Refugee & Asylum Policy

Tens of millions of people around the globe have been forcibly displaced by conflict, natural disaster, or persecution, seeking refuge either within or beyond the borders of their country. Humanitarian protection, whether for refugees, asylum seekers, or internally displaced persons (IDPs), represents a key policy area for many major immigrant-receiving countries as well as nations bordering locations where war, political upheaval, or natural disaster have disrupted daily life. The research offered here relates to the law and practice of protecting refugees and IDPs in areas of conflict as well as in industrialized nations, with a focus on secure solutions and effective institutional arrangements for comprehensive protection.

Recent Activity

Reports March 2024 Coordination Breakdown: The Impacts of COVID-19 on Migration in Europe By Frey Lindsay	Articles March 6, 2024 Iran Faces Dwindling Water and Escalating Climate Pressures, Aggravating Displacement Threats By Javid Rostami and Arash Asad Paski
Articles February 28, 2024 Standoff at Eagle Pass: A High-Stakes U.S. Border Enforcement Showdown Comes to a Small Texas Park By Muzaffar Chishti and Julia Gelatt	Articles February 15, 2024 Afghan Immigrants in the United States By Julian Montalvo and Jeanne Batalova
Articles February 8, 2024 South Asia’s Tibetan Refugee Community Is Shrinking, Imperiling Its Long-Term Future By Tenzin Dorjee and Tsewang Rigzin	Reports February 2024 Outmatched: The U.S. Asylum System Faces Record Demands By Kathleen Bush-Joseph
Policy Briefs February 2024 The Mobility Key: Realizing the Potential of Refugee Travel Documents By Samuel Davidoff-Gore	Multimedia January 24, 2024 Are the Pacific’s Climate Migration Experiments a Preview for the World?

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Reports January 2024 Expanding Protection Options? Flexible Approaches to Status for Displaced Syrians, Venezuelans, and Ukrainians By Andrew Selee, Susan Fratzke, Samuel Davidoff-Gore and Luisa Feline Freier	Reports January 2024 Shifting Realities at the U.S.-Mexico Border: Immigration Enforcement and Control in a Fast-Evolving Landscape By Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh and Doris Meissner
Reports January 2024 Confronting Compassion Fatigue: Understanding the Arc of Public Support for Displaced Populations in Turkey, Colombia, and Europe By Natalia Banulescu-Bogdan, M. Murat Erdoğan and Lucía Salgado	Policy Briefs December 2023 What Role Could Digital Technologies Play in the New EU Pact on Migration and Asylum? By Lucía Salgado and Hanne Beirens
Reports November 2023 The Unmet Potential of Community Consultations in U.S. Refugee Resettlement By Lillie Hinkle	Reports November 2023 Migration and Displacement in Secondary Cities: Insights from Côte d’Ivoire and Uganda By Samuel Davidoff-Gore and Camille Le Coz
Reports November 2023 Immigration and Integration in the Ever More Diverse Houston Area By Valerie Lacarte, Michael Fix and Jeanne Batalova	Policy Briefs October 2023 Why Matching Matters: Improving Outcomes in Refugee Sponsorship and Complementary Pathways By Craig Damian Smith and Emma Ugolini

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A member of the Texas National Guard faces migrants in Eagle Pass, Texas.

Policy Beat

February 28, 2024

Standoff at Eagle Pass: A High-Stakes U.S. Border Enforcement Showdown Comes to a Small Texas Park

Rising tensions between Texas and the federal government have sparked fears of a constitutional crisis after the state deployed its National Guard to prevent the U.S. Border Patrol from conducting operations in a city park in Eagle Pass, with Texas Governor Greg Abbott saying the “invasion” of migrants triggered the need for action. This article provides an overview of the standoff and the larger context of current and past state-federal tensions over immigration enforcement.

A family of Afghan evacuees leaving Fort McCoy, Wisconsin.

Spotlight

February 15, 2024

Afghan Immigrants in the United States

The Afghan immigrant population in the United States has grown dramatically since 2010, and particularly since the 2021 withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan. Most Afghans who obtained a green card in recent years have done so through the Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program, reserved for interpreters and other Afghans who worked with the U.S. government. This article offers data on the approximately 195,000 Afghan immigrants in the United States.

Feature

February 8, 2024

South Asia’s Tibetan Refugee Community Is Shrinking, Imperiling Its Long-Term Future

The number of Tibetan refugees in India, Nepal, and Bhutan has been on a steady decline since the mid-2000s, posing a threat to the future of an exile community that has developed a robust governance, cultural, educational, and religious structure. While the Tibetan government-in-exile has become a model for displaced communities, a series of factors have contributed to the shrinking population in South Asia, as this article describes.

President Joe Biden signs an executive order.

Policy Beat

January 19, 2024

Biden at the Three-Year Mark: The Most Active Immigration Presidency Yet Is Mired in Border Crisis Narrative

In three years, President Joe Biden has surpassed the number of immigration-focused executive actions taken by the Trump administration throughout its entire four-year term, making his the most active U.S. presidency ever on immigration. Yet the Biden administration has been repeatedly accused of inaction at the U.S.-Mexico border, where record levels of migrant encounters have occurred. This article reviews the Biden track record on immigration.

