By James Rochlin

The near collapse of the Venezuelan economy since 2015 and the concomitant erosion of public order have led to an exodus of over seven million people by mid-2023, the largest forced migrant flow in recent Latin American history and the second largest globally after Syria. It occurs against a global backdrop of a 400 percent increase in persons displaced across borders between 2010 and 2021. Colombia hosts the largest number of Venezuelan refugees — with about 2.5 million officially recorded by the government. This has occurred during a politically tumultuous period in Colombia, which has featured the reconfiguration of competing illegal armed groups since the signing of the 2016 Peace Accord between the government and the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC), a major COVID-19 outbreak in 2020–2021, and a crippling and protracted national strike in 2021.

Within the hemispheric context, Colombia serves as a stop-gap to stem the flow of Venezuelan refugees northward, roughly similar to the role played by Mexico to intercept and diminish migration to the United States. This has especially been the case since the January 5, 2023 announcement by US President Biden, which specified that refugees cannot declare asylum in the US if they attempt to cross the US border without first seeking asylum in their initial transit country. For Venezuelan refugees, the first country they enter is typically Colombia. Further, in May 2023, the Biden administration announced it was considering sending US troops to the Darien Peninsula in Panama, and will perhaps train Colombian forces, to diminish the “trafficking” of Venezuelan refugees and other refugees passing through Colombia and headed north. The result, according to leaders of NGOs and other who work directly with refugees, has been more pressure on Colombia to retain them.

The argument here is twofold. First, human security threats for Venezuelan refugees should be viewed intersectionally in the particular spaces through which they pass — from the collapse of order in their home countries (which qualifies them as refugees), through the borderlands with Colombia that pose specific threats to their safety and wellbeing, and to their destinations within Colombia that offer their own peculiar array of opportunities and human security challenges. Second, regularization programs such as the Estatuto Temporal de Protección de Migrantes Venezolanos (ETPMV) are the best way to promote human security for refugees in Colombia in the short and medium terms, but this process needs to be more inclusive.1 The first half of this paper discusses the conceptual underpinnings that link power/mobility/space to human security for refugees. The second part brings those concepts to life through interviews with an assortment of refugees.

The paper draws from a database of interviews with 72 Venezuelan refugees in Colombia in 2022 and 2023 regarding the intersectional nuances of human security. It also relies on interviews with dozens of security, migration, and human rights experts in Colombia since 1997. A unique conceptual perspective is developed regarding critical human security for Venezuelan refugees. Journal on Migration and Human SecurityVolume 11, Issue 4, December 2023, Pages 333-355

By: Haodong Qi and Tuba Bircan

Migration models have evolved significantly during the last decade, most notably the so-called flow Fixed-Effects (FE) gravity models. Such models attempt to infer how human mobility may be driven by changing economy, geopolitics, and the environment among other things. They are also increasingly used for migration projections and forecasts. However, recent research shows that this class of models can neither explain, nor predict the temporal dynamics of human movement. This shortcoming is even more apparent in the context of forced migration, in which the processes and drivers tend to be heterogeneous and complex. In this article, we derived a Flow–Specific Temporal Gravity (FTG) model which, compared to the FE models, is theoretically similar (informed by the random utility framework), but empirically less restrictive. Using EUROSTAT data with climate, economic, and conflict indicators, we trained both models and compared their performances. The results suggest that the predictive power of these models is highly dependent on the length of training data. Specifically, as time-series migration data lengthens, FTG’s predictions can be increasingly accurate, whereas the FE model becomes less predictive.

PLoS ONE 18(4): e0284416. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0284416 Editor: Luca De Benedictis, U

Edited by Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh

Refuge in a Moving World draws together more than thirty contributions from multiple disciplines and fields of research and practice to discuss different ways of engaging with, and responding to, migration and displacement.

The volume combines critical reflections on the complexities of conceptualizing processes and experiences of (forced) migration, with detailed analyses of these experiences in contemporary and historical settings from around the world. Through interdisciplinary approaches and methodologies – including participatory research, poetic and spatial interventions, ethnography, theatre, discourse analysis and visual methods – the volume documents the complexities of refugees’ and migrants’ journeys. This includes a particular focus on how people inhabit and negotiate everyday life in cities, towns, camps and informal settlements across the Middle East and North Africa, Southern and Eastern Africa, and Europe.

