009; I-5 and I-28, Sweden). Nobody mentioned discrimination and, when asked, all waived their hands and stated that they have not felt discriminated against at any point (despite their unemployment or deskilling).

The time before: the refugee camps in ThailandThe general conditions in the camps at the Thai–Burmese border are described as good compared to many other refugee camps, with an enrolment in primary school of almost 100 per cent, as well as comparatively good access to food, water, shelter and health care (Mahoney 2008). Other sources describe the camps as “not like other refugee camps, the ones you see on TV …” (I-29, Sweden) in as much as they resemble villages and – at first sight – do not

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Figure 1. The refugee camps at the Thai–Burmese borderSource: Australian Karen Foundation (n.d.)http://australiankarenfoundation.org.au/9.html (accessed 19 April 2015).

correspond to the stereotypical image of refugee camps as des-titute places (see also County Administration Gävleborg 2012). The camp population in general receives substantial support from various national and transnational Christian networks which – since refugees first began crossing over to Thailand in 1984 – provided shelter, food and clothes (Horstmann 2011). As this study shows, religious networks are also instrumental in the field of education, be it through the establishment of schools and education in and outside the camps or through the brokering of scholarships to Thai and foreign seminaries and universities.

In general, the level of access to education is relatively high and the level of self-determination in the camps as well – partly due to the

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high level of self-organisation – while income-generating activities are relatively few. Furthermore, there are several clinics – both in and outside the camps – that cater for refugees from Myanmar as well as for migrants. They often have CBO- and NGO-trained refugee staff, and regularly receive funding from international donors. They are relatively accessible and service free of charge or at a low cost.

Despite this, many interviewees in Thailand also mentioned the more negative effects of camp life – i.e. the rise of social problems such as the (ab)use of drugs, and violence, including domestic violence – and the increased prevalence of suicide and divorce. While many of these problems were explained in relation to confinement in camp and the gloomy outlook for the future, some also blamed resettlement (I-16, Thailand). Interestingly, the classroom was one venue where the effects of camp life were tangible. All schools – both in and outside the camps – also enrol Karen children from Burma whose parents have sent them across the border in order to obtain an education. In Thailand, I-17 and I-23, both teachers, accord a greater level of motivation and visionary ability to Karen students who are in Thailand for the sole purpose of education. “The ones that come across the border, they have a plan, and they work much harder” or “The ones who grew up in the camp, they are mentally shut down, traumatised, they show no curiosity, and are brainwashed into thinking negatively about a future in Burma” was how these interviewees evaluated the situation quite generally. They point to the camp situation, which they call a “false environment”, where “work ethics get lost” and where children do not get a sense of “where rice comes from”. I-17 explains: “Whether or not you study, at the end of the day you get to eat rice so, for many children and youth, there is no obvious reason why they should study” – in particular, she adds, when the living conditions of the unskilled and skilled refugees are the same and when there is hardly any prospect of them ever being able to apply their skills on the job market.

Education, self-determination and income-generating activitiesInterviewees stressed that people (above all children) in the camps are better educated than those who spent their childhood in Burma, especially those who lived far away from towns. In the villages, there was either a lack of schools (above all in the Northern Karen State)

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or a discontinuity of teaching due to the ongoing conflict and the fact that people had to flee from the Burmese army many times (I-8, Sweden; I-16 and I-17, Thailand; Phan 2009). “A whole generation missed the possibility to learn because of war” (I-17, Thailand).

Along the border in Thailand, education is largely based on the Burmese curriculum – especially as this may enable the students’ eventual repatriation – which goes up to tenth grade and is relatively easily accessible for all children in the camps. After that, there are a (limited) number of possibilities for higher studies (colloquially called “post-10”), which take between two and four years, the latter amounting to a Bachelor’s degree.20

While primary education is organised by the refugees themselves, under the scope of The Karen Refugee Committee’s Entity for Education (KRCEE)’s mandate, most post-10 educational programmes are managed and funded by NGOs – such as Child’s Dream for instance. As mentioned above, many schools accept students both from the camps and from Burma. As in Burma, most of the teachers in the schools are Christian Karen. However, while Christians in Burma have better access to education than Buddhist Karen (among others, due to geographical dispersion), within the camps the access is the same for both (I-16). There are a number of further programmes where students, above all, intensify and upgrade their English-language skills. An increasing number of higher education places have been established outside the camps, either in the borderland (The Curriculum Project n.d.) or – although this is a more recent development – through collaboration with universities located abroad.21 Refugee students sometimes also manage to get enrolled in a local (or foreign) university in Thailand; however, these links are not institutionalised and the Burmese passport required for enrolment is often difficult, though not impossible, for camp residents to obtain. This enrolment is enabled by a scholarship (very limited in number) and permission to study at a Thai university or even a university abroad. For many refugees, university studies are the best way to get away from the camp (I-7, Sweden). For example, in the early 2000s, the Open Society Institute (OSI) offered ten scholarships a year to the brightest exiled Burmese students in the nine camps, who would then study at a university in Chiang Mai (Northern Thailand) or Bangkok (I-7, Sweden and I-16, Thailand;

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see also Phan 2009). Apart from OSI, a number of scholarships are brokered through church networks and highly individual contacts, in the facilitation of which foreign Christian relief workers would often play a central role; however, the scholarships are not easily available.22

Apart from academic education and English-language courses, there are also a number of training opportunities to work on health-related issues; for example, the Mae Tao Clinic23 in Mae Sot provides a three-level medical education to nationals from Burma in Thailand. After finishing the various levels, the students are expected to serve their community either in Thailand or in Burma. The clinic also educates the so-called “barefoot doctors” who – with a backpack full of medical supplies and trained to treat the most common diseases and alleviate typical injuries from military and insurgent group attacks – enter the conflict and IDP areas inside Burma’s so-called “black zone” (Karen-controlled territory where the Burmese regime attacks and kills on sight – Michaels 2014) for 4–5 months on a regular basis (I-25, Thailand).24

Apart from the clinic, there is also a number of international NGOs working on the provision of health care and health-care training in, inter alia, PSW (psycho-social work), working with HIV or TB (tuberculosis), as well as home visiting or hospital administration (I-18).

To illustrate, I-18 (Thailand) arrived in Nu Po Camp in 1997 at the age of 11 where she eventually finished tenth grade. She first registered with the Teacher Preparation Centre (TPC) at Nu Po camp but eventually discovered that she did not want to become a teacher, and changed to the SEP (Special English Programme) in Umpiem camp, where she was taught English, maths and social studies by a foreign teacher for three years. After this, she continued with an EIP (English Intensive Programme) for one year, before working for a year with the American Refugee Committee (ARC) on the programme “Community Help Educator” (CHE). She then moved to another programme, “Gender-Based Violence” (GBV) for six months, where she informed her peers about this type of violence. After that, she worked on the programme “Avian Influenza” (AI) for a year, before changing organisation to the French medical provider PUAMI (Première Urgence Aide Medicale Internationale) where she

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received training and worked as a psycho-social worker (PSW) for three years. Following this, she took a one-year course at Mae La camp in “Medic Initial Training”, offered specifically for women by PUAMI, which enables her now to work as a medic at the camp hospitals. Her education was free.

However, despite the prevalence of educational opportunities on an increasing scale over the years, as all interviewees pointed out time and again, for most youth in the camps there is nothing to do once they finish tenth grade. As stated before, social problems such as domestic violence, sexual and drug abuse, depression and even suicide are on the increase (I-12, I-16 and I-17, Thailand; Worland 2010). I-15 in Sweden stated that, after he finished school, he married and did not do much until he was resettled. I-11 and I-12 also said that, except for marrying and having babies, there is not much to do and many youth get involved in bad things. This view was also put forward by the KYO representative (I-26, Thailand). Some people referred to this when explaining why they left the camp to find work in the town, while others offered it as a reason for choosing resettlement (I-14, Sweden).

Income-generating opportunities are not abundant in a protracted refugee situation, and the camps with refugees from Burma in Thailand are no exception. However, there does seem to be a higher variety of possible sources of income and status there, in comparison with other refugee camps such as Dadaab in Kenya (see following section; Mahoney, personal communication, 2013). Officially, residents are only allowed to leave the camp with the permission of the Thai camp commander. However, as seen above, many residents leave the camp on a regular basis. Interviewees and documents reveal that bribes (payable to police officers along the motorway, for whom they become a regular income) and, in some cases, sexual favours are sometimes involved in a free passage to the nearby town (I-29, Sweden; I-16 and I-17, Thailand). Basically, there are three different economies – camp, NGO and local – in which income and status (social and cultural capital) can be generated.

In the camps, there are a number of positions available from which status and a small salary can be derived. These include teacher in a school, pastor in a church, medic or nurse in a clinic, or vendor on one of the small market stall in the camps. Furthermore, there

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are a number of positions in community organisations such as the KWO, the KYO and the KRC, to name but a few. In some of these positions, a small salary is provided. Many Karen organisations have their headquarters in Thailand but outside the camps. Furthermore, a number of representative positions are available in the camp, for example in each section or zone or in camp leadership. Another activity in the camp is growing vegetables or rearing chickens, ducks or piglets. While the vegetables are mostly harvested for self-consumption and as such are more of a life-improving (rather than an income-generating) activity, the piglets can be sold for special events, such as weddings or thanksgiving ceremonies.

Apart from CBOs, international NGOs are major employers of (educated or otherwise skilled) refugees from Burma. Most of the jobs are in translation and interpretation, and refugees who speak not only Karen and English, but also Burmese and Thai are widely sought after. Journalists and international researchers are also in need of interpreters and facilitators when addressing the Thai camps in their work. NGO salaries are comparatively higher than CBO salaries, and around 3,000 refugees work in different capacities for the TBC. However, camp residents working are a minority (I-16 Thailand; I-2 and I-29, Sweden) and residents whose skills are not required by an NGO sometimes work outside the camps in the fields or in the forest collecting leaves. As the Thai government prohibits this, they often have to bribe the Thai soldiers upon return to the camp. The income derived from this activity is between 50 and 100 Baht a day (I-16 and I-24, Thailand; I-29, Sweden). For the vast majority of camp residents, there is nothing to do once the food ration has been collected. “The majority are sitting in their little houses ... doing nothing. They just talk, they sit ... boredom” (I-16, Thailand).25

As stated above, the level of self-determination in the Karen refugee camps is comparatively very high (I-24, Thailand; Mahoney 2008). The structure is roughly as follows: every camp has a commander – a Thai national, appointed by the Thai Ministry of the Interior. All other leadership positions are covered by the camp residents. Every camp has a leader committee of 15 members (a leader, deputy leader, secretaries etc.), a zone leadership (Mae La camp is divided into three zones), and a section leadership (21 sections in Mae La

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camp). Every three years, elections are held into the different levels of administration. While for section and zone levels, all camp residents are eligible to vote, only registered refugees can lay down their vote for the camp leadership (I-22 Thailand). Criticism of this model, of which the camp leadership is well aware, includes the under-representation of women, non-Christians and non-Karen (I-22 and I-24, Thailand).

Apart from the political leadership, each camp has committees focusing on various social and community issues such as justice, health, women, education and aid distribution. The camp leadership is in contact with the Thai camp commander and all foreign NGOs need to get the approval of both parties before they can start activities and programmes in the camps (I-22, Thailand). The biggest NGO, the TBC, has been working with Burmese refugees in various ways since 1984, whereas the UNHCR only got involved in 1990. Prior to this, relief and support networks already existed, as the KRC managed the makeshift camps and the churches distributed aid. This specific style of camp (self-) administration explains why the Karen were largely able to preserve their traditional ways of social organisation (Erdogan 2012), though the Thai government’s introduction of a stronger encampment policy in the mid-1990s forced the refugees to become more aid-dependent (though less than in camps elsewhere). Nevertheless, while the self-management liberties of Karen forced refugees in Thailand stand out in many ways as “unique” (I-24) and “astounding” (Mahoney 2008), their bargaining power is ultimately deeply hampered by their circumstances of displacement (I-24, Thailand); after all, they are officially only allowed to be in the camps, they do not have a legal status in Thailand and therefore lack many basic rights.

Perceptions and experiences of resettlementMany refugees from Burma welcomed the UNHCR’s 2005 resettle-ment scheme. However, during fieldwork in Thailand, many expres-sed a more ambivalent position towards resettlement (see Suter & Magnusson 2014 for a more thorough overview). The main points of criticism concerned brain drain from the camps, as the majority of the skilled and experienced refugees – the camp leaders, the medics, the teachers and the pastors – signed up for resettlement and

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left. Many of these people experienced severe deskilling in their new countries, and it was pointed out that, in the camps at least, they had a “purpose”. In general, the main motivation for resettlement was “the children’s education and future”, and it was pointed out on many occasions that women tended to be more in favour of resettle-ment than men, leading to tension within families, divorces, violence and even suicide (I-16, I-17 and I-24, Thailand; Worland 2010).

Among the interviewees in Sweden this picture was broadly reflected. Some stated explicitly that they resettled for their children’s sake but that, personally, they would be happier back in Thailand or Myanmar (I-5, I-8 and I-12, Sweden). Others stated that their registration with the UNHCR (which then led to resettlement) was solely to gain increased protection in Thailand (I-7 and I-8, Sweden). Resettlement was also seen by some as a way to gain increased international mobility and protection from persecution by the Burmese regime – through citizenship in the new country (I-8). This does not minimise any of the gratitude that the majority of the interviewees expressed towards Sweden for allowing them to enjoy their lives not only in peace and security, but also as free people with civil and political rights – citizens (I-5 and I-11, Sweden).

Mobility patterns and practices before and after resettlementIn an attempt to show the interviewees’ embeddedness in different social networks, this sub-section looks at the actual and intended movements between different localities where the Karen interviewees were placed or used to live or which were in any way important to them. It will present these movements and immobilities and shed light on the underlying motivations for them.

Burmese resettled refugees from Thailand arrived in Sweden roughly between the end of 2004 and 2008. They were placed in 33 municipalities, mostly in central Sweden between Gothenburg and Stockholm, each having a population of between 2,000 and 50,000. As described earlier, six municipalities took more than 100 Burmese, five took between 50 and 99, and ten took between 20–49 – remarkably different to Somali refugees, who were placed in much smaller numbers in many more municipalities.

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In general, those interviewed in Sweden expressed overall satisfaction about their new country of residence. Several made the explicit point that they now considered Sweden to be their home, despite their long-term plans to visit Thailand and Myanmar in the future.

Mobility within Sweden In general, not many resettled refugees from Burma in Sweden have changed their municipality after arrival – only one family among our interviewees did so, as they were the only Karen in their original municipality, and wished to live closer to other Karen. Interestingly, they had no social ties to any of the refugees from Burma settled in the other municipality; they had simply heard of their existence through their (Swedish) church network. However, many make short visits and trips within Sweden, usually to visit other Karen in different municipalities (I-2, I-3, I-4, I-9 and I-10), participate in events organised by other Karen (summer camps, or Karen Swedish Community (KSC)/Swedish Karen Baptist Fellowship (SKBF) meetings) or establish an ethnic business (I-7).

Mobility abroad – actual and intendedTwo interviewees expressed the wish to move to another country but stated that they were waiting to receive their Swedish citizenship first. I-12 points to the degree of freedom of mobility that Swedish (or Western, for that matter) citizenship enables, and complains that her lack of citizenship renders her immobile and “forces” her to stay in Sweden. I-8 also eagerly awaits his citizenship, as he would like to join his extended family in another resettlement country. Intervie-wees in Thailand said that a small number of resettled refugees had returned to the camps or to Myanmar because they decided they did not want to live in the resettlement countries. The interviewees in Sweden also talked about some individual cases in which a resettled person left again, deeming life in Sweden to be unbearable.26

A number of resettled refugees travel back to Thailand on a short-term basis to visit, or – in one case – to help with the peace process on a temporary basis (Interviews Thailand). Many travelled back for other reasons – one to join a Swedish resettlement delegation to Thailand as an interpreter, one (family) to spend their holidays in

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their former camp (“home”, as the camp-raised daughter says) and one (twice) due to home sickness and to work for a Swedish NGO project; another family moved back to Thailand, only to move to Sweden again after threats on their life.

As mentioned above, many have family and friends in other countries, and some also travel to visit them. Most go to nearby countries (such as Denmark, Norway or other Western European countries), with only one interviewed family visiting family and friends resettled in North America. They were granted citizenship after nine years in Sweden and saved enough money to afford the trip, which included not only visiting close family and dear friends but also exploring well-known tourist sites (I-15, Sweden).

Pre- and post-resettlement immobilityAs this section shows, the Karen interviewed for this study show a relatively small propensity after resettlement to travel or move to a different place, either within or outside Sweden. When asked to comment upon this relative immobility, they advanced three reasons. Firstly, they referred to their lack of documents proving their identity which prevents them from obtaining Swedish citizenship until they have spent eight years in Sweden. During this time they are issued with an “alien passport” (främlingspass) which makes travelling more difficult due to (more) complicated visa applications and customs controls. A further reason which many respondents mentioned is their general lack of money. For some it was financially impossible to participate in all the nation-wide KSC arrangements (summer camp and New Year’s celebration) and SKBF meetings, and so they had to prioritise between them. Airfares for the whole family to go abroad were unthinkable. A third reason that many stated was that “We are not used to travel”, often referring to the Karen people’s long stay in Thailand with limited mobility rights.

Indeed the interviewees’ pre-resettlement life in the refugee camps in Thailand was characterised by long-term enforced immobility due to Thailand’s encampment policy. As we have seen, many interviewees managed to engage in mobility, crossing both camp and the national border between Thailand and Myanmar on an on-and-off basis. However, there was no right to free movement and this mobility was always arbitrary and dependent on chance, good will or the corrupt character of the various members of the Thai security forces.

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Social networks and social capitalAs pointed out before, prior to the resettlement programme there had been no migration of Burmese or Karen in relevant numbers to Sweden. Consequently, the Karen had no established social networks they could tap into for resources (contacts, information, assets), but had to rely on public resources and build their own supportive networks from scratch. This next section looks at social networks at the local, national and transnational levels, at the basis for them (where, why and how they were formed), and what type of social capital can be derived from them.

Bonding, bridging and linking tiesAll interviewees stated that they were in more-or-less close contact with the Karen living in their respective municipalities. As such, the Karen in Sweden can be said to have substantial bonding ties at the local level. Apart from the younger interviewees, who were/are enrolled in the regular Swedish education system, most of the adults – irrespective of the level of their Swedish-language skills – stated that they usually almost exclusively met with other Karen in their spare time.27Religion, as already stated, is central to Karen nation-alism and also to their networks (Horstmann 2011). In the Swedish context, it has been found not only to be an in-group unifying factor, but also to have a strong bridging aspect. The majority of the inter-viewees were of the Christian faith, mostly Baptists and Advent-ists. While all stated that they participated in Swedish services at the local church, the Karen Baptists in some municipalities also organised services in Karen. These meetings provide a venue for the development and maintenance of strong bonding ties. Many of the Christian Karen state that the people they spend the most time with are those from church – whether Karen, Swedish or another nation-ality. Participation in services in Swedish and in other church activ-ities during the week – such as a knitting course or a language café – was a well-used way of meeting with non-Karen and, above all, with Swedes. Among the interviewees the usefulness of these events was well noticed, and they not only participated in these events for religious reasons but also to glean information on Swedish society in general or on employment opportunities. Some Buddhist Karen also visited the church or, in some cases, even converted, as they recog-nised the supporting potential of the church for their overall social

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and economic well-being (I-14). One Muslim interviewee stated that, due to his regular visits to the mosque, he has befriended other people of the Muslim faith. However, their contact is weak and does not go beyond the time spent together during worship. Religious ties, thus, have been found to be both bonding and bridging, with a stronger capital propensity for the Christians among them. When asked to where they would first turn when experiencing economic or social difficulties, most interviewees named the municipality (either the integration officers there or the social assistance office) as their primary point of contact. In a welfare state where integration is exclusively state-funded and state-organised (to some degree exer-cised by municipal actors) this statement is hardly surprising. After these institutions, the interviewees would then refer to the church as a location where support, information and contacts could be found.

Indisputably, linguistic skills open up different ways of incorporation into social networks. Three of the interviewees spoke English on arrival and were immediately used as bridges between the arriving Karen and the receiving institutions. They not only experienced a much smoother transition into Swedish life but also have a wider and more diversified network of contacts. As such, these linguistic ties were very effective in creating bridging ties. As those with such linguistic skills have become central figures and have connected the wider Karen group to institutions and different society groups, they can be seen as “brokers” (Granovetter 1973) or “bridge-builders” (Melander 2009).

Although less important than English, two interviewees stated how their Thai skills opened some doors for them when making contacts. I-12, who speaks the language fluently, went to a municipality in Sweden where she was the first person from Burma. She soon met a woman from Thailand, also a single mother with young children, and they became friends. However, the ethnic affiliation overruled the linguistic commonalities, and she added “But even if we become friends, she is Thai and I am Karen”, and a few months later she moved to a municipality where other families from Burma lived. She did not know any Karen families there personally, but just heard (through the church) about their existence. I-6 did not make any friends through her Thai-language skills but found it considerably easier to learn Swedish as she could make use of the Thai–Swedish dictionary that existed by the time the family arrived in Sweden.

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As a number of scholars have pointed out (e.g. Horstmann 2011; Thawnghmung 2012), despite prominent claims, the Karen are a far from homogeneous group; they are divided along lines of religion (Buddhist, Christian, Muslim), language (Pwo Karen, Sgawh Karen and Burmese) and political involvement. In fact, Horstmann (2011) argues that the unity of the Karen is a prominent, albeit relatively recent, narrative in the dominant version of Karen nationalism developed by the KNU, characterised by an intertwined understanding of religion, ethnicity and militarism. The Swedish material confirms these existing divisions among the Karen. However, when it comes to intra-group (Karen) networks/boundaries, it should be recognised that it is hard to make a clear-cut distinction between ethnic, linguistic and religious ties. Many Buddhist Karen speak another Karen dialect (Pow Karen as opposed to Sgaw Karen, which is dominant among Christian Karen), and some find it hard to understand each other. Generally the Muslim Karen and the Karen born and raised in the cities rather than in the rural locations of Eastern Burma (i.e. the Karen State) tend to speak Burmese rather than Karen. Without further research it is also impossible to explicitly state whether the fact that the Karen have little interaction with other Burmese, non-Karen ethnicities in Sweden has to do with ethnic or rather with linguistic ties.28

Group-level organisationOver the past 60 years the Karen have became quite well-known for being able to replicate their socio-organisational structures wherever they were forced to flee to (Phan 2009; I-16, I-17 and I-24, Thailand). The KSC was started in 2005, six months after the arrival of the first resettled Karen in one of the 30 or so municipalities that received resettled refugees from Burma who had previously lived in Thailand.29 In the beginning, about 20 people from the same municipality were part of it. As narrated by I-7 and I-14, Sweden, the first challenge the founders faced was the limited number of members. That, however, became considerably easier a year later (in 2006) with the arrival of a new group of resettled Karen, among whom someone who had previously held a high position in one of the refugee camps. Her personal ties to many newly arrived Karen refugees facilitated recruitment, and the KSC grew considerably. Affiliations emerged in

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most of the municipalities in which the Karen were placed. Another challenge was association-building, something in which the founders had no experience. Association-building became easier in 2008, when another Karen with a university education offered his services to the organisation. Now they could not only make use of these skills to formulate and set out statutes and everything that was required for the organisation to register as an association under Swedish law, but they could also – through this person’s personal networks – access other contacts. The most influential of these contacts was a retired Swedish member of the Baptist church, who passed on his invaluable knowledge of establishing associations. As a member of the KSC, he encouraged the organisation in 2009 to apply for association benefits from the Swedish Agency for Youth and Civil Society (Ungdomsstyrelsen), a governmental institution that finances ethnic organisations working on participation in society, culture, identity and language (MUFC n.d.). At that time, the KSC had more than 1,000 Karen and around 20 Swedish members. Analytically, the activities and objectives of the KSC were largely targeted at providing bonding ties by gathering the Karen together during Karen holidays and by organising an annual summer camp through which they could maintain both contact and culture, bridging ties by actively representing Karen culture in Swedish society, and linking ties by securing state-funding for ethnic associations, thereby tapping into the resources of the receiving society.

When analysing the development of the KSC and its significance for the establishment of the Karen at a group level, the following three points stand out. Firstly, the importance of well-connected persons cannot be overstated. These are the people who could significantly contribute to bringing together Karen who were spread throughout Sweden, and thereby increase the number of KSC members. Similarly, the importance of people with particular qualifications or abilities has to be highlighted, not only for their skills but also for their often more diversified social networks that include bridges to the wider society. A third point to make here – as it was raised in some of the interviews – is the very weak political mobilisation of the Karen in Sweden despite the significant impact for the individuals on a cultural and social level. The reasons would appear to be, firstly, that ethnic associations with government funding have to refrain from political

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activities (I-5, I-6 and I-7, Sweden). Secondly, compared to the situation in Great Britain, for instance, where the Karen have active lobbyist groups with ties to parliament (Phan 2009; I-5), those in Sweden lack the language ability, knowledge of the Swedish political system amd contacts withj government representatives or lobbyists (I-5) for political engagement. Thus, while the Karen in Sweden (through the KSC) managed to create bridges with Swedish society to enable them to build up their own, registered and government-funded organisation, they have not, thus far, been able to secure the links necessary to activate political support for the situation of the Karen in Myanmar, Thailand or Sweden – as opposed to the situation in other resettlement countries (see Phan 2009; I-21, Thailand).

Social networks at the transnational levelSimplifying to some extent, we can say that the vast majority of the Karen before 2005 lived in either Burma or Thailand. With the start of the mass resettlement operation orchestrated by the UNHCR, the IOM and other international parties, Karen can now be found in about 15 other countries. Some interviewees in Thailand recall how, in the early days of resettlement, the refugees would activate their bridging ties and call their (Western) NGO contacts in Thailand to ask urgent questions regarding the practicalities of their new life, and how their contacts in Thailand would make phone calls to engage someone in the country of resettlement to go and check upon their contacts. These issues could range from a broken water pipe in the kitchen to questions regarding a sky-high electricity bill (I-17). Not surprisingly, most or all interviewees stated that they had friends and acquaintances in Thailand, Burma and the majority of resettlement countries. While the younger people connected digitally through Facebook, Skype, Viber or the chat function of the online Karen News platform (http://karennews.org), the older generation found it much more difficult to keep in contact, partly due to the amount of time spent at work and on household chores and partly to their unfamiliarity with using these modern means of communication (I-3, Sweden). Furthermore, most interviewees stated that they have some close (siblings, children or parents) or relatively close (uncle, aunts, cousins) family members in Myanmar, Thailand or one of the resettlement countries. Some also had other family members in

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Sweden (in addition to their spouse and children if they were adults or parents and siblings if they were under 18); these could be siblings or siblings-in-law, parents or parents-in-law.

Table 5. No. interviewees with family in different places

Thailand Myanmar Australia USA Norway Sweden (other than core family)

6 5 3 6 1 4

Note: Family=siblings, children, parents. While the Somali interviewees also had spouses and under-age children abroad, the Burmese Karen in Sweden did not.

Interestingly, the two nation-wide Karen organisations in Sweden are also part of wider transnational networks. The KNU actively addresses the Karen diaspora, thereby concentrating their efforts into building a strong diasporic network around the globe (Bird et al. 2012; Horstmann 2011). Thus, while it would be wrong to see the KSC as an extended arm of the KNU, it is still through this organisation that the KNU reaches out to the wider Karen audience, by reading messages issued by the KNU president on Karen holidays (I-6). These messages, echoing “ideas about oppression, unity and unique opportunities for identity reconstruction in the Diaspora”, are also read during gatherings of other Karen organisations worldwide (Bird et al. 2012). The SKBF is also part of a European and global network, with Swedish participants travelling to different European countries for the annual European meeting (I-1, I-2, I-3 and I-6, Sweden; I-17, Thailand), as well as to Northern Thailand for the Global Karen Baptist meeting (Blog Ottoulrika 2013).

Interviews with representatives of Karen organisations in Thailand touched upon how their efforts in international advocacy have been positively impacted on by resettlement (see also Horstmann 2011). The KWO, for example, sends regular information to KWO groups in other countries and, in general, as a consequence of both the presence of Karen groups abroad and a better Internet service (both access and connection), disseminating information about the situation of the Karen (and Karen women in particular) has become easier. A KWO group in one resettlement country has donated money and computers to the KWO in Thailand and Burma.

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Furthermore, apart from private remittances, many organisations also send money to their church in the camp (tith). Their new (Baptist) church in the country of resettlement expects tithing (giving one tenth of an income); the church, in turn, pays tithes back to the camp church as well (I-16 Thailand; Horstmann 2011).

Concluding remarksThe Karen refugees from Burma are an ethnic group whose identity and social cohesion have – as for all collectives of people – been importantly shaped by their history; from the arrival of colonisers and Christian missionaries, the brutal civil war and the experience of displacement in Thailand to, finally, resettlement. While internal divisions should definitively not be neglected, the Karen refugees from Burma in Sweden nevertheless appear as a group with strong bonding ties on local, national and transnational levels. The vast majority of their stated travels and trips within Sweden and abroad are undertaken with the goal of re-establishing or maintaining contact with other Karen family members or acquaintances, or with Karen church groups

As we have seen in this study, many of the Karen interviewees identify themselves as a resource-poor group which experiences an even slower start than other resource-poor newcomers as they cannot rely on any place-specific social capital established by earlier Karen immigrants. As some say, as a group they lack education, self-confidence, exposure to different contexts and, most importantly, contacts. Nevertheless, they show strong organisational skills – as mentioned above, the Karen Swedish Community enables the fostering and maintaining of bonding ties among the Karen. Moreover, the organisation is an important actor in creating bridging ties at the group level that enables its members, in turn, to tap into the social capital (contacts) that emerges. The benefits of these ties can be found more in the social rather than the economic dimension of integration.

