Rethinking Refugees: Finding Solutions to the Global Refugee Crisis

With Professor Alexander Betts. Around the world, there is a crisis of displacement. Authoritarian regimes, political persecution, generalised violence, environmental change, and food insecurity are among the array of reasons that force people to cross international borders. With over 2 million refugees having fled Syria to neighbouring countries, the world's refugees are at their highest level in 20 years. This talk aims to make sense of this global crisis. In the context of a changing world, it asks two questions: firstly, who should be recognised as a refugee; secondly, how should such people be protected and assisted? Alexander Betts is Associate Professor on Refugee and Forced Migration Studies at the University of Oxford, where he is a Fellow of Green-Templeton College. He is author of numerous books including Survival Migration: Failed Governance and the Crisis of Displacement (Cornell University Press 2013). He has worked for UNHCR and undertaken fieldwork across Sub-Saharan Africa. He held teaching and research positions at Stanford University and the University of Texas. He completed his MPhil (in Development Studies) and DPhil (in International Relations) at the University of Oxford, and is Director of the Humanitarian Innovation Project (www.oxhip.org [1]).
Nearest tube station Farringdon. 6.45pm (doors open 6.30).