Refugee Policy in the Biden Administration

On April 23, 2021, T. Alexander Aleinikoff, Director of the Zolberg Institute and University Professor at The New School, Mark Hetfield, President and CEO of HIAS, and Kayly Ober, Senior Advocate and Program Manager, Climate Displacement Program at Refugees International discussed the Biden Administration’s refugee policies and proposed actions. NPR’s Deborah Amos moderated.

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Should the multi-disciplinary field of Forced Migration Studies (FMS) re-orient itself around the concept of “displacement”? This short intervention situates this question against the background of the transition from Refugee Studies to FMS, as well as external developments in the realm of protection. It draws attention to how the concept of displacement has become more central to both policy and academic discussion in FMS before considering what difference such a re-orientation might make conceptually, ethically, and politically. It concludes by suggesting that FMS might be conceived as standing between and across two larger fields of enquiry: Migration Studies and Displacement Studies.

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David FitzGerald will discuss why some people facing violence and persecution flee. Others stay. How do households in danger decide whom should go, where to relocate, and whether to keep moving? What interests and conditions in countries of origin, transit, and reception shape people’s options? The Refugee System tells how one Syrian family spread across several countries tried to survive the civil war and live in dignity.

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