Probably the strongest bridging capital – on both an individual and a group level – has been established with the Baptist and Adventist congregations and their members in the municipalities in which the Karen settle. After the municipalities’ integration and welfare institutions, the church was named as the next most significant venue for accessing information and resources that enable the refugees’

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socio-economic advancement in Sweden. As we saw in the section on pre-resettlement conditions, religious networks had already been instrumental in Thailand in providing refugees with some of the important material and non-material support they needed.

In conclusion, let us highlight the most salient points that have emerged from this particular case study. Firstly, we have seen that the social and cultural capital acquired by refugees before their arrival in Sweden are crucial for establishing bonding and bridging ties on both an individual and a group level. This is pivotal especially in a situation of resettlement from a protracted refugee situation in which economic capital is as good as non-existent and human capital often gets devalued, at best, and lost, at worst, in the process of migration. It is also of importance to consider that social capital is often difficult to transfer due to its location-specific component. However, as this section has shown thus far, the fact that a considerable number in total of Karen refugees from Thailand were resettled in Sweden, and that many have been placed into the same or nearby municipalities, seems to have had a beneficial effect on the transferability and application of the individuals’ social capital in creating and re-establishing bonding ties. Bonding ties, on a group level, can – as the example of the KSC shows – lead to bridging ties with non-Karen: the KSC rational of integrating the Karen on a group level into Swedish society (e.g. by performing cultural rituals on public holidays, or by welcoming non-Karen into the KSC) serves as one good example. Similarly, on an individual as well as a group level, the cultural capital which Christian Karen possess due to their religious affiliation is deemed highly valuable in the integration process in Sweden. Due to the power structures in Swedish society, this integration process differs greatly from that of non-Christian migrants (such as our Muslim or Buddhist interviewees or Somali respondents).

The second point to make, which is linked to the first, is the significance of skilled people in the establishment of a whole group, as it is through their cultural capital and consequent wider social networks that associations on a group level can be built. In the case of the KSC, a number of individuals with contacts outside the immediate ethnic group have been instrumental in leading the KSC to the well-recognised position in society which it has nowadays. As such, the bridging ties that some network members are able to create

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can mitigate the paucity of capital of other members of the network. This leads us to conclude that, while brain drain is lamented in the refugee camps and is certainly a matter to be taken seriously, the skills and experiences are often not wasted; on the contrary, they are deemed indispensable in the process of establishing a pioneer group in a receiving country.

Fragmented networks, scattered placement: recently resettled Somalis in SwedenSomali nationals belong to the more recent groups of immigrants in Sweden. Most came either as asylum-seekers or as family migrants (Säfström et al. 2012). Although the first asylum applications of Somali nationals date back to 1988, the majority has come since 2005. Between 1998 and 2010, the presence of Somali nationals more than doubled from 17,000 to roughly 38,000 and, by 2006, they ranked among the ten largest immigrant groups (Bevelander & Dahlstedt 2012). The first Somalis selected for resettlement arrived in 2000; however, the bigger numbers have come since 2010 (see Table 1 on page 60). Altogether, around 1,700 Somalis were resett-led between 2000 and 2012 and, by 2014, the population of the Somalia-born in Sweden was around 58,000 (SCB 2015).

This introduction is followed by an overview of the displacement of Somali nationals and their consequent resettlement, then a sub-section on methodology and a description of the participants’ situation. The section is then divided into three parts; the first sub-section will address the time before arrival in Sweden. This is important when trying to understand the interviewees’ mobility patterns and, ultimately, social networks – the focus of the two following parts. The theoretical framework for social networks and mobility can be found in the introduction to this chapter. The results and analysis are summarised in the final section.

The conflict in SomaliaColonialism and its legacy have been intrinsic to Somalia’s history. In the late nineteenth century, three European countries (Britain, France and Italy) colonised parts of the Horn of Africa. In 1960, both British and Italian Somaliland gained independence from their colonisers, and together they created the Somali Republic, while the French colony gained independence as Djibouti in 1977. The

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following years were tainted by the fact that Somalia’s borders were not clear and the political situation remained unstable (Lewis 2008). The last civil election took place there in March 1969; the same year, the government was overthrown by a military coup led by General Mohamed Siyaad Barre, though 22 years later, in 1991, he and members of his clan were chased out of the capital, Mogadishu, by oppositional clans. This was the start of the Somali Civil War that has still not completely ceased today. Half a million Somalis were killed during the first years of the Civil War and the famine that followed (Al-Sharmani 2006). Most Somali refugees left Somalia at the height of the Civil War, between 1991 and 1993. Over the past decade, Somalia has been socially, economically and politically unstable due to conflicts over governmental power, Islamist attacks and droughts (BBC 2014). Many, however, found ways to escape to other countries and, today, Somali diaspora groups can be found worldwide.30 Many live in countries to which they have former colonial ties (Britain and Italy), in traditional immigration countries (the United States and Canada), in nearby labour-importing countries (the Gulf states), in other neighbouring countries (Kenya, Ethiopia, Yemen) and in other European countries (see Al‐Sharmani 2006).

The resettlement of Somali refugeesAs the Kenyan government rejected the possibility of local integra-tion and with the situation in Somalia barely improving and repa-triation not being an option for those who originate from Central and Southern Somalia (Migrationsverket 2013), resettlement is the UNHCR’s only remaining durable solution for the Somali refugee population in Kenya. While many in Dadaab dream of resettlement and actively seek opportunities to resettle (Horst 2006a), very few will get the opportunity due to the high mismatch between resettle-ment places and needs.

Nevertheless, resettlement from Kenya started in 1991 and, over the following eight years, more than 35,000 refugees were resettled (Kagwanja & Juma 2008). In 2006, the UNHCR started a “protracted refugee resettlement programme” in the Kenyan camps of Dadaab and Kakuma, in which the year of arrival became an important selection criteria. In Dadaab, the insecure situation made it difficult for the refugees to be resettled, since many countries had

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stopped conducting interviews there (Elliott 2012). Between 2008 and 2013, around 11,000 people were resettled from Dadaab, most in the US, Canada, the UK and Australia, with around 900 going to Sweden (UNHCR 2013b).

Between 2000 and 2012, the Swedish Migration Board sent nine selection missions to countries in the Horn of Africa; many of the refugees selected for resettlement were Somalis.31 During this period, around 1,700 Somali refugees were accepted for resettlement in Sweden and a further 450 were resettled in 2013 and 2014 (Migrationsverket, personal communication). The majority has arrived since 2008 from Kenya, with other arrivals from Egypt, Djibouti, Tunisia and Uganda. Since 2012, Sweden – together with the EU and the UNHCR – has prioritised people from the African Horn for resettlement (Migrationsverket 2011). The rationale for this was both a chronic lack of food due to famine and regional conflicts, and the consequent socio-economic strain on refugee-hosting countries like Kenya (Muftee 2013).

Methodology and interviewee profileTo gather material on their integration process, we conducted inter-views with 26 resettled Somali refugees in five different Swedish municipalities. All but three were conducted with a Somali inter-preter and lasted between 30 minutes to two hours (one was con-ducted by phone). Most of the interviewees had been resettled from a protracted situation in refugee camps in Ethiopia and Kenya in which they had spent, on average, 18 years. Four interviewees had lived for a short time in camps in Tunisia and four had never lived in one. These latter are not part of the analysis but their narratives are used to contrast the experiences of the others when deemed inter-esting. The vast majority of the interviewees left Somalia because of war and insecurity at the end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s, with two leaving in the 2000s also due to insecurity. Only one interviewee left for reasons related not to the security situation but to religious discrimination. Two interviewees arrived in Sweden in 2004 and the rest after 2009. Ten women and twelve men were interviewed, aged from 18 to 66 years old, with five under 25 and seven older than 40 (see Appendix II).

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Employment situationWhen it comes to their employment, the majority of the interviewees were enrolled in Swedish-language classes, and a couple of teenagers attended a regular high school. In addition to their studies, some participated in activities preparing them for specific professions such as cleaners, interpreters and assistants to people with disabilities. One of the interviewees was enrolled in higher education.

As in the Burmese interviews in the previous section, the Somali interviewees revealed a strong concern for their employment situation. Many displayed feelings of frustration and hopelessness in regards to finding employment in Sweden. Melander (2009), in her study of Somali migrants in Sweden, found that, in combination with having a social network of family and friends, employment has a major impact on a person’s subjective well-being.32 While the employment services are tasked with providing assistance to newly arrived refugees entering the Swedish labour market, several interviewees stated that the services extended to them were of no use. For example, two were told to use the Internet to find work – however, they did not know how to do this.

It feels hopeless [to find work]. I went to the employment services and they told me to use the Internet and search for a job there by myself. But I cannot do any of that, I don’t know how to use the Internet (I-25).

Two other interviewees (I-12 and I-13) had better luck and, with the help of their publicly funded “Introduction Guide”,33 were able to find work. Most of the Somali interviewees attended the language classes provided by the municipality and are quite happy with the education provided. However, those with very little schooling often have difficulties reaching the demanded skill level after the 525 hours provided, and participants who do not make enough progress within that time are forced to take a break from their studies. This had happened to four of the interviewees (I-23–I-26).

Several interviewees described how they could not relate to the Swedish system. I-8 stated that “In Sweden, everything is systematised”, and saw this as one of the explanations for her slow settlement. The Swedish authorities tend to communicate in written form and interviewees spoke of how the abundance of official

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documents that they receive frustrated them since they could not understand them. In this quote, I-6 provides some advice to new arrivals:

You don’t meet Sweden personally, you meet a paper. The pro-blem is that you don’t understand what the paper says and no one [from the authorities] can help you with that either. So every time you get a paper, ask for help, find someone who can help you.

Some said that they received help from their “Introduction Guide” in understanding and translating documents from the different Swedish authorities.

Indeed, the interviewees’ frustration has also been recorded statistically, and several studies point to the gloomy employment rates of Somalis (Bevelander & Dahlstedt 2012) and Somali resettled refugees in particular (Bevelander, this volume). In 2008, a quarter of all Somalia-born women in Sweden were employed, while the corresponding share of Somalia-born men was slightly higher at 35 per cent. In comparison with the native population, which shows an employment rate of around 80 per cent for both sexes, and with other, larger, immigrant groups (such as nationals from Iran, the former Yugoslavia, Turkey, Iraq and Vietnam, most of whom have been in Sweden much longer), Somali nationals have a very low participation rate in the labour market. The labour market participation of resettled Somalis shows even lower numbers (Bevelander, this volume); 20 to 35 per cent of the Somalis in total were employed ten years after arrival (Johnsdotter 2010; Bevelander, this volume).

The time before: the situation in Somali refugee camps A few of our interviewees had lived in camps in Tunisia and Ethiopia; we therefore provide some brief information below about the situa-tion there. The main focus of this sub-section, however, will be on the situation for Somali refugees in Dadaab, Kenya, the biggest camp housing Somali refugees, and where the majority of our interviewees had lived.

Somali nationals arrived in Ethiopia for protection over the past 25 years; currently around 250,000 Somalis live there in eight different refugee camps in the east and south of the country, close to the towns of Dollo Ado and Jijiga (UNHCR 2014b, 2014c). Unlike

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Kenya, Ethiopia allows refugees to live outside the camps. However, there are no arrangements for local integration, which makes resettlement the most sustainable solution for Somali refugees in Ethiopia (UNHCR 2014c). The refugee camps in Tunisia emerged as a response to people fleeing the Libyan War in 2011. The national origins of the refugees varied widely, with many from Somalia. The UNHCR registered and accommodated refugees in Shousha Transit Camp and quickly launched an initiative to repatriate them. The majority of those whose repatriation could not be executed (3,550 persons) were resettled in the USA, Norway, Sweden, Germany and Canada (UNHCR 2013c), and the camp closed in June 2013 (UNHCR 2014d).

In 2014, Kenya hosted about 430,000 Somali refugees (UNHCR 2015a). The Kenyan government imposes an encampment policy whereby the refugees are isolated in remote desert camps, close to the towns of Dadaab and Kakuma. The town of Dadaab is located in a remote area in north-east Kenya close to border with Somalia. There were five camps established in the early 1990s – Ifo in 1991, Dagahaley and Hagadera in 1992, Ifo 2 and Kambioos in 2011 (UNHCR 2014e). Around 300,000 Somali refugees entered Kenya between 1991 and 1993 alone. During the severe drought in Somalia in 2011, thousands fled to Kenya, and the population in Dadaab again increased considerably (Elliott 2012). Today, around 960,000 Somali refugees are registered by the UNHCR in the Horn of Africa. Most live in Kenya – the Dadaab camps currently host around 340,000 Somali refugees (UNHCR 2015b). These remote locations have been criticised for creating a situation in which not only are the refugees’ mobility and access to agricultural and economic opportunities restricted but also their basic human rights. Hyndman & Nylund (1998:44) show that the refugees’ “lives are literally put on hold”, as their status precludes them from being mobile, from accessing education and from finding employment.

The five camps have four NGO-run hospitals and 18 health posts, which does not live up to UNHCR’s standard of one health facility per 10,000 residents (2013b). The living conditions are sub-standard – there is a general water shortage, almost half of the residents lack adequate housing, and more than two-thirds lack proper access to latrines (Wright & Plasterer 2012). The Dadaab camps are exposed to severe weather, suffering from extreme heat in the dry season and

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prevalent flooding in the wet season. In addition, the residents also experience hostility and physical attacks from the local population and armed groups (Wright & Plasterer 2012). In fact, the security in and around Dadaab is at times so bad that outsiders are discouraged from visiting the camp, which affects not only the lives of the refugees, but also resettlement interviews and research activities (Elliott 2012). Due to these constraints on human life, the Dadaab camps have been described as the last choice for people who have no other place to turn to, in other words, for people without financial and social capital. Indeed, the relatively wealthier refugees are more likely to live in urban areas or abroad than in camps (Hyndlund & Nylund 1998).34

Only a few of our interviewees with experience of life in Dadaab talked of spending time outside the camp. Two of those who left did so for a short trip to receive medical treatment, while one left to work in the capital’s service sector. Others stated that they did not dare to leave the camp to work due to the overhanging risk of arrest and mistreatment by the police.

Education, income-generating opportunities and self-determination The Dadaab camps have a total of 39 schools at primary and secon-dary level. Approximately one third of all children of school age are enrolled in primary schools, with the figure for secondary school attendance less than one in ten (UNHCR 2013b). The UNHCR is tasked with providing primary education for all refugee children under their mandate; in Dadaab, since 1994, it collaborates with the Kenyan Ministry of Education – which provides the Kenyan cur-riculum and oversees examinations – and other UN agencies and international NGOs (Kenyan Ministry of Education 2012). There are also three secondary schools initiated by the refugee community and financially sustained by the UNHCR and other international NGOs (Wright & Plasterer 2012).35

Several reasons for the low attendance rates have been identified. The education system in the camps is challenged by a teacher-pupil ratio of 1:90, by an almost total lack of both resources and trained teachers and by most refugees’ lack of financial resources for material and tuition fees (Wright & Plasterer 2012). Many children, mostly girls, miss school (Norwegian Refugee Council 2012) and the gap increases with age – over a third of girls miss primary school, going

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up to more than a quarter in secondary school, due to domestic duties and cultural norms. A lack of resources has been identified as a problem for all education in Dadaab but is especially prominent for the provision of higher education (Wright & Plasterer 2012). The UNHCR and some international NGOs36 offer scholarship opportunities for refugee students at universities in Kenya, Europe and North America. Many holders of international scholarships stay connected to the camps when abroad by fundraising in aid of refugee schools or mentoring students and teachers. Furthermore, in the past few years, foreign universities have accepted refugee students onto their programmes, either via online courses or by providing courses in the camps themselves (Wright & Plasterer 2012). Refugee students in Kenya with a higher education often face a void of opportunities after finishing their degrees, as they are obliged to return to the camps. Due to the lack of work permits, the only jobs accessible to them are with the humanitarian agencies in the camps (Wright & Plasterer 2012).

Very few of the interviewees had attained a higher level of education before coming to Sweden. Nine interviewees had no or only little education from Somalia and only one person had attended university there. Six had received schooling in Dadaab. They recounted that education was quite accessible to them up until eighth grade, after which they needed to pass the Kenyan national exam to be able to continue, and very few managed to do so. Some of those who were of school age in the camps had not attended school for different reasons: e.g. one had been expelled, one attended Koran school, and some had been too young or too sick to go.

When it comes to wage-generating employment experience in Somalia, only a few of the interviewees had been gainfully employed before arriving in the camps and had worked, for example, with live-stock or merchandise, in restaurants or for health and international aid organisations. While living in Dadaab, opportunities to work outside are restricted so workers are limited to the labour market within the camps. The Dadaab camps hardly provide an abundance of opportunities for self-sufficiency (Horst 2006b); however, some refugees work as salespersons on the market, as tailors or as collec-tors of firewood, while others work with NGOs as health workers and teachers (Migrationsverket 2011, 2014b). English skills as well as qualifications from high school open the door to more income

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opportunities. International organisations, such as the UN and others, usually hire suitably qualified refugees, for example for food distribution and these positions were much coveted by our inter-viewees. A small salary to complement the food ration received could substantially improve the dire living conditions in the camps (I-6).

There are a number of income- and/or status-generating activities in which the Somali interviewees were involved during their time in refugee camps. A few worked in the service sector or as guards. Others traded goods (cultural items, clothes, perfumes) in the market, and one had a tractor and gathered wood outside the camp that he then sold in the market. Several of the mothers spent most of their time at home taking care of their children. The four interviewees from the Tunisian camp had earlier lived in Libya, two working as interpreters, and in building and transportation companies. For example, I-12 – who spoke Somali, English, Arabic and Italian – worked in an office as an interpreter. All of them learned or improved their ability to speak Arabic. However, for one of the four, Libya was not a destination country, but a transit country in which he got stuck on his way to Europe.

In Kenya, unlike in other countries where the responsibility for refugee protection falls to the host government, donors have insisted that the UNHCR and other international NGOs administer the refugee camps (Horst 2006b). The camps are organised in sections, each having elected leaders who serve as intermediaries between the refugees and agencies (Horst 2006b). Despite this form of refugee leadership, both Horst (2006b) and Hyndman (2000) provide in-depth accounts of the Dadaab camps as spaces of strong, hierarchical power structures, with refugees at the bottom and international organisations at the top. As such, there is little room for refugees to participate in the management and improvement of camp life (Horst 2006b). Despite initiatives by the UNHCR and CARE (one of the major NGOs in Dadaab) to increase refugee self-management, Hyndman (2000) sees a prevailing unwillingness to hand over any real power or economic resources to the refugees. In addition these initiatives are more likely to provide advantages to those who already hold some power and will probably not represent all parts of the camps. Women are particularly likely to be underrepresented in official initiatives, although they might participate in smaller, more informal endeavours that provide

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assistance in the camps (Hyndman 2000). The interviews with Somali resettled refugees in Sweden bore witness to very little self-determination; the UNHCR and other international organisations are said to have been in charge of most things, as illustrated by quotes such as: “They helped us”, “They took care of us, the camp, everything”.

Secondary movements and mobility patterns As we saw earlier, EU nationals of Somali background have a high propensity to move (see Johnsdotter 2010; van Liempt 2011). Britain is often the destination country. Transnational social networks allow for information to be disseminated where there are good opportunities for education and employment, which influences Somalis to move to other countries (Melander 2009). The impression that it is easier to find work in the UK is not supported by the statistics; however, compared to Sweden, more business owners have a Somali background (Carlson et al. 2011). Often, mobile Somalis are those who not only are part of transnational networks, but also possess considerable financial capital (Nielsen 2004). Another study has also found a relatively high propensity for mobility within Sweden; more than half of the roughly 400 Somali respondents had lived in two or more municipalities (Integration Board 1999).

Mobility abroad – actual and intendedMany of the Somali interviewees informing this study mentioned family members and other Somalis they were acquainted with who had moved away from Sweden. One motivation for these moves was family formation with a person of Somali background but with citizenship in another resettlement country where the employment prospects were perceived to be more promising.

However, very few of the interviewees themselves stated a wish to move away from Sweden. Only four considered leaving Sweden for good, the reasons given being family reunification, career possibilities and the application of their qualifications in a more adequate labour-market setting. One interviewee with previous work experience in transportation in a Central African country deemed his opportunities for making money to be better there than in Sweden and is therefore

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thinking of returning there. As her husband’s application for family reunification has been pending for more than three years, another interviewee is reluctantly considering moving back to her country of first asylum with her child. Two other interviewees who are (or are soon to be) enrolled in higher education in Sweden stated that they would like to apply their qualifications in countries outside Sweden, for example in the camps where they previously resided. They reason that they want to be useful and provide services to people who might have bigger needs than the Sweden population. However, they do not necessarily want to leave Sweden permanently.

Some interviewees said that they had family members who wished to return to the country of transit. The reason given was usually the perceived hopelessness of getting employment in Sweden. Typically, respondents would state that they “feel strong” and that they “want to work” but that their slow progress in learning Swedish presents an obstacle to employment. Often these people had some kind of income during their stay in the country of transit, for example as a salesperson in a small shop. They could not fully understand the high relevance of the Swedish language for entering the labour market and referred to acquaintances in other countries that were able to acquire a (low-skilled) job very quickly after resettlement.

Four out of 22 interviewees had travelled outside Sweden for shorter trips; in each case the trip had been back to the country of transit, either Kenya or Ethiopia, to visit close family, either their spouse or their children. Interviewees, who were keen to meet with someone residing in Somalia, often arranged to meet in a neighbouring country due to the safety situation.

Mobility within SwedenAs previously stated, the Somalis resettled in Sweden were disper-sed relatively widely throughout the country. Among those who informed this study, the vast majority had stayed in the municipali-ties to which they were assigned. Many of those who had not moved explained that they did not know people elsewhere in Sweden, that they were quite content living where they were, and that they had not thus far considered it because they had spent such a short time in Sweden. Those resettled in smaller municipalities (fewer than 10,000 inhabitants) sometimes negatively commented on the size of

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the place and expressed a wish to move to a more densely populated municipality with better public facilities, such as bigger hospitals for those with children who require medical care, and bigger stores with a greater assortment of goods, or to places where they have relatives.

Three interviewees had moved to another municipality for family reasons and education. Two of them moved out of their arrival municipalities in the north to stay with family members who were living in a different part of the country – one moved not only because her relative lived there, but also specifically due to the municipality’s greater concentration of Somalis, while the other moved further south after three years in Sweden to take care of newly resettled extended family members. The warmer climate was mentioned as a contributory factor in his move. The third person moved to study at university in a different city where she also had friends (who originated from other African countries) enrolled in higher education there. Her family supported her move since they reasoned that being close to supportive friends would be beneficial for her studies.

In regards to shorter trips, most of the interviewees mainly travelled within the Swedish region where they lived. These trips were motivated by visits to friends and family. As we have seen, maintaining contact with family and friends is a big motivator for travel. The few people who had not travelled within Sweden had no social ties of any kind to anyone else in Sweden. Ethnic needs are another motivator for travel; several of the women explained that, as opposed to Somali males who are not limited to culturally typical clothes, the women’s more culturally determined clothes are not available everywhere, hence the need to travel to specific Somali or Arabic shops in other cities. Others travelled frequently to access better public facilities, hospitals and shops in a bigger municipality in the region.

ImmobilityContrary to the dominant literature on Somali mobility mentioned earlier (see Carlson et al. 2011; Johnsdotter 2010; Moret 2015; Nielsen 2004; van Liempt 2011), our interviews with recently resettled Somalis in Sweden showed little mobility. In fact, the interviewees described different factors that limited their travelling. First, they pointed to their travel document – the “alien’s passport”

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– which is issued to them until they obtain Swedish citizenship after eight years.37 It is significantly more difficult to be granted a visa with this document, as confirmed by the UNHCR (2013a). I-27 had travelled on her alien’s passport but found that it took longer, as she was stopped more frequently at security checks. The lack of Swedish citizenship may also account for the fact that resettled Somali are not seen to travel to other countries – a paradox of EU citizenship is that, while it connects the holder to a certain national territory, it also allows for greater mobility, as it facilitates settlement in another EU country (see also Johnsdotter 2010). Another constraint that deters them from travelling is the lack of finances. I-18 stated that this lack of money prevents him from travelling to Kenya to bring his under-age daughter to Sweden under family reunification provi-sions. Another practical issue limiting travel is not being able to find one’s way, as I-8 finds; for this reason, she feels compelled to only travel in the company of someone. Furthermore, as we saw earlier, immobility can, in some cases, be explained by a lack of social ties, as the motivation to visit other places or countries is often the wish to meet with friends, family and acquaintances.

Social networks and social capital This third and final sub-section, discusses the interviewees’ social networks and the possibilities they have to use their social networks to form social capital.

Family and other strong tiesOf the 22 interviewees who had lived in camps, 13 had children and were, in most cases, resettled together with them. However, in two cases, under-age children came later through family reuni-fication. Thus, although the interviewees have many of their close family members in Sweden, the vast majority (20 out of 22) also has siblings, parents, spouses or children outside Sweden – twelve in their country of transit (Kenya or Ethiopia); others in Somalia, and a few in other resettlement countries or in other countries in the region.

Wanting to discuss the separation of families and family reunification was a common pattern during the interviews. Three interviewees had reunited with family members after arrival in

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Sweden, two applications were still pending, and others had applied but been denied. In some cases one reason for rejecting family reunification for the spouse was that the couple did not have children together.38 A few of the interviewees had children in the country of transit. For some of them, reuniting with their children was impossible because they could not afford the tickets and for others because the children were over 18 and therefore legally adults – only in special cases can those over 18 be granted residence permits (Migrationsverket 2014c). Being older than 18 affected I-4, who wanted to be resettled together with her brother and his family in Canada but, because she was no longer legally a minor, she was resettled by herself in Sweden. Her husband was unable to join her since they were not married when she first applied for resettlement. I-6 presented another example of family separation. While he was resettled, together with his siblings and their mother, the father’s application was impeded by the fact that he lived outside the camps and did not have the necessary documentation. Their family reunification is still restricted since the father cannot afford to stay in Nairobi for as long as it takes to go through the process. The UNHCR (2013a) identifies family reunification as very important for the well-being of refugees and is concerned that Sweden’s practice of not accepting Somali identity documents is hindering family reunification.

Other SomalisThe interviewees spoke of social networks across the world. More than half had relatives and friends in other resettlement countries such as the USA, Canada and Australia. Many had frequent contact with people in the country of transit. They had a strong connection to that country since that is where they spent a considerable part of their life, where they have most of their family and friends and where they feel that they understand the system. Two interviewees stated that they send financial remittances to family and friends in the Dadaab camps. According to previous studies (Brinkemo 2014; Melander 2009) sending money back to Somalia or to nearby countries is quite common among Somalis in Sweden, even in cases where they do not have much to spare.

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Most of the social ties that the interviewees had in Sweden were with other resettled Somalis in their municipality. This corresponds to Melander’s (2009) findings on Somalis in Sweden, where most of the informants’ ties were extended to other individuals of the same ethnic background. In her study, the informants who had relatives in Sweden had their closest relationships with them. Many without relatives in Sweden developed strong friendships with other people from Somalia, while those without strong ethnic ties had often gained social support from other networks, professional or otherwise. Our study showed that exclusive contact with other Somalis, to some extent, has to do with the interviewees’ language skills. As I-7 says, the reason he only knows other Somalis is because he can only communicate in the Somali language.

In our interviews with municipal officials we learnt that almost all of the Somalis who lived in the municipalities where we conducted interviews had been resettled. This means that most of them had arrived in Sweden after 2010 (see Table 1). That, in turn, indicates that the Somalis our interviewees have contact with have, like them, only recently arrived in Sweden. Nevertheless, the interviewees all said that they have received support from other Somalis. The help would usually involve practical everyday matters unfamiliar to them, such as paying bills online, installing a light bulb, withdrawing money from an ATM, and help with understanding letters in Swedish.

A number of the interviewees have family members and friends outside their municipality, living in different parts of Sweden, often in the north. Many of the social ties to other Somalis in Sweden date back to their time in camp together. Contact with those who live in other parts of Sweden is mostly sporadic. Nevertheless, some of the interviewees described how they had benefited from these contacts. For example, I-18 got financial help from Somalis in other municipalities when he needed to buy tickets so some of his children could come to Sweden, while I-19 received visits from Somalis in the city where her child was hospitalised.

Organisations There are numerous Somali organisations in Sweden – in the Scania region there are about 20, in Gothenburg 14 and in Stockholm more than 100 (Integration Board 1999; Melander 2009; Open Society

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Foundation 2014). This exceptionally large number of small orga-nisations can, to some extent, be explained by clan divisions and internal strife in Somalia. However, this fragmentation may also be caused by the individual work opportunities created when starting up such an organisation (Carlson et al. 2012; Integration Board 1999; Open Society Foundation 2014).

The Swedish welfare system builds on the public sector largely as the only actor to deal with an individual’s socio-economic needs, while ethnic organisations are usually limited to dealing with cultural issues. Although this makes them important meeting places for fostering bonding ties (with individuals perceived to be socially alike), they usually lack not only the mandate but also the resources to support their members’ efforts to rebuild their life in the Swedish society (Brinkemo 2014; Open Society Foundation 2014). Yet Somali organisations in other countries, such as the UK, Canada and the US, have proved that they can provide a lot more than just “culture”: apart from providing the possibility to (re-)establish networks with other Somalis, they have also been found to open doors to other societal groups, as well as to form institutions (such as business and information centres) in the new host society. In other words, they have established bonding, bridging and linking ties (Open Society Foundation 2014). Simply put, compatriots can, more effectively than state officials, convey essential, societal information to newly arrived Somalis who struggle with understanding Swedish society and its rules (Open Society Foundation 2014). Established Somalis, those who Melander (2009) calls “bridge-builders” (brobyggare), often provide practical and social support to their co-nationals, which can be essential for processes of integration (Johnsdotter 2010).

In one of the municipalities where the interviews for this study were conducted, two of the participants had founded a Somali organisation in 2013. The rationale was to provide more organised help for other Somalis in the municipality. They admitted that providing support to compatriots as individuals could, at times, become burdensome, as Melander (2009) also found in his earlier study, and the organisation served to lessen the burden on individuals by sharing it between several members. The organisation provides information to its members on a variety of everyday tasks and provides help with homework for children and societal information for adults.

