Effective Admission and Integration for Refugees

Statement by the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) made by FAWCO UN Rep Mantalin Kyrou, Policy Officer at ICMC, at the UN Global Compact Thematic Discussions in Geneva, November 14, 2017

When we think of “comprehensive refugee response”, of pathways of admission, and mechanisms for integration, we think of so many practical mechanisms that already exist—just not in enough places. From our experience, we most appreciate existing mechanisms for admission that do “double duty”: that is, mechanisms in which the way people are admitted increases the speed of their integration. Mechanisms designed to connect global need for resettlement and other admission pathways with national, local and family interests and capacity for solid integration. And the more we succeed at integration the more we all can succeed at admissions, beginning with greater resettlement of refugees who have nowhere else to go. What are those mechanisms that do both admission and integration?

1. Work-based mechanisms: Across Europe, ICMC works with local and national Church groups and other partners in over 27 countries, in an EU-funded project called SHARE. Everywhere we see that when refugees have a job, the work both settles them economically and accelerates their practical integration. What admission mechanisms promote jobs and accelerate integration? In designing the channel for the admission itself, work-related entry visas can match employers that need workers with refugees that can do that work. A number of countries do this, and we appreciate the new 1,000 such visas that Australia is soon making available. Within the design of these admissions, civil society partners can be contracted to tailor pre-departure orientation, employment counseling, training, credentialing and job search to help refugees of working age who are being resettled or otherwise admitted to find jobs in their new country as soon as possible. In North America as well as across Europe, ICMC resettlement programmes connect with Church and other civil society organizations doing precisely this in direct partnership with the governments.

2. Education-based mechanisms: In our work with the European Resettlement Network (ERN), we see how education visas enable refugee students to continue their studies and eventually find their place in the local labour market, often responding to labour shortages. Education itself fosters integration by enabling refugees to learn with and interact directly with the students who are nationals of their new country, and understand that country’s history, cultural orientation and values. For many years, ERN partner Foundation for Refugee Students UAF in the Netherlands has been providing education support for refugees, from university to professional training for better labour market integration. UAF studies show that once refugees officially begin their course of study, they advance more rapidly as compared to other classmates.

3. Family-based “private sponsorship” mechanisms, either within traditional resettlement or in Humanitarian Admission Programs (HAPs). Canada and the US have long and strong experience in recognizing family anchors for refugee admission and integration; Germany and Ireland more recently. Family anchoring is what brought Qefsere from Kosovo to New York, resettled by Catholic Charities with several of her brothers, a sister and their families, including small children. Of Qefsere’s own two children, one is now a high school teacher, the other working for his PhD in mental health. Mechanically, many of these family reunification opportunities include a type of ‘sponsorship’ component, that calls for—and secures, often with joy!—a financial commitment on the part of applying relatives¹ or the community.

4. Communities of faith-based mechanisms which offer sponsorship and continued support for refugees. These are mechanisms that connect admission to whole-of-community support that is deeply motivated, non-discriminatory, and long-lasting! For example, the Humanitarian Corridors programmes of the Community of Sant’Egidio, the NGO Pope John XXIII, and the Catholic and Protestant Churches of France and Italy welcome Syrian and other refugees and family members by providing full personal accompaniment and helping support travel, housing, living expenses, health insurance and other costs. Recently, the program not only facilitated resettlement to Italy of a little Syrian refugee girl diagnosed with eye cancer but sponsored her family, too. Whether in new humanitarian corridors or traditional resettlement, the individual accompaniment of refugees by national and local communities of faith not only fosters practical integration—through, for example, language classes and cultural orientation—but also meaningful, day-to-day connection between both refugees and the wider community.

So many countries, communities and institutions that receive refugees are already using these mechanisms—just not enough. There is so much success—so much energy, achievement, social value—and joy in it! The mechanisms are rights-based; centered on welcoming and helping refugees and their family members to re-build their lives within a new society. And the mechanisms work, actually doing “double-duty”: achieving admission and integration both, by design.

Finally, together, the mechanisms and numbers add up. A generation ago, 70 countries of the world, UN agencies, the International Organization for Migration, community groups, churches and NGOs like ICMC put themselves together to add numbers up. And 2 million Indochinese refugees, their family members were welcomed—and integrated—through resettlement, family reunification and labour migration admissions that were carefully designed and implemented. We don’t have to “re-invent the wheel” in the new Compact: we need to get it rolling more.