Resettlement Services

Room for Improvement in Pre-departure and Post-arrival Services

Abstract

Resettlement is one of few legal pathways for refugees and offers enormous potential for stabilizing a humanitarian refugee crisis. This leads to the question as to why this program seems to be relatively unknown and how it could be improved in order to use its potential effectively. The present paper provides a deepened understanding of the resettlement process as a safe pathway for refugees and introduces possibilities for improving its pre-departure and post-arrival services. Therefore, it reflects on the resettlement strategy itself and explores the program’s weaknesses and strengths. Additionally, this paper analyses the provision of pre-departure and post-arrival services: What services are provided to refugees in the phase directly before resettlement (pre-departure) and right after arrival in the resettlement country (post-arrival)? Who are their main actors and what potentials do those services have? Answering these questions will lead to first recommendations for the services. Subsequently, the theoretically based recommendations are further analyzed by using the results of two empirical expert interviews. The experts work in the field of pre-departure services in Jordan as a transit country and in the field of post-arrival services in Germany as a host country. The insights of the interviewees finally affirm and finalize the recommendations, providing a clear picture for the possibility of improvement. Moreover, this allows the identification of necessary skills for service providers that are needed to implement the recommendations. Ultimately, these results indicate the roles that social workers are able to undertake within the resettlement process.