Disempowerment-Empowerment Dynamics: Theorizing the Role of Cultural Background and Capital in Refugees' Adaptation to New Contexts

Abstract

This paper presents a conceptual analysis of the role of cultural background or otherness and social capital in refugees' adaptation to new resettlement contexts. It also presents a framework, The Disempowerment-Empowerment Dynamics (D-ED), that can be used to theorize issues of power within refugee families. D-ED explores how the new society's recognition or non-recognition of refugees' personal capital affects adaptation and how the differences in individual aspirations and capital recognition interface with family-held values around identity, gender, roles and unity in a new context. The potential implications of this for social work practice are also discussed.

Keywords:

• refugees
• empowerment
• disempowerment
• social capital
• adaptation to new contexts