Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-r5zm4 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-05T23:20:29.621Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Navigating Patchwork Governance: Somalis in Kenya, National Security, and Refugee Resettlement

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 March 2020

Sophia Balakian Open the ORCID record for Sophia Balakian [Opens in a new window]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

Refugee resettlement is accomplished through the intersecting administration of state and non-state actors with competing claims and interests. These competing claims are caught between humanitarian imperatives to rescue the most vulnerable refugees on one hand and security demands to protect national borders from those deemed undesirable and undeserving on the other. Based on ethnographic research with Somali refugees in Nairobi from 2013 to 2015, Balakian examines the ways in which refugees maneuver through an unsynchronized assemblage of institutions to which they are subject; she brings this assemblage into relief through ethnographic accounts of Somali refugees as they attempt to navigate the resettlement system and are simultaneously caught in Kenya’s 2014 anti-refugee security operations. Based on this case, the research demonstrates that being subject to multiple, competing governing bodies is central to the condition of statelessness in twenty-first century Africa.

Résumé:

la réinstallation des réfugiés est réalisée par une administration entrecroisée composée d’acteurs étatiques et non étatiques ayant des revendications et des intérêts contradictoires. Ces revendications concurrentes sont prises entre des impératifs humanitaires de secours aux réfugiés les plus vulnérables d’une part et aux exigences de sécurité visant à protéger les frontières nationales contre ceux qui sont jugés indésirables et non méritoires de l’autre. Basé sur des recherches ethnographiques à long terme menées auprès de réfugiés somaliens à Nairobi de 2013 à 2015, Balakian examine comment les réfugiés manœuvrent à travers un ensemble d’institutions disparates auxquelles ils sont soumis ; elle met en relief cette structure par le biais de récits ethnographiques de réfugiés somaliens alors qu’ils tentent de naviguer le système de réinstallation et les opérations de sécurité anti-réfugiés du Kenya en 2014. Basé sur ces cas, cette recherche démontre que le fait d’être soumis à de multiples organes directeurs concurrents est au cœur de la condition d’apatridie dans L’Afrique du XXIe siècle.

Resumo:

O realojamento de refugiados é levado a cabo através da intervenção simultânea de agentes estatais e não-estatais, como interesses e reivindicações concorrentes. Estas reivindicações concorrentes situam-se entre a exigência humanitária de socorrer os refugiados mais vulneráveis, por um lado, e as necessidades securitárias para proteger as fronteiras nacionais daqueles que são considerados indesejáveis ou indignos, por outro. Partindo de uma investigação etnográfica de longo termo realizada junto dos refugiados somalis em Nairobi entre 2013 e 2015, Balakian analisa os modos segundo os quais os refugiados lidam com um conjunto desarticulado de instituições a que estão sujeitos; a autora evidencia este conjunto de instituições através dos testemunhos etnográficos de refugiados somalis que tinham simultaneamente de lidar com o sistema de realojamento e com as operações de segurança antirrefugiados levadas a cabo no Quénia em 2014. Com base neste caso, a investigação demonstra que a sujeição a organismos reguladores múltiplos e concorrentes é central para a condição apátrida na África do século XXI.