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The organisation introduced here, however, has a bigger aim than just to provide help to co-nationals; they also want to reach out with their activities beyond their own ethnic group. Their five native Swedish members expressed an interest in the organisation and were then personally invited by its head. He strongly believes that it is important for newly arrived Somalis to enter into society and for their children to grow up feeling that Sweden is their home country. The organisation provides a venue for contact where people can meet and get to know each other, which is the first step towards mutual integration and the eventual elimination of racism (I-12). Another aim of the organisation is to make Somali culture known in the municipality; they organise meetings where they show videos, hold presentations, and perform songs and dances from Somalia. Yet another set of bridging ties based on religious affiliation is formed when the organisation arranges bigger events to celebrate Muslim holidays, such as Ramadan or Eid, in collaboration with Muslims of other nationalities. The organisation’s members are both Somalis from the same municipality and from further away, as well as municipality residents with different ethnic backgrounds. The organisation is solely funded by membership fees.

Absence of ties: feeling lonelyAs we have seen, most of the interviewees claim to have bonding ties with family members both in Sweden and in other parts of the world, as well as friends in Sweden who mostly are Somali. However, three interviewees stated that they felt very lonely and had no one to turn to – “No one is showing me the way” and “I feel blind” (I-5 and I-11). Both were only recently resettled (between 6 and 18 months before the interview) and lived in a small municipality with a limited number of other Somalis. I-11 lives with his two brothers. He grew up in a refugee camp and had a vast social network there that he misses. I-5 is in his 40s and lives with his family. His conversion to Christianity caused him to be treated poorly by other Somalis both in Somalia and in Sweden. And I-15 (a middle-aged man who had resettled without his family) gave a very gloomy account of his stay in Sweden. He did not hide his disappointment at how his life in Sweden had turned out, and talked of feeling that he has been put in an environment where he is helpless and has no one to guide him through it. “Here, they put me in a room, an apartment, and put

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forward aid [allowance]”. He says that he felt “deaf” and “blind” and that his constant worries about the future and lack of meaning-ful activities made him depressed.39

Religion and clansMost interviewees did not bring up the topic of clan or religion, nor were any direct questions asked about it. As it was, they were only mentioned in two of the 26 interviews. However, this should not be interpreted as evidence that clan and religion were of no importance. The importance of religion becomes evident in the case of I-5, who has very little connection with others Somalis since he does not share their religion.

Religion plays an important role in the life of many Swedish Somalis (Open Society Foundation 2014). Melander’s (2009) study, for example, found that, for some informants, religion has become a tool to help deal with their war experiences and life in exile. The clan system has also been said to fill a social and existential role as well as to function as a socio-economic safety net (Johnsdotter 2002). Informants in previous studies presented different perspective on the importance of clan, some arguing that it has played out its role in Sweden whereas others argued that it persists (Melander 2009; Open Society Foundation 2014). Johnsdotter (2002) argued that the clan system still functions and exists as a social network for Somalis in Sweden but that Somalis avoid speaking about it with non-Somalis because of the connotations of war and backwardness that they perceive it has in Sweden.

Ties to other ethnic groupsSeveral of the interviewees also have friends who are migrants from countries other than Somalia. They have met where they study, and in their neighbourhood. One of the younger interviewees made Swedish friends by volunteering for an NGO and another one through school and playing on a football team. However, these ties are often described as less important and shallower than those they maintain with other Somalis.

As our study shows, language is an important bridge-builder which facilitates contacts with people who are not part of the same ethnic group. Some of the interviewees communicate with their non-Somali

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friends in Arabic, others in Swedish. One of the interviewees, who spoke English on arrival, stated that he had experienced a relatively smooth transition into Swedish society because he could speak to Swedes from Day 1. He explains: “It is easy for me to integrate. For the first four months I spoke with other Swedes in English, Arabic, or Italian because I know those languages. So it is easy…” (I-12). Arabic also proved to be of good use to I-2, who explained how he befriended other Arabic-speakers, and currently shares an apartment with two Arabic-speaking friends. He also tried to use his language skills to find work in Arabic shops, attempts which were, however, unsuccessful. I-2 continued using the different forms of cultural capital in his repertoire in order to find employment and eventually acquired a paid position working with youth for a Somali organisation.

Concluding remarks As presented above, all our interviewees fled conflict and/or persecution in Somalia. However, depending on whether they lived in a Kenyan or an Ethiopian camp, or found employment in Libya, their post-flight lives presented very different opportunities – in terms of freedom for mobility, for work, for self-determination – for them to apply and acquire human, cultural and social capital.

The interviewees’ mobility patterns were related both to their time in the camps and to the social networks they were able to form there. Most interviewees made friends in the camps and maintained contact with them despite now living in different countries. Those who had travelled outside Sweden have gone back to countries of transit where they had connections both to people and, to some extent, the country. Very few seriously thought about changing their current place of residence. One potential explanation for this was that they had not quite settled into their municipality or because they did not have social networks that would allow them to go elsewhere. Previous studies suggest that, after eight years, when most Somalis are able to attain Swedish citizenship, several looked for opportunities in other parts of Europe or the world, and that their social networks, their educational level and their financial resources affected this decision.

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Networks and various types of capital are crucial in building up a new life in a new society. Some of our interviewees came to Sweden with cultural capital in the form of language knowledge and were able to create networks both within (bonding) and across (bridging) ethnic boundaries. Those who had had more exposure to different types of society (not just refugee camps) before their arrival in Sweden also found it easier to understand and adapt to the Swedish system. For those who arrived without much of the cultural capital (for example, language, literacy, computer skills) that is so useful for participating in the wider Swedish society, it was hard to access anything other than bonding ties with their own group. Thus, for them and their well-being, bonding ties became even more crucial. The networks that the interviewees in this study had within Sweden mainly consisted of other resettled Somalis who had also recently arrived in Sweden. While these contacts provided some support when finding their way into Swedish society, many interviewees still felt quite lost in their new life. The established networks of Somali-born residents (Somali organisations and business centres, for example) in Sweden were not located in the municipalities where the interviewees were resettled. Only one interviewee was able to benefit from these established networks, but after he moved into another municipality. In fact, many resettled Somali were the first to arrive in their municipalities and can thus be said to have constituted a pioneer group at the local level.

The biggest frustration raised by the interviewees was the difficulty in finding employment and understanding the Swedish system. As mentioned, many studies suggest that compatriots and ethnic organisations can be helpful in providing a deeper understanding of life in Sweden than that which the Swedish authorities and institutions can provide (Brinkemo 2014; Carlson et al. 2012; Melander 2009; Open Society Foundation 2014). From our study we have one example of this happening in a Somali organisation formed by resettled refugees. Why it does not happen in more of the municipalities where we conducted interviews might be because there are not enough people who possess the social and cultural capital needed to organise it. Furthermore, the very recent arrival of many Somalis, and the way in which they were geographically dispersed in small numbers into their municipalities, may have further prevented organised networks (thus far) from emerging.

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FindingsThis final section brings together the findings presented in the two case studies in a comparative way. The role which social networks can play in the integration process of individuals and groups is presented here. By making the link between the pre-resettlement situation and the post-resettlement period in terms of mobility practices, network formation and capital accumulation, the chapter comprehensively connects the post-resettlement integration process to events in time and space. To recall, the integration process is defined very broadly, and includes a variety of aspects that enable individuals to build up a new life in a new country. The two groups, refugees from Burma and from Somalia, both experienced protracted refugee situations before arriving in Sweden over the past ten years. These groups were chosen to enable us to see what difference the earlier migration by co-nationals can make for the overall integration process. While the Burmese Karen in this study were resettled from roughly the same region in Thailand, the interviewed Somalis came from three dif-ferent regional settings; the majority from the Kenyan camps around Dadaab, but others from camps in Ethiopia and Tunisia. Depending on their previous setting, they had remarkably different experiences of their pre-resettlement time and, in general, showed quite varied levels of social, cultural and human capital. Both groups are under-stood to have little human capital and to experience severe difficul-ties in integrating economically into the Swedish labour market.

The situation in SwedenThe resettled Burmese nationals arrived in Sweden largely between 2004 and 2008, considerably earlier than the resettled Somalis, who arrived mostly after 2010. As we have seen, their geographical concentration in Sweden differs considerably: while an almost equal number (ca 1,700) of Burmese and Somalis were resettled between 2000 and 2012, they were quite unevenly dispersed throughout the country. The Burmese found a home in 33 municipalities, while the Somalis were dispersed into 92. Above all, 67 municipalities only accepted between 1 and 19 resettled refugees in the period, while 12 accepted Burmese refugees. Furthermore, by far the vast majority of Burmese nationals in Sweden arrived through resettlement and, as such, constituted a pioneer group in the Swedish context. On the

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other hand, the fact that there was prior Somali migration to Sweden before the first resettled Somalis arrived has not been found to have had a significant impact on the post-resettlement experiences of the resettled refugees in this study, as they were often the first Somalis to arrive in their respective municipalities. Hence, they, too, can be described as a pioneer group at the local level.

The time beforeWhile both groups spent more than 15 years on average in a refugee camp, they show substantially different patterns of displacement. Most of the Burmese ethnic minority groups – and, above all, the Karen – who fled the Burman regime stayed along the Thai–Burmaese border in one of the refugee camps (some exceptions are provided in the Australian and Japanese chapters in this anthology). One conse-quence of the way in which the conflict played out, and the way in which people fled, was that the majority of the Burmese refugees in the Thai camps were Karen, and they were also the majority of the resettled Burmese in Sweden. Most are Christian, and many are or have been affiliated with the Karen National Union (KNU) or the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) – either directly or indi-rectly. Long before they fled across the border to Thailand, they for-cefully relocated many times within Eastern Burma (the Karen State) (see, inter alia, Phan 2009). Everywhere they went, they quickly set up their social and administrative organisation. This made them into a group with relatively compact structures of social cohesion and organisation in the camps, which were rebuilt and largely main-tained. This is very different to the flight of the Somalis, who left Somalia in large numbers from the end of the 1980s because of the conflict there. They ended up in many parts of the world. By no means everyone ended up in refugee camps and, according to our key informants, the Somalis in the Dadaab camps of Kenya belonged to the most marginalised among the fleeing Somalis – those with very low levels of financial, human, and social capital.

Further, the pre-resettlement contexts (after Mahoney 2008) of most of our interviewees were quite similar, as both groups fled oppressive governments and/or civil war, endured protracted refugee situations, and spent a significant time in refugee camps. However, the cultural, community, human and security contexts of their lives

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in the refugee camps as well as their level of self-determination differed greatly. This meant, for example, that their access to education, to health provision and income-generating activities was quite dissimilar. In both of the camp situations (Dadaab and the camps in Thailand), the residents were forbidden to leave the camp and to work. However, in Thailand, it was possible to partly circumvent or negotiate these rules, especially for the residents of the camps located closer to urban areas, to a much greater extent than in Kenya. As such, the spectre of possible income-generating activities was found to be greater in the Thai camps than in Dadaab, where the refugees had hardly any such “out-of-the-camp opportunities”. Despite this, those in the Thai camps also spoke of the dire shortage of opportunities after secondary school, without little potential for developing and realising their dreams. The camps in Thailand also demonstrated a unique level of self-determination on the part of the refugees, a very high enrolment rate in primary schools and, compared to the Dadaab camps, widespread access to basic or medium medical facilities.

A further difference concerned the perceptions and experiences of resettlement. For example, when the opportunity to resettle came along in 2005, many Karen refugees decided against resettlement, as many (especially the older generation) deemed life in the camps to be acceptable, and that returning to Myanmar was still, for many, the preferred option. The Somalis, on the other hand, saw resettlement much more as the only solution to a better life. The interviews with refugees from Burma, both in Thailand and in Sweden, also revealed more ambivalence towards resettlement. While the majority expressed their gratitude for being able to lead a life of freedom, in peace and in security, some stated that they had decided to resettle solely for the sake of their children’s future.

MobilityWhile secondary movements within Sweden have been considera-bly easier since 2010, our two groups of respondents – for various reasons – did not move in large numbers, post-resettlement. The very few who did move (from both groups) did so to be closer to either family or other co-nationals, or for work and education. Hardly anyone expressed the intention to relocate within Sweden, yet a

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handful of interviewees said they expected to relocate to another country in the future. Behind these intentions lay the wish to be closer to family members who were resettled in other countries, or to make use of their skills and knowledge, and hence experience social mobility in a way that they had not found possible in Sweden. Most of the respondents who expressed these intentions deemed Swedish citizenship to be a necessary prerequisite in making their move, and hence felt compelled to wait for a few more years.

Both groups had, overall, travelled infrequently within Sweden and abroad. The trips within Sweden were motivated largely by seeing family or co-ethnics, accessing health facilities, or business activities (rare). The reasons for the limited travelling abroad were insufficient financial resources, as well as increased hassle and even obstacles when travelling with their temporary travel documents (främlingspass) – thus not having Swedish citizenship was, in some cases, found to be an effective deterrent. Both groups had difficulties proving their individual identities. Consequently, most had to wait for at least eight years before they could obtain Swedish citizenship – something that a number of interviewees considered to have had a negative impact on their mobility rights (see UNHCR 2013a). While some of the Karen interviewees had just obtained citizenship (and in some cases made use of the mobility it facilitates), of the Somali respondents, only one of the interviewees had already obtained citizenship. Among the Karen (with or without citizenship), most short-term trips were to neighbouring European countries to meet with Karen resettled there, while the Somali had a higher propensity to travel to the country of transit in order to meet with close family members who had not been resettled.

Social networks and capitalsIn regards to their post-resettlement situation, the types of social network the resettled refugees had created or had access to in Sweden – which consisted of both bonding and bridging ties – and the Swe-den-specific capital they were able to derive from it, differed greatly.

Both the Burmese Karen and the Somalis stressed the significance of bonding ties with co-ethnics/nationals. Almost all of the interviewees, irrespective of the level of Swedish and their knowledge of other languages, stated that they spent most of their

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free time with their co-ethnics. However, there were quite a number of differences to highlight: the Karen seemed to possess considerably more bonding and bridging ties than the Somali respondents. So far, the benefits derived from this can mostly be found in the social sphere, where the Karen as a group have found more venues for contact and exchange with Swedish society than the Somalis. While this is explained in detail in the case studies, some major points to highlight are the following. Firstly, the nature of the conflict in Myanmar and of displacement fostered, as mentioned above, a strong sense of cohesion among the Karen. However, there were some quite major rifts among them, too, said to be less relevant in the camps than in Myanmar and virtually non-existent in Sweden. The practice of replicating these structures wherever they were displaced certainly helps to explain the very quick establishment of the Karen Swedish Community (KSC). This organisation exists nationwide, with small factions in many of the municipalities in which the Karen were placed. The rationale of the KSC is to foster Karen unity in Sweden (bonding capital), and to integrate the Karen into Swedish society, inter alia by representing Karen culture to the wider Swedish public (bridging capital). As the study shows, in order for the KSC to gather a substantial number of members and to access government funding for their ethnic associations, the social and cultural capital of a number of individuals, developed both before and after resettlement, was indispensable in this process. Importantly, while the loss of skilled individuals through resettlement was experienced as “devastating” in the camps, some of these skilled people were highly valuable and influential in building up structures in the new country, especially in enabling the Karen as a group to re-establish and maintain their bonding ties, and thereby allowing the creation of bridging ties.

On the other hand, the Somalis interviewed for this study provided a much more fragmented account of their social networks. While some had family members who had arrived in Sweden earlier, from whom they had received some help, others stated that they hardly knew anyone, either in their municipality or in the rest of Sweden. In one municipality where interviews took place, efforts were made to establish a Somali organisation that would not only support other Somalis in their daily encounters with Swedish

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institutions and everyday life, but would also function as a venue for gathering Somalis both to practice their culture and to represent it in the municipality. The organisation seems to be fulfilling this goal to a large extent. However, it is not connected to a wider network of Somali organisations and does not receive the state funding that would allow it to expand and intensify its activities.

The Karen part of the study also shows the significance of religious affiliation for creating bridging ties. The majority of those interviewed were Christians. Already during their time in Thailand, networks based on religious affiliation played an instrumental role, as a striking number of Christian organisations and individuals were involved, in different ways, not only in humanitarian and relief work, but also in brokering contacts at the individual level. In Sweden, apart from the municipal (welfare) institutions, the church congregations and individual members they met there proved to be pivotal for accessing information and resources. There was an awareness of this among the Karen, which caused many Buddhist Karen to attend the services as well and even to convert to Christianity. In contrast, while religion certainly played an important role in the life of most Somali resettled refugees, in the interviews it was not mentioned as a unifying factor. Judging from the narrated experiences of the interviewee who converted to Christianity, religion is important in inclusion/exclusion practices. However, neither mosques nor other places of worship were pointed to as places where resources and information could be accessed.

The interviews with the Somali provided a much more fragmented and troubled account of their existence and, to some extent, gave the impression of disorientation. Part of the explanation surely lies in the fact that the Somalis interviewed had only been in Sweden for a short time (nine months to three years), and many were still in the process of re-orientation and settlement. Many were also involved in the draining bureaucratic processes of trying to achieve family reunification which, as we have already stated, is crucial in the broader integration process. As we saw, in both groups there were a considerable number of respondents who had close family members abroad. However, for the Somali interviewees, the situation with family reunification seemed to be more intricate, with not only parents and siblings, but also spouses and children in the country

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of transit – although, admittedly, our fieldwork in Thailand also revealed many narratives on the topic of family reunification.

Final remarksAs shown, social networks are highly relevant for refugee integra-tion. With regards to the process of building up a new life after resettlement, our study contributes to the literature that recognises the value of bonding capital, both in itself and as a tool for creating wider (bridging) social networks. We have highlighted how a few individuals with higher human and cultural capital than other network members have been able to create bridging ties between their own group and other groups, which not only works to their individual benefit, but can also help members who are part of their group.

The practical implication of this study is that the post-resettlement process ought to facilitate the (re-)establishment of bonding ties – both in informal and more organised ways; bonding ties are usually formed first and with the least effort, and are open to anyone who shares the feeling of belonging. Provided that the group has an interest in accessing the new host society, these bonding ties can then, as shown, lead to bridging ties, inasmuchas the few individuals who have the capacity to do so create bridges to other, more differentiated and more established, networks. As such these created bridges are of greater benefit to the whole group, even to those members who would never have been able to form them themselves, due to their lack of language skills and social codes and their unfamiliarity with social behaviour (cultural capital). The ambition to facilitate these bonding ties among co-ethnics or co-nationals in the post-resettlement integration process might be a beneficial measure worth considering for overall integration; it has direct consequences for the placement of resettled refugees in the municipalities.

Finally, the capital approach applied in this study has highlighted the prerequisites to accessing resources (i.e. social, cultural and human capital), and how the capital acquired abroad plays (or not) a role during post-resettlement in Sweden. Coupled with the field of refugee protection and humanitarianism, the segmented approach suggested by Jamal (2008) and Brees (2009) – which, among other things, point to the benefits of increased self-reliance pending

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repatriation for all stakeholders involved – also promises benefits for individuals awaiting resettlement. Immaterial assets, such as human, cultural and social capital, reap benefits for the future process of building up a new life after resettlement. The development of this capital is strengthened by the right to mobility and to work – in other words, rights which are often absent in a protracted refugee situation. By highlighting the importance of capital-rich individuals in the integration process of a whole group, this study provides a strong impetus for adhering to the principles of fundamental human rights in long-term refugee situations, as they enable the acquisition of various forms of capital – for the benefit of all concerned.

Notes

1. For a general critique see, above all, the work of Malkki (1996). Other authors include Bird et al. (2012), Hyndman & Giles (2011), Lamba & Krahn (2003) and Nibbs (2011). For a critique of Swedish conditions, see Brune (2004), Khosravi (2010) and Wikström (2009).

2. Importantly, the vast majority of the Burmese/Myanmarese nationals we interviewed belonged to the ethnicity of the Karen because the majority of the camp residents from which the refugees were selected for resettlement were in fact Karen (TBC 2011). In this study, the term “Burmese” refers to the nationality of the group if not stated otherwise, and is thus not to be confused with the ethnicity of the Burman, who constitute the majority in Myanmar. The regime oppressing and killing the Karen and other ethnic groups since 1946 consists largely of individuals of Burman ethnicity.

3. In 1989, the Burmese regime changed the country’s name from Burma to Myanmar. The oppositional democracy movement opposed this name. Many prominent Karen activists and all the interviewees in this study used the name Burma. Also, while the Swedish stakeholders speak of the “Burmese” when talking about the resettled refugees, they are listed as citizens of Myanmar in the official statistical database. In this study, Burma and Myanmar are used interchangeably.

4. It is interesting to note that the Burmese Karen have also been pioneer migrants in other resettlement countries such as Canada (Erdogan 2012; Hyndman 2011), or the Czech Republic (Sicrie Project 2011). Australia seems to be the only resettlement country that had already experienced considerable Karen immigration before 2005 (see Worland’s chapter in this book), while Japan received a modest number before 2010 (Osanami Törngren, in this anthology).

5. Traditionally, the southern part has not received many resettled refugees. One reason for this is the overall higher number of asylum-seekers and refugees who choose to live there.

6. Since 2008, Sweden (like all other EU member-states except for Denmark who pledge resettlement places) receives a lump sum of € 4,000 per refugee from the EU through the European Refugee Fund (ERF). This sum is to be

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increased in the next fund, the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF).

7. This was the first major reform in the field of integration policy since 1997/98. Briefly, it redistributed the central role in the 24-month integration programme from the municipalities to the state. Other changes were the inclusion of an “Introduction Guide” (lots) into the programme (abandoned in 2015) and the transferability of the establishment allowance.

8. Maintaining and simultaneously reinforcing social ties was the basis for frequent border crossings in Moret’s (2015) study on Somalis in European countries. Weddings, in particular, were mentioned as social occasions where culture and traditions were upheld and transferred to the younger generation, but also where new connections were made. Physical mobility thus allowed individuals not only to (re-)create emotional ties with people they held dear, but also to (re-)negotiate their position in a social network and thereby forge and strengthen their social capital.

9. On the other hand, social networks are also embedded in a certain societal structure, which has an impact on further social capital development as influenced by individuals in their efforts to form and maintain social ties (Lin 2002). While, for a proper social networks analysis, the structural factors (e.g. the reception framework, the previous history etc.) have to be taken into consideration, our study explicitly makes do with the individuals and the network and, as mentioned before, treats the structure as secondary.

10. Elwert (1982) was the first to introduce the advantages of bonding capital for integration into the German debate that was, up until then, dominated by a negative view of strong migrant organisation. It was feared that autonomous institutions of immigrants would lead to the establishment of ghettos.

11. Possible explanations to this faction serve both perceived religious discrimination of Buddhist Karen at the hands of the Christian leadership, and the manipulation of the Buddhist ranks by the (Buddhist) Burmese regime. The defecting Buddhists formed the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), and from 1995, committed human rights violations at the Eastern border with Thailand as a proxy army of the Burmese regime (Worland 2010).

12. The four-cuts policy was developed in the 1970s by the former regime. Its rationale was to undermine the ethnic militia’s struggle by cutting off their access to food, funds, information and recruitment (Wae Moe 2011).

13. On 8 August 1988, hundreds of thousands of people protested for democracy across Burma. The protests that were heaviest in the capital Rangoon were initiated by students, and brutally cracked down on by the military, leaving many dead, wounded, arrested or forced to leave the urban areas (Marshall 2003).

14. Mannerplaw in Eastern Burma (Karen State) was the KNU’s headquarters and ”the symbolic heart of ethnic resistance” (South 2003:220), which fell in an attack by the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army and the government’s regime in 1995.

15. One objective of the resettlement programme was to ease the living conditions of the refugees who remained in the camp with scant resources. However, because the conflict in Myanmar was still ongoing and the economic situation in the country was dire, the UNHCR resettlement scheme attracted new refugee arrivals, leaving the camps in the same crowded conditions it was meant to alleviate.

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16. Strictly speaking, the so-called Black Karen do not belong to the Karen ethnicity but to a group of Muslims who, after the 1988 uprising in Burma, agreed to form a regiment and fight under the authority of the KNLA, the armed wing of the KNU. They are called Black because of their dark skin tone.

17. The Karen National Union (KNU) is the quasi-government representing the Karen in Eastern Myanmar (the area claimed as the “Karen State”). While the original goal was to form an independent Karen State, since the 1970s the official KNU stance has been to create an autonomous state within a federal union (Karen National Union 2015).

18. The colloquial lingua at the Thai–Burmese border labels immigrants from Burma without immediate protection as “needs migrants”. Their migration is solely seen to be based on economic reasons (I-16 and I-17, Thailand), and they are often of Burman ethnicity. However, a number of scholars point out that, in practice, the difference between political oppression and economic precarity is blurry (Balcaitè 2014; Brees 2009) and, to some extent, connected to intra-Karen power structures (Horstmann 2011). Migrant schools are designed for the children of Burmese migrant workers crossing the border to Thailand.

19. www.theborderconsortium.org; www.zoa-international.com; www.msf.org.

20. For example, the Shalom Arts and Leadership College (SALC) is one of the post-10 education providers located in Mae La Camp. The school offers a Bachelor’s Degree in Liberal Arts and, in 2014, taught a variety of disciplines such as philosophy, political science, sociology to 87 students, many of whom were from Burma.

21. For example, the Australian Catholic University – with its partner York University in Canada – offers a Diploma of Liberal Arts on two campuses in the borderland. Part of the course is taught through online instruction.

22. This practice has its roots in the time of colonisation by the British Crown and the establishment of the Adventist (and Baptist) missionaries in Burma (I-16). Thus, nowadays, the Seventh Day Adventist University, the Asia Pacific International University north of Bangkok accepts some refugee students. For courses in Christian Theology, the Baptist Oriental Theological Seminary in Nagaland, India, or the Baptist Seminary in Baguio, the Philippines, accept a couple of refugee students each year.

23. The clinic’s founder, Dr Cynthia Maung, herself a Burmese refugee, received the “World’s Children’s Prize Award” in 2007 from Queen Silvia of Sweden (The World’s Children’s Prize n.d.). The clinic is located outside the refugee camps and mostly treats Burmese migrant workers and refugees for a small sum of money. Its medical staff delivers babies, treats the most common diseases and conducts minor surgery. The clinic receives financial support from the EU and other international donors (www.maetaoclinic.org).

24. One interviewee in Sweden recalls how as a barefoot doctor he delivered babies, taught hygiene and first-aid and amputated legs, and how, more than once, he was chased by Burmese soldiers. “I risked my life”, he says, and recalls how he sometimes went to jungle villages in which, apart from flies on the corpses, no living soul was around (I-8, Sweden).

25. Most of the interviewees in Thailand stated that there was a quite strict separation between the jobs that the camp residents (refugees) did and the jobs that the so-called migrants did. For example (with some exemptions) it would be the migrants who worked in the factories in Mae Sot, Bangkok and other Thai towns and cities. Oftentimes, employment in a factory goes through an agent (social network) who had already arranged everything

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from Burma. Many of the migrants were Burmans and left the country for purely economic reasons (I-16, Thailand). Interestingly, there seemed to be some situations where migrants’ and refugees’ paths intertwined: for example, Balcaitè (2014) points to the connectedness of Karen migrant and refugee networks, and the nexus between economic and political reasons for leaving the country. I-13, in Sweden, recalls how she left not only the camp but also the borderland after finishing school and, with the help of contacts who could transport her clandestinely away from the borderland, went to major Thai cities to work as a nurse and nanny. However, this seems not to be very common.

26. As this information is purely hearsay (from interviews both in Sweden and in Thailand), it is impossible to put forward for more detailed reasons for the return of these resettled refugees. Suter & Magnusson’s (2014) contribution on the experiences and perceptions of resettlement sums up some of the reasons, which might serve as an indication for the return of resettled refugees.

27. None of them spent much time with other ethnic groups from Burma (such as the Chin, Shan, Kachin or Burmans) even though, when asked, they knew of their presence. However their contact did not seem to stretch beyond a friendly “Hi” in the street.

28. This has certainly to do with the aforementioned strong intertwining of religious, ethnic and political/military dimensions in current Karen nationalism, as well as with the fact that the Karen struggle against suppression has largely unfolded independently to the struggle of other ethnic minorities (see, for example, Horstmann 2011).

29. There is a second nationwide Karen organisation in Sweden, the Swedish Karen Baptist Fellowship (SKBF). This organisation has transnational ties to similar organisations in Thailand and many other resettlement countries and is sometimes perceived to compete with the KSC for members. Due to a methodological bias, this study does not describe the role and activities of the SKBF.

30. Importantly, the Somali diasporas not only consist of (former) refugees, but their migrations have been for a variety of reasons, e.g. due to (former) colonial ties and practices, to a nomadic heritage or to student migration (Kleist 2004).

31. These missions went in 2010 to Kenya (299 Somalis), to Egypt (43 Somalis) and Djibouti (128 Somalis); in 2011 to Kenya (340, unclear how many of them were Somalis), to Tunisia (81 Somalis), and Djibouti (88 Somalis); in 2012 to Kenya (294 Somalis), and to Uganda (12 Somalis), and in 2013 to Kenya (265 Somalis) (Migrationsverket 2014b).

32. Something that is outside the scope of this paper but worth mentioning is that many Somalis suffered from mental health issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD (Brinkemo 2014; Johnsdotter 2010). These health issues can be linked to the time before their arrival in Sweden, although some research suggests that poor health among refugees can also be heightened by conditions after migration (Wikström 2009).

33. An ”Introduction Guide” (lots) is part of the Employment Services’ programme for newly arrived immigrants. The guide is a person who is commissioned to function as a link between the immigrant and Swedish society and to provide help with finding work using his/her contacts (Swedish Public Employment Service 2014).

