Abstract
Since the end of World War II, the international system seeking to protect forcibly displaced people has evolved to currently include 147 states and multiple non-state actors responding together to the needs of an increasingly diverse population of over 86.5 million people. This chapter discusses the root causes of forced displacement, provides a historical overview of global forced displacement in the post-World War II period, and outlines the development of the modern global protection system of forcibly displaced populations, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the 1951 United Nations Convention on Refugees at its core. In this chapter, current protection gaps and possible solutions are analyzed. Finally, the chapter discusses the root causes of, scale, and responses to recent displacement emergencies, including those in Syria, Venezuela, and the Asia-Pacific Region. The chapter highlights the power relations underlying systems built around forced displacement, contributions to forced displacement by highest-income former colonial nations, and the disproportionate burden of protecting displaced persons carried by lowest-income countries.
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Notes
- 1.
For more information about IDPs, see Chap. 9.
- 2.
For more information about granting international protection based on sexual orientation and gender, see Chap. 17.
- 3.
Non-refoulment is a principle of international law preventing states from returning migrants to places where they could be tortured or persecuted (Duffy, 2008).
- 4.
The exception was Greek Communists who fled to the Soviet Union or other Eastern Bloc countries (Fakiolas & King, 1996).
- 5.
For more details on international laws and conventions, see Chap. 3.
- 6.
For more details on asylum seekers, see Chap. 16.
- 7.
The USA is a party to the Protocol, but not to the 1951 Convention.
- 8.
- 9.
Positive recognition rate includes all forms of positive asylum decisions, including the 1951 Convention status, humanitarian status, subsidiary protection status, and temporary protection status.
- 10.
This number includes refugees under UNHCR’s mandate, asylum seekers, IDPs of concern to UNHCR, Venezuelans displaced abroad, and stateless persons. It does not account for the group of “Others” under UNHCR mandate. It also includes 5.6 million Palestine refugees under UNRWA’s mandate.
- 11.
For more details on statelessness see Chap. 15.
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Łukasiewicz, K. (2023). History of the Global Response to Forcibly Displaced Persons. In: Murakami, N.J., Akilova, M. (eds) Integrative Social Work Practice with Refugees, Asylum Seekers, and Other Forcibly Displaced Persons. Essential Clinical Social Work Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12600-0_2
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