Keywords

refugeesresettlementbureaucracyhumanitarianismsecurityKenyaSomalia
Type
Forum: Migration in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Somali Refugee and Migrant Experience
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 63 , Issue 1 , March 2020 , pp. 43 - 64
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2020 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abdi, Awa M. 2005. “In Limbo: Dependency, Insecurity, and Identity amongst Somali Refugees in Dadaab Camps.” Bildhaan 5: 17–34.Google Scholar
Abdi, Awa M. 2015. Elusive Jannah: The Somali Diaspora and a Borderless Muslim Identity. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.10.5749/minnesota/9780816697380.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, David M., and McKnight, Jacob. 2014. “Kenya at War: Al-Shabaab and its Enemies in Eastern Africa.” African Affairs 114 (454): 1–27.10.1093/afraf/adu082CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balakian, Sophia. 2016. “‘Money Is Your Government’: Refugees, Mobility, and Unstable Documents in Kenya’s Operation Usalama Watch.” African Studies Review 59 (2): 87–111.10.1017/asr.2016.36CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Besteman, Catherine. 2016. Making Refuge: Somali Bantu Refugees in Lewiston, Maine. Durham: Duke University Press.10.1215/9780822374725CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bornstein, Erica, and Redfield, Peter. 2010. Forces of Compassion: Humanitarianism between Ethics and Politics. Santa Fe: School for Advanced Research Press.Google Scholar
Cabot, Heath. 2014. “The Social Aesthetics of Eligibility: NGO Aid and Indeterminacy in the Greek Asylum Process.” American Ethnologist 40 (3): 452–66.10.1111/amet.12032CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The Daily Nation . 2014. “HRW Asks Kenya to Stop Security Operation.” May 13. http://www.nation.co.ke/news/HRW-asks-Kenya-to-stop-security-operation/1056-2312774-pgscf4z/index.htmlGoogle Scholar
Daniel, E. Valentine, and Knudsen, John Chr.. 1995. Mistrusting Refugees. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
de Genova, Nicholas. 2007. “The Production of Culprits: From Deportability to Detainability in the Aftermath of ‘Homeland Security.’” Citizenship Studies 11 (5): 421–48.10.1080/13621020701605735CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fassin, Didier. 2011. “Policing Borders, Producing Boundaries. Governmentality of Immigration in Dark Times.” Annual Review of Anthropology 40: 213–26.10.1146/annurev-anthro-081309-145847CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fassin, Didier. 2012. Humanitarian Reason: A Moral History of the Present. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Feldman, Ilana. 2007. “Difficult Distinctions: Refugee Law, Humanitarian Practice, and Political Identification in Gaza.” Current Anthropology 22 (1): 129–69.Google Scholar
Gupta, Akhil. 2014. Red Tape: Bureaucracy, Structural Violence, and Poverty in India. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Hardt, Michael, and Negri, Antonio. 2000. Empire. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Harrell-Bond, B. E. 1986. Imposing Aid: Emergency Assistance to Refugees. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Holston, James, and Appadurai, Arjun. 1996. “Cities and Citizenship.” Public Culture 8: 187–204.10.1215/08992363-8-2-187CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horst, Cindy. 2006. “Buufis among Somalis in Dadaab: the Transnational and Historical Logics behind Resettlement Dreams.” Journal of Refugee Studies 19 (2): 143–57.10.1093/jrs/fej017CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyndman, Jennifer and Nylund, Bo Viktor. 1998. “UNHCR and the Status of Prima Facie Refugees in Kenya.” International Journal of Refugee Law 10 (1/2): 21–48.10.1093/ijrl/10.1-2.21CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, Erica Caple. 2010. Democratic Insecurities: Violence, Trauma, and Intervention in Haiti. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Jansen, Bram J. 2008. “Between Vulnerability and Assertiveness: Negotiating Resettlement in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya.” African Affairs 107 (429): 569–87.10.1093/afraf/adn044CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaag, Mayke. 2008.“Transnational Islamic NGOs in Chad: Islamic Solidarity in the Age of Neoliberalism.” Africa Today 54 (3): 3–18.10.2979/AFT.2008.54.3.2CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewellen, Ted. 2002. The Anthropology of Globalization: Cultural Anthropology Enters the 21st Century . London: Bergin and Garvey.Google Scholar
Lindley, Anna. 2010. The Early Morning Phone Call: Somali Refugees’ Remittances. New York: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Lochery, Emma. 2012. “Rendering Difference Visible: The Kenyan State and Its Somali Citizens.” African Affairs 111 (445): 615–39.10.1093/afraf/ads059CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Loescher, Gil, Betts, Alexander, and Milner, James. 2008. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR): The Politics and Practice of Refugee Protection into the Twenty-first Century. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Malkki, Liisa. 1995. “Refugees and Exile: From ‘Refugee Studies’ to the National Order of Things.” Annual Review of Anthropology 24: 495–523.10.1146/annurev.an.24.100195.002431CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malkki, Liisa 1996. “Speechless Emissaries: Refugees, Humanitarianism, and Dehistoricization.” Cultural Anthropology 11 (3): 377–404.10.1525/can.1996.11.3.02a00050CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martin, David A. 2005. The United States Refugee Admissions Program: Reforms of a New Era of Refugee Resettlement. Migration Policy Institute.Google Scholar