34. Thus, despite the government’s strict encampment policy, in 2013, more than 30,000 Somali refugees lived in Kenya’s urban areas (UNHCR 2013d). Most of them lived in the Nairobi neighbourhood of Eastleigh also

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referred to as “Little Mogadishu” (Elliott 2012; Migrationsverket 2013). A minority of them had legal permission to reside in the cities. However, the majority of the refugees living in urban areas was at risk of being arrested and often faced harassment and discrimination (Elliott 2012). Nevertheless, some refugees preferred urban life since it often provided better opportunities and living conditions than the camps (Hyndman & Nylund 1998; Migrationsverket 2013). The Kenyan government had, over the years, conducted several police raids in urban areas in order to find “illegal aliens” and send them to the camps. One of the last raids took place in 2012 (Migrationsverket 2014d).

35. Refugees initiated the Community Secondary Schools because of the limited capacity of the existing secondary schools. The refugees pay for teachers and supplies, Care International supports the management of the schools, and the UNHCR connects the school with donors. Money is also received through remittances (Wright & Plasterer 2012).

36. E.g. Jesuit Refugee Services, Windle Trust Kenya, World University Service of Canada Student Refugee Programme, the Albert Einstein German Academic Refugee Initiative Fund, DDPuri, and Dadaab Young Women Scholarship Initiative (Wright & Plasterer 2012).

37. An alien’s passport can be granted to persons who have obtained a residence permit in Sweden on the grounds of protection and who cannot get a passport from their home country (Migrationsverket 2014e). While the normal time which refugees have to wait until naturalisation is four years, individuals who cannot prove their identity need to wait for eight years until they can apply for citizenship. Somali identity documents issued after 1991 are not accepted by the Migration Board, and Somali nationals can therefore only obtain citizenship after eight years (Migrationsverket 2014b, 2015).

38. According to the Migration Board, the partner of a person living in Sweden can be granted a residence permit in Sweden (Migrationsverket 2014f). The problem for the Somalis is that the Swedish Migration Board does not accept Somali passports and therefore they cannot prove their identity (Migrationsverket 2014b, 2015). Without a proven identity the only way to apply for family reunification is through a DNA test, which is only applicable for parents and children. In these cases, the DNA of the child is used to prove that the two parents are indeed partners and thus eligible for family reunification.

39. The interview with this respondent was cut short when he understood that his participation in this study would not result in any direct personal benefit. He did not feel like sharing more of his situation in Sweden since it would be painful and not worth the pain, since the study would not directly help him in his situation.

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135

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CREATING COMMUNITY: KAREN REFUGEES’ STORIES OF TRANSITION TO LIVING IN AUSTRALIA

Shirley Worland

A land of opportunity for those who search(Saw Hsa Mu, a Karen refugee resettled in Australia in 2009).

IntroductionAustralia is one of the top three countries in the world for the resettlement of refugees. Since the end of World War II, more than 700,000 refugees have resettled there, with more than 100,000 of them arriving in the last ten years under the Humanitarian Programme.1 These refugees have contributed to the creation of a multicultural Australia which respects a rich diversity of ethnic traditions. Since late 2005 to the time of writing (2015), refugees from the protracted conflict in Myanmar are one of the top three regional area focus of Australia’s Humanitarian Programme. Between 2005 and 2013, 16,500 refugees from this conflict have been resettled in Australia, with 9,200, the majority of whom are of Karen ethnicity, arriving from the nine refugee camps situated along the Thai–Myanmar border. An increased allocation of 4,000 refugee places per annum under the Special Humanitarian category2 is expected to result in a significant increase in this number in coming years (Department of

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Immigration and Border Protection 2015a, 2015b; Department of Immigration and Citizenship 2009).

The journey of displacement resulting from conflict is characterised by trauma, fear and loss. It is also characterised by resilience, hope and adaptation. The journey involves human spatial, temporal, historical and symbolic relationships (Long 2000). As such, it is a dynamic journey spanning people’s lives. The Karen refugees resettling in Australia have transitioned through many stages, including being internally displaced in their own country and then within refugee camps in Thailand. To optimise refugees’ transitional journey to third countries, researchers (for example, Ryan et al. 2008) advocate an integrative community development approach that acknowledges individual and collective refugee resilience in transition. This chapter presents such an approach through narratives of Karen refugees who have resettled in Australia. The structure of this chapter first establishes the method and underpinning theory that guided the research, together with a short history of Karen settlement in Australia. The outworking of the theoretical underpinnings in resettled Karen refugee lives in Australia is then presented in a narrative style, with the aim of sensitising researchers and practitioners to the myriad factors impacting on Karen transitional journeys as they seek to adapt to their new environment. The chapter concludes by encouraging readers to reflectively consider their responses to refugee adaptation in host countries.

MethodThis chapter portrays the findings of two separate but related pieces of qualitative research. The first occurred as part of my PhD research over three weeks from December 2008 to January 2009. In this time, I took advantage of two national Karen events – the Karen Baptist Churches of Australia Annual Bible Camp and The Austra-lian Karen Organisation’s (AKO) National Youth Seminar – both held in Sydney, Australia, to conduct two focus groups, in-depth key-informant interviews with ten Karen community leaders and participant observation. The purpose of the focus groups was to garner ideas, opinions and feelings about their resettlement expe-riences, while the key-informant interviews had a broader focus on patterns of Karen resettlement in Australia.

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The second fieldwork took place over two months in July and October 2014. In these two visits, first to the Eastern Australian states and then to South-Western Australia, I conducted in-depth interviews with seven of the people who were focus-group participants and six of the people who were key informants in the 2008/2009 field trip, as well as an additional three key-informant, three individual and five family-group interviews with resettled Karen refugees who had migrated to Australia under the UNHCR Resettlement Scheme since 2006. The principal purpose of this study was to explore resettled Karen refugee acculturation processes in the context of their transitional migratory journeys over time.

An inductive thematic analysis of the data collected, as suggested by Braun and Clarke (2006), was undertaken in each of these studies. Beginning with the familiarisation process – reading and re-reading the transcripts several times – the analysis then moved to the identification of interesting features in the data, and the naming and defining of themes that highlight the interrelated aspects of the lives of resettled Karen refugees in Australia.

The voices of these participants and their stories are represented in this chapter; to give life to the research. However, to safeguard the anonymity of the participants and key informants, pseudonyms are used. Karen names are very descriptive. In most instances, the Karen do not have surnames; all words are their only name. In assigning pseudonyms, I sought to give names that, while they would not identify the person or misidentify another person, would reflect participants’ and key informants’ personalities.3

In a spirit of polyvocality, this chapter creates a space which enables many voices to express a number of truths about the transitional journeys of Karen refugees now living in Australia (Hatch 2002). My voice is included as a gnyaw-wah (white Karen), as I have been privileged to live and work with Karen refugees along the Thai–Myanmar border for the past 12 years. My journey is also transitional, beginning as a short-term volunteer in 2003, living in Mae La Camp for a year while conducting my PhD study (Worland 2010) in 2007, then living and teaching in a remote refugee school for six years, and now lecturing on an international programme in Chiang Mai University. My former students are now in many places; some resettled in the Western countries; others working or attending university in Thailand, and I continue my contact with

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them as their former “thramu” (teacher) or, more specially, their “pee pee” (respected grandmother). In this way, a continuum of lived experience has located my sense of “self” within the Karen’s existential and psychosocial reality.

The potential for researcher bias arising from my already mentioned emic role in this study created a further ethical consideration. To manage this potential bias, a combination of strategies advocated by Padgett (2008) and Creswell (2007) were implemented in all phases of both the 2008/9 and the 2014 fieldwork. These included prolonged engagement in the field, peer debriefing and member checking, whereby I contacted all participants and key informants on Skype, through social media, by telephone or by email after I had completed first drafts of the doctoral thesis and, later, this chapter, to share with them findings and gain their approval for specific passages pertaining to them.

A settlement history of Karen in AustraliaThe first Karen to come to Australia under the UNHCR Resett-lement Scheme arrived in June 2005. However, there were two previous migratory groups of Karen from Myanmar, already settled in Australia, who greatly helped their transitional journey. The first of these migrations was in the decades after Burmese indepen-dence (1948). This group were mostly the spouses of Australian expatriates who had been living in Burma for varying periods of time, but who chose to return to Australia following cessation of British colonial rule. The second migration came after the fall of the Karen National Union (KNU) Army Headquarters at Manerplaw, in Eastern Myanmar in February 1995, when a small number of Karen who escaped at that time were granted refugee status under the Humanitarian Programme and permitted to resettle in Australia. This was a time of great confusion along the Thai–Myanmar border, with large numbers of refugees pouring across into refugee camps and villages along the Thai side. It was also a dangerous time, with many arbitrary killings of Karen being carried out by the Burmese Army and its proxy, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army. In this milieu, a number of Karen were successful in applying for protec-tion through some of the Western countries’ Embassies in Bangkok, Thailand, with a small number eventually being allowed to resettle permanently in those countries.

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Australia was one of those countries, accepting approximately 600 Karen in the immediate months and years following the fall of Manerplaw. This group of Karen, most of whom identified as Christian, were instrumental in establishing Karen-based national, faith, welfare and cultural institutions – the Karen Welfare Association (1996), Australian Karen Organisation (1997), the Karen Baptist Churches of Australia (1997) and the Australian Karen Cultural Organisation (1999). In 2008, the Australian Karen Buddhist Association was formed, reflecting the diversity of faith practices of the most recent Karen migration under the UNHCR Resettlement Scheme.

The Australian Karen Organisation and the Karen Baptist Churches of Australia specifically mirror the organisational processes of the Karen National Union and the Kawthoolei Karen Baptist Churches already established in Myanmar and border areas. State branches of both have been set up in all six Australian states and two territories where Karen live, with sub-committees focusing on issues such as women, youth, education and culture. Through kinship networks, connections were made with some of the first (much smaller) group of Karen to come to Australia in the 1950s and 1960s. In this way, a strong body of support, practically and spiritually, was in place for the third migratory group of Karen, who arrived after 2005 under the UNHCR Resettlement Scheme.

The transition to a new life in a new country – the acculturation processThe process of transition and acculturation for refugees resettling in third countries is complex. Scholarly research highlights issues relating to individual and group dynamics, as well as intergroup and intragroup relationships in terms of ethnic and social identity. For example, Berry (1997) identified two main issues relating to groups who migrate and settle in a culture different to their own – namely, cultural maintenance and contact and participation. Valtonen (2004) builds on this to identify four possible acculturation strategies: assimilation, integration, separation or marginalisation, with integration regarded as the optimum strategy enabling migrants to:

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… participate fully in economic, social, cultural and political activities, without having to relinquish one’s own distinct ethnocultural identity and culture (Valtonen 2004:74) .

Incorporating aspects of both Berry (1997) and Valtonen (2004), Ryan et al. (2008) developed a resource-based model, recognising that the complexity of variables involved when people dislocate and relocate requires a broader approach. Grounded in social psychology, this model adopts a systems perspective within a qualitative framework. Specifically, this model highlights that the foundation of human well-being is the satisfaction of basic physiological and psychological needs; that humans need to have a sense of belonging, a sense of feeling esteemed and wanted in order for successful refugee adaptation to occur in third countries. Its significant difference to earlier quantitative adaptation-measure approaches is that Ryan et al.’s model enables the meaning of actual human stories, told through the voices of the refugees themselves, to be understood. In summary, this model identifies four central issues:

(i) that personal, material, social and cultural resources are interrelated and paramount in the process of migrant transition;

(ii) that the whole refugee experience, including pre-, during and post-migration, must be analysed within a psychological framework;

(iii) that, while host countries have an obligation to ensure that basic needs are met and opportunities provided for refugees, there needs to be an awareness that this does not always happen; and

(iv) that the migration experience is a continuum whereby resources are in a constant state of flux (Ryan et al. 2008).

These central issues provide an appropriate platform for exploring refugee Karen transitory journeys to Western countries such as Australia. The Karen who have left the refugee camps to begin new lives in countries such as the USA, Australia, Canada, Sweden and Norway, leave with the bare minimum of material resources – their traditional clothes, some Western-style clothes, photographs, a Bible (for Christians) and excerpts from the Tripitaka (for Buddhist), music

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CDs and video VCDs in their own language, neatly packed in candy-striped polythene bags. Their reasons for leaving vary, from wanting better opportunities for their children, to finding another way to help their people, and seeking security and freedom of movement. In common, they are leaving the known for the unknown. The degree to which they will realise their hopes and dreams in their new host countries is dependent on three interrelated factors; the personal, material, social and cultural resources that they take with them, how the host country receives them, and how they adapt the resources they bring with them and acquire additional resources once they arrive. This realisation occurs within the context of relationships with family and wider ethnic and social networks, and host societies. At times, this will be a positive experience and, at others, challenges and constraints will test their resilience and coping mechanism.

Karen refugee acculturation in the Australian contextKaren from Myanmar have been living in Australia now for more than 60 years. However, Karen from the refugee camps in Thailand, who make up the bulk of the number, are recent arrivals, now living in all Australian states and territories in both urban and rural settings. Utilising the four central issues of Ryan et al.’s (2008) approach outlined above, this chapter now explores the transitory journeys of these refugee Karen, giving voice to their stories and experiences.

(i) Personal, material, social and cultural resources are interrelated and paramount in the process of migrant transition.

Ryan et al. (2008:13) state that the interrelationship between the personal, material, social and cultural resources that refugees resettling in a third country bring with them are central factors in their acculturation process – the means by which to gain new resources in their host country and to conserve what they bring with them.

The ethnicity of the Karen is characterised by the collective nature of their society, evidenced by the sharing of resources, interdependence of relations among group members and a feeling of involvement in one another’s lives (Erez & Earley 1993; McKinnon 2003). Inherent in this is a strong sense of community, language and faith practices

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which have transitioned with the Karen refugees in their resettlement process. Community is seen in extended family living and in how those who have been in Australia for longer help the newer arrivals and share resources as needed – such as local knowledge for accessing services, translators and transport for attending appointments. This way of living is explained with reference to historical roots by one of my first fieldwork key informants in 2009, Naw Moo Mu, who arrived as a teenager in the second migratory group in 1997,

It is very easy for us to bond everywhere we go. As we are Karen, we are Htaw Meh Peh’s grandchildren,4 so we are all family whether we are here in Australia, in our home country or in the camps.

In this way, individuals arriving without their own family members are not alone as the community work together to ensure they have a place to stay with a family. Naw Say Moo was 20 when she arrived alone in Perth in 2008. Her parents and sister did not have a plan to resettle, but gave their blessing for Say Moo to take this opportunity to further her dream for higher education. Not knowing anyone on arrival, the Karen Welfare Association linked her immediately with a Karen family with whom she lived for the next four years until she finished her education and began working.

I need not worry for anything. Moe (adopted mother) and Baba (adopted father) helped me to organise everything for my needs. I made new friends at church, enrolled in school … God make my life very good here (Naw Say Moo, 2009).

In just six years, Naw Say Moo and her partner have bought their own house and she is working in an administrative position in a refugee settlement agency. They are leaders in their Karen church youth group and active members of the Australian Karen Organisation, Western Australian branch.

My research and familiar connections with the Karen living across many parts of Australia highlight that their strong sense of ethnic community extends beyond their host country living to the maintenance of transnational connections between Australia and the border refugee camps and villages from where they have come.

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As we are Karen, we have heart for our people … we can help what they need (Saw Wah, 2009).

The blessing of this country [Australia] is that, even if our income is less, it is still enough to support our family here and back home as well (Thara Ah Ghay, 2014).

Through regular communication now made possible by modern technology and remittances, participants and key informants all stated across both fieldwork studies that those remaining in the camps and home villages are considered as much a part of the community as those in Australia. An executive member of the Australian Karen Organisation, Saw Nay Htar Ghay, shared with me, in 2009, his belief that resettlement in Australia would, in the longer term, be a “brain gain” for the Karen people, with a significant number becoming educated and returning with those skills to help both in Karen State, Myanmar and the border regions. When I visited with him again in 2014, he was preparing to return to the Thai–Myanmar border to work with Australian Volunteer International5 – “First we settle, then prepare and equip ourselves, then return to help” (Saw Nay Htar Ghay, 2014).

Language is a central way in which social lives are conducted and cultural identities constructed (Kramsch 1998). During my 2009 Australian study, participants and community leaders praised the Australian government’s multicultural policies that promote the maintenance of mother-tongue language and learning.

We can maintain our language, our culture … because when we arrived here, we have our right, because this is a multicultural country, we can speak our language in our community, we can study our literature … this is the beauty of this country (Thara Mar Hser, 2009).

As an indicator of the importance placed on the maintenance of mother-tongue learning, in all states where the Karen are living, volunteers in the churches hold Karen literacy classes on Saturdays and in the school holidays. At different centres in Western Mel-bourne, the local authority fully funds Karen literacy classes every Saturday and in the school holidays, from Grade One to Ten, with more than 300 children enrolled.

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However, while mother-tongue learning is an important cultural resource, host language learning is an important factor in the gaining of new resources in refugees’ transitional journeys. As part of the Australian Settlement Grants Programme, all new refugees attend 510 hours of English-language training (Certificate I), with many continuing to study Certificate II (810 hours). While many Karen have successfully completed these programmes, there are many who find this the most challenging aspect of their transitional journey, especially those who are illiterate in any language when they arrive. A key informant from my 2009 study criticised the means by which English language is taught to these new arrivals, emphasising its ineffectiveness, and hindering rather than helping these refugees’ transition to life in Australia.

Some of them are very frustrated; whatever they were taught they said that they couldn’t grasp what they are teaching … I have told the lecturers from TAFE [College] that you can’t teach these people like you teach the high-school students – some of them have never been to school … have never held a pencil … cannot read or write their own language … you have to start from the very beginning (Naw Kae Blut Moo, 2009).

Naw Moo Mu added that the reason why so many of the adults who are coming have not accessed any formal education is because they have spent their whole childhood running through the jungle to escape the Burmese Army (see also Suter & Magnusson, this anthology). This is just one of the legacies of displacement challenging many of the Karen who are resettling in Australia. The older participants in one of my 2009 focus groups attested to this problem, linking it with their inability to secure employment.

[P]roblem is I can’t speak the language so I can’t find a job – when I try to find a job, I go to the interview, people always ask for certificate, certificate, certificate 6 [laughter] – I can’t get certificate because I can’t speak English, it is a problem (Saw Kler, 2009).

I interviewed Saw Kler again, with the assistance of an interpreter, in 2014. At age 57, having lived in Melbourne for six years, he still cited his greatest challenge of living in Australia to be language.

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I finish 810 hours English study but I cannot pick up … I feel if I had no language difficulty, I could be more useful to help my community (Saw Kler, 2014).

Even so, Saw Kler is a very active member in his Karen community, with his volunteer role in his church where he serves as deacon and pastoral care worker. In this role, he visits the sick and elderly in hospitals and homes, assists newly arrived Karen in his area with practical information such as how to operate household appliances and gives general encouragement to help them transition to their new lives in Australia. His wife and three older children are in full-time employment, and his younger son is completing secondary school.

Religious belief and a connected sense of spirituality are integral components of Karen culture, forming a vital part of their cultural traditions and community (Worland & Vaddhanakphuti 2013). While Christianity is not the majority religion practiced by Karen from Myanmar, it is the majority belief of refugee Karen who have resettled in Australia, evidenced in the expanded growth of Karen-language-based churches wherever they settle (Wilkinson-Hayes 2009). My experience of living in Mae La Camp during the height of the UNHCR Resettlement Programme and subsequent living on the border has shown that, while the selection process of refugees for third-country resettlement does not emphasise any particular religious affiliation, the majority of those choosing to apply for resettlement have been those who have attended school and had various roles, some paid, but mostly unpaid, in community organisations within the camps. Since the advent of a written script for the Karen developed by early Christian missionaries in the early 1800s, there has been a strong link between the Christian church and education. In this way, many of the refugee Karen who have accessed formal education identify as Christian which, in turn, has correlated with Christianity being the predominant faith of the resettled Karen (Kenny & Lockwood-Kenny 2011; Worland & Darlington 2010).

Karen-based churches were formed mostly by the second arrival of Karen migrants in the latter 1990s in Melbourne, Sydney and Perth, with a belief that “If we put God first, He will bless us with our identity … and keep us on track both nationally and spiritually” (Thara Ah Ghay, 2009). Today, there are Karen-language churches that are either independent or a part of established mainstream

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churches in every town and city where Karen live, predominantly of the Baptist denomination, but also Seventh Day Adventist, Anglican and Roman Catholic. For the Christian Karen in Australia, the church is more than a place to hold Sunday or Sabbath services in a language understandable to all. It is a place where information is shared, where needs are identified and support is given, where specialist ministries for youth, women, men and music are centred, where cultural programmes are delivered, and where remittances are channeled via their tithes back to church-based work, including schools and clinics, in Karen State, Myanmar and the border refugee camps.

For the smaller number of Buddhist Karen now living in Australia, monasteries in the form of houses have been established in Bendigo and Melbourne in Victoria and Perth in Western Australia, with Karen monks to administer the rituals of their belief. In Sydney and Brisbane, Buddhist Karen attend Burmese-language monasteries. Symbolic of non-violence, these monasteries provide a sacred place where evil cannot trespass, a protection for these Karen mitigating the many challenges of living in a new country, and a place to share together the “known” – to make merit (i.e. to do a good thing to store up ‘merit’ for your next life) and celebrate their festivals. This view was shared by two participants in my 2014 fieldwork in Melbourne and Sydney.

I am Pwo Karen [one of the major sub groups of Karen from Myanmar, the other major group being Sgaw]. My family have been Buddhist for generations. Here [Australia] we are not many … most who come are Christian but we work together to help our people. My husband and I helped to start the monastery here … we called for the monk to come and we raised money to buy the house. Now we have the place to go to give gifts to the monk, to ask his blessing because our life here is very different from the camp … We have to try hard for our lives and it is helpful for us to follow our traditional ways and to enjoy our festivals like thount kloun7 (Naw Paung Owar, 2014).

It was hard when I first came. My wife is Christian, and I sometimes go with her to her church, but my heart is Buddhist … there is no Karen monastery like we have in the camp but I am happy to go to the Burmese monastery. I go and light a joss

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stick and ask for a blessing for my family. Especially now it is Buddhist Lent, I go and listen to the dharma by the monks (Saw Eh Thu, 2014).

Karen cultural and national days of celebration, such as the Wrist Tying Ceremony, Karen New Year, Karen Revolution Day and Martyr’s Day, are well supported by the Karen community across Australia, and most Karen continue to wear their national dress to church and social functions.

My lived experience, including formal research over these past 12 years, has shown me that, for the Karen, culture, religion and spirituality are not separate entities; rather, they are parts of the whole person-in-environment perspective (Worland & Vaddhanaphuti 2013). This view is supported by researchers across different disciplines who recognise that spirituality is a traditional way through which many people develop personal values and beliefs, meaning and purpose, and that religious faith is a primary coping strategy for victims of organised violence, such as has been experienced by many of the Karen refugees who have resettled in Australia since 1995. Further, religious frameworks and practices have been found to have the potential to influence the coping mechanisms and recovery of refugees who have experienced trauma by reducing feelings of loss of control and helplessness (Blackwell 2005; Peres et al. 2007).

This section highlights the importance of culture, language and faith as a means by which many refugee Karen have been able to both utilise resources they brought with them to Australia and acquire new ones, enabling them to successfully engage with the economic, educational and social spheres of Australian society.

(ii) The whole refugee experience, including pre, during and post-migration, must be analysed within a psychological framework

Ryan et al. (2008) highlight the impact which trauma has on the adaptive capacity of refugees transitioning to life in a host country, linking trauma experiences to resource loss at all stages of the refugees’ transitional journeys. In the pre-migration phase, material, personal and social resources are lost, along with sense of security; in the preparation to migrate to a host country, further losses in

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the form of belonging and attachment to physical places are expe-rienced. Post-migration trauma can be experienced as they struggle to adapt to new environments. In Ryan et al.’s resource model, trauma is normalised rather than pathologised, with an emphasis on the psychological responses that validate refugees’ life experiences. This section focuses on this aspect of resettling Karen refugees’ lives in Australia.

The refugee Karen who have resettled in Australia have lived their lives under a cloud of oppression and violence. All the people I interviewed in Australia had either seen family or community members killed and/or tortured or had close relations with those killed and/or tortured. Many have experienced the destruction of their villages, internal displacement in their own country and eventual forced exile to the refugee camps on the Thai side of the border. For some, their trauma experiences did not cease in the camps, as cross-border mortar fire was a constant threat in the mid- to late-1990s in many of the border camps. One of my former students, who now lives in Melbourne with his family, recounted how he helped his mother to grab their few possessions and his younger sisters and fled into the night as an enemy army attack on their camp on the Thai side of the border reduced the whole camp of 3,000 people to ashes overnight, though with surprisingly few causalities. He was 12 years old at the time.

The Refugee Council of Australia auspices the Forum of Australian Services for Survivors of Torture and Trauma (FASSTT), a national network of eight specialist counselling and rehabilitation agencies located in each of the six Australian states and two territories, and aimed at helping refugees to recover from trauma experiences and successfully acculturate to life in Australia.

Many refugee Karen have accessed the services provided by these agencies. In an interview in 2014 with Saw Doh Soe – himself a Karen resettled in Australia in 2007 and now a counsellor working in the Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors (STARTTS) in Sydney – he shared with me the value of Community Gardens as a means of “accidental counselling in a natural environment … digging puts us in touch with the land”. STARTTS began a number of community-garden projects in the western area of Sydney in 2011 in which many newly resettled Karen participate, alongside refugees from other countries. It is well known

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that community gardens are both healing and restorative landscapes, facilitating a sense of safety, connection and empowerment that has been breached by trauma (Linn 2007; Stone 2009). Similarly, across different locations in Melbourne and its environs, the Adult Multicultural Education Services (AMES) coordinate community-garden projects that, according to a community worker in 2014, “create community-enriching environments with the aim of increasing self-worth and promoting good health … so many of the Karen refugees come from farming and village backgrounds …the gardens restore a sense of place and well-being for them”. Other community gardens where Karen refugees are also participating are in place in both urban and rural areas across Australia.

Another community project that aims to mitigate the impact of trauma from the pre-, during and post-migration experience for Karen resettling in Australia is the Men’s Shed. Men’s Sheds are uniquely Australian, with the similar aim of community gardens to promote social health and well-being and connectedness specifically for men who have suffered loss and trauma. Some are operated by community-welfare organisations with funding from government grants, while others are operated by Christian organisations with funds raised by churches, sometimes supplemented by government grants (Ballinger et al. 2009; Fildes et al. 2010). Many Karen join other refugees to attend workshops on welding, car and home maintenance at Men’s Sheds operating out of churches in Brisbane and Melbourne. Within an environment of hands-on skill building, confidence and self-worth are fostered as well as the opportunity for “accidental counselling” to occur.

A number of government-funded community organisations for migrants and refugees, together with church-based support organisations across the many cities and towns where Karen refugees live, hold weekly or monthly Karen Women’s groups to build confidence in speaking English and be a place where the women can feel safe to share difficulties and successes in their transitional life. Some of these groups operate as sewing clubs, others as Bible-study groups, and yet others as general discussion groups.8 From my interviews with facilitators and some attendees, I learnt that a common aim of these groups is to provide an open and caring environment whereby Karen women are empowered and supported in their transition journeys.

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Sider (2001) and Herman (1997) highlight the importance of creating these safe environments to enable reconnection to occur from disconnection, empowerment from disempowerment, to restore control for the person who has suffered trauma, enabling healing and future-oriented hope to occur. The community gardens, Men’s Shed and women’s group projects in which many Karen refugees are participating in Australia represent such safe environments, complementing other state- and community-funded trauma-recovery counselling services that seek to validate refugees’ normal life experiences within a psychological framework.

(iii) While host countries have an obligation to ensure that refugees’ basic needs are met and opportunities provided, there needs to be an awareness that this does not always happen.

Ryan et al. (2008) emphasise the point that, for all migrant groups, access to resources in the host environment is facilitated or constrained by state institutions and policies as well as the general host environment. This section examines this aspect from two perspectives; firstly, the Australian government’s immigration policies, and secondly, how wider societal issues impact on the refugees’ transitional journeys.

In relation to the first perspective, Australia has a mixed reputation in relation to the policies and services which it provides to refugees, recently summed up well by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Mr António Guterres:

Australia is a very strange situation … It has the most successful resettlement program I can imagine and the community integration is excellent … The problem is when we discuss boats and there of course we enter a very, very, very dramatic thing (cited in Whyte & Ting 2014).

The scope of this chapter is on Karen refugees resettling in Australia who have been processed through offshore applications. This is part of the “… most successful resettlement programme” to which Mr Guterres refers. However, outside the scope of this chapter, but needing to be mentioned, is the abysmal reputation which Australia is currently gaining for its failure to uphold its obligations under

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the 1951 Refugee Convention in relation to asylum-seekers who seek refuge in Australia. The reason why there are now so many additional places being allocated under the Special Humanitarian Programme outlined in the beginning of this chapter is that, under new legislation, asylum-seekers arriving in boats are being refused entry to Australia to lodge applications for asylum. It is their previous number allocation that has now been transferred to offshore applications – a propagation of the idea of the “good refugee” who waits in camps for resettlement versus the “bad refugee” who “jumps the queue” (McAdam 2013). The following story is one example of the outcome of this increased Special Humanitarian Programme allocation.

Saw Moo Ler and Naw Paw Kae Blut married in Umphiem Refugee Camp in 2006. Just one month later, Moo Ler, his parents and siblings left for their new lives in Melbourne, Australia. The expectation was that Moo Ler’s wife would follow very shortly. However, Paw Kae Blut did not have UNHCR registration (see UNHCR 2012 for more information), a core requirement for any refugee wishing to resettle in a third country, and soon found out that she could not join her husband. What followed was a lengthy long-distance relationship with repeated unsuccessful advocacy from the Multicultural Task Force of Baptist Union, Victoria, and one of the refugee Settlement agencies in Melbourne. Then, in 2013, with the change in government policy that increased allocations and flexibility in criteria under the Special Humanitarian Programme, Saw Moo Ler was able to apply to sponsor his wife to join him in Australia. In essence, this meant that he had to meet the costs of processing Paw Kae Blut’s application and her subsequent travel to Australia (approximately AUD $2,000) but, on arrival, she would be able to access financial, educational and health resettlement benefits for newly arrived refugees. Following approval of a visa under this programme, Paw Kae Blut was finally reunited with her husband, after an eight-year absence, on 16 May 2014. At the time of writing, Paw Kae Blut has completed Certificate I (510 hours) English-language training and is currently studying Level 1 of a Health Service Assistant Certificate, living with her husband and his extended family and transitioning to her new life in Australia. The family are currently in the process of applying under this same programme for Paw Kae Blut’s parents to also join them.

