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Into the Mind of a War Refugee

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Into the Mind of a War Refugee w Faculty of Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences (BMS) Into the mind of a war refugee: An ethnography of refugees from Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina concerning the integration system in the Netherlands between 1995 and 2007 Sumedin Verlasevic M.Sc. Thesis Public Administration January 24, 2019 Supervisors: Dr. M. R. R. Ossewaarde Dr. V. Junjan Public Administration Faculty of BMS University of Twente P.O. Box 217 7500 AE Enschede The Netherlands ‘’I feel like throughout the whole process of integration they try to brainwash you completely and then give you the Dutch citizenship. They could have gotten a teacher, but now because of this whole process, they have a completely crazy person’’ (Srebrenican refugee 1, p. 82, 2018) Abstract This thesis explores the lives of powerless victims from Srebrenica who specifically sought refuge in the Netherlands between 1995 and 2000. In this vein, the paper’s main research question asked, ‘how can the perceptions and experiences of refugees from Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina regarding the integration system in the Netherlands between 1995 and 2007 be explained?’. This question is constructed from the desire to understand the relationship between the Dutch system-world and the specific Srebrenican life-world. While the system-world includes policymakers and the implementation of the refugee integration system, the life-world presents the lived refugee experiences concerning this system. Herewith, a document analysis was employed to contextualize the integration system and an ethnography by using semi-structured interviews was performed to gain insight into the life- world. The outcome of this research shows the presence of two separated and incoherent worlds. On the one hand the dominated and powerful system-world and on the other hand the powerless and submissive life-world. Keywords Yugoslavia; refugees; integration; experiences; policies; system-world; life-world Preface In front of you lies my thesis focusing on the lives of traumatized war refugees from Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina. The basis for this research originated from the fact that I was one of these refugees myself. In 1997, my parents and I sought refuge in the Netherlands. After spending five years in different asylum centers we obtained the Dutch citizenship in 2002. The war in Yugoslavia left many scars for most of my family members and took his toll on my parents - I knew how hard it was for them to assimilate into a new society. For this reason, I was curious about the experiences of other refugees from Srebrenica and what kind of obstacles they had to overcome to resettle in Dutch society. Overall, this thesis was very interesting and at the same time emotional for me. However, I could not have achieved this end result without strong support. Therefore, I would like to thank dr. Ringo Ossewaarde and dr. Veronica Junjan for their help and advice during the development of this thesis. Especially, dr. Ringo Ossewaarde for his inspirational and overall important guidance during this research. I hope you enjoy reading this thesis. Thank you. Sumedin Verlasevic January 2019 Table of contents 1. INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................................... 6 1.1 BACKGROUND ..................................................................................................................................... 7 1.2 RESEARCH QUESTIONS........................................................................................................................... 9 1.3 RESEARCH APPROACH ......................................................................................................................... 11 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .................................................................................................................. 13 2.1 THE SYSTEM-WORLD AND LIFE-WORLD .................................................................................................... 13 2.2 THE INTEGRATION SYSTEM-WORLD ......................................................................................................... 14 2.2.1 The conceptual model of the integration system ....................................................................... 15 2.3 THE INTEGRATION LIFE-WORLD .............................................................................................................. 17 2.3.1 The life-world stages of integration ........................................................................................... 18 2.3.2 The one-, or two-way process of integration.............................................................................. 19 3. METHODS .............................................................................................................................................. 23 3.1 CASE DESCRIPTION ............................................................................................................................. 23 3.2 METHODS OF DATA COLLECTION ............................................................................................................ 25 3.2.1 Document analysis.................................................................................................................... 25 3.2.2 Interviews ................................................................................................................................. 27 3.3 METHODS OF DATA ANALYSIS ................................................................................................................ 31 3.3.1 Document analysis.................................................................................................................... 32 3.3.2 Interviews ................................................................................................................................. 37 3.4 LIMITATIONS OF METHODS ................................................................................................................... 40 4. ANALYSIS ............................................................................................................................................... 43 4.1 THE SYSTEM-WORLD ANALYSIS .............................................................................................................. 43 4.1.1 A mandatory assimilative policy approach ................................................................................ 44 4.1.2 The institutional power of the system-world .............................................................................. 46 4.2 THE LIFE-WORLD ANALYSIS ................................................................................................................... 50 4.2.1 The powerless life-world ........................................................................................................... 52 4.2.2 The isolated life ........................................................................................................................ 55 4.2.3 A forcing assimilative way of integrating ................................................................................... 59 .............................................................................................................................................................. 60 4.3 SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE TWO WORLDS ........................................................................ 62 4.3.1 Similarities system-world and life-world .................................................................................... 63 4.3.2 Differences system-world and life-world.................................................................................... 63 5. CONCLUSION AND DISCUSSION ............................................................................................................. 66 5.1 CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................... 66 5.2 DISCUSSION ..................................................................................................................................... 68 5.3 IMPLICATIONS OF THE RESEARCH ............................................................................................................ 70 5.3.1 Theoretical implications ............................................................................................................ 70 5.3.2 Practical implications ............................................................................................................... 70 5.4 LIMITATIONS OF THE RESEARCH ............................................................................................................. 71 5.5 SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER RESEARCH.................................................................................................... 72 BIBLIOGRAPHY................................................................................................................................................ 73 APPENDICES ................................................................................................................................................... 80 APPENDIX A. INTERVIEW GUIDE .......................................................................................................................... 80 APPENDIX B. SUMMARIES INTERVIEWS ................................................................................................................. 81 1. INTRODUCTION The massacre at Srebrenica,
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