RSC newsletter summer 2009 header right

FEATURE Leaving Mogadishu: Researching the causes of displacement, 2007 – 2008

News MSc students’ trip to Geneva Office and library move

Activities Forced Migration Information Network RSC’s fundraising aims

Publications RSC policy briefings FMR: Statelessness Journal of Refugee Studies

Conferences, Workshops & Discussion List Wednesday public seminars RSC policy workshops Forced Migration Discussion List: FM List Conference ‘Protecting People in Conflict and Crisis’

Alumni Invitation to alumni to contribute to newsletter Andrea Pacheco Pacífico Cindy Horst Christine Bacon News

MSc students’ trip to Geneva

Ten students from the MSc in Forced Migration travelled in Office and library move April to Geneva and engaged in question-and-answer sessions In April, the RSC offices moved into a state-of-the-art new Refugee Studies Centre with several key organisations building constructed as an extension of the main departmental Department of that are dealing directly with site at Mansfield Road (OX1 3TB). The building designed by International Development issues of displacement all over Hawkins Brown, echoes the rhythm of the existing structure. the world. On a four-day trip, We now have new telephone and fax numbers that can be found the group met with staff from on this page. 3 Mansfield Road ICRC, IOM, and UNHCR, We are delighted to now be housed alongside all of the Oxford OX1 3TB, UK including High Commissioner Department’s research Centres which will greatly improve António Guterres. Jane Rice, opportunities for collaboration and exchange. We are Tel: +44 (0)1865 281720 a participant on the trip, said, particularly looking forward to working more closely Fax: +44 (0)1865 281730 ‘I’m so glad that we had an with other centres such as Young Lives, Oxford Poverty Email: [email protected] opportunity to be in Geneva. and Human Development Initiative and the International www.rsc.ox.ac.uk This trip was a real chance to Migration Institute. The open layout of the new offices is a put nine months of academic great improvement to our work environment, as are the well learning into context.’ equipped new rooms and the abundance of light and space. In Design by www.advocate.uk.com Students also conducted addition the building provides a 70-seat seminar room and desk Printed on 50% recycled paper individual interviews with space for Master’s students. experts relating to their With some sadness, due both to limits of space at 3 Mansfield dissertation topics. They are Road and the Oxford University Library Services’ collections grateful to former MSc law policy, the RSC library will not be moving with us. It will lecturer Jean Francois Durieux remain in the current Worcester Street site until August 2009 for his hard work organising when the collection will move into the Social Science Library this trip, to student organisers (SSL) in Manor Road (OX1 3UQ). In this new location it Valentine and Rebecca, as well will retain dedicated specialist library staff and the ‘grey’ as to the RSC for its financial (unpublished) literature will be stored as a discrete, accessible support. collection. Readers will benefit by having access to wider SSL collections and services including a dedicated media room, 400 reader desks, wireless internet and greatly extended opening hours. Importantly, international visitors will still be able to turn up and enjoy free access to the materials on the day.

For more information on the library, please visit www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/library.html

Professor Roger Zetter, Director of the Refugee Studies Centre

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Forced Migration Information Network