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Ryan et al.’s (2008:8) model highlights the obvious – that needs are bound to resources – and then proceeds to place part of the responsibility for the meeting of those needs for the well-being of migrant populations on the host-country environment. The degree to which the Australian host environment meets those needs for refugees arriving under the Humanitarian and Special Humanitarian Programmes, however, varies considerably. Both ends of this spectrum are presented below.

The government-funded Settlement Grants Programme9 provides new arrivals with a range of resources, starting immediately upon their arrival and lasting up to five years post-arrival. A variety of practical, vocational and well-being services are funded under this programme by federal, state and local-government grants, and are delivered through multicultural and welfare-service agencies located in all Australian states and territories, in centres close to where migrant groups are living. Comprehensive support packages are provided for all newly arrived refugees, including a case worker, accommodation, income support, English-language training and access to mental health and other health services.

Incongruous, however, is the situation that the additional influx of new arrivals under the Special Humanitarian Programme has coincided with a reduction in government funds for the Settlement Grants Programme. Funding cuts have particularly impacted on the staffing of agencies providing this service, not the entitlements which are given to new arrivals though, logically, without case workers to facilitate the entitlements, the potential risk is that many new arrivals will fall through the safety net provided by the legislation. In response to this situation, two service-agency co-ordinators whom I interviewed (in Melbourne and Brisbane, 2014) stated that they are now relying on unpaid volunteers from the migrant and refugee communities to assist them in facilitating the processing of the comprehensive support packages allocated under government legislation. The following case of a newly arrived Karen refugee family, related by a volunteer church worker in 2014, poignantly illustrates the heightened risk to the well-being of newly arrived refugees through these funding cuts.

Naw Paw Gay sponsored her brother, his pregnant wife and their three children under the Special Humanitarian Programme. Naw Paw Gay and a volunteer from her church met the family at the

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airport, became concerned that the 35-week-pregnant woman was possibly in labour and rushed the family to the local hospital, where the mother was admitted and delivered a healthy son overnight. The volunteer phoned the settlement agency that had been allocated to provide the initial support package but encountered only an answering machine. With no accommodation or financial package in place, the volunteer utilised her own resource networks and secured a house rental close to Naw Paw Gay’s house. It was not until the next afternoon that a case worker appeared to sort out all the logistical issues, not least accessing social security payments and an emergency Medicare card to cover health care for this family.

On balance, while the case described above may or may not be an isolated one, the other end of the spectrum is that multicultural and welfare agencies funded under Government Settlement Grants are administering a wide range of services to promote the well-being of resettling refugees in Australia. Two examples are the Wyndham Community and Education Centre (WCEC), Melbourne, Victoria and the Multicultural Service Centre of Western Australia (MSCWA) in Perth.

The WCEC delivers basic settlement services as well as training courses in areas such as nationally recognised vocational education, language, literacy and numeracy education and skills for educa-tion and employment. With its vision statement Improving Lives, Strengthening Community, WCEC also auspice the Wyndham Inter-faith Network, which has been recognised by the Australian govern-ment as a vital link in building a cohesive and harmonious society. This network regularly conducts “Know your Neighbour” seminars attended by newly arrived and older-established community groups, with the aim of highlighting issues that unite rather than divide diverse communities (see http://www.wyndhamcec.org.au/WIN.html).

In 2013, one of WCEC’s case workers, Naw Say Htoo Eh Moero, received the title of Australian Case Worker of the Year in the inaugural Australian Migration and Settlement Awards for her service to newly arrived refugees in the Western area of Melbourne. Naw Say Htoo Eh Moero is a Karen from the second arrival of Karen migrants in 1995. More than 3,000 Karen live in the area covered by her agency and, in an average day, her work can include helping people to pay bills or locate housing and providing emotional support to enable people cope with the vast changes of living life in a new country.

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The Multicultural Service Centre of Western Australia (MSCWA) has four centres in Perth and a nearby regional town providing a range of support services for both newly arrived and longer-established refugees. Described in 2013 by former Prime Minister Ms Julia Gillard as a “beacon of welcome and a place of hope” (MSCWA, 2013), its broad range of services include settlement support, mental-health counselling, disability support, housing and employment advocacy. Its employees and volunteers represent 60 language groups, ensuring that their clients do not have to walk the journey of settlement alone. MSCWA Co-Ordinator of Workforce Development, Saw Paul Kyaw, a Karen refugee who arrived in Australia in 1995, has been instrumental in facilitating innovative employment opportunities for Karen and other refugee groups. In recognition of his services to refugees, he was awarded the Community Service Award of Western Australia in 2009 and, in 2013, became a People of Australia Ambassador in recognition of his commitment to the principles of a multicultural Australia.

In relation to the second perspective – how the wider societal issues impact on the refugees’ transitional journeys – while, since 1985, Australian government legislation has provided entitlements and other services to newly arrived refugees under the Settlement Grants Programme (known as the Integrated Humanitarian Settlement Strategy before 2006) to assist their transition into Australian life, there needs to be an awareness that there are a myriad of factors within a host society that present challenges to these journeys. Racism, culture and biology are three factors that arose in my research.

A major challenge for many migrants in a new country is the difference in cultural mores and norms. This can lead to misunderstanding, distress and even conflict as refugees seek to acculturate into their new environment. In recent years, racism has been highlighted as a problem for refugees resettling in Australia, despite the national image propagated of a multi-ethnic society with strong laws pertaining to anti-racism and anti-discrimination. In response to a heightened media awareness of racist attacks against Asians during 2011, this issue was the focus of Associate Professor Charles Teo’s (2012) Australia Day Address in which he called for an Australia that

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… is both culturally and socially sensitive and tolerant; one that acknowledges a responsibility to our own people as well as our near and distant neighbours who are less fortunate than us.

During my interviews with Karen youth in 2009, Saw Hsa Thaw told me of racist slurs and attacks against them in both Sydney and Brisbane.

My friends and I were walking to church and these guys yelled out at us “Asians go home”. We were dressed in our Karen chaka [shirt]. We tried to ignore them, but then they threw tomatoes at us … I wanted to fight them, but my friends told me to just keep walking.

Another area that presents cultural challenges to newly arrived Karen refugees to Australia relates to postpartum care. This is a prime example of how “resources that are rooted in the migrant’s home cultural environment can become obsolete or devalued [in the host environment]” (Ryan et al. 2008:13). The mores and norms of postpartum care of the mother and her baby have existed in Karen culture for millennia. The “lying-in” period of one month, whereby both mother and baby remain in the home being cared for by women attendants, usually family members, is quite foreign in modern-day Western society. For Karen, this period is one where the mother rests, regains her strength and bonds with her baby, while female family members care for her, the baby and the rest of the household. She needs to be kept warm (in traditional life, to sit by the fire for at least three days), eat special foods and drink herbal tea and tonics with ingredients gathered from the forest.

The busy pace of life in Western life in Australia, whereby there are fewer family members able to remain in the home to care for the new mother and her baby, and the absence of traditional herbs and foods challenges these age-old rituals, and has been noted to cause distress and depression among new Karen mothers. A 2012 study by Assistant Professor Renata Kokonavic and her colleagues from Beyond Blue, focusing on Karen refugee women to Australia, has identified these issues with the aim of assisting health services across Australia to develop culturally informed health and community services in the perinatal mental health of refugee-background women.

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In 2009, Naw Moo Mu, a leader in the Women’s Ministry in a Sydney-based Karen church, spoke to me about this issue, highlighting both the issue itself and one of the roles of the women’s ministry in Karen churches in Australia:

There are many problems with our pregnant and new mums. My church sends translators with them to their appointments, but a lot worry about examinations. Our Karen women are not used to male doctors; at home, they have traditional birth attendants to care for them; they are women who understand … then, after they give birth, they are shocked when they are told to leave the hospital in just five or six hours … no older sister to care … then there is the problem of us not having the right herbs here, like we have in our forests. This is a big problem for us … causes many upsets.

While current research is contributing to the provision of culturally appropriate training for health-care providers to give them a greater understanding of issues relating to birth and the postpartum care of refugee women from various ethnic backgrounds, there remains the issue of maternal health policy and practice, which is incongruent in many aspects to ethnic traditional practices. As Naw Moo Mu’s account highlights, there are no easy answers to this situation.

A biological-cultural factor that causes angst to a number of refugee families in Australia, including Karen, is the societal lack of understanding of Mongolian spots. These are congenital birthmarks that appear on the buttocks and lower back of up to 95 per cent of Asian infants and generally disappear by puberty. Their colour of blue or grey is often misinterpreted as bruising and referral to child protection agencies ensues. Kaur’s research (2009, 2012) has identified a lack of medical knowledge (due to a Eurocentric educational programme) in Australian child protection policy; frontline child protection workers lack specific knowledge and are inadequately trained to work with culturally and linguistically diverse families. I spoke with two families who had experienced intense questioning by workers from the Department of Child Safety following routine child health check-ups, with satisfactory outcomes only coming about after translators showed medical reports about this normative condition. It is encouraging that Kaur’s research is

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being taken seriously by child protection agencies across Australia and it is hoped that policy and training initiatives will prevent further misdiagnosis of this congenital condition.

This section has shown how the Australian government has demonstrated the “will” to create an environment to which refugees in Australia can successfully transition. However, it also needs to be understood that its “will” does not always translate into action and that there are wider societal issues that can impede this transition.

(iv) The migration experience is a continuum whereby resources are in a constant state of flux

The psychosocial well-being of a community depend on three inter-related factors; human capacity, social ecology and culture and its associated values10 (Ager et al. 2005). When considering the fourth aspect of Ryan et al.’s model, the continuum of the flux of resources on the Karen’s migration journey to Australian host-society living, these three factors are very relevant, as each represents a community resource that is commonly depleted in the wake of displacement, but which also serves as a critical basis for recovery (Ager & Ager 2010:157). For Karen interviewed in the camps and in Australia, their motivation to resettle was the better educational and employ-ment opportunities for themselves and their children. Many further stated that they wanted to use the skills they learnt in the third country to help their people remaining behind (Worland 2010). However, the hopes and vision for the achievement of this, and the reality of the situation when they arrived in Australia, have been a struggle for all, as they have had to adapt and build on resources from their former life experiences in their home country and refugee camps – individual skills and capacities, kinship relationships and support networks and their traditional beliefs – to those of their new lives in Australia. The following stories provide a greater insight into these transitional states of flux.

Saw Yo Shoo is 30 years old. He was born in a rural village in Eastern Myanmar which was destroyed by the Burmese Army when he was 15, at which time he fled with his family to Umphiem Refugee Camp, 150 kilometres south of Mae Sot, Thailand. After completing Grade Ten in the camp, he joined the Kawthoolei Karen

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Baptist School and College (KKBBSC) in Mae La Camp, from where he graduated in 2006, after three years, with a Bachelor’s degree in Theological Studies. I met him when I taught his second-year class for a short time. Further study options are very limited for refugees, but he had the opportunity to join an Indian Seminary, where he completed Masters of Divinity study after three more years, returning to the refugee community in 2009 and joining the teaching staff in a Theological Seminary located in a rural Thai Karen village south of Mae Sot. In early 2012, Saw Yo Shoo married Naw Law Eh, who had resettled in Australia in 2006 but who returned to Thailand for her wedding. Under the Australian government’s Special Humanitarian Programme, Yo Shoo was able to resettle in Australia and join his wife in Brisbane in mid-2013.

Saw Yo Shoo’s transitional journey to Australia was relatively smooth. His human capital of skills and knowledge gained from his education, including a strong proficiency in English language, coupled with the social ecology and cultural values of the Australian Karen community, meant that, on arrival, he was able to join a familiar environment of extended family which included a sister-in-law and three brothers-in-law, his former peers at KKBBSC and a church community whose members included many people he knew from his life in Umphiem Camp. His role as assistant pastor of this church had already been decided. In many ways, he moved from “the known” of the Karen refugee community in Thailand to “the known” of the resettled refugee community in Brisbane. Within 18 months, Yo Shoo completed a Diploma of Community Services Work and is working as a teaching aide in a local secondary school. In 2015, he plans to begin part-time study for a Graduate Diploma of Divinity. His eventual aim is to study for a Doctorate of Ministry but, as his previous course is not recognised in Australia, he has to proceed step by step.

A challenge in Yo Shoo’s transitional journey to Australia began with the actual migration process, which was fraught with bureaucratic red tape to satisfy the stipulations of what could be accepted as proof of a legal marriage.11 However, perseverance and prayer by Yo Shoo and Law Eh, their families and the church community are believed to be factors determining the eventual granting of his visa to resettle in Australia. A further challenge

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has been his realisation that his many years of study in the camp and in India are not internationally accredited, thus inhibiting his long-term goal of becoming a lecturer in Christian Studies in Australia. Even so, Yo Shee’s acculturation transition is facilitated by the combination of his own individual skills and knowledge, the support of his extended family, his Karen and Australian church communities, and his cultural beliefs and practices, which give him the tenacity to continue, within the requirements of the Australian education system, to achieve his goal.

Naw Klet Hser was 19 when she arrived in Sydney, Australia in 2007 from Tham Hin Camp, Southern Thailand. She had finished Grade 10 study in the camp and immediately began working for an international NGO whose office was in the camp. With the encouragement of her aunt and uncle, who had migrated to Australia under the UNHCR resettlement scheme the previous year, Klet Hser decided to join them, leaving her immediate family behind in the camp. Having intermediate English proficiency was advantageous, enabling her to matriculate in the Australian mainstream education system within three years. Having an independent spirit, and with the goal of entering university to study nursing, Klet Hser concurrently studied and completed a Certificate II in Nursing and worked part-time as a cleaner, all while studying for her Senior High School certificate: “We are refugees … we don’t have high education, so we come to Australia … we have to try hard”. In 2009, Naw Klet Hser became an Australian citizen: “I will take citizenship as soon as I can … then I will have a true identity”. This was one of her foremost goals in her acculturation process. In 2014, she stated: “Now I belong to somewhere … now I am a Karen Australian … independent with no need to be scared any more.12

In December 2014, Naw Klet Hser graduated from the University of Western Sydney with a Bachelor’s degree in Nursing Science and is working as a Registered Nurse in a large Sydney hospital. Throughout all her studies in Australia, she has worked part-time and, for the past four years is also an Assistant Youth Leader in her church: “If you work hard, there is much opportunity and support here [Australia] … family, community, church, government”.

Naw Klet Hser’s story of transition epitomises that of so many young Karen refugees who have migrated to Australia in the past two flows of Karen refugee migration. It is a story of determination

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to succeed in the face of lived experiences of violence, oppression and displacement. Those with some English-language skill have travelled this journey of acculturation with greater ease than others; even so, the common denominator of a will to make a new life in Australia, together with government initiatives, social ecology and the cultural support of the community, have enabled many to persevere and overcome challenges. Thara Wah Ghay’s and Naw Kree Moo’s story is a further example of this determination.

Thara Wah Ghay and Naw Kree Moo met and married in Tham Hin Camp, Southern Thailand, in 1997. Wah Ghay completed his theological studies and was planning his marriage to Kree Moo when their community was forced to flee to the refugee camp on the Thai side of the border after their village was attacked and destroyed by the Burmese Army in June 1997. In the camp, Thara Wah Ghay was appointed pastor in a Baptist Church and Kree Moo was a middle-school teacher. When the UNHCR announced the possibility of resettlement, they opted to migrate to Australia with the hope of better opportunities for themselves and their children. In 2007, they resettled with their four children, aged two to nine, in Sydney. However, with limited English language, they struggled for many years. For the next three years, Kree Moo was on full-time home duties, while Wah Ghay was mostly underemployed in nursery gardens located many kilometres from their rented home in Sydney’s outer Western suburbs. Then, in 2010, a new opportunity presented itself:

It seemed like being caught in a trap being in Sydney … we couldn’t move forward. But then, my good friend encouraged me that there was work near Perth and more opportunity for our fa-mily, so we decided to go west … now everything is very different for us (Thara Wah Gay, 2014).

Described in detail in a media article by reporter Julie Power in 2012, Thara Wah Ghay and his family moved more than 3,000 kilometres from the east to the west coast of Australia, first to Perth and then to Albany, a coastal city of 36,000 people, a further 450 kilomet-res south-west. With the assistance of long-term friend Paul Kyaw, within his employment development role at MSCWA, they were the first Karen family to move to Albany, where Wah Ghay secured full-

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time employment with Fletcher Meat Works and his wife became a part-time cleaner at a local school. Within two years, Thara Wah Ghay and his wife purchased their own home, the eldest son, aged 16, joined the Australian Army Cadets,13 and all four children were very active in education and community sports activities.

The interrelated factors of human capital, social ecology and culture are very evident here within the complex interplay between individual relationships, community and societal linkages working together to create a new Karen community in this regional Australian city. Following the media attention on Thara Wah Ghay and his family’s courageous move, and by word-of-mouth, ten more Karen families have made the move from Sydney to Albany, making them the largest refugee group in this town (other groups, in smaller numbers, are Somalis and Afghans). The principal employer for those who have settled in Albany is Fletcher Meat Works. Albany Baptist Church has embraced this new community, and Thara Wah Ghay now pastors a Karen-language service and Bible Study each week within this mainstream church, utilising his training and knowledge gained in the home country. Liaison between the MSCWA and Albany City Council has resulted in land being made available for the establishment of community gardens, where the Karen families work side-by-side, growing their own traditional vegetables and herbs, and promoting the sense of place and well-being within their cultural framework. Half of the Karen families have now purchased their own homes in this town – indicative of their commitment to settle there. Together, these factors are contributing to the successful transitioning of these resettled Karen to their new lives in Australia, as validated by their principal employer, Mr Greg Cross, General Manager of Fletcher Meat Works, who stated that “The Karen are tremendous workers … they integrate extremely well” (cited in Power 2012:9).

Katanning is an extraordinary example of a rural community where local people, churches and businesses have a long history of showing acceptance and welcome to new arrivals, whatever their nationality, faith or culture. A small country town located 277 kilometres south-east of Perth, in Western Australia, its name is an Aboriginal word meaning “the junction or meeting place of three different tribal groups” – which is certainly appropriate for the town

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as it stands at present, with many of its population of approximately 5,000 representing a large proportion of culturally and linguistically diverse groups (Lyas et al. 2013; Sayer 2015). The main employer is WAMMCO (Western Australian Meat Marketing Co-operative Limited), a halal abattoir whose majority workforce is from these backgrounds. As a direct result of negotiation by MSCWA Co-Ordinator for Workforce Development, Paul Kyaw, in 2008, today one fifth of WAMMCO’s 300+ workforce are Karen refugees who have settled in Australia within the past seven years, more than half of whom have purchased their own homes in this town. When I visited the Karen in this community over three days in October 2014, I was so struck by the traditional village like atmosphere, I thought I was back on the Thai–Myanmar border and felt so much “at home”. Here, the Karen mostly live within a three-block radius of each other, with one street in particular being almost completely inhabited by Karen families. Karen traditional dress is worn in daily interactions by both adults and youth. Most houses have vegetable gardens and chickens, ducks and geese peck freely in fenced yards. Most of the families identify as Christian but the few Buddhist families join in social activities and the informal co-operative whereby bulk Asian goods and whole animals are bought for slaughtering, with the cost shared by those participating. This outworking of human capital, social ecology and culture and its values have enabled this Karen refugee community to successfully compensate for resource loss on their migratory journeys, with resource substitution ensuring their psychosocial well-being.

Saturday afternoon and more than 100 Karen gather in and outside the home of Saw K’Paw Shee, his wife Naw Eh Wah, and their five children, aged three to 16, to celebrate a new home thanksgiving

and the sixteenth birthday of the oldest son.14 A traditional Karen choir sings, the Katanning Baptist Church elder gives a message of encouragement for the youth to follow their dreams, Assistant Karen Pastor, Thramu Paw Wee, gives a scriptural insight into how this home came about, and this is then followed by the sharing of food prepared by all who came.

Saw K’Paw Shee lost his leg in a land mine explosion in rural Karen State in early 2001. He was fortunate to be near a village clinic where he received immediate first aid and was then carried

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by friends to a community hospital on the Thai side of the border for longer-term treatment and rehabilitation. After his discharge from hospital, K’Paw Shee moved to Ban Don Yang Refugee Camp and, shortly after, married Naw Eh Wah. In 2006, K’Paw Shee and Eh Wah and their three children resettled in Perth. They moved into rental accommodation, joined the local Karen Baptist Church and had two more children. Because of his disability, K’Paw Shee receives Government income-support benefits and his wife looks after the home. When the first Karen families, all of whom identified as Christian but had limited proficiency in the English language, moved to Katanning in 2008 to take up employment at WAMMCO, K’Paw Shee and Eh Wah responded to a call from their church elders and volunteered to also move to Katanning as volunteers to assist the families in the settlement process of securing housing, and accessing health and education services. When asked about his motivation for doing this, K’Paw Shee told me in 2014: “They are my people … I couldn’t do much to help back there [Perth], but here I am useful … it is God’s job for me”.

With his good English communication and interpersonal skills, K’Paw Shee liaises with community and civic agencies in Katanning to assist the Karen families in the myriad of tasks needed when moving to and living in a new town. While more Karen families began purchasing their own homes in this town, K’Paw Shee and his family remained in rented accommodation – that was, until the Karen families living in Katanning gathered together to raise the money (AUD $18,500) for a deposit on an older house that had been uninhabited for many years and presented it as a surprise gift to K’Paw Shee and his family. The local estate agent, who had worked closely with K’Paw Shee in both rental and home purchases for the Karen families, joined in, foregoing his commission to pay the legal fees and start-up costs and the local bank provided the necessary mortgage. Over two weeks, the Karen community worked together to clean up the property and make the necessary repairs to the house. The outcome was a sunny afternoon of thanksgiving to God for His provision for this family through the generous spirit of their community.

Sunday night, and more than 20 cars are parked outside Saw Blet and Naw Paw Say’s home. The voices of more than 50 young people

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resound as the Katanning Karen Baptist Youth Group hold their weekly worship and Bible Study service led by the youngest son and co-owner of this home, Saw Ghay K’Paw, aged 22. First arriving in Australia in 2009 from Ban Don Yang Refugee Camp, this family’s transitional migratory journey has been a difficult one. They have moved many times seeking work, from Hobart in Australia’s far south to Darwin in the far north, to Townsville in the north-east and Mt Gambier in the central south, before finally settling in Katanning in the far west in 2011. With limited education before arriving and no English language, the family found it very difficult to acculturate into Australian society. Today, father, son and son-in-law are all working full-time at WAMMCO, have purchased their own five-bedroom home, and have finally found the place where they are happy to settle.

The stories outlined in this section have shown how the interactive dimensions of personal, community and structural resources have combined to provide a positive response to the state of flux experienced by refugees in their settlement journeys, facilitating resilience and well-being.

ConclusionThe polyvocality of this chapter has highlighted the transitional journeys of refugee Karen in their settlement in Australia, referen-cing the four central issues of Ryan et al.’s (2008) resource-based model of migrant adaptation. The stories have shown that the col-lectivist nature of Karen culture, coupled with host-country policies, are central to an understanding of their transition and accultura-tion into Australian society. Through a combination of their own personal faith beliefs and individual, social and cultural resources, together with Australian multicultural, economic and settlement policies, many have successfully adapted to new lives in Australia.

We live in a world where organised violence and subsequent displacement from homelands are the norm for millions of people. For many of us, there is limited or no understanding of these people, of the social injustices perpetrated against them, of their struggle to not only survive in these circumstances but, even more so, to rise above their refugee status and build new lives in third countries, while maintaining their integrity as ethnic peoples with their own

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distinct history, culture and identity. It is hoped that the voices which we have heard throughout this chapter have not only facilitated a greater understanding of the Karen journey of acculturation in Australia, but have also gone some way to encourage reflection on how we, as host societies, can better facilitate the whole person-in-environment perspective of refugee adaptation to new lives in third countries.

Notes

1. Australia’s Humanitarian Programme provides protection and resettlement for refugees and others in humanitarian need from all parts of the world (Department of Immigration and Border Protection 2015a).

2. The Special Humanitarian Programme (SHP) was established in 1981 within the offshore Humanitarian Programme to allow people who have a connection to Australia, who face human rights abuse in their home country and/or are split from family in Australia, to settle permanently in Australia. Since 2013, the Australian government has allotted 4,000 places per year for people who fit this category. To apply under the SHP, people must be proposed by an organisation or a family member living in Australia who are prepared to cover the costs of the resettlement process (Department of Immigration and Border Protection 2015b).

3. According to ancient Karen folklore, Htaw Meh Pah is the father of the Karen race and credited with fostering the values by which the Karen live.

4. Australian Volunteers International (AVI) connects people and organisa-tions internationally with the aim of being a significant contributor to a peaceful, just and sustainable world, focusing on people-centred develop-ment (http://www.australianvolunteers.com).

5. Saw Kler was referring to differing occupational certificates such as the Workplace Health and Safety Certificate and the Forklift Certificate and Licence.

6. Thount kloun is the Pwo Karen word for Water Festival, which is held over one week in April. It is an auspicious time when respect is given to the elders, water is offered to the Lord Buddha, and forgiveness is sought for past mistakes. It is also a time of celebration, with traditional dancing, singing and throwing of water over each other.

7. Many of these same groups hold similar programmes for women of other refugee groups. A facilitator of one of the church-based groups explained to me that their experience has shown that women are more open to dis-cussing challenges, as well as their successes, when in their own language group.

8. For more information on the Settlement Grants Programme, including a list of agencies which received grants in 2013–2014, see Refugee Council of Australia. (2014).

9. Human capacity refers to people’s ability, including skills and information; social ecology – also known as social capital – refers to the social relation-ships within families, peer groups, religious and cultural institutions, and

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links with civic and government agencies; culture and its related values – i.e. cultural capital – refers to the cultural traditions of meaning, cultural mores and the norms of a community. These combined capacities enable the development of resilience and well-being in human-environmental systems (Ager et al. 2005:161).

10. Saw Yo Shoo and Naw Law Eh’s marriage certificate was issued under the Thai Karen Baptist Convention, which normally has legal recognition under Thai law. However, as neither were Thai citizens, this certificate was initially not accepted as proof of marriage by the Australian government and, as Yo Shoo listed his status as married on his application for resett-lement, the process was delayed by several months while this issue was deliberated upon.

11. Many of the people I interviewed, in both the camps and Australia, spoke of their fear of being a non-citizen, a stateless person, of not belonging to any place. In Australia, a number spoke of continued fear when they saw police, even though they knew in their minds that they had a document granting permanent residency, they still felt they were non-citizens. All the people I interviewed in both fieldwork studies spoke of applying for Australian citizenship as soon as they were eligible – for those who came before 2009, this was a two-year period; since 2009, when legislation regarding citizenship was changed, it is a four-year period.

12. The Australian Army Cadets is a community-based youth development organisation, focused on Australian Army customs, traditions and values. It provides youth with the opportunity to develop leadership, team-buil-ding and survival skills (Australian Government Department of Defence n.d.).

13. Within a Karen Christian context, thanksgiving services are held for a variety of events, including the birth of a new baby, birthdays, anniversa-ries of death and weddings, and new homes. It is a time to give thanks to God for His provision and blessings to those concerned.

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Kaur, J. (2012) Cultural Diversity and Child Protection: Australian Research Review on the Needs of Cultural and Linguistic Diverse (CALD) and Refugee Children and Families. Brisbane: JK Diversity Consultants.

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Kokonavic, R., Niner, S., Cho, V. & Cuthbert, D. (2012) Pilot Study on Perinatal Depression in Refugee Communities. Melbourne: Beyond Blue and Monash University.

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ADDRESSING HUMANITARIAN NEEDS OR PURSUING POLITICAL PURPOSES? AN OVERVIEW OF JAPAN’S RESETTLEMENT PROGRAMME

Sayaka Osanami Törngren

Introduction

Who are immigrants? The US is a country of immigrants who came from all around the world and formed the (US). Many people have come to the country and become part of it. We won’t adopt a policy like that (Yoshida 2014).

The above statement was made by Prime Minister Abe on TV, while advocating considerations for easing the regulations on the issuing of temporary residence permits to foreigners. Recognising that Japan’s population is shrinking and that the country needs to open up the border to fill in the labour shortage, he continued, “It’s not an immigrant policy. We’d like them [labour migrants] to work and raise incomes for a limited period of time, and then return home” (Yoshida 2014). Since 2008, the population of Japan has been in decline and there is growing awareness of the problem in Japan, which has been followed by increased public and political attention on immigration (Akashi 2014). The Prime Minister’s statement, however, clearly shows that Japan – a country which has long

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practised strict immigration control – still does not consider itself to be a country of immigration. The idea is that the foreigners are not “here to stay” therefore no serious consideration needs to be given to the integration of immigrants.

Despite its afore-mentioned strict stance on immigration, Japan applies one of the most liberal policies in the world for the immigration of high-skilled migrants (e.g. Oishi 2012). Low-skilled migrants are, in contrast, according to the immigration law of 1989, not admitted to the country. However, in reality, they are recruited through the opening of the borders to Nikeijin, or Brazilians of Japanese descent, and through a trainee system. Brazilians of Japanese descent can enter Japan with a residence permit that sets no restriction on their activities. The trainee system is another way of recruiting low-skilled labour mainly from Asia to a particular industry with a labour shortage on a strictly temporary basis, although with an obligation for the industry to provide vocational training (Miyajima 2014).

