Colombia’s national legislation on internally displaced persons (IDPs) is impressive. The country has a strong judicial system, a Constitutional Court that has consistently upheld the rights of IDPs and a committed network of civil society organisations, including hundreds of IDP…
Where displacement to towns and cities is itself a coping strategy, IDPs may prefer not to display any features that may differentiate them from other urban inhabitants in an effort to avoid becoming targets. Choosing private accommodation over government-sponsored housing…
Attempts to estimate the numbers of people who are internally displaced within their own countries invariably come up against the challenge of estimating those who have been forcibly displaced to urban centres. Calculating the numbers and characteristics of IDPs in…
Displaced people, like others in in urban settings, face a continuous struggle to balance livelihood opportunities with personal safety. While it is initially easier for humanitarian agencies to protect and address the needs of displaced people in camps on the…
In Khartoum, as in many other cases of urban displacement, it is difficult to separate the elements of coercion in someone’s decision to leave their home from other reasons (including economic ones) as migrants tend to settle among existing residents…
There has been continuing forced displacement over many years in the south of the Department of Valle del Cauca. Families fleeing conflict and violence between insurgents and government forces have moved into the municipality of Florida which has a population…
The future of displacement is clearly urban – and clearly fraught with challenges. The Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) has recently undertaken research into the risks and challenges confronting refugee women in urban areas – as well as the opportunities they…
There are over 28 million people living in Malaysia. Among the three to four million non-citizens are around 100,000 asylum seekers, refugees and stateless persons. Malaysia is signatory neither to the 1951 Refugee Convention, nor to its 1967 Protocol. It…
More than half of the world’s refugees now reside in non-camp settings, including urban areas, and a larger proportion of them than before are now fleeing from middle-income countries where the demographic and disease epidemiologic profiles are those of an…
Social support refers to the perceived or actual psychological benefits from social contacts, such as trust, cohesion, and intimacy, as well as to the exchange of information and material goods. Social networks provide the connections which allow for the exchange…