The RSC is developing a more systematic approach to RSC’s fundraising aims international collaboration and partnerships. One element of this ambitious initiative, funded by the UK Department for Fundraising has always been an essential component of the International Development, is to nurture a Forced Migration Refugee Studies Centre’s activities. Since its inception, the Information Network of selected partners working across Centre has relied heavily on the support of its donors in order regions most closely affected by forced migration. both to pioneer a new field of academic study and to ensure its Although the network is still in its early stages, it is already successful growth and development. Today, of the thirty current providing mutual support and advice, sharing contacts and posts at the Centre, four are supported by modest endowments country information and improving the dissemination of and three are supported by the Department and three by the relevant research materials and findings. The network aims to Oxford University Library Services. The remaining posts exist assist with advocacy work and promote research on difficult by virtue of external funding. or particularly sensitive issues. Possibilities for combined Over the years, governments, trusts and foundations, UN teaching and training are also being investigated. A central agencies, NGOs, corporates and private individuals have component of the initiative is to help communicate refugee and collectively ensured that the ambitions of the Centre could be other forced migrants’ concerns in their own voices in order to ambitiously pursued: that it could address the complex and contribute towards their empowerment and engender a richer changing phenomena of forced displacement in the last quarter understanding of their situations. of a century, and provide knowledge and understanding to its Initial work plans focus on the collection of these refugee many and diverse stakeholders around the world. and IDP perspectives. Examples include the Forced Migration We are currently working hard to secure funding for a fourth Studies Programme at the University of the Witwatersrand endowed post in refugee and international human rights law which is documenting and publishing the experiences of at the Centre. This is a subject of universal relevance to every those affected by recent xenophobic attacks in South Africa; aspect of our work. Forced exile, whether as refugees or by the Refugee Consortium of Kenya, which is documenting the internal displacement, always implies the violation of human experiences of refugees living in Dadaab Refugee Camp with rights and the loss of protection. Up until now we have been a particular focus on the survivors of gender-based violence; lucky to attract a number of committed and able legal scholars to and, in South Asia, the Calcutta Research Group, which is the Centre but only ever on a short-term basis. It is our highest collecting the experiences of forced migrants in post-conflict priority to create a senior permanent post in this discipline. Nepal, a project which includes a special reference to IDPs in In addition, we would like to attract funding for a new urban contexts. These perspectives will be widely disseminated research agenda in ‘Conflict, Forced Displacement and across the network through various website portals, volumes of Protection in a Changing World’ as well as for bursary support collected testimonies, articles and discussion papers. for our teaching programme and for policy- and practice- oriented activities in our outreach work. For further details, contact [email protected] For further information on the Centre’s development activities, please contact [email protected]

RSC SUMMER 2009 3 feature

Leaving Mogadishu Researching the causes of displacement, 2007 – 2008

In 2007 to 2008, some two thirds of Mogadishu’s population conflict. This research is part of a bigger project on conflict abandoned the city in the wake of intensified violence following and mobility within the EC-funded consortium MICROCON the ousting of the Islamic Courts and the arrival of the (then) (A Micro-Level Analysis of Violent Conflict), and focused on Ethiopian-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG). people from Mogadishu seeking refuge in Somaliland, mainly Whole neighbourhoods emptied as people sought refuge Hargeisa, investigating one fragment of the complex picture elsewhere in the Somali territories and abroad. Confronted of mobility in the Somali territories. From June to August with often massive and precipitous population movements 2008, with a team of research assistants (including two people associated with violent conflict, there is an understandable originally from Mogadishu), we carried out 21 individual tendency to accept macro-political explanations of the causes interviews and four focus groups, with people of a range of of migration: people fled civil war. And certainly, on one level, demographic, economic and clan characteristics. Combined the question of why people have been leaving Mogadishu with other sources, these accounts provide insights into out- since 2006 has an obvious answer. But, on another level, many migration from Mogadishu during this troubled period. of the people leaving had lived their entire lives in one of the Participants described two key shifts in Mogadishu in most insecure urban environments in the world, finding ways recent years – the rise of the Islamic Courts, which for a short to negotiate daily dangers. To understand this exodus, and its time brought the capital under a coalition administration future implications, we have to listen to how the conflict and and dramatically improved security, and the arrival of the other factors impinged on people’s everyday lives, and how this TFG, which was followed by devastating violence between changed over time. a fragmented, insistent insurgency and counter-insurgent The RSC has been working to develop a micro-sociological response with little regard for civilian welfare, including analysis of mobility in this specific episode in a protracted indiscriminate bombardments of densely populated

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neighbourhoods. This second shift – fuelled by the geopolitics of the war on terror – impinged on participants’ varied configurations of capabilities and resources in several ways. First, many people’s human capabilities and resources were decimated as people lost family members when their homes were destroyed, when they took flight, or when they were shot by combatants or arrested. Several participants or their family members had experienced severe disability as a result of violence – including injuries from beatings and rape, loss of hearing, loss of limbs, and psychological problems. This had a huge effect on the emotional lives of individuals and families, as well as on their security and ability to pursue existing livelihood strategies. Second, loss of physical and financial resources – the wholesale destruction or confiscation/occupation of homes, business atch premises and stocks – was a major precipitating factor for some. While businesspeople had weathered previous crises

