THE refugee crisis one of the causes is the increase in migratory flows, phenomena that have accompanied humanity since its beginnings and whose reasons can be the most diverse, although the most common is the search for better living conditions, that is, migration economic.
However, there is a specific type of migrant, the refugee, who is forced to flee your country for suffering persecution of any nature and fear for your physical integrity and for your own life. Armed conflicts and wars have caused the massive displacement of refugees around the world, especially from 2015 onwards.
Although they initially move within the limits of their country's borders, in dramatic situations it is necessary to seek asylum in neighboring countries and, sometimes, in distant countries. This specific type of migrant, recognized in the 1950s, became a protagonist in the agenda of countries and international organizations in recent years, when there was a massive entry into the continent. European.
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migrants and refugees
According to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), a refugee is someone who flees his or her homeland due to persecution or armed conflict. Being part of this group gives the law established in international law to receive assistance from UNHCR, States and specialized organizations.
UNHCR was created in 1950, his first mission was to assist the remaining European refugees from the Second World War. Some refugee camps created in the middle of the last century still exist and are active, such as a 1966 camp located in Zambia, which initially housed refugees from the Angolan civil war and, in 2020, started to welcome Congolese people fleeing conflicts led by armed militias that devastate their country politically unstable.
O Refugee Status, adopted by the United Nations Convention in 1951, provides that a refugee cannot be expelled from a country or returned to your country in situations that put your life and freedom at risk.
What is the difference between a refugee and a migrant? The migrant moves to another country by personal choice, and not because he is directly threatened, his intention is to improve his life and not to flee from imminent dangers. Even if they are migrants in extreme poverty, they are not defined as refugees, refugee status is closely linked to situations of violence.. Therefore, migrants are not covered by the same law as refugees, each country treats them according to its specific legislation, and there is no restriction on returning them to their countries of origin.
Generally, a refugee's itinerary goes like this: first, he moves internally within of their own country seeking protection, in this circumstance it is conventionally referred to as the “internally displaced person”. When widespread insecurity compels him to cross borders so that his refugee status is officially recognized, he you need to request asylum from the country where you took shelter, in which case you are called an "asylum seeker", and the asylum request is not always serviced.
According to United Nations (UN), in 2019 there were around 68 million refugees in the world. Of those 40 million on average were internally displaced, 25 million were refugees and three million were asylum seekers. Note that the number of internally displaced people is significantly higher than that of refugees, this reinforces the thesis defended by experts that fleeing from one's own country is the last resort for those living in conflict situations, is a dramatic attitude, as it requires moving away from cultural and consanguineous ties and living with restricted rights.
Many refugees intend to return to their places of origin after the conflict ends, but the global average length of time lived as a refugee is 26 years.
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Refugees in Europe
O historic peak of arrival of migrants to Europe it was in 2015, when about a million people entered European territory. Although intensified by waves of Syrians fleeing the war in their country, there were also many migrants fleeing hunger and poverty, especially from African countries.
This migratory flow cooled in later years due to measures adopted by the countries of the European bloc, such as the closing borders, especially on the Balkan route, where migrants went on foot; the agreement between Italy and the Libyan Coast Guard, a country that was the main embarkation point for clandestine trips to Europe; and the controversial and criticized agreement signed in 2016 between the European Union and Turkey, whereby for every Syrian refugee who arrived on the Greek coast and was returned to Turkey, another refugee who was on Turkish territory would be taken to Europe.
This agreement is criticized by supporters of Drights Hone year, who allege that international law of not rejecting asylum seekers is violated. The effect of these measures meant that, in 2018, the number of refugees and migrants entering Europe was less than 200 thousand.
![Signing of an agreement between the Government Board and the NGO ACCEM to assist refugees in Madrid (Spain), 2019. [1]](/f/92ae6df8e2670ff98d12f6b5fb355695.jpg)
Main refugee routes
Refugee crises are an old phenomenon. In the most recent refugee crisis, felt especially from 2015 on account of the civil war that terrorizes Syria, the routes were different from previous crises, given that the geographic situation in which the conflict that motivates the crisis unfolds is decisive for the formation of escape routes.
It is common for refugees to initially move within their own territory and, when this is no longer possible, to cross borders into neighboring countries. Syrian refugees, for example, did not go directly to Europe when the crisis intensified, but to the closest countries, as Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey, in the latter, in 2019, there were around 3.3 million Syrian refugees.