A key dynamic documented throughout the book is the multiple ways that responses to displacement are enacted by people with personal or family experiences of (forced) migration. These people appear in many roles: researchers, writers and artists, teachers, solidarians, first responders, NGO practitioners, neighbours and/or friends. Through the application of historically and spatially sensitive, intersectional and interdisciplinary lenses, the contributors explore the ways that different people – across axes of religion, sexuality, gender, and age – experience and respond to their own situations and to those of other people, in the context of diverse power structures and structural inequalities on the local, national and international level.

Ultimately, Refuge in a Moving World argues that working collaboratively through interdisciplinary approaches and methodologies has the potential to develop nuanced understandings of processes of migration and displacement, and, in turn, to encourage more sustainable modes of responding to our moving world.

London: UCL Press, 2020.

Edited by El ˙zbieta M. Go´zdziak · Izabella Main

This open access book brings into dialogue emerging and seasoned migration and religion scholars with spiritual leaders and representatives of faith-based organizations assisting refugees. Violent conflicts, social unrest, and other humanitarian crises around the world have led to growing numbers of people seeking refuge both in the North and in the South. Migrating and seeking refuge have always been part and parcel of spiritual development. However, the current 'refugee crisis' in Europe and elsewhere in the world has brought to the fore fervent discussions regarding the role of religion in defining difference, linking the ‘refugee crisis’ with Islam, and fear of the ‘Other.’ Many religious institutions, spiritual leaders, and politicians invoke religious values and call for strict border controls to resolve the ‘refugee crisis.’ However, equally many humanitarian organizations and refugee advocates use religious values to inform their call to action to welcome refugees and migrants, provide them with assistance, and facilitate integration processes. This book includes three distinct but inter-related parts focusing, respectively, on politics, values, and discourses mobilized by religious beliefs; lived experiences of religion, with a particular emphasis on identity and belonging among various refugee groups; and faith and faith actors and their responses to forced migration.

Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023. 200p.

By Guadalupe Correa-Cabrera and Beatriz García Nice

  Forced migration or forced displacement continues to relocate millions of people around the world. The category includes refugees, migrants, and internally displaced persons, and it is a direct result of persecution, conflict, other events seriously disturbing public order, and generalized human rights violations. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 82.4 million people are currently forcibly displaced—more than twice the number of people as a decade ago. Of those, women and girls make up 50 percent of displaced populations; they are, in general, at a higher risk of violence.  

Washington, DC: Wilson Center, 2021. 9p.

By Jane McAdam

The international protection regime for refugees and other forced migrants seems increasingly at risk as measures designed to enhance security — of borders, of people, of institutions, and of national identity — encroach upon human rights. This timely edited collection responds to some of the contemporary challenges faced by the international protection regime, with a particular focus on the human rights of those who are displaced. The book begins by assessing the impact of anti-terrorism laws on refugee status, both at the international and domestic levels, before turning to examine the function of offshore immigration control mechanisms and extraterritorial processing on asylum seekers' access to territory and entitlements — both procedural and substantive. It considers: the particular needs and rights of children, especially as forced migrants; the role of human rights law in protecting religious minorities in the context of debates about national identity; the approaches of refugee decision-makers in assessing the credibility of evidence; and the scope for an international judicial commission to provide consistent interpretative guidance on refugee law, so as to overcome — or at least diminish — the currently diverse and sometimes conflicting approaches of national courts. The last part of the book examines the status of people who benefit from 'complementary protection' — such as those who cannot be removed from a country because they face a risk of torture; cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment; or punishment — and the scope for the broader concept of the 'responsibility to protect' to address gaps in the international protection regime.

Oxford, UK: Portland, OR: Hart Publishing, 2008. 310p.

Edited by Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long and Nando Sigona

This Handbook critically traces the birth and development of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, and vividly illustrates the vibrant and engaging debates that characterize this rapidly expanding field of research and practice. The contributions highlight the key challenges faced by academics and practitioners working with and for forcibly displaced populations around the world, as well as identifying new directions for research in the field. Since emerging as a distinct field of study in the early 1980s, Refugee and Forced Migration Studies has grown from being of concern of a relatively small number of scholars and policy analysts to become a global field with thousands of students worldwide studying displacement, either from traditional disciplinary perspectives or as a core component of newer interdisciplinary programmes across the Humanities and Social and Political Sciences. Today the field encompasses both rigorous academic research as well as action-research focused on advocating in favour of refugees’ needs and rights and more directly concerned with influencing policy and practice. The Handbook’s fifty-two state-of-the-art chapters, written by leading academics, practitioners, and policymakers working in universities, research centres, think tanks, NGOs, and international organizations across every continent, provide a comprehensive and cutting-edge overview of the key intellectual, political, social, and institutional challenges arising from mass displacement in the world today.

Oxford, UK; New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 800p.