Refugees in Vermont: mobility and acculturation in a new immigrant destination

This paper explores the idea of mobility for recent refugees who have resettled in a non-traditional immigrant destination in the northeastern U.S. It is based on a multi-year qualitative study of travel behavior, preferences, and needs amongst these new arrivals in a small city in the state of Vermont. As a result of their experiences of both forced displacement from their home as well as stasis within camp settings and the refugee determination process, refugees are an example of what some have called “a dialectic of movement/moorings” (Urry, 2003: 125), both on the move and trapped in place. Their resettlement in the U.S., as this paper illustrates, may represent a further extension of this dialectic—placed by government agents in new immigrant reception areas not of their own choosing, forced to commute long distances and into unfamiliar environments for work and limited in their abilities to access healthcare, education and employment (amongst other services) due to a range of transportation barriers. I argue in this paper that refugee mobilities in a new settlement site are about more than inconvenience: barriers to movement may constitute obstacles to acculturation, integration, self-empowerment, and community building.     

Using scenarios to forecast outcomes of a refugee crisis

The Syrian civil war has led to millions of Syrians fleeing the country, and has resulted in a humanitarian crisis. By considering how such socio-political events may unfold, scenarios can lead to informed forecasts that can be used for decision-making. We examined the relationship between scenarios and forecasts in the context of the Syrian refugee crisis. Forty Turkish students who had been trained to use a brainstorming technique generated scenarios that might follow within six months of the Turkish government banning Syrian refugees from entering the country. The participants generated 3–6 scenarios. Over half were rated as ‘high’ quality in terms of completeness, relevance/pertinence, plausibility, coherence, and transparency (order effects). The scenario quality was unaffected by the scenario quantity. Even though no forecasts were requested, the participants’ first scenarios contained 0–17 forecasts. The mean forecast accuracy was 45%, and this was unaffected by the forecast quantity. Therefore, brainstorming can offer a simple and quick way of generating scenarios and forecasts that can potentially help decision-makers to tackle humanitarian crises.     

Refugee influx: Repercussions and research agenda for service scholars

Service provision is an integral part of hosting refugees. However, the service scholar community has remained rather dormant in regard to focusing on refugee issues. This is indeed surprising given international refugee influx is today one of the more pressing issues for developing and developed countries alike. This research note aims to identify the demands on countries’ “service ecosystems” after an influx of migrants arrives in a country, and suggests research avenues for scholars. Resolving service related issues can assist practitioners and government bodies in how to better design and manage the interface between refugees and the new (service) ecosystems these actors have entered when reaching a host country. Therefore, this research note outlines the challenges of such refugee in- or through flux relating to service provision by focusing on the incoming actors (refugees) as well as the resident actors (locals, service providers, government bodies etc.). Repercussions as well as the subsequent agenda for inquiry for service scholars outlined refer to the various system levels from micro to macro, such as on individual, family, city, regional, state and national level, but also outside the system on an international level.     

Ethnic identity and economic welfare

In this study, we use rich survey data to understand the determinants of labor market success across refugees of different ethnicities in Turkey. In particular, we examine individual personality traits and integration barriers by considering metrics of refugees’ proximity to Turkey based on their home countries’ levels of cultural distance. Using microdata, we derive a refined index called ethnosizer scale to grasp the distance of minor ethnic identities in Istanbul to the dominant identity. Utilizing this parameter, we aim to analyze how the degree of commitment to the local society’s culture affects the economic welfare of refugees in Istanbul, in terms of their earnings, participation in labor markets and wage gap compared to the natives.     

Welcoming Refugees and the Cultural Wealth of Cities: Intersections of Urban Development and Refugee Humanitarianism

In a context of rising nativism, cities across liberal democracies are enacting agendas to ‘welcome’ migrants and refugees. Existing scholarship examines this contentious political geography as reflecting either accommodative or restrictive responses to local immigrant populations. Through this lens, pro‐immigrant policies and dynamics are seen to recognize and support a set of pre‐defined immigrant ‘interests’, with the pertinent question being which local actors initiate processes of incorporation and why. Drawing on urban scholarship, this article offers an alternative framework through an analysis of resettled refugees’ experiences within the ‘welcoming agenda’ of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I show that this agenda is tethered to postindustrial ideologies of urban development, which see building and promoting ‘diversity’ as an economic exigency. As such, locally resettled refugees are incentivized to participate in a ‘symbolic economy’ valuing images of diversity, cosmopolitanism and immigrant contribution. Refugees gain access to resources, recognition and decision makers through participation in this symbolic economy, a process constituting a previously unexamined form of incorporation. I advance the concept of the ‘welcomed refugee’ to organize thinking about this process and call for critical attention to the forms of incorporation fostered in pro‐immigrant, cosmopolitan, substate settings.     

Guest editorial: Female and ethnic minority entrepreneurship

There has been an increasing level of interest in diversity in small business enterprises. This diversity has been largely focused on female and ethnic minority entrepreneurs. Although there is evidence that female entrepreneurship can have a positive impact on economic prosperity, levels of earnings remain low. The articles in this special issue further our understanding of female and minority entrepreneurs. They examine important topics such as the differences between male and female entrepreneurs in terms of confidence, growth expectations, entrepreneurial orientation and social capital, developing management skills in female entrepreneurs, their management competencies and refugee entrepreneurship.     

Refugee entrepreneurship in Belgium: Potential and practice

By promoting refugee entrepreneurship, both the integration of refugees in society can be aided and domestic entrepreneurship can be boosted. Refugee entrepreneurship has been an underdeveloped domain of scientific research though. There clearly exists a potential for refugee entrepreneurship in Belgium, but this is too seldom realized in practice. Male refugees who have been self-employed in the past and whose family is active as an entrepreneur have a higher appetite for entrepreneurship. Refugee entrepreneurs are mostly male, in their thirties and forties and active in ‘inferior’ sectors. It was also found that refugee entrepreneurs earn less than other entrepreneurs.     

Refugees as Surplus Population: Race,Migration and Capitalist Value Regimes

ABSTRACT

Refugees and migrants are often studied as though they have no relation to the racial and class structures of the societies in which they reside. They are strangers to be governed by ‘integration’ policy and border management. Refugees and migrants are, however, subjects of contemporary capitalism struggling to render themselves valuable capitalist modes of production. I study the government of refugees and migrants in order to examine capitalist value regimes. Societal values and hierarchies reflected in capitalist modes of production impact on struggles of racialised subaltern groups to translate body power into valued labour. Marx’s account of surplus populations points to the common marginalisations of people called ‘refugees’ and other subaltern groups struggling to translate their body power into valorised labour. The essay includes a study of the gentrification of a district in Budapest, and its transformation into a means for the reproduction of capital, leading to the marginalisation of groups who no longer fit the new value regimes. Studying refugees as surplus populations allows for a sense of the common marginalisations of subaltern and racialised groups before capitalism, and questions the treatment of refugees and migrants as ‘strangers’.     

Belonging or estrangement—The European Refugee Crisis and its effects on immigrant identity

This study examines the impact of the 2015 European Refugee Crisis on the ethnic identity of resident migrants in Germany. To derive plausibly causal estimates, I exploit the quasi-experimental setting in Germany, by which refugees are allocated to different counties by state authorities without being able to choose their locations themselves. This study finds that higher shares of refugees in a county increased migrants’ attachment to their home countries, while not affecting their perceived belonging to Germany. Further analyses uncover strong heterogeneities with respect to country of origin and suggest that concerns about xenophobia, experiences of discrimination, and the consumption of foreign media contributed to these effects. Lastly, I find that changes in ethnic identity coincide with the political polarization of migrants.