Intersectionality and Durable Solutions for Refugee Women in Africa

Abstract

This article proposes a re-evaluation of the classic ‘durable solutions’ – repatriation, local integration, resettlement – being applied to refugee women in Africa, foregrounding gender considerations in the selection of solutions to apply, women’s access to these processes, and sensitivity to the African and peacebuilding context. Extant literature largely ignores the reality of diversity among refugee women. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) policy and states’ practices regarding refugee women do not sufficiently address this diversity and how structural dynamics are shaping durable solutions for refugees. I argue therefore that there is an intersectionality of disadvantage, a dual intertwined convergence of personal and systemic factors that make refugee women in Africa doubly deprived in accessing and experiencing sustainable durable solutions. I suggest that rethinking durable solutions for refugee women in Africa involves a reassessment of the three solutions, and the adoption of initiatives that positively link refugee women and peacebuilding outcomes.

Keywords:

• refugee women
• durable solutions
• intersectionality
• United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
• peacebuilding
• Africa
• Liberia
• Nigeria

Notes

1 Researcher’s observation from fieldwork in Liberia, cross-validated in interviews with refugee workers.

2 Betts (2009, 3) refers to the situation as a ‘North-South impasse’, while UNHCR (2010, 3) condemns what it calls ‘burden-shifting’ to developing countries hosting refugees.

3 UNHCR’s annual global refugee reports usually detail the countries involved in offering each of the durable solutions.

4 Interview with returnee woman in Ganta, Nimba County, Liberia, held 7 October 2006.

5 Interview with returnee woman in Monrovia, Montserrado County, Liberia, held 27 September 2006.

6 Interview with returnee woman in Ganta, Nimba County, Liberia, held 7 October 2006.

7 Interview with refugee worker in Saclepea, Nimba County, Liberia, held 8 October 2006.

8 This scheme was called the Liberia Emergency Capacity Building Support (LECBS) programme. It was well intentioned and funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Open Society Institute (OSI). See Government of Liberia/UNDP/OSI/United States Agency for International Development (USAID) (2008); Friedman (2012).

9 Interview with refugee woman at Duport Road, Monrovia, Liberia, held 27 September 2006. I have retained the original words as spoken in broken English as the meaning remains intact.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Olajumoke Yacob-Haliso

OLAJUMOKE YACOB-HALISO teaches Political Science at Babcock University, Nigeria. Her research on refugee women and post-conflict has been supported by the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation and the University for Peace Africa Program. She was Global-South-Scholar-in-Residence at the Graduate Institute, Geneva (2012) and is currently ACLS African Humanities Program Postdoctoral Fellow (2016–2017).