This represents approximately half of the total number of Syrian refugees around the world. That tendency to seek asylum in countries bordering their country of origin it is one of the main reasons 85% of displaced people are sheltering in developing countries, according to UNHCR.
The country with the highest number of refugees in the world, in 2018, was Turkey, with 3.3 million; in second place are Uganda and Pakistan, with 1.4 million refugees each; and, in third place, Lebanon, with approximately 1 million. For comparison, Italy, in that same year, had an average of 150,000 refugees and 180,000 asylum seekers, which represents a third of the total number of refugees in Lebanon.
![Syrian and Iraqi refugees arriving from Turkey on the island of Lesbos (Greece, 2015) and being helped by a Spanish NGO (Proactiva Open Arms). [2]](/f/46518e513b1d133e4d272d79e7bed32a.jpg)
From 2015, an intensified influx of migrants tried to enter Europe. Many went to Libya, a country in North Africa, where smugglers organized the trip on precarious vessels that they carried out dangerous and often deadly crossings across the Mediterranean Sea, with countries such as Greece and Italy. According to the UN, in 2016, more than five thousand people died during crossings in the Mediterranean.
The crossings are divided into three routes: route from the central Mediterranean, part of Libya to the Italian coast (Island of Lampedusa); route from the western Mediterranean, part of Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria to the Spanish coast; route from the eastern Mediterranean, part of Turkey to the Greek coast. Another commonly used route is the Balkan route, which is less dangerous because it can be overland. These incursions have decreased due to measures taken by European countries.
See too:Ethnocentrism - way of categorizing your own ethnicity as superior to others
Causes of the refugee crisis
Humanitarian crises driven by mass migration are an ancient phenomenon. Throughout human history, there have been situations in which populations have had to flee persecution, famine and wars. However, under international law, refugee status is conditional on migration motivated by situations of violent conflict, such as persecution of a specific ethnic group, localized armed conflicts or war civil.
Therefore, the causes of a refugee crisis are related to violence, insecurity and threat to life. Crises motivated by poverty and hunger are migratory crises. A refugee crisis can only be defined as such if the cause is persecution or war. Therefore, every refugee crisis is a migration crisis, but not every migration crisis is a refugee crisis.
In addition to the definition of refugees as fugitives from war and armed conflict, in recent years the emergence of a new category, the "climate refugees", referring to people fleeing their countries because of natural disasters resulting from climate changes. This category, although gaining more space in public debate, is not recognized by the UN or other international organizations.
According to data presented by The globe |1|, in 2019 more than half of the refugees in the world (57%) came from three countries: Syria (6.3 million), Afghanistan (2.6 million) and South Sudan (2.4 million). million), three countries in civil war, the first from 2011 to the present, the second from 1978 to the present, and the third from 2013 to February 2020.
THE civil war lived in syria caused, as of 2015, the biggest migration crisis since WWII. Other countries that are also experiencing serious conflicts that force their countrymen to flee are: Eritrea, Central African Republic, Iraq, Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi and Nigeria.
Also access: Religious intolerance - form of prejudice due to religion
Refugees in Brazil
In Brazil, in 2019, there were about one million resident foreigners. This corresponds to less than 0.5% of the Brazilian population. In the last decade, three waves of migration have been outstanding in the country: as of 2010, the Haitians; from 2015, the Syrians; and from 2018, the Venezuelans. About 11,000 foreigners were recognized for refugee status and there were 161,057 applications for recognition. According to the research “Refuge in numbers” |2|, of the recognized refugees, 36% were Syrians, 15% were Congolese, 9% were Angolans, 7% were Colombians, and 3% were Venezuelans.
Even being the largest and most populous country in South America, Brazil has a small migratory flow compared to other countries. When we analyze, for example, the migration of Venezuelans that, mainly from 2018 onwards, intensified in the state of Roraima, we realize that, compared to other neighboring countries, Brazil, that year, received around 455 thousand Venezuelans, less than Peru (506 thousand) and Colombia (1.1 million).
