Scaling Up Resettlement: The Role of Private Sponsorship Programmes in Addressing the Refugee Crisis
A webinar discussing how private sponsorship programmes for refugees, used by Canada and a handful of other countries, could alleviate some of the pressure from the European refugee crisis, by allowing individuals, groups, businesses, and other entities to sponsor individual refugees for resettlement. Discussion includes findings and analysis from a MPI Europe report.
As the European Union considers scaling up plans to resettle refugees from Turkey and other countries of first asylum to improve protection, as well as reduce pressures to travel illicitly, limit the power of criminal networks and develop more equitable responsibility sharing among EU Member States, speakers, including the author of a MPI report, discuss their analysis on how private sponsorship programmes for refugees could possibly enhance outcomes and spread costs.
Used by Canada, Australia, and a handful of other countries, as well as 15 of the 16 German länder, these programmes permit private individuals, groups, corporations, and other entities to sponsor individual refugees for resettlement and accept financial responsibility for them for a period of time. Panelists explore how these programmes, if implemented or expanded in EU countries, might provide an additional safe and orderly channel for refugees to gain protection and become one part of the broader solution that policymakers are seeking in response to the current crisis.
Speakers also delve into key questions and challenges that should be considered in implementation, including who would be eligible to sponsor refugees, what would sponsors’ responsibilities entail, who could be sponsored, and how would applicants be chosen, what entitlements and status might sponsored refugees get, and more political questions as to whether such initiatives merely represent a divestment of government responsibilities onto an overstretched volunteer sector.
Speakers:
Tim Finch, Coordinator, National Refugees Welcome Board
Madeline Garlick, Chief of Section, Protection Policy and Legal Advice, UNHCR Division of International Protection
Judith Kumin, Adjunct Professor in the Politics and Society Program, University of New Hampshire at Manchester; and former UNHCR Director for Europe and Representative to the European Union
Moderators:
Elizabeth Collett, Director of MPI Europe and Senior Advisor to MPI Transatlantic Council on Migration
About the Moving Europe Beyond Crisis Project
As the systems designed to process migration flows to Europe buckled in 2015-16, this project offered new ideas to manage mixed flows and create sustainable long-term solutions for refugees.
About the Global Program
The Global Program bridges policy advice, research, and candid dialogue to design effective migration policies, drawing on global evidence and anticipating the forces reshaping how people move.
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