E.g., 09/25/2022
E.g., 09/25/2022
Refugee & Asylum Policy

Refugee & Asylum Policy

Asylum Seekers
Refugees & Resettlement
_RefugeeAsylumPolicy credit

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

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Multimedia
September 21, 2020
17th Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference
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Reports
November 2020
The Next Generation of Refugee Resettlement in Europe: Ambitions for the Future and How to Realize Them
By  Susan Fratzke and Lena Kainz
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Reports
November 2020
Building a New Regional Migration System: Redefining U.S. Cooperation with Mexico and Central America
By  Andrew Selee and Ariel G. Ruiz Soto
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Articles
November 20, 2020
The “Trump Effect” on Legal Immigration Levels: More Perception than Reality?
By Muzaffar Chishti and Jessica Bolter
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Multimedia
November 18, 2020
Welfare States and Migration: How Will the Pandemic Reshape a Complex Relationship?
Building Welcome from the Ground up: European Small and Rural Communities Engaging in Refugee Resettlement
Reports
November 2020
Building Welcome from the Ground up: European Small and Rural Communities Engaging in Refugee Resettlement
By  Liam Patuzzi, Monica Andriescu and Antonio Pietropolli
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Multimedia
November 17, 2020
Mission Critical: The Evolution of U.S. Homeland Security in the 21st Century
Managing the Pandemic and Its Aftermath: Economies, Jobs, and International Migration in the Age of COVID-19
Reports
November 2020
Managing the Pandemic and Its Aftermath: Economies, Jobs, and International Migration in the Age of COVID-19
By  Demetrios G. Papademetriou

Pages

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Reports
October 2015
The Academic Engagement of Newly Arriving Somali Bantu Students in a U.S. Elementary School
By  Dina Birman and Nellie Tran
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Policy Briefs
October 2015
Unaccompanied Child Migrants in U.S. Communities, Immigration Court, and Schools
By  Sarah Pierce
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Reports
October 2015
The Educational and Mental Health Needs of Syrian Refugee Children
By  Selcuk R. Sirin and Lauren Rogers-Sirin
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Reports
August 2015
In-Country Processing in Central America: A Piece of the Puzzle
By  Faye Hipsman and Doris Meissner
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Policy Briefs
July 2015
Irregular Maritime Migration in the Bay of Bengal: The Challenges of Protection, Management, and Cooperation
By  Kathleen Newland
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Reports
June 2015
The Integration Outcomes of U.S. Refugees: Successes and Challenges
By  Randy Capps, Kathleen Newland, Susan Fratzke, Susanna Groves, Michael Fix, Margie McHugh and Gregory Auclair
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Reports
June 2015
Beyond Asylum: Rethinking Protection Policies to Meet Sharply Escalating Needs (Transatlantic Council Statement)
By  Demetrios G. Papademetriou
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Reports
May 2015
Before the Boat: Understanding the Migrant Journey
By  Jacob Townsend and Christel Oomen

Pages

Sign left by No More Deaths activists in Arizona
Top Ten
December 17, 2018
Pushback to the Resistance: Criminalization of Humanitarian Actors Aiding Migrants Rises

As industrialized countries are adopting harder-edge immigration and asylum policies to deal with real and perceived crises, humanitarian actors have sought to blunt the effects of those policies by launching rescue missions at sea, rendering direct aid to migrants in need, and offering legal assistance. A concerted pushback to this resistance emerged in 2018, with governments using legislative, legal, and other tools to fight back.

Migrants returning to Ethiopia
Top Ten
December 14, 2018
Intensifying Focus on Migrant Returns Takes a More Global Stage

Questions of how, when, and under what conditions migrants and asylum seekers can be returned to their origin countries have featured prominently in international discussions of migration in 2018. Crucially, so too has an increased interest on the part of both destination and origin countries in making reintegration assistance more effective to help ensure that return is sustainable.

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Top Ten
December 13, 2018
Asylum Hangover? Governments Seek to Narrow Avenues for Humanitarian Protection

Faced with absorbing vast numbers of asylum seekers who headed to Europe during the 2015-16 migration crisis and the ongoing arrival of much smaller, but steady flows of Central Americans at the U.S.-Mexico border, EU Member States and the United States in 2018 took or explored significant steps to narrow asylum and harden policies.

South Sudanese refugees in Ethiopia.
Top Ten
December 10, 2018
“Silent” Refugee Crises Get Limited International Attention

Despite the major focus by media and publics on a handful of refugee crises around the world, displacement situations worsened during 2018 in a number of countries that received much less attention, including the Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and South Sudan—where unending conflict, new displacement, rising starvation, and an Ebola outbreak made already complex situations even more dire.

SwedenImmigrants
Profile
December 6, 2018
Sweden: By Turns Welcoming and Restrictive in its Immigration Policy

Swedish asylum policy has taken a restrictionist turn since the country received a record-breaking number of asylum seekers in 2015 and after electoral gains by the nationalist, anti-immigration Sweden Democrats pushed the governing coalition to a harder line. Still, other aspects of the country’s migration policy remain welcoming, as this country profile explores.