It is always important to emphasize that there is a difference between the economic migrant and the refugee, the former flees hunger and poverty, seeks better life opportunities, the second flees from persecution of any kind, from situations of violence and threat to its integrity physics. Brazilian law establishes the fear of returning home as a criterion for recognizing asylum requests. The National Committee for Refugees (Conare) is linked to the Ministry of Justice. THE Brazilian refugee law, Law 9474, of 1997, consider as a refugee |3|:
“[…] every individual who leaves their country of origin due to well-founded fears of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, social group or imputed political opinions, or due to a situation of serious and widespread violation of human rights in your country of source."
According to Conare, as pointed out by G1|4|, in 2018 at main reasons that motivated asylum requests granted by the agency in Brazil were: serious and widespread violation of Human Rights, political opinion, social group, religion, nationality and race. The Brazilian state that registered the most asylum requests in the same year was Roraima (63%), due to the collapse in Venezuela. Although Venezuelans are the ones who filed the most asylum requests, the contingent of officially recognized Venezuelan refugees is the smallest (3%) compared to other nationalities.
![Syrian family sells Sfirras in Rio de Janeiro after fleeing the war in their home country (2015). [3]](/f/372ef254055f9b78e0787ebe3e5f6646.jpg)
Consequences of the refugee crisis
The flow of people across the world has countless consequences, both good and bad. In normal situations, the cultural exchanges between different peoples are immensely beneficial, but in conflict situations the negative consequences tend to be more emphasized.
In political terms, the consequence that stands out is the growth of nationalism in countries that receive large numbers of refugees and migrants. Ultra-nationalist parties gained more seats in the European parliament, and some gained central government in their countries, such as Hungary, Ukraine and Poland.
A significant example of this trend was found in Italy, whose campaign promise by the government elected in 2018 was to prevent the disembarkation of clandestine ships. The drastic measure of closing Italian ports has meant that both migrant and refugee ships and ships of international rescue organizations were left adrift for several days, even with the elderly, children and sick people a board.
You fears of local populations — in losing their job, have your restricted access to state services or reducing the quality of these services and paying more taxes for the government safety net to serve foreigners — they end up generating focuses of xenophobia, that is, aversion to foreigners, which can result not only in individual manifestations of intolerance and prejudice, but in organizations promoting this type of hostility, such as supremacist groups.
Although a higher-than-expected flow of people initially generates pressure on the government safety net and on the labor market, in the long run, if the local government manages to distribute this contingent of people in its territory and integrate it through formal mechanisms in its security system and in the economic system, O group of migrants can represent economic gains for the host country.
For example, the researcher Álvaro Navarro Sotillos|5| found that, as of 2016, the massive presence of Syrian refugees in Turkey led to the installation of a growing number of companies with Syrian capital. Refugees have the potential to attract new markets to host nations. Furthermore, in countries with aging populations, the young workforce represents a revitalization in the economy.
The negative effects of the presence of refugees, whether in the provision of public services, or in the demand for jobs and wages, are subverted in the long run, as well-settled refugees have the potential to make a return on these countries.
Grades
|1| TRAIANO, Heloisa. Enem: Understand the Refugee Issue for Current Events and Writing. Available in: https://oglobo.globo.com/sociedade/educacao/enem-e-vestibular/enem-entenda-questao-dos-refugiados-para-as-provas-de-atualidades-redacao-23993504
|2| MAGAZINE EXAM. Who are the 11,000 refugees who are in Brazil and where do they come from. Available in: https://exame.com/brasil/quem-sao-e-de-onde-vem-os-11-mil-refugiados-que-estao-no-brasil/
|3| CONSULAR PORTAL. Refuge in Brazil. Available in: http://www.portalconsular.itamaraty.gov.br/refugio-no-brasil#:~:text=A%20Lei%20Brasileira%20de%20Ref%C3%BAgio, %20human rights%20no%20your%20pa%C3%ADs
|4| G1. Refugees in Brazil. Available in: http://especiais.g1.globo.com/mundo/2019/refugiados-no-brasil/
|5| MACENA, Natalia Elias. OBREGON, Marcelo Fernando Quiroga. Impacts caused by refugees in host countries. Available in: https://www.derechoycambiosocial.com/revista052/IMPACTOS_CAUSADOS_PELOS_REFUGIADOS.pdf
Image credits
[1] Madrid Diary / commons
[2] ggia / commons
[3] Fernando Frazão/Agency Brazil / commons
By Milka de Oliveira Rezende
Sociology Professor