The only immigrants for whom entrance is still strictly controlled, both in policy and in practice, are asylum-seekers and refugees. This does not contradict the government’s attitude: refugees are not temporary migrants, but are here to stay. Instead of admitting refugees in large numbers, the Japanese government’s contribution to international refugee protection has mainly been financial and logistical. For example, Japan is one of the top three donors to the UNHCR, and IOM Japan has been facilitating the travel of resettled refugees from Thailand to the US each year via Narita Airport (The 2nd REC Meeting 2012).

However, in 2008, there was an interesting shift in Japan’s attitude towards its role in international refugee protection: as the first Asian country, the government announced the launch of a resettlement programme, regulated under a Cabinet Agreement, which renders refugee protection a political act and not one based on a change in immigration law. The government announced that it would admit 30 Myanmarese1 refugees annually from the camps in Thailand. The implementation of the resettlement pilot programme in 2010 marked a new era and was hailed as a possible turning point for Japanese refugee policy (see, e.g., Ishikawa 2011). In 2014, the Japanese government agreed to continue with the resettlement programme as a regular programme without any pre-determined timeframe.

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This chapter examines the current Japanese resettlement programme – research on which, in Japan and written in English, is very scarce2 – and provides a general discussion on resettlement in the specific Japanese context; through this discussion it contributes to the broader research on refugee situation in Japan. The outline of the chapter is as follows: the introduction presents a brief description of current immigration to Japan in order to provide the context. Special focus is given to the current refugee population, with a particular interest in Myanmarese refugees, who arrived in Japan in earlier years as asylum-seekers. The concept of integration in the Japanese context is also described, followed by a description of the methodology used in this study. The chapter then proceeds with a presention of the Japanese resettlement programme; the political and technical elements of both the pre- and the post-resettlement phase. The final part of the chapter casts an eye over the lives of the resettled refugees and outlines the difficulties which they face in Japan, as well as their levels of social networks, employment and mobility, before concluding with some reflections on the future of the resettlement programme in Japan.

Current immigration to JapanOf the total Japanese population of 130 million in 2014, around 2 per cent or 2.1 million3 were foreign citizens registered as residents. Among them, around 1.7 million were nationals of other Asian countries (Ministry of Justice 2014a). Historically, the largest foreign population has consisted of Korean descendants (zainichi) who have resided in Japan since before the end of World War II. Their number lies at around 510,000, of whom 360,000 possess a special permanent-residence status granted to people of Korean descent. Most of the Korean immigrants who have arrived in recent years come on a student permit (Ministry of Justice 2014a). Since the 1980s, however, Chinese nationals account for a larger number of foreign residents in Japan, comprising around 32 per cent of the total foreign population (Kashiwazaki 2013). Around one third of the 650,000 Chinese residents in Japan have permanent residency there and, like the Koreans, many live in Japan on a student permit. The largest number of non-Asian immigrants originates from Brazil, with about 180,000 registered Brazilian nationals in Japan (Ministry of Justice 2014a). Their number increased significantly after changes

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to the immigration law in 1989, which permitted second- and third-generation Japanese descendants to enter without any restrictions on their activities and travel between the countries (Kashiwazki 2013; Takenoshita et al. 2013).

Refugees in Japan Japan applies three types of status for refugee and humanitarian protection. One is the recognition (and admittance) of Convention refugees, which is regulated under the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Act (ICRRA). Convention refugees have been admitted since 1981, when Japan became a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention. The second type of refugee acceptance is based on a political decision, the “Cabinet Agreement”. Acceptance of refugees under this category does not constitute a legal change; instead it is temporary and can be terminated at government will. Under this scheme, Japan admitted around 11,300 Indo-Chinese refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia between 1978 and 2006. The third type of protection is extended on special humanitarian grounds which are based neither on legal nor on political decisions: special residence permits on humanitarian grounds may be granted to asylum-seekers, even though they do not qualify for the status of Convention refugees. The government has not outlined the criteria for determining individual cases and Banki (2006a) states that there is no apparent consistency in granting a permit.

Even though Japan accepted Russian refugees fleeing the 1917 Russian Revolution and the subsequent civil war, and thousands of Jewish refugees during World War II, post-war Japan has not actively participated in the international protection of refugees (Mukae 2001; Strausz 2012). It was not until the 1970s that refugee acceptance began to be considered and practiced more openly in Japan. The highest level of refugee admittance was, as already mentioned, that of Indo-Chinese refugees as a response to the large numbers of them arriving on the coast of Japan (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014a). Between 1975 and 1979, Japan was the first country of asylum for many refugees fleeing the Indo-Chinese War. The majority were granted temporary residency status until a third country could be found for resettlement. In 1979, a Cabinet Agreement was announced which set an acceptance quota of 500 Indo-Chinese refugees, which increased to an overall quota

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of 10,000 in 1985 (Strausz 2012:250). The acceptance of Indo-Chinese refugees and their family reunification officially came to an end in 2006, due to the stabilised situation in Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, and the decreasing number of family reunification applications (ICCR 2005). Many scholars have analysed why Japan suddenly decided to admit so many refugees, and many point to the foreign pressure pushing Japan to open the border. Although recognising this foreign pressure, Strausz (2012) argues that the decision was impacted by the government’s belief that the admittance of Indo-Chinese refugees would not set a precedent for a consequent influx of refugees and would not lead to Japan becoming a major destination for resettlement.

Currently, there are a total of 2,646 refugees and 7,950 asylum-seekers in Japan (UNHCR 2015). The number of asylum-seekers is increasing every year. In 2013 the number of asylum applicants was 3,260; a 28 per cent increase from 2012. In the same year, 157 asylum-seekers were granted permits to remain in Japan. Of these, only six admissions were based on the Convention, while the other 151 refugees were accepted on special humanitarian grounds (Ministry of Justice 2014b). One year later, in 2014, the number of asylum-seekers reached a record high of 5,000. The recognition rate, however, was very low, at 0.2 per cent, leading to only 11 asylum-seekers being granted permission to stay in Japan under the terms of the Refugee Convention. Additionally, 110 asylum-seekers were granted permits on humanitarian grounds, making a total of 121 asylum-seekers granted permits in 2014 (Ministry of Justice 2015). Since the implementation of the Refugee Convention in 1981, 630 refugees have been admitted in total.

While Convention refugees and refugees admitted by Cabinet Agreement can access the state-financed Settlement Support Programme (which includes financial support), refugees admitted on special humanitarian grounds are not eligible to do so. The different categories of admittance also affect the rights extended to refugees, such as the right to travel abroad (Cabinet Secretariat 2008) or the guarantee of non-refoulement (Ishikawa 2011).4 After five years, all categories of refugee can apply for permanent residency and naturalisation, the criteria for which include economic self-sufficiency, which is relaxed solely for Convention refugees and is not extended to those with other statuses (Cabinet Secretariat 2008).

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Burmese migration to JapanToday, there are an estimated 9,000 Myanmarese nationals living in Japan. The majority of them (around 2,000) hold a student permit, 1,400 have permanent residency and around 2,000 a long-term settlers’ permit or teijyusha (Ministry of Justice 2014a). The majority arrived in Japan after the military junta’s crackdown against student-led democracy demonstrations in 1988 and con-tinued to arrive from then on. Japan was a destination for those refugees with relatively greater resources, who entered the country by plane with legal permits such as student or tourist visas. Burman, Chin, Kachin, Karen, Lahu, Paluang, Rakhine, Shan, Mon, Naga and Rohingya are the ten Burmese ethnic minority groups in Japan (Banki 2006b), although there are no official statistics on how these 9,000 Burmese nationals are divided ethnically. It is estimated that there were around 80 Karen individuals who were in Japan before the resettlement programme started (Interview C).

Between 2010 and 2012, the number of Burmese asylum-seekers (the largest group in Japan in 2010 and second-largest in 2011) varied between 350 and 500 (Yoshihara et al. 2013:451). In 2005, 88 Burmese were granted residence permits under the Refugee Convention, 124 remained in Japan on special humanitarian grounds, and 163 were asylum-seekers (Banki 2006a). Burmese in Japan have received somewhat preferential treatment due to their refugee status; while they make up only 10 per cent of all refugee applications, nearly 25 per cent of the Convention refugees and 30 per cent of the special humanitarian category were Burmese (Banki 2006a).

Currently, there are 36 Burmese organisations in Tokyo, though some may no longer be active and others may not be listed. The first one was established in 1988 and the latest in 2012. Four are Karen organisations (Yoshihara et al. 2013).5 As the number of organisations in Tokyo indicates, the Burmese refugee community is split into various political groups. Moreover, the question of refugee status creates tension in the larger group (Banki 2006b). The majority of Burmese live in Takadanobaba in central Tokyo, which is often called “Little Yangon”. The rent is relatively inexpensive and the share of foreign Asian residents is greater than in other parts of the city (Banki 2006a). The Burmese community is seen to be able to secure employment and housing for the larger Burmese

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community. Research also shows that the Burmese in Tokyo used to form different ethnic communities; however, as their years of residence in Japan increased, they organised a pan-ethnic Burmese network (Kajimura 2014).

Integration in the Japanese contextEven though the term “social integration” (shakai tougo) exists in the Japanese language, it is not commonly employed by public administrations. Instead, the government and policy-makers use the term “multicultural co-living” (tabunka-kyosei), which can be understood as Japan’s version of immigrant integration policy (Kashiwazaki 2013, 2014). Multicultural co-living is defined as “people of differing nationalities or ethnicities living together as local community members through mutually accepting each other’s cultural differences and striving to establish an equal relationship” (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication 2006). This policy promotes the idea that “Immigrants who bear different ethnicities and cultures are expected to be incorporated into the host society as foreigners rather than by becoming Japanese nationals” (Kashiwazaki 2013:31), and ultimately reflects the Japanese government’s point of departure – that foreigners are not here to stay. The policy recognises that language training, education, housing, employment, access to medical care and social welfare are identified as the important aspects of life where foreign residents need support (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communication 2006). These policies are established and implemented at the local level, but are absent at the national level (Kashiwazaki 2013).

For this reason, the concept is never used in the Cabinet Agreement and the Implementation Decision of the new resettlement programme. Instead the words “adjust” (tekiou) and “settlement” (teichaku/teijyu) are used, although these concepts are not defined in the document. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that the Japanese government does not define integration, therefore “integration” is not a goal, though the “promotion of social integration” is. With the idea of the “promotion of social integration”, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs includes the issue of whether or not the refugees are self-reliant (Interview A). However, no criteria for self-reliance are outlined in any official document, although it is generally understood

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to mean that “the person can obtain employment which will fund their living expenses” (The 8th REC Meeting 2012). Independent of whether Japan’s goal should be integration, multicultural co-living, settlement or self-reliance, it is obvious that there is no clear national policy on how to incorporate foreigners and refugees into Japanese society.

MethodThe research from which this chapter is drawn was conducted between April and October 2014. In order to understand the resett-lement programme in Japan, official and public documents such as the Cabinet Agreement, the Implementation Decision and minutes from the “Resettlement Expert Council” (Yushikisha Kaigi) are studied. The Resettlement Expert Council – which consisted of eight experts on refugee issues, including prominent academics, a NPO representative and staff from local communities which had already admitted refugees, plus observers from the IOM, RHQ and UNHCR – ran from May 2012 to December 2013 in order to monitor the implementation and progress of the resettlement pilot programme. Another objective of the council was to suggest amend-ments and indications for the proposed continuation of the resettle-ment programe as an ordinary programme from 2015. Information disseminated at official meetings and seminars on the Japanese resettlement programme is also incorporated in this description.6 Seven interviews were conducted with representatives from diffe-rent stakeholders, including international organisations, NGOs and the commissioned implementing partners of the resettlement pro-gramme – International Organization for Migration, International Social Services Japan, Japan Associations for Refugees, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Minna no Ouchi, Refugee Assistance Headquarters, and the Tokyo office of the UNHCR. To protect the stakeholders’ anonymity and confidentiality, each interview is coded. Interviews usually lasted for about two hours and provided the researcher with rich information, much of which, however, was considered “off the record” and was therefore eliminated.

Conducting research on resettled refugees and gathering information was not an easy process. Japanese researchers have criticised how difficult it is to access information about the resettled

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(e.g. Koike 2011; Kubo 2014; Miura 2013). The Resettlement Expert Council’s minutes are a source of valuable information on resettled refugees from 2010 and 2011. However, since the council closed in 2013, there has been almost no public channel through which to obtain detailed information about the resettled refugees who arrived in 2013 and 2014. To identify and meet those refugees who were living in Japan was an almost impossible task, at least within the seven-month period of fieldwork. Kubo writes of his frustration at wanting to meet the refugees and hear their voices but being denied access by the government and the refugee assistance organisation. He claims that this protection of “confidentiality” and “personal information” is creating a wall between the refugees and the society into which they are hoping to be accepted (Kubo 2014). During my seven months of fieldwork, I also came up against this wall. As mentioned earlier, not all the information obtained through my interviews were “on the record”. All the interviewees disclosed significant information which was considered by them to violate the protection of confidentiality and personal information. Moreover some interviewees told me that there would be “government sanctions against and consequences for” the organisation or the individuals working for them if this confidential information was leaked. I do understand and respect the consideration, since the number of resettled refugees in Japan is very small (only 86 in total) meaning that they could easily be identified. However, from my perspective, this consideration is sometimes exaggerated; nevertheless, the resettled refugees and the subject of resettlement were treated as overly sensitive issues to touch upon. There are many questions that were never answered, and I faced severe difficulties in fully understanding the resettlement programme and the situation of refugees in Japan. Any information which I could have used for this study merely repeats the content of the minutes from the Resettlement Expert Council and other relevant meetings that I attended. Importantly, this chapter therefore analyses the refugee situation on the basis purely of the information communicated officially in Japan, with its inevitable bias. However, in the absence of access to the refugees’ perspectives, the information I provide at least gives us an idea of their situation. The next section moves on to describe the Japanese resettlement programme in more detail.

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The Japanese resettlement programmeAlthough a statement of official objectives is missing in the Cabinet Agreement announcing the launch of the resettlement programme in 2008, public documents and discussions of the Resettlement Expert Council point to the following motivational aspects used: “refugees as a labour force and persons who can contribute to the local community”, “refugees as a contribution to multicultural co-living” and “Accepting refugees presents a good example of international contribution” (e.g. ICCR 2014a; The 12th REC Meeting 2013). As Kubo (2014) mentions, there is no reference to the acceptance of refugees based on humanitarian needs.7 Some references, however, are made to international refugee protection, as illustrated in the Implementation Decision:

The admittance of refugees through third-country resettlement is one of the durable solutions for refugees, together with repa-triation and local integration in the first country of asylum. It is also seen as crucial from the perspective of sharing the burden of the refugee problem equally with the international community (ICCR 2008a).

The Implementation Decision by the Inter-Ministerial Coordina-tion Council for Refugee Issues (ICCR) stipulates the details of the resettlement programme. It states that the programme was set to run for three years, starting in 2010, and aimed to receive Myanmar refugees from Mae La Camp in Thailand – thirty refugees annually in family units. The eligibility criteria stated were twofold: firstly, the refugees must be recognised as in need of protection and be recom-mended by the UNHCR. The second criteria is that the individuals should have the potential to adjust to Japanese society and should be able to acquire a job and become self-reliant (ICCR 2008a). Infor-mally, there is a set of more detailed eligibility criteria which favour the ethnic Karen and, among them, nuclear families consisting of a young couple and a small number of children (Hashimoto 2014). The choice of the Karen is based on the fact that half of the refugees in Mae La Camp are of this ethnicity and that the Karen engage in agriculture and are considered to integrate well into Japanese culture and traditions (The 6th REC Meeting 2012).

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As further stated in the Implementation Decision, a survey of the refugees’ Japanese language skills and living conditions will be conducted every six months after arrival, in order to assess the continuation of the resettlement programme in the future (ICCR 2008b). Thailand was chosen based on the UNHCR’s recommendation that there was a need for resettlement from the country. Family units in the Japanese context refers to a nuclear family consisting of a wife, a husband and children under the age of 20 and does not include grandparents, adult siblings and adult children. The reasoning behind the government focus on the family unit is that resettlement and adaptation to Japan is perceived to be easier for families compared to single refugees (The 6th REC Meeting 2012).

In 2012, the pilot programme was extended for a further two years until 2014, since the goal of accepting 90 refugees within the three-year pilot programme was not achieved. Two more camps were added as source camps (ICCR 2012). The same year, the government again failed to resettle any refugees. Three families were initially selected for resettlement. However during the pre-departure orientation, all the families withdrew. The reason for this remains uncertain and speculations are rife. The official understanding is that the refugees’ extended family showed strong feelings of rejection and the resettled felt that they could not migrate to Japan without their approval (Hashimoto 2014). An avid discussion on refugee selection was conducted (e.g. The 6th REC Meeting 2012), which led to the further expansion of source camps and a change in the definition of a family unit, which now included the parents and the single adult siblings to the main applicant family who can work and have a potential to be self-reliant (ICCR 2013).

In 2014, as the five-year resettlement pilot programme came to an end, the government announced that Japan would continue the resettlement programme as an ordinary program (ICCR 2014b). Still focusing only on Myanmar refugees, and only on those who are fit to work, two major changes were made – the shift of country from Thailand to Malaysia, and the opening of the possibility of family reunification for those resettled refugees who arrived in previous years. A greater need for resettlement from Malaysia instead of Thailand was identified, while the ICCR concluded

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that the demand for family reunification from previously resettled refugees would probably grow. Importantly, the reasoning was also that many of the refugees in Malaysia are urban refugees working in the service sectors, and were therefore suitable for Japan, which seeks self-reliance as a requirement for acceptance. The fact that many Myanmar refugees in Malaysia can communicate in Burmese is also seen as something positive, given the pre-existing Burmese-speaking community in Japan (ICCR 2014a).

Since Japan does not have a specific permit for refugees, the selected resettled refugees are given long-term settler (teijyusha) status8 on arrival in Japan, which is one of the only types of residence permit that imposes no restrictions on the economic activities of the refugees in the country (Cabinet Secretariat 2008). The resettled refugees receive the longest period of residence status, which was three years up until 2013 and has been five years since 20149 (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014b). Resettled refugees have a separate status category from the Convention refugees. This means, for example, that there are restrictions on the kind of travel documents they can obtain, and there is no specific mention about the relaxing of conditions for permanent residency and naturalisation, nor is there any specifically mentioned guarantee of non-refoulement (Ishikawa 2011).

There is no one ministry responsible for the implementation of the resettlement programme. Administratively, it is the ICCR, a council within the Cabinet Secretariat consisting of representatives from a total of 13 ministries and government agencies,10 which coordinates the implementation (see Figure 1). It functions as a venue in which to share and consult information about refugees. The Ministry of Justice is in charge of the selection process, while the Refugee Assistance Headquarters (RHQ), a semi-governmental agency, is then commissioned as an implementing partner.

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Cabinet SecretariatInter-Ministerial Coordination

Council for Refugee Issues(ICCR)

Ministry of ForeignAffairs Agency for Cultural Affairs Ministry of Health, Labour and

Welfare Ministry of Justice Nine other ministries and agencies

Refugee Assistance Headquarters (RHQ)

Figure 1. Organigram of the implementation structure of Japan’s Resettlement Programme

The reception programme offered to resettled refugeesThe reception program offered to resettled refugees in Japan consists of a pre-departure programme, and a one-year programme post-arrival which is a combination of the Settlement Support Programme and on-the-job training, and further continuous support as needed.

Before arriving in Japan, resettled refugees receive a three-to-four-week pre-departure training. The IOM is commissioned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to conduct this training, which is separated into two parts.11 The first part is on life in Japan, with the main focus on employment and household economy management. Practical skills for the actual journey – such as how to board an aeroplane, use the toilet and fasten the seatbelt – are practiced as well. The other part consists of Japanese language classes, which amounts to about 15 days of training. After arrival in Japan, the government offers a one-year programme with financial support covering their rent, livelihood and other necessary costs such as medical care. This programme consists of an initial 180-day Settlement Support Programme given at the Resettlement Centre in Tokyo, followed by a move to a settlement city and on-the-job training for another six months. As seen in Figure 1, the RHQ is commissioned to provide the Settlement Support Programme12 (Interview A, D).

The initial 180 days of the Settlement Support Programme offered after the refugees’ arrival in the country starts with a one-week orientation and health check-up. After that, the refugees spend time at the Resettlement Centre in Shinjuku, Tokyo, run by the RHQ, and participate in the programme (which is also offered to

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Convention refugees and their families). It consists of three parts: Japanese language training, social-life orientation (Shakai seikatsu tekiou shidou) and job counselling and referral. The social-life orientation is a cultural and civic course which gives the refugees practical information necessary for a self-reliant life in Japan. The refugees learn about Japanese public manners, how to manage their household economy and how to maintain safety in Japan, which includes emergency drills (Ministry of Foreign Affaris 2014a). The programme also offers activities with the local residents and ethnic community of the neighbourhood where the Resettlement Centre is located. Refugees take part, for example, in the Karen New Year event and local festivals and the children experience going to school and pre-school/daycare for three weeks (The 9th REC Meeting 2013). Employment counselling and job referral is an important part of the Settlement Support Programme. Through counselling and visits to potential employers, the refugees are presented with different occupations and employers from which they choose where they would like to spend time during the on-the-job training (CDR research team 2011; The 9th REC Meeting 2013). The RHQ selects possible employers and considers the standards of work, the company’s experience of employing refugees, the size of the company, the availability of daycare, and schools and housing in the vicinity (Interview C; The 9th REC Meeting 2013).

The initial six months are followed by the move to the settlement city and a 180-day on-the-job training. As employment is a key factor in Japan’s resettlement programme, it also determines where the refugees will be sent: the current programme settles them in a city within a commutable distance to work. As such, it is not the settlement cities that initiate the admission of refugees, and the settlement city is not necessarily the same city where the workplace is located. The RHQ facilitates the move to the settlement city, and helps with housing and the necessary administrative procedures for the move, such as arranging schools and daycare for the children (Interview D). The exact organisation of the internship is discussed together with the employer and the RHQ offers support such as translators (The 9th REC Meeting 2013). The refugees do not receive a salary during their training, but have their living expenses covered by the government. In addition, the employers receive a monthly

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financial support of around 25,000 JPY (ca 1,800 SEK or 195 euros) per accepted refugee during this period. Employers who offer training to more than two resettled refugees receive extra training subsidies (The 14th REC Meeting 2013). While employers are compensated for their efforts, the settlement city does not receive any subsidies from the government for welcoming the resettled refugees (although, since 2013, it can receive subsidies to offer language training to them if they so wish). However, non-financial support such as translators is provided according to the city’s and the refugees’ needs.

After an initial year in Japan, refugees are expected to be self-reliant. The current programme does not indicate a set end to the continuous support it offers after the initial year, due to the absence of a clear government definition and criteria for assessing integration (Interview A). According to the government, after the initial year in Japan, refugees should utilise the general social welfare scheme to which they have access (The 2nd REC Meeting 2012). This is also in accordance with UNHCR’s guidelines recommending that refugees be gradually incorporated into any pre-existing local services available (UNHCR 2013). However, the transition plan is not clear, and help is still given when needed, even after the first year. In fact, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is actively engaged in coordinating support for the refugees through the RHQ and through local settlement support staff (Interview D). These are individually contracted by RHQ, appointed in the settlement cities and mandated to bridge the gap between the refugees and the host city. The local settlement support staff are selected from prominent figures in the local community and have backgrounds in professions such as former district welfare officers or Japanese language teachers. Before the local settlement support staff were appointed, the RHQ staff visited the local cities as the need for support arose. Now, with the placement of local settlement support staff, it is recognised that the day-to-day basic support for refugees is fully provided (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012).

Who has come?Since 2010, a total of 89 individuals, including children, have arrived in Japan as resettled refugees and currently live in different cities.

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Table 1. Resettled refugees’ settlement cities

2010 2011 2013 2014

City No.

families

City No.

families

City No.

families

City No.

families

Initial settlement city

SuzukaTogane

32

Misato 4 Kasukabe 4 Not officially

announced

5

Current settlement city

SuzukaMisatoShikiTokyo

1112

Misato 4 Kasukabe 4 Not officially

announced

5

Note: Suzuka is in Mie Prefecture, Togane in Chiba Prefecture, and Misato, Shiki and Kasukabe in Saitama Prefecture.

Refugees from 2010The first group of refugees is the only group who were separated and resettled in two different cities. As Table 1 shows, three families (14 individuals) settled in Suzuka, Mie prefecture, and two (13 indi-viduals) in Togane in Chiba prefecture. In both cities, the refugees were employed in the agricultural sector. After spending two years in Suzuka, two families decided to move to Saitama Prefecture (in two different cities, Shiki and Misato) where they subsequently found employment. The family who remained in Suzuka is often referred to as the “most successful case of resettlement” in meetings and official documents (e.g. REC 2014). The families in Togane made their move to Tokyo directly after finishing the on-the-job-training, a move which was facilitated by an NGO with the help of lawyers who recognised that the two families’ living and working conditions in Togane “left much to be desired” (Interview C). The two families had several problems during the on-the-job training, such as issues with their children’s schools, their health and their employment con-ditions (Watanabe 2011). This incident was featured negatively in the media, stressing that the Japanese Resettlement Programme was not going smoothly or according to plan. The adults in both families found work after moving to Tokyo, although one started to receive public assistance in 2012 due the difficulty in sustaining their living conditions. All the children from the five families go to school; two of them attend a night-time public high school, and will be the first to receive a high-school education in Japan (REC 2014).

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Refugees from 2011The four families (18 individuals) all live in Misato, Saitama prefecture. All the adults are employed in the service and production sectors (REC 2014). The men work in a shoe factory and the females in a linen-supply factory. In 2013, a member of staff from Misato assured the Resettlement Expert Council that the families were getting used to their lives in Japan, and the children were well integrated in school with both Japanese and other children of immigrant background. The refugees in Misato are described as “successful” and receive high commendations from their employers (The 15th REC Meeting 2013). However, one of the adults in this second group committed a crime in 2014, which was reported in a Japanese tabloid newspaper (Shukanbunshu 31 July 2014). The government called this incident unexpected and a betrayal of (Japanese) people’s generosity and support for the refugees. In response to the incident, the government increased the focus in the 180-day resettlement programme on educating the refugees about the juridical system and the laws of Japan (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014a).

Refugees from 2013–2014Information on the refugees who arrived in 2013 and 2014 is scarce, because of the lack of public documents available after the closure of the Resettlement Expert Council in 2013. Four families (18 individuals) arrived in 2013, and all settled in Kasukabe, Saitama Prefecture. The men are employed by a construction company (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014a); however, information on the women’s employment is not available. Five families (23 individuals) arrived in Tokyo in September 2014 (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014c). Two of the selected female refugees are sisters and came in 2013 with a third person. Ties like this are seen as positive for the families’ resettlement process (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2014a). The refugees finished their 180-day Settlement Support Programme at the Resettlement Center in March 2015, although where they will receive their on-the-job training and in which city they will settle have not yet been officially announced. The lives of the resettled refugees in JapanThis section describes the lives of the resettled refugees in Japan, from the perspective of the stakeholders and from what is publicly

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communicated. It provides an insight into the difficulties which refugees face in their life in Japan, and their social networks, mobility and employment. As mentioned earlier, Japanese researchers have criticised the difficulties they experience in accessing these resett-led migrants (e.g. Koike 2011; Kubo 2014; Miura 2013). Due to the research constraints referred to above, meeting the refugees in person was impossible. Moreover, gathering the material necessary to be able to understand and analyse the resettled refugees’ daily lives through interviews with stakeholders and through consulting public documents was equally challenging. The officially available information is fragmented and therefore an academically sound analysis of resettled refugees’ lives is not possible.

Difficulties in Japan As in any country, Japan’s refugees face problems of adjustment. One refugee said at a official meeting that he would have preferred to receive more information before arrival on how the school system works, and how difficult it is to live and work in Japan. Another refugee stated that his impression of Japan was very good before he arrived but now he is not sure what to think about it (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012). On the other hand, some say that they are glad that they chose to come to Japan, despite the difficulties (The 5th REC Meeting 2012).

The lack of Japanese language skills seems to be one of the biggest concerns for the refugees, their employers and their settlement cities. This concern is greater for the adult refugees, as the children learn and adjust to the Japanese system better than the parents (e.g. The 5th REC Meeting, The 4th REC Meeting 2012). It has been suggested that the six-month settlement programme is not sufficient for the refugees to be able to learn both the language and the social skills and experiences they need to be independent (Ishikawa 2011). Another issue that is identified in public documents and by the stakeholders who were interviewed for this study is the lack of emotional and material stability in the refugees’ lives. Refugees have expressed a wish for a better and more stable standard of living. A local settlement support staff member in Misato confirmed that he had witnessed the daily struggles of life and the emotional instability that the refugees have (The 5th REC Meeting 2012). This

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emotional instability was mentioned by some of the stakeholders, who indicated that the resettled refugees sometimes express their wish to leave Japan and go back to the camp, since their lives in Japan are difficult. Stakeholders say that the current resettlement programme puts the emphasis on refugees’ self-reliance through employment, and lacks any consideration for their subjective well-being (Interview B, C).

Lack of ethnic tiesAgain, stakeholders I interviewed confirmed that the resettled did have some ethnic social networks in Japan before arriving, however these are said to be more organisational ties, such as the Karen National Union or the Karen National League, and not individual networks (Interview B, C, F). Those resettled refugees who came in the same year and live in the same area have strong bonds between themselves (Interview A). For example, the five families in Misato, four from 2011 and one from 2010, live in the same housing deve-lopment and seem to have established themselves well and help each other. Some of the other refugees visit each other’s homes, talk on the phone and keep in touch, even though geographically some way apart (The 10th REC Meeting 2013; Interview D). However, the connections between the resettled refugees who arrived in dif-ferent years seem generally to be weak. What is more, the lack of contact with the existing Karen community in Japan is also raised as a problem by some stakeholders (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012). Those Karen who have been living in Japan for 20 years said that they would like to have more contact with the resettled refugees – the same wish is also expressed by the newly resettled; however, this has so far not resulted in strong bonding ties (The 7th REC Meeting 2012; Interview B and C). Despite these weak ties, co-nationals have been helping the Karen resettled refugees to some extent. Interes-tingly, most of the cases were initiated by Japanese NGOs and the RHQ. For example, when one family who resettled in 2010 faced difficulties in paying the rent, it was co-nationals who helped the family with one month’s rent and sent food packages, in response to the NGO’s and the RHQ’s request (Interview B).

