On Norwegian public opinions

Nordlys commissioned a survey by InFact to find out current public opinion on how the government is handling the influx of refugees and asylum seekers in Norway — Forrige uke kom det 2452 asylsøkere til Norge. Det er ny ukesrekord og har skapt et massivt press på norske myndigheter for å håndtere situasjonen. Samtidig svarer […]

On learning from the past

[this post will be continually updated] General: Five history lessons in how to deal with a refugee crisis 1989 Comprehensive Plan of Action: To deal with the refugee crisis you need to understand the cause The Balkans: What the Balkans can teach us about how to end the conflict in the Levant ; on the “ancient […]

On trains, planes, and automobiles

Being married to a civil engineer who spends his days working with mass transit, stories in the news about infrastructure tend to grab my eye. This recent article in the NYT about the human cost of ignoring maintenance is worth reading for its argument alone (notably echoed by a one Mr John Oliver), but the […]

On panel discussions: The Migrant and Refugee Crisis @ Oxford Martin School

Interesting set up, really interesting result: The Oxford Martin School hosted a panel to discuss the migrant and refugee crisis + responses and solutions. In her six minutes to address the panel, Bridget Anderson brought up issues around victimhood, agency and morals [@35:20] — On September the 7th in response to the so-called ‘refugee crisis […]

On refugees resettling cities

[updated as I find further examples] USA Detroit: Let Syrians settle Detroit [USCRI-Detroit awarded grant in 2016] Baltimore: A city that wants more refugees Syracuse: The refugees that come alone Roanoke: success there, The refugees of Roanoke Clarkston: The ‘most diverse’ square mile in America Buffalo: Resettled refugees help to ‘bring Buffalo back’ Utica: This rust […]

On push factors [2]

Via the International Crisis Group, Burundi again faces the possibility of mass atrocities and civil war. Escalating violence, increasingly hardline rhetoric and the continued stream of refugees (more than 200,000) indicate that divisions are widening, and the “national dialogue” is doing little to relieve the mounting tensions. According to Crisis Group’s sources as well as media […]

On conferences: Guterres @ 12th Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference

On 29 October 2015, António Guterres gave the lunchtime keynote lecture at the 12th Annual Immigration Law and Policy Conference (video available). The High Commissioner echoes many of his statements from his Georgetown lecture; the quotes I’ve transcribed dive deeper into securitization, resettlement + US influence — On the US [@ :23:20] — Guterres: You have a […]

On humanitarian visas

Sam Cowie at IRIN discusses Brazil’s use of humanitarian visas — Until recently, Haitians escaping their homeland after the utter devastation of the 2010 earthquake took hazardous overland routes through South America in the hope of finding a better life in Brazil, often putting their lives in the hands of unscrupulous smugglers. Now, it’s simple: they […]

On punctuation + effortless writing

Reading this morning’s post on the incomparable Brain Pickings, Maria Popova highlights a passage from Quack This Way by David Foster Wallace + Bryan A. Garner. The bit about punctuation especially resonated after trying to transcribe quotes yesterday — Reading is a very strange thing. We get talked to about it and talk explicitly about […]

On public lectures: Guterres @ Georgetown

News to me: according to John J. DeGioia’s introduction to António Guterres’ lecture at Georgetown on 28 October 2015, Dr. Susan F Martin will be the editor-in-chief of the 2016 ed. of UNHCR’s State of the World’s Refugees. A few quotes from the lecture — (@17:30) On inequality: Guterres: … And, one of the problems is […]