Pages

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Video, Audio
September 24, 2018

Addressing the Intergenerational Mental Health Needs of Refugee Families with Young Children

Experts on this webinar discuss efforts being undertaken in Maryland to serve refugee families with young children through tailored, trauma-informed approaches that address their specific mental health needs.

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Video, Audio
August 29, 2018

Young Children in Refugee Families and Early Childhood Programs: Ways to Mitigate the Effects of Trauma

Experts discuss the effects of trauma on the development of young refugee children, and highlight ways early childhood education and care (ECEC) programs can address this trauma, including practical strategies that child-care providers in Canada are using to support the resiliency of refugee children and families. 

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Video, Audio
April 20, 2018

Making Every Encounter Count: Using Peer Support to Improve Refugee Resettlement

This webinar, featuring findings from an MPI Europe report, examines major challenges facing refugee resettlement peer-support projects in Europe and key lessons for Member States. 

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Video, Audio
April 12, 2018

Responding to Early Childhood Education and Care Needs of Children of Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Europe and North America

On this webinar, authors discuss their findings, highlighting promising policies and practices for serving young children of refugees and asylum seekers in nine key host countries, as well as key areas in which ECEC services need to be strengthened.

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Video, Audio
March 21, 2018

Supporting DLLs in Superdiverse PreK-3 Programs: Findings from Two Studies

This webinar focuses on patterns of home language use across different early childhood education and care (ECEC) program types, and the potential of the Sobrato Early Academic Language model to improve instruction and outcomes for DLLs in superdiverse settings. 

Pages

Recent Activity

Video, Webinars
September 21, 2020

17th Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference

This year’s Immigration Law and Policy Conference examines the immigration policy agenda under the Trump administration, including changes in the asylum system; the vast societal upheaval brought on by COVID-19 and the rising racial justice movement; what the future of U.S. immigration may look like; and many other topics related to U.S. immigration policy.

Reports
November 2020

The Next Generation of Refugee Resettlement in Europe: Ambitions for the Future and How to Realize Them

In recent years, the European Union and some of its Member States have taken on a greater role in global refugee resettlement, expanding or launching new programs and experimenting with creative approaches to providing protection to those in need. This report looks ahead to how these efforts, investments, and lessons learned can be built upon, even in the face of the uncertainty brought by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Reports
November 2020

Building a New Regional Migration System: Redefining U.S. Cooperation with Mexico and Central America

Addressing regional cooperation around migration will be among the immigration challenges and opportunities facing the incoming Biden administration. This report examines how movement between the United States, Mexico, and Central America has evolved in recent decades, and lays out a four-part strategy to expand opportunities for legal migration, address humanitarian protection needs, improve enforcement, and mitigate some of the forces driving people to emigrate.

Articles
November 20, 2020

The “Trump Effect” on Legal Immigration Levels: More Perception than Reality?

Despite a widespread perception that the Trump administration has drastically slashed legal immigration to the United States, a review of the data shows that temporary and permanent admissions during the period mostly followed previous trends—at least until the COVID-19 pandemic hit. This article examines trends in temporary, permanent, and humanitarian admissions during the administration, and the related policies that could take a more significant bite ahead if left unchanged.

Video, Audio, Webinars
November 18, 2020

Welfare States and Migration: How Will the Pandemic Reshape a Complex Relationship?

This MPI Europe webinar reflects on the implications of this current moment for European economies and societies and the role of immigration and immigrant integration policy, and highlight research from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre on the fiscal and demographic impacts of migration.

Reports
November 2020

Building Welcome from the Ground up: European Small and Rural Communities Engaging in Refugee Resettlement

Small towns and rural areas within Europe have become more active in receiving resettled refugees in recent years. How is resettlement to these communities different compared to urban areas? And what can be done to make good on the promise of “rural welcoming”? This report explores these questions, drawing on interviews with resettled refugees and receiving-community members in Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, and Sweden.

Video, Audio, Webinars
November 17, 2020

Mission Critical: The Evolution of U.S. Homeland Security in the 21st Century

What does it mean to “secure the homeland” in the 21st century? And how do the Department of Homeland Security's immigration and border security missions figure into the equation? Top security experts assess DHS’s evolution and how it organizes its operations and migration management. They also offer recommendations on how to improve U.S. homeland security.
 

Reports
November 2020

Managing the Pandemic and Its Aftermath: Economies, Jobs, and International Migration in the Age of COVID-19

Around the world, governments are grappling with how to combat the COVID-19 pandemic while also managing the economic fallout of policies put in place to stop the virus’ spread. Global migration has dropped sharply amid border closures and travel restrictions. This reflection takes stock of policy responses to the pandemic thus far, and of the challenges (and some opportunities) on the horizon for migration systems, labor markets, and integration of newcomers.

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