New development: From aid to empowerment—making refugee policy more sustainable

IMPACT

Globally, refugee support has been rendered unsustainable by the contemporary pace and scale of human displacement. This article proposes that policy shifts towards greater opportunities for refugees and asylum seekers can complement humanitarian aid and ease the financial pressure building in the sector. This article examines what ‘opportunity-focused initiatives’ look like by focusing on refugee business support initiatives being piloted in several territories around the world. The authors consider the practical and policy implications of this shift and propose a research agenda to facilitate collaborations between public administrators, researchers, programme delivery bodies and refugee communities.

ABSTRACT

This article explores the growing shift towards opportunity-focused policies, particularly the support of refugee-founded businesses that bolster self-determination and dignity as individuals rebuild their lives. Examples of successfully implemented initiatives are provided. The authors call on researchers and public administrators to consider where transitions between humanitarian and opportunity systems can be co-ordinated. One key challenge facing policy-makers is that shifting to an opportunity-focused policy does not negate the need for sensitivity in supporting asylum seekers and refugees who are likely to have experienced trauma. Another challenge is that the refugee sector and business sector are not currently well aligned in most countries that have piloted business support programmes, creating some issues with implementation. The authors detail a research framework that is sensitive to the macro, meso and micro level implications of shifts towards greater opportunities for refugees and asylum seekers.

KEYWORDS:

• Asylum seekers
• business support
• empowerment
• opportunity
• refugee policy
• social integration
• sustainable policy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michelle Richey

Michelle Richey is a senior lecturer in technology and entrepreneurship at Loughborough University, UK. She works with organizations addressing pressing social issues globally. She is the Working Group Chair for Research for the Refugee Entrepreneurship Network and has led several large-scale, impact-oriented research projects. She has published peer-reviewed articles on social technologies, social entrepreneurship and innovation and open access reports targeting policy change.

Jade Wendy Brooks

Jade Wendy Brooks is a lecturer in information systems at the University of Auckland Business School, New Zealand. Jade's research takes interest in social and organizational aspects of information systems and, using predominantly qualitative methods, attends to a variety of contexts including globally distributed teams, social innovations, and digital inclusion/exclusion. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed journals and has been presented in leading international conferences including ICIS, ECIS and the Global Sourcing Workshop.