The RHQ introduces Karen community leaders to resettled refugees, organises meetings with co-nationals and visits to a church located close to Takadanobaba (where a large number of

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Myanmarese live) in order to facilitate communication between the resettled and the wider Myanmar community (Interview D). In 2014, a system was introduced whereby the Karen from previous migrations act as “mentors” (Ministry of Foreign Affaris 2014a). The goal is to build a support system amongst the resettled refugees. Stakeholders stressed the importance of extending support and to strengthening ties between the existing Karen community and the resettled refugees. Furthermore, it was deemed crucial to help to establish a newly resettled Karen community with the hope that this would facilitate a support system between them that could also be extended to future Karen refugees (The 4th REC Meeting 2012).

There are different factors leading to these weak ties between the Karen and the broader Myanmarese community. Firstly, the estimated 80 Karen who have lived in Japan since before 2010 are members of three different associations (Interview B, C). The stakeholders also had divided opinions as to whether or not the three Karen organisations were on good terms with each other. Irrespective of the relation between them, the existing Karen seem to be divided in small groups and there is an understanding that they are generally only loosely organised (Interview B, C, G). The same can be said about the Myanmar community (Banki 2006b). Language was another issue which was felt led to weak ties; many of the resettled refugees spoke a different dialect to the others, which created difficulties in finding interpreters (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012; Interview B, C, D). Many of the longer-term resident Karen are Sgaw Karen, who were treated as elites by the English military and, while they strongly identify as Karen, they speak predominantly Burmese – and are known as Yangon Karen in Japan (Interview C). The majority of the resettled Karen are not fluent in Burmese, however (The 7th REC Meeting 2012). This also indicates differences in social class. Thus the resettled refugees may feel that they do not have much in common with the established Karen in Japan (Interview B, C, D). Furthermore, the various stakeholders perceive a certain resentment between the resettled Karen and their previously migrated co-ethnics; as the existing community members know that the resettled are taken care of by the government, many are content just to watch what is happening instead of reaching out to them (Interview B). There are also tensions about the issue of refugee status (Banki 2006b). Many previously established Karen

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refugees had to struggle to win their refugee status and current living standards in Japan, and then see the resettled Karen refugees receiving full social security and financial support from the government on arrival. Finally, the long working hours six days a week may also be part of the explanation why these ethnic ties are not yet growing stronger (Interview B, C, D). Since the refugees focus on being self-reliant, they may simply not have the time to initiate or maintain a social network.

The lack of a broader social networkCloser contact with Japanese society and other immigrants and refugees living in Japan is identified as important for the language development of the newly arrived and also as a channel via which they can seek help when needed (Interview B, C, D, G). However the resettled refugees face a lack not only of ethnic ties in Japan but also of a broader social network beyond national and ethnic ties in general.

First of all, the lack of connection with the wider refugee community is identified (The 14th REC Meeting 2013). It is believed that it is best for the refugees to reside where there are other foreigners, and concerns have been raised that the refugees are currently being settled in areas where there is no strong Indo-Chinese community (The 7th REC Meeting 2012). This decision is based on the assumption that local cities which have a large share of foreign residents have prior experience that can be beneficial in supporting the refugees and have well established public services for foreigners. Moreover, the local residents in these cities are also believed to be more tolerant towards newcomers, since they are used to living with foreigners. In Misato, the refugees live in a public housing area where a proportion of the residents are foreign, which is considered to be a positive environment for the refugees (The 5th REC Meeting 2012).

Furthermore, the resettled refugees lack social networks with Japanese society. Since the settlement cities do not receive subsidies from the government when admitting resettled refugees, the level of engagement and the resources of the host city affect the type of contact between the place of residence and the refugees. The refugees seems to have a lack of Japanese friends and of communication with

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their neighbours and Japanese society in general which, in turn, hinders their progress in Japanese language skills. Despite friendly relations with their Japanese co-workers, the nature of the manual work in which most refugees are engaged does not encourage personal communication in Japanese (Interview A). Employment, in other words, does not help much to establish contact with the Japanese people. Furthermore, the fact that the refugees live and work in different cities also negatively affects the establishment of social contacts as the refugees spend significant amounts of time at work. The only exception to this is Suzuka, where the refugees live in the same city that they are employed in; it is the employer and the city of Suzuka which help the refugees with their daily lives and enable them to have closer contact with local residents (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012).

Many stakeholders indicated the importance of the connection between refugees and Japanese society, especially for individuals (Interview B, C, G). One stakeholder explained that, since ethnic communities are still weak in Japan and are not at a point where the communities can support the members themselves, the role of the settlement city becomes greater. The interviewee believed that the government’s goal of self-reliance is achieved not only through employment but also through the creation of personal networks where the refugees can seek support (Interview C). As such, many of my interviewed stakeholders advocated that the Settlement Support Programme should create more opportunities for refugees to communicate and meet with Japanese local residents and to establish individual networks. They criticised the “closed” nature of the current resettlement programme, which they see as responsible for the refugees’ lack of social networks. The difficulties in reaching out to the refugees prevent NGOs from supporting the refugees the way they would like to (Interview B, C, F). As mentioned earlier, this “wall” between refugees and the host society has often been criticised by researchers in Japan (see Kubo 2014). However, improvements are being made by the government and the involvement of NGOs is increasingly welcomed (Interview A).

Despite the fact that their social networks are limited, the stakeholders believe that the refugees feel that they can reach out for help. The stakeholders state that many refugees have established

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individual ties with staff at the RHQ (including local settlement support staff), at different NGOs, with their settlement city and with their employers when in need of assistance (Interviews B, C, D, G). Their utilisation of these limited ties can be seen in the next section, which describes the geographical mobility of the refugees.

Geographical mobility among the refugeesStrictly speaking, the Japanese Resettlement Programme already contains a secondary move in itself. As mentioned above, refugees spend the first 180 days in Tokyo, and then they are assigned to live in other parts of Japan, depending on the choice of occupation and available housing. The current programme does not prohibit refugees from making any self-initiated moves at the end of their job-training. Whether it is positive for the refugees to spend the first six months in the middle of Tokyo, and not in the settlement city, was intensively discussed by the Resettlement Expert Council (The 3rd REC Meeting 2012, The 9th REC Meeting 2013). Many argued that the first six months should be spent at the place of resettlement, so that the refugees get to know the settlement community, and the place, better (The 12th REC Meeting 2013).

Even though the refugees have been in Japan for only a relatively short time, some secondary moves have already been observed. Two families moved from Mie Prefecture (the city of Suzuka) to Saitama (Misato and Shiki); this move was self-initiated and based on the refugees’ own free will. One family moved to Misato because of the contact the family had with another resettled family already living there. Exactly how the other family made their decision to move to Shiki is unknown to the stakeholders involved. However those I interviewed believed that the family had some kind of personal connection with a Myanmar refugee who was non-Karen (Interviews B, C, G). In contrast to these two families, the case of the two who moved from Chiba to Tokyo is considered controversial from the government’s perspective; it is still a complicated matter where the different stakeholders interpret the situations as self-initiated, as coerced by an NGO or as necessary support for the protection of the human rights of the refugees (Interview B, C, F). As mentioned earlier, the two families were helped by an NGO and lawyers, who saw their living and working conditions as questionable. It has not

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been possible to identify who initiated the move and how the contact with the NGO and the lawyers was made in the first place, which has led to the different feelings about the secondary moves of the two families.

Employment As mentioned earlier, the Japanese Resettlement Programme only accepts refugees who have the potential to be employed and be self-reliant. This, together with the one-year reception programme, of which the latter part is spent working for a potential employer, has led to a high degree of employment. Besides the subsidies they receive during the training, employers receive subsidies that cover up to one third of refugees’ salaries during the first year of regular employment. This becomes an incentive for the employers to hire refugees after the training period. The fact that the refugees continue to work for the same employer, however, indicates that the subsidies are not the only reason for the refugees’ continuous employment. Even those who have moved to other places have jobs today. Finding employment in Tokyo does not appear to be a problem, although the jobs may not meet the refugees’ skill levels (Banki 2006a). Those families who have made their secondary moves usually found work through the support of different NGOs, friends and the ethnic com-munity (Interview B, C).

The Japanese case is interesting, since there is a demand for low-skilled workers that cannot be filled by the Japanese local population. As resettled refugees are given residence status as long-term settlers, they can engage in low-skilled work where there is a shortage of labour. Contrary to the trainees or Brazilians who may later return to their home countries, refugees are generally seen as permanent residents. Many employers therefore see them as a long-term investment, and are willing to hire and train them, since they are the ones who are likely to stay with the employer (Kabe 2014). This idea of looking at refugees as a low-skilled labour resource has also been criticised. Watanabe (2011) sees the six-month on-the-job training as (unpaid) low-skilled labour in disguise. Indeed, there are a number of indications that the resettlement programme can be a source for employers to secure low-skilled workers; for example, the decision to resettle was not based on humanitarian grounds and

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the protection of the people who are in need. Instead the refugees are selected on the basis of their potential to adjust to Japanese society and be economically self-sufficient. And the move to resettle Myanmarese refugees from Malaysia was seen as more positive partly due to the fact that the refugees in Malaysia are already engaged in the urban economy there. From the perspective of seeing resettlement as a humanitarian contribution, this is problematic.

However, employment does not always secure an economically stable and self-sufficient life. Many refugees earn enough to cover the essentials; however, not to the extent that their income is enough for all their necessities. The situation can be even more difficult for those living in Tokyo, where the cost of housing is higher. One concern expressed by refugees was the difficulty of saving money for the children’s future education (The 3rd REC Meeting, The 5th REC Meeting 2012). This is not a problem specific to refugees but even true for the Japanese low-skilled population. The minimum wage set in Japan is sometimes not enough to make a sufficient living and public assistance becomes a better income option. Refugees have access to a social insurance scheme, therefore they can apply for the subsidies and allowances that are offered to low-income families in the settlement cities. Because of their limited language skills, the resettled refugees need to be guided towards this support. However there seems to be a lack of engagement by the government and the RHQ to introduce social benefits which are different to already existing allowances and subsidies, and to let the refugees access them when they face problems (Interview B, C).

Concluding remarksIt is widely believed among scholars that Japan sees the Resettlement Programme as a way of bettering its international reputation (e.g. Koike 2011:59). In this process, the government shows little tole-rance for details that do not go according to plan; hence, the fact that one family is currently on social benefits and another person committed a crime is seen not only as a problem but also as a failure. Many stakeholders felt that today’s Resettlement Programme does not allow for any “deviance”: resettled refugees are expected to complete the one-year program, settle in the city initially chosen for them, work and be as self-sufficient as any other foreign citizens

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residing in Japan. Once moving to the settlement city, the resettled refugees do have a job that enables them to be economically self-reliant. The financial assistance ends when the refugees complete their 180-day on-the-job training. However, continuous support in their daily lives is still provided through a government-commis-sioned scheme, partly because of their poor language acquisition. Even though social networks and ties are established between some resettled families, NGOs and the wider ethnic network, the lack of ethnic and Japanese social networks in general has been identified as one of the major problems in the experiences of the past five years of the pilot phase. As pointed out before, there is no clear definition of what it means to be self-sufficient, nor does the govern-ment have a clear plan as to when the support given to the resettled refugees should end. The fact that the government still continues to provide day-to-day basic support to the resettled refugees indicates that it is not only focusing on the refugees’ economic self-sufficiency, but on other necessary aspects for independence, such as language skills. This reflects the statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in which the ministry stresses that its goal is to “promote social integration” (Interview A), where economic self-sufficiency is only one of the indicators. If Japan truly wants to see refugees as “con-tributors to the revitalisation of the local community and Japan’s multicultural co-living”, as stated in some of the official and public documents (e.g. ICCR 2014a; The 12th REC Meeting 2013), and in order for the resettlement programme to be sustainable, then it is crucial to consider when would be the most opportune moment for refugees to make the transition from government help to the support offered locally within the pre-existing services for all residents.

The five-year pilot phase ended in 2014 and, in 2015, the resettlement programme became an ordinary programme regulated by Cabinet Agreement. Even though the move was a political decision rather than a change in legislation, this still shows the government’s long-term commitment towards resettlement. There will be new challenges as the source country shifts from Thailand to Malaysia in 2015. As Japan moves on to the next phase of resettlement, it will be interesting to follow what happens not only to those who have already arrived but also to those who are coming in the future. The question remains whether Japan will commit to the resettlement programme

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from the perspective of humanitarian needs, or maintain its focus on what Japan can gain from committing to the settlement programme – namely an improved international reputation and a labour force to fill the vacancies in the low-skilled occupations. Although the country has changed, the framework of the resettlement programme remains the same (ICCR 2014c), continuing thus with the selection of resettled refugees based on their potential to be employed and self-sufficient. This question becomes even more significant in relation to the question of whether or not Japan will commit to admitting a larger number of resettled refugees in the future.

Notes

1. In this article, the terms Myanmar/Myanmarese and Burma/Burmese are both used to refer to the country and its people. The terms Myanmar/Myanmarese are used in Japanese statistics and public documents.

2. For further information on Japan’s resettlement programme, see the forthcoming UNHCR report A Socio-Economic Review of Japan’s Resettlement Pilot Project (provisional title) (2015).

3. This number excludes those who remain in Japan on a temporary permit and those who have diplomatic status there.

4. Convention refugees receive a refugee travel document, while Indo-Chinese, resettled and humanitarian-status refugees only receive a re-entry permit to Japan. The guarantee of non-refoulement is only specifically stated for Convention refugees and not to refugees with other statuses.

5. Karen National League Japan, Karen National Union Japan and Overseas Karen Organisation are listed as political organisations. I do not know why there are three separate Karen political organisations, nor what kinds of activity each organisation is engaged in.

6. These meetings are Symposium on Evaluating Policies on the Refugee Resettlement Support System (12/07/2014), Briefing of Third Country Resettlement for Public Hearing (19/09/2014) and The 7th Sasakawa Foundation Round Table Meeting on Refugee Admittance (05/11/2014).

7. Since 2013, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also started to state on its website that resettlement is an “international contribution and humanita-rian aid” (Ministry of Foreign Affairs 2013; 2014c).

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8. This status is normally given to persons of Japanese descent (from Brazil and China), to persons who are or have been married to a Japanese citizen or a permanent resident of Japan, or to persons who have children with a Japanese citizen.

9. This was part of the change in the residency management enacted in July 2012, which introduced a system of Resident Cards and abolished the Alien Registration System. The five-year permit is only given to those with a specific residence status – such as professors, engineers, specialists in humanities and international business – and to the spouse or child(ren) of a Japanese national or permanent resident.

10. Cabinet Secretariat, National Police Agency, Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Finance Japan, Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Japan, Agency for Cultural Affairs, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Ministry of Land, Transportation, Infrastructure and Tourism, Japan Coast Guard.

11. Details of the pre-departure training can be found in International Organization for Migration 2009a, 2009b.

12. The RHQ is commissioned through a bidding process where any organisation can freely send proposals for project implementation. Except for the RHQ, in 2013 there was one organisation and, in 2012, there were two, who submitted their proposals (The 12th REC Meeting 2013). The RHQ is commissioned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (for guidance in adjusting to Japanese society), the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (for job referral), and the Agency for Cultural Affairs (for Japanese language education) to implement the resettlement programme.

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RESETTLEMENT FROM A POSTCOLONIAL PERSPECTIVE: ENCOUNTERS WITHIN SWEDISH CULTURAL ORIENTATION PROGRAMMES

Mehek Muftee

IntroductionResettlement tends to be portrayed as the simple transfer of people from a country of asylum to a third country, a technical, adminis-trative term used in the field of international refugee protection. However, what tends to be neglected is the embedding of this process in wider historical context in order to facilitate understanding of the complex work and encounters taking place between refugees and officials representing the resettlement country.

This chapter has at its core an understanding of resettlement as a humanitarian practice that is deeply embedded in postcolonial relations. Cultural Orientation Programmes (henceforth COPs), which form part of Swedish resettlement missions, are not excluded from these relations. Thus the aim of this chapter is to show how the asymmetric relations between refugees from the Horn of Africa and the Swedish delegations’ impact on the very practice of offering COPs; it looks in more detail at how the stereotypes formed in a postcolonial context play out in face-to-face encounters and in conversations between the Swedish delegation and the refugee children to be resettled. As the focus is on children and young people

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in the resettlement process, another aim of the chapter is to explore how they contest these stereotypes during such encounters and thus manifest agency within COPs.

The chapter is based on a 2011 study, using participant observation, where I accompanied two delegations of the Swedish Migration Board to Kenya and Sudan in order to observe the COPs. Video observations were carried out of nine COPs that were held for children and youth. Along with the programmes for adults, special programmes targeting the children were also held, where specific activities and information were given in order to prepare these latter for their move to Sweden.

The outline of the chapter is as follows: I start by contextualising refugee humanitarian work, including resettlement and COPs, from a postcolonial perspective. I argue that the COPs being held in Kenya and Sudan cannot be understood without considering the colonial legacies within the Horn of Africa which have direct links to the current refugee situation in the region. I also discuss the concept of stereotyping, and how the notions of difference between a “superior” coloniser and an “inferior” colonised still permeate much of our understanding of, for example, refugees from the Horn of Africa. Drawing on Malkki’s (1995) ideas regarding refugeeness, I argue that stereotypes prevent the voices and perspectives of those on the margins being heard, and thus create barriers which hinder humanitarian responses to those who are the most in need of assistance. The critical stance, from which this study proceeds, is, I believe, a fruitful way of understanding the power asymmetries that are at work and that seem to prevent some of the stated aims of COPs, one of which is engagement in two-way communication. The chapter will also highlight children’s agency as a way of countering the idea of young refugees being viewed as merely passive victims. A brief methodological discussion follows, where I reflect on the use of video recording during the COPs and on the role of translator. After this, the background to Swedish COPs is provided. Three central tenets of COPs are then presented – those of providing adequate information, focusing on two-way communication, and actively involving the refugees in COPs in order for them to become self-reliant in their new society. I also show, here, how certain notions that refugees are passive and prone to dependency seem to permeate

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the guidelines created for COPs. In the later part of the chapter, two empirical examples from the COPs in Kenya and Sudan are given in order to illustrate the tension between the refugee humanitarian work and the practice of stereotyping and its impact on the meetings taking place during the programmes. What is also shown is how the young refugees deal with their encounters with Swedish delegations and manifest resistance to stereotyping. At the end of the chapter I engage in a discussion of humanitarian work from the postcolonial perspective and discuss how colonial legacies inform the meetings that take place during COPs. Finally, I raise some important points that are worthy of reflection in order to break with the existing hierarchies and remove the barriers hindering those who are about to be resettled in Sweden.

Refugee humanitarianism in a postcolonial contextColonialism is referred to an era of extensive European expansion and domination. The Africa Conference in Berlin in 1884 is commonly seen as the starting point for the “scramble for Africa” (Griffiths 1986),1 where European powers divided most of the African con-tinent among themselves. In the Horn of Africa, Britain occupied what was then known as British Somaliland, France annexed French Somaliland (today Djibouti) and Italy occupied Italian Somaliland as well as Eritrea. The borders of the occupied territories which, after independence, were turned into nation-states, were drawn according to the interest and negotiation of the colonial powers, with a complete disregard for the social and ethnic fabric of the land. After the colonial powers left in the 1960s, conflicts erupted over land borders and political power in all former colonial territories of the Horn – among them, the Eritrean War of Independence against Ethiopia, 1961–1991, the Eritrea–Ethiopian War of 1998–2000 and the Somali Civil War, still ongoing since 1991. These conflicts lie at the centre of the massive human displacements that continue to take place within the region: in 2014, the UNHCR counted approx-imately 1.5 million refugees from Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia and Djibouti, with another 1 million estimated internationally displaced persons (IDPs) in Somalia (UNHCR 2015a).

Three legacies of the colonial period should be highlighted. Firstly, as already stated, many refugee-producing conflicts erupted in the

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Horn of Africa are directly related to colonial impact in the region. Secondly, postcolonial economic and political links continue to reproduce economic and social inequality between Europe and Africa. Thirdly, and what can be seen as of most importance in this chapter, the colonial era also produced an ideology of difference between the colonised and the colonisers, on which the core undertaking of colonial domination is based. This ideology has been globally entrenched and, from a postcolonial perspective, continues to live on, legitimising the idea of civilizing, developing, and modernizing of the ‘other’. It continues to impact on how we view the world around us and tend to think of ourselves as good, superior, and of others – often referring to those from the Third World – as markedly different and inferior (Loomba 2005). This legacy, as I will show in this chapter, very much permeates the refugee humanitarian work including resettlement and COPs.

In the field of humanitarian work, Hyndman (2000) makes the link between the colonial era and contemporary refugee protection, and argues that the work of humanitarian organisations such as the UNHCR needs to be understood within this context. She argues that “colonial and cold war political geographies, cultural politics and economic alliances” lie behind the massive displacement in the Horn of Africa, and calls for recognition of Europe’s effect on the postcolonial lives of those who were formerly colonised and are, today, displaced (2000:37).

Resettlement is part of humanitarian refugee work as it is one of the three durable solutions that are applied by the UNHCR in order to protect refugees globally.2 It is a specific migration process that includes the regulated movement of refugees from one nation-state – the country of first asylum – to another. The resettlement country provides a number of refugees with permanent residence and, in collaboration with the UNHCR and other international actors, arranges the move to the new country. It is within this process that the COPs are held, as a way for the representatives of the receiving nation-state to prepare the refugees selected for resettlement for their new life.

The process of resettlement mirrors the geopolitical relations lying at the very heart of virtually all humanitarian assistance that is extended from Europe to Africa. Importantly, and quite clearly,

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the power within resettlement is in the hands of the resettlement countries, mostly countries in the West. It is these countries that decide who, how many, and from where to resettle. With regards to the COPs, the members of the delegations carrying out the programmes come to represent the nation-states that resettle refugees on the basis of humanitarianism and goodwill (Hyndman & Giles 2011). Resettlement clearly highlights the power asymmetries between those who are at the giving end of help, and the others, the refugees, who are on the receiving end. For instance, the delegations directly form the context in which the COP meetings take place: it is up to them to form the agenda for the meetings, to select which information should be given, to choose which topics should be raised, and to decide what conversations should be held.

Refugee representation and stereotypesLike “the colonised”, refugees have been represented through “oth-erness”. There has been a tendency to universalise the refugee expe-rience, and to fix the representation as a stasis of a helpless person in need of protection (Malkki 1995). Helpless people are then assumed to suffer from speechlessness and hence to be in need of someone to speak for them. Malkki (1996) exemplifies this through the visual representation of refugees that can be found, for example, in news-papers and NGO advertisements and campaigns. In many of these images, women and children in particular are used to illustrate this helpless state. Based on the aforementioned representation of other-ness, the message is one of difference, between “us” – the helpers – and “them” – the refugees. Other scholars (e.g. Jönsson 2014) have pointed out that the images of children and women strongly bring forth the idea of innocence, assistance and a need for protection. Jönsson (2014) shows this in a Swedish study of social workers’ perspectives on undocumented migrants. Many social workers made use of a victim discourse while talking about the women and children, but applied a different discourse for undocumented men, who were more often perceived as individually responsible for their situation.

This notion of refugeeness, as outlined above, relates to the act of stereotyping. Whereas categorising is something that we all do as a means of making sense of the world around us (Jenkins

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2004), stereotyping relates to the practice of constructing a negative representation of a group of people. It includes the reduction of personal traits to simple, memorable and widely recognised characteristics, and the exaggeration and simplification of these characteristics, without the admittance that change is possible and, as such, it “reduces, essentializes, naturalizes and fixes ‘difference’” (Hall 1997:258). Furthermore, stereotypes work to keep the different parts apart, e.g. to split between the acceptable and the non-acceptable, the normal and the abnormal, and tends to occur where there are large inequalities of power. For those belonging to “us”, stereotyping certainly has a unifying function. Thus, while “[i]t sets up a symbolic frontier between the ‘normal’ and the ‘deviant’, the ‘normal’ and the ‘pathological’, the ‘acceptable’ and the ‘unacceptable’, […] it facilitates the ‘binding’ or bonding together all of Us who are ‘normal’ into one ‘imagined community’ […].” (Hall 1997:258).

In a Swedish context, stereotypical representations of “the Other” can be found in various spheres of the society. Studies have highlighted the work on positioning various groups as the “inferior others” in, for example, school literature, humanitarian efforts, language education, and education for sustainable development and migration policies (e.g. Ideland & Malmberg 2014; Johansson 2005; Palmberg 2000; Rosén 2013). According to Eastmond (2011), a paradox in Swedish integration policy and practice is that, whereas belief in equality is viewed as an ideal, the practice often rests on the idea of Swedish culture as being something inherent and distinct. This not infrequently leads to a reproduction of inequality between “us, Swedes” and “them, immigrants”. A manifestation of this can be found in Rosén’s (2013) study of SFI institutions (Swedish for Immigrants courses). Based on an analysis of policy documents and text material on SFI, as well as on video observations of SFI classes, Rosén shows how SFI becomes an arena where the negotiation of potential inclusion in the Swedish community takes place. Taking part in SFI involves relating and responding to categorisations of oneself. Discourses of the “immigrant” and the “Swede” are constructed through highlighting the topic of gender equality, positioning “immigrant” women as the subordinated “other” in their own culture and thus in need of liberation through Swedish

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understanding of gender equality. What is brought to the forefront in Rosén’s study is how the work of stereotyping can be seen as part of the very introduction phase in Sweden, as SFI is one of the very first encounters many newly arrived persons have with the society.

The imminent danger of stereotyping refugees is, I would argue, the effect that the perspective of refugees is not heard. When this takes place in the initial phase of an introduction to Sweden – be it through an SFI course or COP participation – it may constitute an obstacle to the effective meeting of the needs of refugees. Following Malkki’s (1995, 1996) argument on the representation of refugeeness in the humanitarian realm, the COPs can be viewed as one arena where the stereotypical image of a refugee has very specific consequences for the encounter between the various actors. As I argue, within the postcolonial context of both resettlement and COPs, these images create a barrier to taking the refugees’ perspectives fully into account and thereby contribute to reinforcing unequal power relations.

Children’s agency and resisting stereotypesMy focus in this study is on the actual conversations between the delegation and the refugee children and youth. This focus is based on a social constructionist stance where categories such as “refugee” or “Swede” are not viewed as something that people simply are, they are not stable entities within human beings (Hall 1996), but, instead, are constructed and filled with meaning through interac-tions. The emphasis on interaction not only allows us to observe how stereotypes play out in practice, but also enables us to grasp the negotiations and contestations of such stereotypes by the recei-ving group, and thus to capture the agency of those who are mar-ginalised – in this study, young refugees. Hence, stereotypes are not only reproduced but are also, in many ways, subjects of resistance and disruption (Phoenix 2009). One theory that engages with the pursuit of highlighting the voices and perspectives of a marginali-sed group is that of the sociology of childhood. According to Speier (1976), research on children has traditionally been carried out via an essentialist understanding of childhood as mainly a socialisation period which assumes a commonsensical understanding of children as incompetent participants in society. This, he argues, precludes any insight into children’s agency and their social worlds. As a way of

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meeting this critique, the sociology of childhood has emphasised the importance of viewing children as social agents who take part in constructing their social lives (James & Prout 1997; James et al. 1998). Here, the importance of children not being seen as merely a product of simple biological determinism is stressed (James et al. 1998). The idea of highlighting the perspectives and agency of children has also been stressed within the realm of migration (e.g White et al. 2011) where studies have shown how children going through the migration process, besides trauma and loss, manifest immense amounts of responsibility and involvement in, for example, family matters both during migration as well as in the new country (Christopoulou & de Leeuw 2008). The children are anything but mere passive victims of circumstance. Yet, within the process of resettlement, this situation is still to be explored. Internationally, one group of young refugees that has received attention in research is that of young Sudanese boys – known as the “Lost boys of Sudan” – who were resettled in the USA in the early 2000s (see, for example, Goodman 2004). However, within the Swedish context, there are no studies to be found on children’s perspectives on and experiences during resettlement.

Focusing on children as active social agents provides us with a lens through which to view the agency of young refugees. Since the context of resettlement is marked by uncertainty, with much at stake for the refugees, the agency of refugees does not necessarily make a great impact on the resettlement process. However, recognising the agency of marginalised groups can, apart from challenging the notion of refugees merely as passive victims, also help us understand how uncertain situations and dominance come about and are being managed.

Field and methodological considerationsAs mentioned above, this study is based on participant observation during nine COPs conducted by the Swedish Migration Board. In 2011, as part of my study, I accompanied two delegations in order to observe five COPs that were held in Dadaab and Nairobi, in Kenya, and four COPs that were held in Khartoum, Sudan. Each delegation consisted of seven representatives, representing the Migration Board (Migrationsverket), the Swedish Employment Office, and two of

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the municipalities in which some of the refugees would be resettled. In Kenya, a total of 342 refugees were granted Swedish permanent residence in 2011. They were offered the opportunity to participate in COPs. In Sudan, in 2011, 249 refugees were selected for resettle-ment and were offered participation in COPs before the move. The number of children (between the ages of 6 and 16) who took part in the COPs was 63 in Sudan and 106 in Kenya.

Four of the COPs in Kenya were held in Dadaab, a town located in North-Eastern Kenya, approximately 100 km from the Somali border. Here lies the world’s largest refugee camp complex, with over 300,000 refugees residing there (UNHCR 2015b). The camps were set up in 1991 due to the increased number of people arriving from Somalia as a result of the breakdown of the Somali state. The families who took part in the COPs in Dadaab were of Somali background and had lived in Dadaab for many years (some as many as over 15). This meant that many of the children were born in the camps or had – due to Kenya’s strict encampment policy – spent most years of their lives in Dadaab. Among the refugees who face the greatest difficulties in terms of threats to security are those who reside in the larger cities of Kenya, such as Nairobi, where police raids are frequent. From here, a group of refugees were resettled in Sweden. They took part in the fifth and last COP in Kenya in 2011.

