A Brief Note On The United States And Non Governmental Organizations

“Refugees are part of humanity and we can’t leave them behind.” Ger Duany, Actor. If we have the ability and the power to help people we have to help. We can’t just shut the door on them. According to Warren St. John in Outcasts United, the town of Clarkston, Georgia, was chosen as a refugee resettlement site for several reasons, including access to affordable housing, affordable public transportation, and availability of low-skill jobs.

The most commonly accepted definition of a ‘refugee’ is set out in the United Nations 1951

In today’s society, many people do not think about the outcome that immigration can lead to. It has been noticed that immigration into the United States is increasing more rapidly than ever. Recently, talk of allowing a large number of refugees to travel to the United States has surfaced in the media and has proven to be an extremely controversial topic. When it comes to refugees, many complications arise and some of these complications can be depicted in towns such as Clarkston, Georgia. In the novel Outcasts United, author, Warren St. John gravitates toward the expression of the idea of refugees and the struggles they encounter when coming to America.

Refugees and immigrants have a specific set of needs that differ from other families. Oftentimes they suffer from a lack of resources and do not fully understand the culture that they live in. I would like to work with this population because I have experience in helping refugee/immigrant families succeed in the United States, while helping them to retain their own culture and identity. Though I have some experience working with this population, I would like to learn more about the depth of their needs and the ways that social work as a profession is seeking to fulfill that need.

In a small town outside of metro Atlanta, each year, at least 1,500 refugees settle in the city of Clarkston to start a new beginning at life. Refugees from Bhutan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Liberia, and Vietnam come in waves from every corner of the globe. Lately there has been an increasingly number of refugees from the Congo, due to the civil war that has been ongoing for many years. Currently, there is a population of 13,000 individuals who have made Clarkston their home away from home. We ask, what brings the refugees to this little city? Many wonder how this has happened, how Clarkston has developed its own little cultural sense of identity? Refugees started settling in Clarkston back in the early 1990's, and it's been the resettlement hub ever since. The reason so many refugees settled in Clarkston, Georgia is due to the low- income based apartments, easy access to public transit and it’s near the interstate, which can take you to any part of Atlanta.

There is a critical need to support Refugee Services of Texas and the services it provides to the local refugee community. Without these services many of this community would not be able to navigate the state’s social services as effectively nor would they be able to support themselves financially upon their arrival in the country. The absences of such services lead to a greater risk of these individuals falling victim to poverty, unemployment, homelessness and social isolation.

The United Nations approach on the treatment of refugees is as follows. the Convention relating to the status of Refugees 1967 Protocol defines who a refugee is and explains what Rights countries should afford to refugees. A refugee is a person who is outside of their own country and is unable or unwilling to return due to a well-founded fear of being persecuted because of their; race, religion, nationality, membership of a group or political

To further assist Vietnamese refugees, Congress passed an act in 1980 called the Refugee Act. It reduced restrictions on entry to the US and provided an official definition of a refugee. It also set the number of refugee admissions at 50,000 per year and allowed a refugee that stayed in the US for 1 year to become a permanent resident. Finally, after four years, the Act allowed refugees to become a United States citizen. On a side note, addition laws were passed that allowed children of American servicemen to enter the United States.

The non-profit agency I selected for my essay is one that is very familiar to me. Between my father and my husband, I have spent a total of thirty-two years as a military dependent. During those years, I became very familiar with the United States Organization (USO) and what it offers military service members and their families. The USO will always be a reminder of wonderful memories for me. I distinctly recall the time my brothers and I napped on the sofa at the Guam airport during an extended layover on our long journey to Okinawa, and when I tasted jager schnitzel for the first time while visiting a friend in Berlin. In my mind, the USO will always be a safe haven and a place of comfort for military members and their families.

In the battle of refugee resettlement, America is its own worst enemy. By abandoning and victimizing harmless refugees, America robs them of their chance at the American Dream. After spending two years interviewing refugees, Anna Husarska was able to support her argument that America is outrageously unfair to foreign refugees (90). In Husarska’s journal, “Exile Off Main Street: Refugees and America’s Ingratitude,” Husarska emphasizes how widespread and commonplace America’s refugee abandonment is, as well as how seldom America attempts to reconcile for it, and how poor it is at doing so.

One of the most recurring themes in Warren St John’s 2009 novel, Outcasts United: An American Town, A Refugee Team, and One Woman’s Quest to Make a Difference is community. Throughout the book, the protagonist, Luma Mufleh, creates a unique community amongst refugee boys living in Clarkston, Georgia. In the 1990s, Clarkston became a resettlement location for refugees and their families. The boys and their families were selected by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for resettlement in the United States. These families were forced to relocate after living in countries with war, persecution, natural disasters, environmental crises, and poverty.

The dilemma regarding the American refugee policy and America’s stance on refugees at this point in time is a challenging topic for many to discuss. Not only is this controversy affecting Americans, it is also hurting refugees in desperate need of our help. America needs to start handling the emerging refugee crisis by first working to remove the stereotype associated with refugees, then the U.S. needs to assess which refugee countries should (if any) actually be banned, and after accomplishing those-- America needs to work to help the countries in need by letting refugees in, and working to help the refugees live happily in their country of origin.

Has United States or Canada been more effective with implementing and abiding by refugee rules and laws? Before discussing and comparing which of these countries had been more successful, the historical context of refugees needs to be explored. Although refugees have existed throughout the course of history, the definitions of what a refuge is had shifted and evolved over time. The League of Nations in the 1920s defined refugees “by categories, specifically in relation to their country of origin.” Up until 1950s, the League of Nations, which later became the United Nations, “established and dismantled several international institutions devoted to refugees in Europe.” After World War II, creating and facilitating solutions for refugees were of high importance internationally. This is evident in the first session of United Nations General Assembly in 1946 when it adopted the principle that no refugee who had “expressed valid objections to returning to their countries [sic] of origin ... shall be compelled to return.”

They propose three solutions: voluntary repatriation, local integration, and resettlement (UNHCR Resettlement Handbook 28). The UNHCR adds that “The three solutions are complementary in nature and, when applied together, can form a viable and comprehensive strategy for resolving a refugee situation” (UNHCR Resettlement Handbook 28). Voluntary reparation is helping a refugee safely and proudly return to their country of origin, allowing them to resume their former lifestyle (UNHCR Resettlement Handbook 31). Local integration is attempting to grant the refugee a permanent right to stay in the host country, and possibly become a citizen (UNHCR Resettlement Handbook 34). Resettlement is transferring refugees from the original country they fled to, to another State that agreed to accept them and grant permanent settlement, and sometimes citizenship (UNHCR Resettlement Handbook 36). This book provides extensive details on policies used by the UNHCR, which will be helpful when writing the Policy

The United Nations High Commissioner Refugees (UNHCR) is an international organization that works to protect and assist refugees anywhere in the world, by providing shelter, health, safeguarding individuals, assessing global needs and advocating for those population (UNHCR, 2016). In fact, the 5 groups the UNHCR helps are refugees in Eastern of Turkey, The diaspora from Africa, refugees in South America, refugees in Middle East and refugees from Syria (Salopek, 2015). Generally, refugees are those who flee from inevitable, often long-term violence and other difficult living conditions brought on by the conflict. The United Nations more narrowly defines refugees as "persons who are outside their country and cannot return owing to a well-founded fear of persecution because of their race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group" (UNHCR, 2016). Those are groups of people who leave their home to another country for safety purpose.