by temporarily closing down, adapting activities or buying opyright: IS N S ecurity W protection, many found it impossible to continue in 2007. Bakara Market, the biggest Somali market and the heart of arsahmeh. C Hawiye (the dominant clan family in Mogadishu) economic power, has continued to operate but was frequently the epicentre of battles. Meanwhile, physical and financial resources W by Abdurrahman Photos in some cases helped people to cope during turbulent times before they decided to leave, and ready cash significantly returned in 2009 to Mogadishu. But the new president will have facilitated the process of migration. People often tried to to navigate complex political challenges – including political convert their physical assets into cash, or place them in the care entrepreneurs, clan tensions, extremist militant groups and of others, before leaving Mogadishu. international pressures – to secure peace in the city. Finally, but significantly, previous mechanisms of socio- Detailed findings will be published shortly on the political protection were weakened as patterns of political MICROCON website. I carried out the fieldwork as a visiting power in Mogadishu were dramatically reconfigured, exposing scholar at the Academy for Peace and Development in Hargeisa, people to greater physical insecurity. This affected even and greatly benefited from the guidance of colleagues there. We prosperous families that had hitherto led relatively comfortable are very happy to have secured a MICROCON-funded visiting lives. For women, exposure to increased risk of rape often fellowship for one of their senior researchers, Mohamed Hassan contributed to the decision to depart. For many people, the Ibrahim, to come to the RSC in 2009. increased urban insecurity impeded their usual livelihood strategies as it became much riskier to move around the city. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Samira Hassan Meanwhile, aid workers and journalists were specifically Ahmed, Rahma Cabdulqadir Ma’alin, Ahmed Mohamed Isse and targeted by militant groups and government forces. Mohamed Abdirahman Hassan with this research, as well as the The situation in Mogadishu remains volatile. Following the support of Zeinab Haji Mohamed, head of the Gashan Women’s resignation of Abdullahi Yusuf, former president of the TFG, Development Organisation. withdrawal of Ethiopian troops, and the inauguration of the moderate Islamic Courts’ leader Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed Dr Anna Lindley is a Research Officer at the RSC: as president, some of the internally displaced have reportedly [email protected]

RSC SUMMER 2009 5 publications

RSC policy Journal of Refugee Studies briefings The Journal of Refugee Studies (JRS) provides a forum for The RSC has launched a new exploration of the complex problems of forced migration and Policy Briefing Papers series. national, regional and international responses. Published by This series seeks to highlight (OUP) in association with the RSC, the very best and latest policy- the Journal covers all categories of forcibly displaced people. relevant research findings It is a multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal. Contributions from the fields of forced which develop theoretical understandings of forced migration migration and humanitarian or advance knowledge of concepts, policies and practice are studies by providing a forum welcomed from both academics and practitioners. in which academic researchers, Now in its 22nd year, the JRS has around 2000 subscribers, humanitarian practitioners, FMR: a good proportion of them in Europe and North America international lawyers and Statelessness but also including subscribers in Australia, New Zealand, policymakers may share evidence, the Philippines, Japan, China (Hong Kong), the Indian experience, best practice and carried subcontinent, the Middle East and Africa. Areas on which the innovation on the broad range out a survey of its readers at the JRS has published relatively little, and where the Editors would of critical issues that arise at the end of 2008. Responses showed particularly welcome research articles, are: Central and South intersection of forced migration that the main uses for FMR are America, West Africa, India, Bangladesh and Southeast Asia, and humanitarian intervention. for research and as background Japan and the former Soviet Republics. The first of these papers, by reference; as training/teaching Co-Editors of the JRS are Professor Richard Black (Sussex RSC Director Professor Roger resource material; and for Centre for Migration Research, University of Sussex) and Dr Zetter, in collaboration with conferences. There is also a Joanne van Selm (Consultant to the Institute for Migration Dr Camillo Boano and Dr significant use of it for advocacy. and Ethnic Studies, Universiteit van Amsterdam); the Book Tim Morris, was launched in The responses encourage us Reviews Editor is Dr Oliver Bakewell (International Migration December 2008 and addressed to continue to seek strategically Institute, University of Oxford) and the Assistant Editor is Mrs the question of ‘Environmentally important themes for the Margaret Okole. displaced people: Understanding magazine; retain a reasonable The JRS is published quarterly. Volume 21 number the linkages between balance between the feature 4 (December 2008) was a special issue on Invisible environmental change, theme and the ‘general’ articles; Displacements, guest-edited by Tara Polzer (University of the livelihoods and forced migration’. maintain a wide range of Witwatersrand) and Laura Hammond (School of Oriental and In May 2009 the RSC will authors; and continue to appeal African Studies, London). Volume 22 number 1 was published launch three further papers in this to a broad range of readers in in March 2009. A full list of all issues, contents and abstracts series, addressing the topics of: geography, affiliation, level is available online . Subscription details are available from the Statelessness (by Dr Brad Blitz); of seniority, and in terms of OUP web server. Humanitarian reform and refugee activity. A report of the results Books for review and other correspondence should be protection (Dr Anna Schmidt); is online at www.fmreview. addressed to the editors at the postal address of the RSC (please and Targeted development org/2008survey.htm. see page 2). assistance and refugee protection FMR32, with a feature theme (Dr Alexander Betts). on Statelessness, was published Articles for the Journal and general correspondence should be sent in April and is online at www. by email – if possible – to [email protected] Further details may be found at fmreview.org/statelessness.htm. www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/pub_policy.html It has 22 thematic articles and 17 additional articles on other aspects of forced migration. To request a copy, please email the Editors at [email protected].