Mburu, Nene. 2005. Bandits at the Border: The Last Frontier in the Search for Somali Unity. Trenton, New Jersey: Red Sea Press.Google Scholar
Medovoi, Leerom. 2007. “Global Society Must Be Defended: Biopolitics without Boundaries.” Social Text 25 (2): 53–79.10.1215/01642472-2006-027CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merry, Sally Engle. 2006. “Anthropology and International Law. Annual Review of Anthropology. 35: 99–116.10.1146/annurev.anthro.35.081705.123245CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oka, Rahul. 2014. “Coping with the Refugee Wait: The Role of Consumption, Normalcy, and Dignity in Refugee Lives at Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya.” American Anthropologist 116 (1): 23–37.10.1111/aman.12076CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piot, Charles. 2010. Nostalgia for the Future: West Africa after the Cold War. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rana, Junaid. 2011. Terrifying Muslims: Race and Labor in the South Asian Diaspora . Durham: Duke University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Refugee Consortium of Kenya. 2012. Asylum Under Threat: Assessing the Protection of Somali Refugees in Dadaab Refugee Camps and along the Migration Corridor. Nairobi: Refugee Consortium of Kenya.Google Scholar
Refugee Processing Center. 2019. “Arrival Reports.” Ireports.wrapsnet.org.Google Scholar
Sandvik, Kristin B. 2011. “Blurring Boundaries: Refugee Resettlement in Kampala—between the Formal, the Informal, and the Illegal.” Political and Legal Anthropology Review 34 (1): 11–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thompson, Vincent. 1995. “The Phenomenon of Shifting Frontiers: The Kenya-Somali Case in the Horn of Africa, 1880s–1970s.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 30 (1): 1–40.10.1177/002190969503000101CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thomson, Marnie Jane. 2012. “Black Boxes of Bureaucracy.” Political and Legal Anthropology Review 35 (2): 186–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ticktin, Miriam. 2011. Casualties of Care: Immigration and the Politics of Humanitarianism in France . Berkeley: University of California Press.10.1525/california/9780520269040.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Troeller, Gary. 2008. “Asylum Trends in Industrialized Countries and their Impact on Protracted Refugee Situations.” In Protracted Refugee Situations: Political, Human Rights and Security Implications, edited by Loescher, Gil et. al. New York: United Nations University Press.Google Scholar
Turner, Victor. 1967. The Forest of Symbols: Aspects of Ndembu Ritual . Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Turton, E. R. 1972. “Somali Resistance to Colonial Rule and the Development of Somali Political Activity in Kenya, 1893–1960.” Journal of African History 13 (1): 119–143.10.1017/S0021853700000293CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UNHCR. 2015. UNHCR Statistical Yearbook 2014. Geneva: UNHCR. www.unhcr.org.Google Scholar
UNHCR. 2016a. “Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2016.” Geneva: UNHCR http://www.unhcr.org/5943e8a34.pdfGoogle Scholar
UNHCR. 2016b. “Populations.” Geneva: UNHCR. www.reporting.unhcr.org.Google Scholar
UNHCR. 2018a. “Refugee Resettlement Facts.” Washington: UNHCR Regional Office Washington. https://www.unhcr.org.Google Scholar
UNHCR. 2018b. “Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Kenya.” Washington: UNHCF Regional Office Washington. www.unhcr.org.Google Scholar
UNHCR. 2019. Resettlement Data Finder. Geneva: UNHCR. https://rsq.unhcr.org.Google Scholar
U.S. Government. 2017. United States Government Glossary of Interagency and Associated Terms. Washington DC: U.S. Government. https://fas.org/irp/doddir/dod/usg-glossary.pdf.Google Scholar
Verdirame, Guglielmo, and Harrell-Bond, Barbara. 2005. Rights in Exile: Janus-Faced Humanitarianism. New York: Berghahn Books.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Voutira, Eftihia, and Harrell-Bond, Barbara. 1995. “In Search of the Locus of “Trust: The Social World of the Refugee Camp.” In Mistrusting Refugees, edited by Daniel, El Valentine and Knudsen, John Chr.. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Weitzberg, Karen. 2017. We Do Not Have Borders: Greater Somalia and the Predicaments of Belonging in Kenya . Athens: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Whitaker, Beth Elise. 2020. “Refugees, Foreign Nationals, and Wageni: Comparing African Responses to Somali Migration.” African Studies Review 63 (1): 18–42. doi: 10.1017/asr.2019.52.Google Scholar
Whittaker, Hannah. 2008. “Pursuing Pastoralists: The Stigma of Shifta during the ‘Shifta War’ in Kenya, 1963–68. Eras 10.Google Scholar
Wilson, Richard. 2011. Writing History in International Criminal Trials. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar