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ABSTRACT
Over the last 35 years, the US has been the top recipient country for refugee resettlement. Despite political ambivalence about refugee admittance and their integration into America’s sociocultural fabric, little is known in refugee literature about how receiving countries’ refugee and asylum policies structure refugee migratory processes and flows from countries of origin. Based on 21 in-depth interviews and group discussions with Chin-Burmese families, this paper traces migratory strategies and routes from Northern Burma to the US by examining the role of class, family dynamics, cross-border connections and social capital in migratory decision-making for irregular border-crossings and endurance as transit migrants. Additionally, I analyse the critical functions of intermediary social actors and institutions, particularly faith and community-based organisations, for gaining entry to destination countries. I show that examining Chin refugees’ agency and pre-migratory motives demonstrates the heterogeneity of the refugee population, justifying Chimamanda Adichie’s claim that ‘nobody is just a refugee’.
Acknowledgments
I presented findings related to this research at the IXVIII ISA World Congress of Sociology, Japan in 2014. I am deeply grateful to Bandana Purkayastha, Steve Gold, Melanie Heath and Vrushali Patil for providing valuable input for preparing this manuscript. I am thankful to anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions and to PEER Summer Grant of WVSU for supporting the research.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. Burma was the largest origin country for refugees resettling in the US in 2015 and the second-largest in 2013 and 2014 (Zong and Batalova Citation2015).
2. I use the term ‘migrant’ to describe any person outside their country of citizenship or, in the case of stateless migrants, outside their country of habitual residence. I use ‘migrant’ interchangeably with ‘refugee’, ‘asylee’ and ‘asylum-seeker’ to describe the migration process. ‘Refugee’ also refers to the internationally recognised status participants had before arriving in America.
3. For more examples, see Besteman Citation2016; Haines Citation2010.
4. Burma Center is a social service organisation working with recently arrived and resettled Burmese refugees. It maintains a database of Burmese refugees (see Burmacenterusa.org).
5. For a detailed discussion of US refugee policies and admittance, see Haines (Citation2010), Tress (Citation1991) and Besteman (Citation2016).
6. In 2015, the National League for Democracy won Burma’s national election and now controls the parliament, which recently elected the first civilian president.
7. The Chins have six main tribes: Aso, Cho, Khuami, Laimi, Mizo and Zomi, which can be subdivided into 63 sub-tribal categories differentiated by cultural variation and dialect (Eyth Citation2013).
8. I define ‘family’ here very broadly, including household units, inter-/trans-generational relatives, young single childless family members, siblings and cousins, as in Ryan et al.’s study of Polish migrants (Citation2009).
9. Mizoram is an Indian state bordering Chin State; the CNF is the Chin National Army’s armed branch.
10. From June 2000 to January 2001, approximately 1100 Burmese entered Guam and requested asylum (Kio Citation2002).
11. Transit migrants’ experiences, transit countries’ policies, the choices of asylum-seekers and refugees at various stages of their journeys and the extent to which they can choose their destination country are well documented (Hamood Citation2006). However, most research focuses on the European context and the outcome of the EU’s efforts to stem migration and cooperation with non-EU countries to implement migration-control policies.