Karen Jacobsen

Livelihoods in Conflict: The Pursuit of Livelihoods by Refugees and the Impact on the Human Security of Host Communities

This paper explores how long–term refugees pursue livelihoods, the impact this pursuit has on the human security of conflict–affected communities, and the ways in which international assistance can help. Refugees’ pursuit of livelihoods can increase human security because economic activities help to recreate social and economic interdependence within and between communities, and can restore social networks based on the exchange of labour, assets and food. When refugees are allowed to gain access to resources and freedom of movement, and can work alongside their hosts to pursue productive lives, they would be less dependent on aid and better able to overcome the sources of tension and conflict in their host communities. The paper identifies how humanitarian programmes working with national governments can increase economic security and shore up the respective rights of both refugees and their host communities. Today, relief interventions are no longer expected solely to save lives in the short term, but also to lay the foundation for future development and to promote conflict resolution.

Factors influencing the policy responses of host governments to mass refugee influxes.

The policy responses of asylum governments to mass influxes of refugees have varied considerably. Focusing on less developed countries, this article explores why some host governments respond in relatively generous ways, while other governments act more restrictively. The policy alternatives available to receiving governments are classified, and a set of factors influencing refugee policy formation is explored. These factors include: the costs and benefits of accepting international assistance, relations with the sending country, political calculations about the local communitys absorption capacity, and national security considerations. However, the end result is not a neat solution yielding a rationally evolved refugee policy. Host governments also struggle with bureaucratic politics, the position of refugees in domestic politics, power struggles between government ministries and among decisionmakers, paucity of information, bureaucratic inertia, and other complications that must be teased out at the empirical level.

Can refugees benefit the state? Refugee resources and African statebuilding

Refugees impose a variety of security, economic and environmental burdens on host countries, but also embody a significant flow of resources in the form of international humanitarian assistance, economic assets and human capital. These refugee resources represent an important statebuilding contribution to the host state, but security problems and other hindrances inhibit the state’s ability to access and control them. This article explores the challenges and opportunities for African states arising from the double impact of refugeegenerated resources and security problems. It argues that the potential benefit for the state and its citizens go beyond the burdens imposed by a mass influx. Refugee resources and security threats potentially provide long-term gains, and, by compelling the state to strengthen its grip on border areas, enable the state to ‘harden’ its presence there. However, for host states to realise the potential of refugee resources and continue hosting refugees, they must be assisted by appropriate humanitarian programmes.

Federal Block Grants and State Spending: The Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Block Grant and State Agency Behavior

With renewed interest in block grants as a way to channel federal funds to states, several questions arise about the effect of block grants on state spending. A central question about the block grant form of intergovernmental aid is whether states spend the funds on the intended services or use budgetary strategies to appear to be in compliance with maintenance-of-effort provisions but then reallocate block grant funds from the targeted program. We studied the effect of the Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health block grant program on state substance abuse expenditures by analyzing spending data from the fifty states between fiscal years 1987 and 1992. Our findings suggest that this block grant has stimulated state spending, but this effect may be relevant only since 1990, and differs among states.

Organizational structure and state mental health expenditures

State mental health agencies (SMHAs) are characterized by a variety of organizational and fiscal arrangements. SMHAs may be part of a multi-functional agency or free-standing. They may be devoted exclusively to mental health or also responsible for other human services. States also vary in terms of their SMHA-controlled expenditures on mental health services. This paper explores whether organizational structure affects expenditures on mental health. Consistent with some theories of bureaucratic behavior, we find (subject to data limitations) that SMHAs appear to compete for funds with other human service agencies and that the bargaining position of the SMHA is affected by its position in the state bureaucratic organization.

Losing Place: Refugee Populations and Rural Transformations in East Africa

List of Maps Figures and Tables Abbreviations Acknowledgments Credits Chapter 1. Refugees and Rural Transformation Chapter 2. Migration and Agrarian Change on Border Lands Chapter 3. Integration and the Cultivation of a Hard Life Chapter 4. Resettlement and Positions of Poverty Chapter 5. Exile and the Perils of Pastoralism Chapter 6. Asylum and the Making of Home Terrain Chapter 7. Repatriation and the Search for Home Chapter 8. Concluding Reflections Bibliography Census of Wad el Hileau Glossary

Refugees and IDPs in Peacemaking Processes

Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs)1 in camps are the most directly affected by war and protracted conflict (after those who are killed or hospitalized) but with the exception of the Palestinians, refugees’ role in peacemaking processes has not received much academic attention nor has the impact of these processes on refugees and IDPs in camps been much studied. The reason for this neglect is probably because refugees and IDPs have rarely been consulted by the protagonists involved in peace processes, and have been viewed as passive recipients of outcomes that are negotiated in distant arenas of power. Yet there are significant potential linkages between peace processes and refugees and IDPs. This chapter explores the role of refugees and IDPs in peacemaking processes, and suggests that contemporary changes, including advances in communications technologies, are giving refugees a more salient role.