6 RSC SUMMER 2009 CONFERENCES, WORKSHOPS & DISCUSSION LIST

Conference: RSC policy Protecting Wednesday workshops Forced People in public Migration Conflict and In 2009 the RSC will host a range Discussion seminars of policy workshops to bring Crisis together researchers, policy List: FM List The RSC hosts public seminars makers and practitioners to Ten years ago the International every Wednesday of the discuss the most urgent matters The Forced Migration Committee of the Red Cross/ university term. The programme of forced migration policy and Discussion List was established Red Crescent held a series for Trinity term (May to June) practice. The workshops will in 1998 and is owned and of workshops to agree an includes presentations on consider a range of issues from moderated by the RSC. It understanding of the meaning of Environmentally-Induced the role of the International is an email-based forum ‘protection’ with the proliferating Migration in Ghana; the Politics Organization for Migration in to encourage exchange of number of international of Refugee Repatriation; the forced migration management information and to promote humanitarian organisations. The Provision of Employment to the influence of shelter discussion on the issues facing protection of people affected by Services to Refugees; and EU interventions on the achievement refugees and other victims of conflict and crisis is now not Projects for the Extra-Territorial of protection outcomes for forced migration. The list has only one of the central aims of Processing of Forced Migrants. refugees and internally displaced a membership of nearly 1,200 the international community of The full seminar list can be people. subscribers. Typical postings humanitarian and development found on the RSC website. Contributions for the include event announcements, actors but also one of its The seminars take place workshop on ‘Humanitarian calls for papers, notices of challenges. The threats of climate on Wednesdays at 5pm at Action in Somalia: Expanding publications, descriptions of change, conflict, state fragility the Oxford Department of Humanitarian Space’ – to be research activities, invitations and economic transformation International Development, held on 8–9 June 2009 – are to collaborate on projects, beg further questions about 3 Mansfield Road, Oxford currently being solicited from job or internship offers, and how rights and security will be OX1 3TB. researchers and humanitarian requests for research assistance. protected during the 21st century. The Elizabeth Colson Lecture practitioners with an interest In an online environment In September 2009 the on 20th May will be held at the in the subject. The workshop dominated by blogs, wikis and RSC, in collaboration with Magdalen College Auditorium, seeks to address the question of other social networking tools, the Humanitarian Policy Oxford OX1 4AU and will be humanitarian action in Somalia, the FM List has successfully Group (HPG) at the Overseas given by Carolyn R Nordstrom, to share current thinking on the used the LISTSERV model Development Institute, will Professor of Anthropology situation and to consider creative to exchange information and address these questions at an at the Kellogg Institute for solutions to the humanitarian promote linkages within the international conference entitled International Studies, Notre deadlock. For further details on forced migration research ‘Protecting People in Conflict Dame University. She will this workshop, please contact community. Teachers, students and Crisis: Responding to the give a talk entitled ‘Fractures [email protected] and scholars constitute Challenges of a Changing World’. and Flows: Africa, Elizabeth On 21–22 May 2009 the the largest percentage of It aims to convene academics, Colson, and the Current Global workshop ‘Violence and subscribers. However, policy practitioners, policy makers and Meltdown’. Displacement in Colombia’ makers, practitioners and civil society representatives to will take place. Details may be advocates can also be counted review policy and practice in the found at www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/ in sizeable numbers. The latest field of humanitarian protection. conf_conferences_0908.html. postings are also displayed on Paper submissions are currently the Forced Migration Online being accepted. home page. Please see www.rsc.ox.ac.uk/ For more information or to conf_conferences_210909.html for subscribe, please visit www. more information or email forcedmigration.org/discussion [email protected]

