ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the plight of protracted refugees in their host communities/countries from a human security perspective. Whereas some hosts view refugees’ long stay as an opportunity to tap into their expertise, labor, and entrepreneurship, others label them dangerous, menacing, threatening, and alarming. This chapter interrogates the dilemma of meeting refugees’ livelihood needs where the legal and policy frameworks on access do not treat them as referents, a wicked problem examined using the case of Somali refugees in Kenya and Uganda. The chapter uses human security and human development to suggest global refugee governance that transcends humanitarianism and engages human development to transform protracted refugees’ situations. Its premises are three: separately supporting protracted refugees within the same challenged setting as their hosts increases human security challenges and undermine possibilities for resilient livelihoods; investing in long-term livelihood strategies fosters protracted refugee’s peaceful co-existence with their hosts; viewing protracted refugees by what they contribute as opposed to what they take endorses the success of refugees’ integration programs in building sustainable livelihoods for both protracted refugees and their hosts. This chapter demonstrates how the human development and human security nexus can be used in transforming the livelihoods of protracted refugees.