Feature

December 6, 2023

Often Shut Out of the Financial System, Refugees and Other Migrants Face Economic Integration Challenges

Credit cards, bank accounts, and other financial services are often critical in order to fully participate in the modern world. Yet many refugees and other forced migrants have trouble obtaining these seemingly simple tools, preventing them from full integration. This article outlines humanitarian migrants’ needs for financial services and the barriers that can arise.

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Expert Q&A, Audio

October 27, 2023

Is Climate Migration a Homeland Security Threat?

Former U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff talks about the security implications of climate change and migration in this episode of the podcast Changing Climate, Changing Migration.

Expert Q&A, Audio

October 19, 2023

Documenting the Migration Journey: African Kinship Dynamics in Europe

African migrants turn to the strength of kinship-based support systems in pursuit of stability as they settle in a European landscape that is sometimes made precarious by their legal status and shifting policies. This episode discusses use of the kinship networks, including to exchange or broker identity documents between migrants along the migration journey and at destination.

Expert Q&A, Audio

September 26, 2023

The Power of Refugee Sponsorship: A Sponsor’s Story

How is refugee resettlement evolving? As more countries turn to private or community sponsorship, MPI speaks with Erin Schutte Wadzinski, who leads one of the pioneering private sponsorship groups in Worthington, Minnesota, under the Welcome Corps initiative.

Video

September 18, 2023

20th Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference

The 20th annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference, organized by MPI, Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc., and Georgetown University Law Center, features fresh, thoughtful policy and legal analysis, and discussion of some of the top immigration issues by leading government officials, attorneys, researchers, advocates, and other experts.

Video, Audio

September 14, 2023

Strengthening Refugee Engagement in Community Sponsorship Programs

Speakers, including a resettled refugee, examine the challenges that hinder refugee participation in sponsorship program design and operation and explore meaningful ways, tools, and mechanisms for effectively expanding refugees’ role in current and future programs. They also discuss innovative initiatives that are already making strides in refugee involvement.

Recent Activity

Expert Q&A, Audio

June 27, 2023

A Mixed Welcome: Haitian Migration within the Caribbean

MPI Senior Policy Analyst Valerie Lacarte speaks with experts Bridget Wooding and Louby George about migration of Haitians to the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas.

Video, Webinars

June 14, 2023

Making Refugee Participation in Protection Community Dialogues Meaningful

In the run-up to the 2023 Global Refugee Forum, this discussion examines efforts at facilitating refugee participation and meaningful engagement in policy conversations at global and other levels. It also marks the release of a publication Building Meaningful Refugee Participation into Protection Policymaking from the Beyond Territorial Asylum: Making Protection Work in a Bordered World initiative.

Articles

June 15, 2023

Refugees and Asylees in the United States

U.S. refugee resettlement is slowly increasing after hitting a historic low, rebounding from the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce humanitarian migration as well as pandemic-era restrictions on movement and processing slowdowns. This article offers recent and historical data about refugees resettled in the United States, as well as asylum seekers and asylees.

Reports

June 2023

Building Meaningful Refugee Participation into Protection Policymaking

One promising—but often underutilized—element of addressing the world’s urgent humanitarian protection needs is meaningfully engaging refugees in policymaking processes. As this report highlights, consultations, advisory roles, and leadership and staff positions can help ensure refugees’ knowledge and expertise are reflected in policy responses to displacement. The study also examines common limitations and ways to make engagement more impactful.

Articles

June 6, 2023

In Canada’s French-Speaking Quebec, Immigration Sparks Anxieties about Language and Identity

Canada's ambitions to dramatically increase immigration have met resistance in Quebec, the country's only majority-French province, where many worry their identity is under threat. Provincial officials have sought to fortify the role of the French language in society through academic, immigration, and linguistic policies, but the language nonetheless faces demographic threats, as this article explains.

Reports

June 2023

Migration Narratives in Northern Central America: How Competing Stories Shape Policy and Public Opinion in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador

El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras have long histories of emigration, but are seeing increasing transit and return migration as well. This report explores the stories told within these three countries about migration in all its forms, how these narratives intersect with (and at times, contradict) each other, and how they influence policy decisions and public opinion.

Articles

June 2, 2023

Inmigrantes centroamericanos en los Estados Unidos

Los centroamericanos representan menos de una décima parte de la población de inmigrantes en Estados Unidos. Pero su número se ha multiplicado por diez desde 1980. Este artículo proporciona una mirada integral a esta población.

Articles

May 31, 2023

Global Spending on Immigration Enforcement Is Higher than Ever and Rising

Budgets for border security and interior immigration enforcement have been on the rise in places including the United States and the European Union. The spending is a result of the heightened focus on securitization by the Global North and has led to a ballooning private industry. This article explains the trend.

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