RSC SUMMER 2009 7 ALUMNI

To everybody who has studied and worked at the RSC…

This page of the RSC newsletter is dedicated to you. If you have news about your career, research, publications, organisation, experiences or anything else related to forced migration that you would like to share with our readers in the next RSC newsletters, please send an email to [email protected]

Andrea Pacheco Pacífico, Cindy Horst, International Summer School Foundation Course on in Forced Migration 2004 Forced Migration 1997

In October 2008 I finished my After finishing the foundation PhD in Social Sciences with course, I conducted PhD Distinction at the Catholic research among Somali refugees University of Sao Paolo, Brazil. in the Dadaab camps in Kenya, The dissertation entitled resulting in the monograph ‘The social capital produced by ‘Transnational Nomads’. Then refugees in Sao Paolo and in I completed a post-doc while Toronto: Cultural background being responsible for a course

and public policy’ can be found on forced migration at the elly in the digital library of the University of Amsterdam.

University of Sao Paolo. The Currently I am a researcher by B en K Photo book based on the dissertation at the International Peace will be published in Portuguese Research Institute (PRIO), Christine Bacon, MSc in Forced Migration 2004–2005 and I hope to translate it into Oslo. PRIO is an independent English as soon as possible. institute which not only aims to Before coming to the UK in 2004 to do the MSc in Forced produce sound academic work Migration, I was an actor, campaigner and coordinator of Contact Andrea: but also puts great emphasis an informal network called Actors for Refugees in Australia, [email protected] on conflict resolution, dialogue made up of professional actors who were dedicated to drawing and reconciliation, public attention to the harsh realities of my country’s refugee laws information and policymaking and policies. After graduating from the RSC in 2005, I started activities. I’ve always felt an urge planning a similar network in the UK. to combine the two. There is By a stroke of magnificent luck, I came across the pioneering great need for knowledge-based theatre company iceandfire, and it was agreed that Actors for policy improvements in our Human Rights (as it was re-branded) would be the outreach research field. project of iceandfire. Actors for Human Rights was launched I have focused mainly on with five actors and a script, Asylum Monologues, made up the transnational networks and of first-hand accounts of three individuals who have been ties that refugees maintain, through the UK’s asylum system. Almost three years and 20,000 which have an impact on their audience members later, the network is made up of over 350 lives in countries of origin and professional actors and responds to requests for rehearsed settlement, and in regional readings of no fewer than six documentary plays about refugee camps or urban spaces. contemporary human rights concerns. These include the sending of As well as directing Actors for Human Rights, I have this year remittances, the imaginations of become Co-Artistic Director of iceandfire. Two new Actors- ‘life elsewhere’, and engagements for-Human-Rights scripts will be launched this year, about the in conflict resolution and UK’s counter-terror legislation and older people. Iceandfire peace building. European is collaborating with leading human rights organisations, governments and organisations including Amnesty International, Save the Children, Reprieve, are increasingly interested Refugee Action, British Institute of Human Rights and Index on in diaspora contributions to Censorship, on various performance projects throughout the year. development and peace building. Contact Christine: [email protected] Contact Cindy: [email protected]

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