Those from Sudan who were resettled in 2011 had a more varied background than the group from Kenya. The refugees participating in the four COPs in Khartoum were of Eritrean and Ethiopian background. Some were Muslims, other Christians. The refugees had lived in Sudan for varying lengths of time and resided in different parts of the country. Whereas some lived in the larger cities of Sudan such as Khartoum or Port Sudan, others had spent years in refugee camps in Eastern Sudan. Many of the refugees had fled the long-drawn-out war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, whereas others had left Eritrea more recently, due to the political hardship in the country. A smaller group of refugees also belonged to the Oromo ethnic group, which has systematically been excluded from power and has suffered hardship in Ethiopia.

The COPs were carried out approximately one month before the actual resettlement and each programme was held over about one and a half days. The programmes contained information about the

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journey to Sweden, as well as about the upcoming introductory phase. Each COP consisted of several sessions on different topics chosen by the delegations in charge of the programmes. All the children attended every session. The most prominent topics were the Swedish education system and spare-time activities for children and youth in Sweden, as well as the journey to Sweden. Many of the sessions were activity-oriented, where the children would draw, play games, watch movies, learn Swedish words and engage in conversations with the delegations. Specific sessions were also held for the youth (between the ages of 13 and 20), where topics such as spare-time activities, the education system and gender roles were discussed. Much of the information provided was illustrated by pictures that the delegations had brought from Sweden.

The COPs for children and young people were observed through video-recording of the sessions and the meetings between the children and the representatives. Apart from this, I also observed a three-day preparation course that was held in Sweden for the members of the delegation going to Kenya, and at which I took field notes. During the COPs a video camera was placed in one corner of the room or tent in which the programmes were held. There are several reasons why video-recording was chosen as a method. The main interest of the study was the conversations taking place between the representatives and the children and youth. Video-recording proved to be the most practical way of gathering data, given the short duration of the fieldwork, since each programme lasted no more than a day and a half. The limited time available, and the many participants in the COPs, made it difficult to remember all the participants’ names and faces, hence the use of video-recording. This method also enabled me to capture the environment in which the COPs were being conducted in a way in which field notes would not be able to. The video-recording thus served as a kind of note-taking of the physical environment (Pink 2001). Furthermore, video-recording became an important way of capturing conversations that revolved around specific images – which were a common inclusion in the COPs. Another advantage of video-recording was that the method enabled the observation of facial expressions and body language during the conversations.

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In total, 60 hours of video-recordings were conducted. Apart from this, the images documents and reports that were used during the COPs were also collected. Field notes were also taken during the observations. In order to ensure that this research and fieldwork met ethical requirements, the refugees and the delegations received both oral and written information about the study. They were also asked for permission to conduct the observations. The refugees received information both in English and in their own language with the assistance of a translator. The children were also asked separately whether or not they wanted to take part in the study.3 Large parts of the COPs were conducted through an interpreter, except when they were held by representatives who spoke the same language as the participants. Interpretation was thus embedded within the institutional practice of the COPs. Wadensjö (1998) argues that norms and people’s expectations and ideas inevitably play a part, even in communications carried out through an interpreter. This is an aspect that is, indeed, important if we are to understand the difficulties of carrying out a dialogue with the refugees.

The study that is presented in this chapter focuses on the social dimension of the meetings that took place between the refugees and the Swedish delegations during the COPs. It is the discursive practices during conversations between the members of the Swedish delegation and the refugee participants that are at the centre of this chapter’s attention. Departing from a social constructionist stance, social identities are seen to be constantly at work (Hall 1996). The point of departure of the analysis has been the examination of how stereotyping works in these conversations. Besides this, the children’s and youths’ different ways of participating in the conversations have been analysed.

Cultural Orientation Programmes In the field of research on resettlement, American resettlement centres have received attention. These centres were established in Vietnam during the 1970s and 1980s for Indochinese refugees about to be resettled in the United States. The programmes that were held for between 12 and 14 weeks offered language training as well as cultural orientation classes to refugees. The aim of these programmes was to enable the refugees to quickly adjust to American society on

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arrival and gain employment. However, Mortland (1987) critically notes how the programmes revealed discrepancies between, on the one hand, telling the refugees how all citizens in America are equal and, on the other, the very practices in the centres which demonstra-ted a strong conception of the refugees as having a lower status. The American programmes inspired Sweden to develop its own informa-tion programmes for refugees about to resettle in Sweden (Anders-son et al. 1997). Resettlement countries throughout the (Western) world have chosen their own ways of preparing refugees for resettle-ment – some, such as the UK and Denmark, offer a brief orientation programme in conjunction with the selection process, while others, like Australia, use the services of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

The development of Swedish COPsSweden carries out its own COPs, the first of which was held in 1992 in the Philippines for a group of Vietnamese refugees (Anders-son et al. 1997). Although not as comprehensive as the American programmes, they included information about Sweden as well as an initial language course. The aim of this early programme was to provide the refugees with the knowledge and skills that would facilitate their resettlement in Sweden. Another aim was to prevent ‘culture shock’, as the cultural differences between the group being resettled and Swedish society was deemed substantial. Among the objectives of the programmes were the enhancement of the refugees’ self-confidence, self-knowledge, cultural awareness, and ability to take initiatives and form realistic goals, as well as to teach them social and practical skills (Andersson et al. 1997).

Two points should be made here: firstly, these initial programmes have been based on the idea of cultural difference. As such, perceived differences formed the very basis upon which the information for refugees was developed. To assume that people who come to a new country may need information as a means to navigate within a new environment is not a problem per se. However, as I would like to point out, a one-sided focus on the contrasts and differences between people often excludes the recognition of similarities. Further, it often tends to include the idea of one person’s superiority over another (Eriksen 2007). The focus on contrasts and culture shock also begs the question as to whether the taken-for-granted differences, as a

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point of departure for the conversations, mirror the thoughts and queries that the refugees themselves may have. The second point I would like to highlight is the perceived need for refugees to develop certain specific skills. These skills focus on personal abilities – such as confidence, social skills, and taking initiatives – which the refugees are assumed to be in need of gaining. Thus, before having met the refugees, the programmes were built on a stereotypical assumption of what the refugees may lack. Both internationally and within the Swedish context, the initial preparations and introduction of refugees seem to have included an extensive focus on refugees as being different. This resembles what Ong (2003) shows in her study on the resettlement of Cambodian refugees to the United States. Here, the officials based their humanitarian cause on the aspect of civilizing the new citizens into what was considered as American values, such as taking individual responsibility for one’s own situation. The initial Swedish COPs seemed also to have included this notion of refugees as in need of learning certain (personal) traits, such as taking initiatives and being confident. Thus, what we see here is how the notion of refugees as “the other” has informed the context of previous COPs. While this has been academically scrutinised in the American context, hardly any attention has been paid to this practice of othering in the Swedish resettlement process (e.g. Muftee 2014a).

Since 2008, when responsibility for the Cultural Orientation Programmes was handed over from the Swedish Integration Board to the Swedish Migration Board, COPs have been developed through various projects in order to prepare refugees for resettlement. These programmes are carried out in the country to where the refugees have fled and from where they are being resettled – the first country of asylum. The current Swedish COP is the result of the transnational MOST Project,4 which started with the aim of increasing efforts for resettlement within the EU in general.5 These efforts included the development of preparation programmes (COPs) and the strengthening of the introductory phase in the resettlement countries, in order to improve methods for the reception, introduction and integration of resettling refugees. To explore the experiences of the resettlement process from different perspectives, the Swedish Integration Board conducted an interview study within the MOST Project to examine the experiences of introduction among resettled

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refugees, municipality officials and personnel from the Migration Board. One of the outcomes of the study was the need to enhance the active participation of refugees through organised activities from the early stages of resettlement (Järvinen et al. 2008). Although COPs had been carried out for a while, as mentioned above, it was in the aftermath of the MOST Project that several initiatives took off in order to develop the Swedish COPs, the goal of which is to prepare the refugees for their upcoming resettlement process (Migrationsverket 2014). The overall aim relates to working towards a better integration of refugees (Järvinen et al. 2008). The current Swedish COP makes use of both written information and programmes that are conducted by special delegations sent to the countries from where refugees are to be resettled.

The focus on information, communication, and the passive refugee Since 2008, the Swedish COPs have been evolving, and the pro-grammes have been designed in different ways in order to further develop the information and programmes provided, both for adults and for children. The COPs as they were when this study took place (2010–2012) were permeated by three core aspects of information, communication, and active involvement.

One of the central aims of the COPs is “to inform refugees about Swedish conditions and prepare them for their journey to and arrival in Sweden” (Migrationsverket 2014).6 The fact that information is one of the central aspects of the COPs is also emphasised in the Migration Board’s protocol from 2011, where the specific motivations for the particular COPs in Kenya under study are stated. Here, it is argued that the refugees in Dadaab have spent an extensive period of time (up to 20 years) in camps and thus have little information about life in what is stated to be a “normally functioning society”. A general lack of education among the group and their limited knowledge about Sweden are other arguments found for conducting a COP. Similar statements are made as to why COPs should be held in Sudan (Migrationsverket 2011).

Again we can see how the basis of the programmes, today as much as in previous decades, take difference as their point of departure, and how this difference is understood to be divisible into two categories: “normal” and “deviant”. Assuming that refugees lack understanding of what a “normally functioning society” is means that this presumed

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idea already exists and forms the basis upon which information is to be prepared and given. Furthermore, there is no elaboration to be found in the text on what is actually meant by “normal”. What exactly is being referred to here? Is it technological differences or access to legal rights, or is it referring to culture and norms? The vagueness of this term is open to many different interpretations. What does become apparent is that a lack of “normality” is identified from the perspective of the Migration Board. It is thus their ideas of normality that are to be the basis upon which the COPs are held, rather than the experiences of the everyday lives of the refugees in the camps. Despite severe hardships, refugees in camps indeed form different ways of creating and upholding a sense of community and routine (e.g. Horst 2006). Departing from a preconceived idea that refugees lack information about “normal society” may mean that we fail to see the knowledge which they do have.

Closely linked to the informational aspect is the aim of providing participants with what are referred to as “realistic expectations” of resettlement and Sweden (Kullberg et al. 2009). The aim is to counter rumours and incorrect information circulating among refugees and, instead, to provide them with first-hand information about Sweden via the delegations. This should counteract any disappointment and potential difficulties for refugee participants (Thomsson 2009). What becomes apparent is, contrary to previous assumptions that refugees are in need of knowledge, here it is conceded that the refugees have some knowledge (in the form of rumours circulating within the refugee group) and, thus, expectations about Sweden. This also indicates that the refugees indeed must be engaging in some kind of activity of sharing information with each other. From such a perspective, they can in no way be viewed as passive. Yet it is felt that their information needs to be corrected. The delegations are positioned as those who have the correct knowledge, who need to prepare the refugees through managing their expectations with information that they view as correct.

After the MOST Project, the Swedish Quota Communication Strategy (SQCS) was started in 2008. The aim of this project was to develop and test information material for refugees in various phases of resettlement and to develop better communication strategies (Migrationsverket 2009). One of the outcomes was the development of a handbook for communication with quota

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refugees. Here it is clearly stated that the new strategy is a shift from “information” to “communication” which is designed to permeate the whole resettlement process (Migrationsverket 2009). This communication includes the active involvement of refugees in their resettlement, spurred on by two-way communication between the delegations and the refugees (Migrationsverket 2009). The emphasis on communication is designed to make use of this interaction by, for example, showing pictures in order to encourage reflection and discussion among refugees regarding the information they are being provided with (Migrationsverket 2009). Furthermore, during the preparatory meetings with the members of the delegation to Kenya, there was a strong emphasis put on dialogue in the COPs. The vision for the new COPs was to create the programmes which would be platforms for dialogue. This was often emphasised by those at the Migration Board in charge of resettlement. It was hoped that, on the one hand, the refugees could ask their questions and, on the other, the delegates could learn more about the post-arrival needs of the group being resettled (Migrationsverket 2009; Thomsson 2009). Through this two-way communication, COPs can be seen as a learning experience for all parties involved. One important benefit of taking part in a COP delegation, often highlighted during the preparation course and meetings, was to be able to better understand the global refugee situation; it was hence thought of as a learning experience for officials working on migration issues.

The emphasis on communication is related to a much wider concept – the need to be actively involved in the COPs and, as a result, in the upcoming introduction in the new country (Migrationsverket 2009). The key recommendations from the MOST Project were:

• “The active participation of refugees in COPs and in organised activities should be promoted from the earliest stages of resettlement.

• Efforts should be made to ensure the more dynamic and motivated involvement of quota refugees in introductory programmes.

• Introductory programmes should be designed to consciously avoid isolating the refugees from society” (Järvinen et al. 2008:131).

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The first point hints at the need for preparatory efforts such as COPs, where refugees are expected to actively take part in their own resettlement process. Here, the idea of active participation becomes prevalent. Furthermore the active engagement relates to the refugees becoming part of the host society and working against isolation – in other words, it relates not only to the actual meetings during the COPs but also to the need for the refugees to become actively involved in the wider Swedish society as a result of a successful intro-ductory phase. One prominent issue discussed in the MOST Project report is the need to work against tendencies to dependency and passivity among refugees, tendencies that are viewed as outcomes of both their time spent in refugee camps and of the highly regulated resettlement process. In the report it is stated that the refugees have problems asking the officials to do things for them, hence their pur-ported lack of initiative (Järvinen et al. 2008); this, in turn, prompts the perception that refugees are seen as passive victims. The very guidelines that inform the COPs – namely the goal of providing information, creating two-way communication and the active enga-gement of refugees – include stereotypical notions of the refugees being prone to a life of dependency and passivity. What seems to stand out is the need to make the refugees aware that they need to take responsibility for their situation and their introduction to life in the host country. In a way, the idea of the passive and dependent refugees relates to Malkki’s (1995) idea of refugees as uprooted people, whose lives have been on hold. On the contrary of this idea, research on the situation of refugees both in camps as well as during the resettlement process shows how refugees are everything else but passive (Horst 2006; Ong 2003; Muftee 2014a). In this sense, the COPs guidelines manifest ambivalence in terms of wanting to hear the perspectives and voices of refugees as well as, giving them certain kinds of information based on preconceived ideas.

Encounters: presenting Sweden and talking equalityI now present two empirical examples in order to illustrate both how preconceived ideas about the refugees inform the encounters and styles of conversation that took place during the COPs, and how the children manifest agency. The two excerpts have been chosen as they illustrate the recurring practices of stereotyping, done by the dele-

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gations, and how children contested them during the programmes. Stereotyping was a prominent occurrence during the COPs. The children’s agency was apparent in different ways, such as in contes-ting the stereotypes they found themselves faced with, creating their own stereotypes, and accepting the parameters of the information, to name but a few.

The following example is from a COP held in Dadaab. A member of the delegation, Rebecca,7 provides a group of children between the ages of 6 and 16 with information about the school system in Sweden.

Rebecca: And you are going to school with other children from other countries. From Sweden and from many other countries. The whole world is represented in Sweden. So it’s not going to be only, er, persons from Africa, from other countries too. […] And one important thing about teachers in Sweden is that they are absolutely not allowed to hit you or hurt you in any way. The teachers in Sweden are very, very nice.

The aim of the session was to inform the children of school age about the education system in Sweden in order for them to be prepared for what awaited them. The delegation members showed visual images, for example of school buildings, of children playing in the school yard, and of classrooms, in order to give the children an idea of what things would look like in Sweden. The fact that a separate school session for the children is held without the presence of the parents is an indication of the desire to offer a platform for children where information is provided that is relevant to them and where they can ask their questions.

In this excerpt, we see how Rebecca, through the particular information she offers, positions herself as a representative of Sweden, as a humanitarian who is granting the children hope for a better future in a new country. Here, the extending of hope is done through portraying Sweden as an open and multicultural society. When Rebecca presents the Swedish school, she ensures that they are aware that they are not the only ones who will be living in Sweden but that there will be people from other countries, too. Rebecca’s phrase “The whole world is represented in Sweden” turns the country into

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a kind of global village where everyone is welcome and embraced, a nation that works in line with universal humanitarianism.

The excerpt highlights the common presentation of the future country of residence in an exaggeratedly positive way. Aspects that may bring to light potential difficulties – such as poor economic circumstances (see next excerpt) – tend to be avoided by the delegations. The exaggeratedly positive image is, of course, not a surprise as it is on a par with the notion of resettlement as humanitarian effort that should lead to a positive change in the lives of refugees. In this vein, the representatives base their work and information on the idea that the refugees will have the chance of an ideal life in Sweden, a notion which finds additional strength in the fact that those at the receiving end of the information are children, a group who, according to Malkki (1995), in particular represent victimhood (See also Jönsson 2014). But, we also see the contradiction at the heart of the wish to provide refugees with “realistic expectations”. Whereas realistic expectations, within the aims of the COPs, are about making sure to counter misinformation among refugees that may lead to false expectations, this aim seems to not be followed through when it comes to the information given by the delegations themselves. Here, the idea of presenting Sweden as a country following humanitarian goals seems more important.

Furthermore, the positive aspect relates not only to society but also to the people living in the society, a part of Swedishness. Rebecca adds how teachers in Sweden are very nice. Through making use of this example, a stereotype is created of Swedes as nice and non-aggressive. But this stereotype is also based on the assumption that perhaps the teachers in the children’s current school do not portray these qualities, hence the information needs to be provided. How the children’s current teachers and school situation is, we never get to know.

Information that is based on an ideal portrayal of the new host country seldom generates any response by the children, often leading the delegation members either to having to ask further questions or to moving on with other information, as happens in the extract we have just seen, where no one responds to Rebecca’s information. This raises the issue as to whether there is a risk that stereotyping which highlights a person in a positive manner serves to simultaneously

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create a barrier to the construction of a platform where genuine meetings can take place and where marginalised groups can feel free to discuss their wishes and worries. Furthermore, the fact that this short passage from Rebecca refers to the refugees in generalised terms such as “Africans” strengthens the idea of the refugees as “others” whose experiences are not the focus of attention. A generalised dichotomy is created between Sweden and Africa, where Rebecca is providing information to, what for her remains an anonymous group whose experiences and perspectives are unknown to her. This, of course, partly needs to be understood through the practical circumstances forming the context of COPs (such as the time limit), together with how Rebecca chose to meet the group. Regardless, the excerpt prompts us to reflect upon what is actually being accomplished during these meetings.

The next excerpt is from a COP session that was held in Khartoum for a group of young refugees between the ages of 13 and 18. The two Swedish delegation members, Nejat and Lina, introduce the topic of gender equality in Sweden to the group.

Nejat: What do you think about this, about equality?Diana: It’s really good. There has to be equality. We are all born equal, boys and girls. So the boys do not have to have it better than us girls. Nejat [pointing to a girl named Simret]: And what do you think? Simret: Well, it’s good.Nejat: But I mean, how is it, how do you think it will be different from here? [Pause] Do you have this here? Equality?[inaudible mumbled reply]Nejat: And can you just give us an example? Because you said there is no equality here, give us an example. Simret: There just isn’t, there isn’t. Nejat: But we don’t understand. We don’t come from this society.Diana: Here the man works and she stays at home. It would be better if both worked.Nejat: It would be better if… What do you think of this [to the boys]?Adam: [Smiles] We’re just listening. Nejat: No, but I asked you a question.Adam: We’ll answer later.Nejat: Yeah, what do you think [pointing to one of the girls] ?

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[No response]Lina: What would be better about having a job? To have a job. What would be better?Diana: To get what?Nejat: Job, job, job. What’s good about having a job?Diana: Everything would be easier. Instead of just sitting at home. Lina: I understand you, and I think like you and I also think it’s very good to have your own salary, to have your own money. Diana: Like, then we don’t need to ask people for money.

In this excerpt, one of the more prominent topics raised during these youth sessions was that of gender equality. The youth sessions in Khartoum were always based on cards depicting different images that were designed to stimulate discussion within the group. One of the cards depicted a sign that stated “50/50”, which symbolised the idea of equality between men and women. This card would always be picked up by the delegation members in order to start a conversa-tion on the topic, a topic that was never initiated by the participants. The fact that the card was included in the COPs makes it clear that this topic was viewed as an important one to be discussed with the refugees. This also resonates with discussions already held during the preparatory course, where delegation members would point to the importance of bringing up the topics of Swedish gender equality. Gender equality was viewed as a positive aspect of Swedish society. Similar findings have been observed by Rosén (2013), who shows how the idea of Swedishness as being intimately connected with gender equality runs throughout SFI courses. In the excerpt above, Nejat asks the group what they think about equality. As we can see, she has to work very hard in order to elicit reactions from the group who are not very keen on the topic. To spur on the discus-sion, Nejat hints at the differences between the situation in Sweden and the current situation of the group. She also adds how she and her colleague, Lina, do not understand the current circumstances of the refugees, since they are not from this society. By doing this, she emphasises contrasts rather than looks for similar experiences that may create a platform for dialogue.

Nejat’s way of asking the questions and focusing on the differences strengthens the notion of “us” and “them” (Hall 1997), where the situation in Sudan is viewed as not only markedly different but also

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worse than in Sweden. Here, whereas Sweden is stereotyped as the country that promotes gender equality, a core idea of Swedishness (Towns 2002), the refugees are stereotyped as potentially lacking knowledge of gender equality (e.g. Muftee 2014b), a presumption that informs Nejat’s way of approaching the group with the topic.

In this excerpt we can also see how the young participants manifest agency by in various ways showing that they are not willing to engage in the conversation within the parameters given by the delegations. Simret, for example, has been brief in her answers. Furthermore, when Nejat turns towards the boys in the group and asks them what they think, Adam refuses to answer her rather pointed question by stating that he is just listening and will answer later. These responses indicate unease and a reluctance to engage in the conversation. This reluctance is also manifested through the body language of the youths. Both Adam and Simret look down while answering in a low voice, glancing at the other participants. Providing brief answers, refusing to answer and sometimes correcting the delegations were some of the ways young refugees manifest agency during the COPs (Muftee 2014b; 2015). These responses or lack of responses manifest a resistance towards stereotyping albeit in cautious manner in order not to jeopardise their resettlement. This reflects the power asymmetries that form the context in which the COPs are held, with the party being the provider of humanitarian assistance also being the one leading the conversations.

Occasionally, the participants would let the delegations know about their thoughts and perspectives regarding different matters. One such instance is found in the excerpt where Diana, who finally states “Then we don’t need to ask people for money”. When Lina declares that she thinks it is important to have one’s own money, she says this against the backdrop of the agenda of empowering the girls. This fits well with the overall context of the conversation, where the representatives have asked questions in order to make the group reflect upon gender relations. However, Diana’s final answer suggests a broader issue – the financial constraints related to their situation as refugees. Money is a topic that is important to the children and youths and there are instances where the children participating in the COPs ask the delegations questions about how their financial circumstances may change following resettlement in

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Sweden (Muftee 2015). On the other hand, money is not a topic that is commonly raised by the delegation. Financial circumstances can be seen as a potentially important topic which introduces the refugees to the very realistic structural issues with which they will be confronted in Sweden. However, Diana’s comment is ignored, and the conversation moves on to another topic. Lina’s statement “I understand you, and I think like you” seals the conversation by declaring that the two parties have reached a consensus over the matter; that, despite the differences between societies, they do think alike on the topic. The conversation thus ends with a morally imbued declaration of the importance of gender equality in Sweden.

Final discussionIn this chapter I have provided two empirical examples from COPs highlighting how the information given is based on certain notions of Swedishness, which is built on stereotypical images based on the dichotomies of “us” and “them”.

In the first excerpt, the representatives presented Sweden in a highly positive way, focusing both on its humanitarian position and on the positive characteristics of the country’s citizens. This raises questions regarding the aim of creating realistic expectations. Furthermore, the refugees are spoken to as a generalized group from Africa reflecting the dichotomy between Swedes as ideal citizens and the refugees as the anonymous ‘others’.

In the second excerpt, we see how the positive notion of Swedishness portrays a country that adheres to gender equality. As this trait is brought up, the refugees are simultaneously stereotyped as leading gender-unequal lives, an understanding which then justifies the choice of this topic. Moreover, it is also shown, that the young participants are no passive recipients of this stereotyping. Instead they manifest resistance towards this positioning.

It is important to remember that the COPs are relatively short in duration and often carried out with the help of translators. These circumstances, of course, add to the difficulties of setting up a dialogue where the experiences and questions of the refugees can be heard. Yet, the tensions that result from the encounters during the COPs provide us with some other important lessons. My argument is that the stereotypical notion of refugees as fundamentally different

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and inferior to “us”, permeates the way these conversations are initiated and led, ultimately presenting an obstacle to the aim of enabling dialogue. As we can see throughout the analysis, contrasts – mirroring stereotypical dichotomies – rather than similarities, tend to be the point of departure for the provision of information.

The COPs as they are carried out reflect the asymmetric relation between Europe and Africa that still exists in all refugee humanitarian work (Hyndman 2000; Malkki 1995).8 One of the strongest legacies of colonialism is the ideology of difference and inferiority of the ‘other’ that legitimised the colonial efforts of civilizing and modernizing the colonised. From a postcolonial perspective, the dichotomies being manifested during the excerpts point to the hierarchies permeated by colonial legacies that are at work during the very encounters between the delegations and the refugees. The very aims of the COPs rest upon the idea of refugees having lived a life in passivity and being prone to dependency. They are in need of learning about a ‘normal functioning society’. While a two-way communication is a goal the COPs strive towards, what we see in practice is how the conversations tend to be carried out according to the terms and conditions of the delegations. The guideline of providing ‘realistic expectations’ and countering rumors is not followed, where it seems important to highlight Sweden as the ideal upholder and provider of humanitarianism.

What is the problem with viewing refugees as passive victims in need of help and information? Why do we need to reflect upon the notions of refugeeness as they occur during efforts such as the COPs? After all, if we look at the bigger picture, the refugees are being given the opportunity to build a new life in security. In an article dealing with the stereotyped notions of refugeeness, Malkki (1996) discusses this very question while reflecting on the common images of refugees en masse. She argues that one consequence of the stereotypical notions of refugees is the silence of the very group that is the centre of attention. The problematic aspect here is that the COPs do not seem to provide a platform for dialogue. What I have shown is that the meetings actually miss the voices, questions and concerns of the refugees. Instead, similar to what is shown by Rosén (2014), the meetings tend to be turned into an arena where the negotiation of potential inclusion into Swedishness takes place. In

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the second excerpt the youths are supposed to learn about Swedish gender equality and spell out what they think about it. Taking part in COPs involves relating and responding to stereotyping. However, as stereotypes are social constructs they can – and should – be both reflected upon and countered. As we have seen, they are being resisted by the children who in contrast to the assumptions upon which COPs are held, actively engage in the meetings, manifesting agency.

The problem of reproducing hierarchies based on stereotypes during COPs calls for reflection on what role these programmes are to play within the resettlement process. Is it possible to break free from this hierarchical context? Knowledge and awareness of the hierarchies in which the resettlement process is embedded ideally lead to caution over what information is provided and how, and in what ways the programmes are carried out. Both the practical circumstances and the hierarchies at work need to be considered when forming these kinds of programmes. Recognising their own privileged position and reflecting upon it during their preparatory course may be a good starting point for the delegations who are to meet the refugees for the very first time and facilitate their resettlement process. Furthermore, there needs to be a realization that hardships and victimhood that very often is part of the circumstances of refugees does not exclude them from having agency and valuable knowledge. The questions of the refugees could and should be the starting point for the programmes. Currently, programmes such as the COPs run the risk of creating and strengthening barriers rather than enabling an optimal start for the refugees in the new country, by offering a platform where their voices and perspectives can be heard.

Notes

1. The “Scramble for Africa” refers to the outcome of the Berlin Conference of 1884–1885. Over-riding local autonomy, the European powers formed borders that ignored the local constellations of people living in the region.

2. The two other durable solutions are local integration and repatriation.

3. The methodological procedures were reviewed and approved by the Regional Ethical Review Board of Linköping. A more in-depth discussion and reflections on ethical considerations, as well as other methodological

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issues related to the video-recording, interpretation and translation can be found in Muftee (2014b).

4. MOST stands for “Modelling of Orientation, Service and Training related to the Resettlement and Reception of Refugees”. It was a transnational project that was funded by the European Refugee Fund, with the aim of developing models for faster and better integration for refugees.

5. As a way to accommodate the UNHCR’s request that more nation-states take responsibility for the global refugee situation, the 2000s were marked by an increased emphasis on resettlement through projects aiming to develop this particular durable solution within the EU (Perrin & McNamara 2013). For an overview of developments on resettlement within the EU, see Krasniqi & Suter (2015).

6. All information in Swedish in this paper has been translated by the author.

7. All the names in the examples have been anonymised.

8. These asymmetric relations have also been found in overall migration policies (Hansen & Jonsson 2011).

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Resettlement constitutes a durable solution to international refugee protection. However, for it to be sustainable, the integration process of the post-resettlement phase is crucial. This volume, which is the outcome of the project “Before and After – New Perspectives on Resettled Refugees’ Integration Process”, sheds light on the integration process from a broader perspective. After briefly addressing the labour-market integration of resettled refugee groups in Sweden, the volume’s main and longest chapter addresses the role of social networks in the integration process of resettled refugees. Social networks are analysed in relation to time and space, and hence attention is paid both to the time before – spent in refugee camps – and to the patterns of mobility pre- and post-resettlement. The following two chapters move away from Sweden and focus on the situation in Australia – with an investigation into the role of ethnic social networks – and Japan, with a focus on the recent development of the country’s resettlement programme. The final chapter brings the focus back to Sweden and enriches the volume by looking at one particular aspect of the resettlement process – the Cultural Orientation Programme – from a postcolonial perspective.

MALMÖ UNIVERSITY

205 06 MALMÖ, SWEDEN

WWW.MAH.SE

isbn 978-91-7104-637-6 (print)

isbn 978-91-7104-638-3 (pdf)

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