Academic calls for review of refugee integration policy

New research has led to calls for a review of some elements of refugee resettlement policy based on an extensive investigation of how Bosnian refugees to Australia are coping with the transition to life in their new country.

More than 35,000 refugees from Bosnia moved to Australia in the 1990s, making them the largest recent group of refugee arrivals.

Dr Val Colic-Peisker has just completed a three-year study of Bosnian refugees in Perth and Sydney, using a survey of households and interviews with refugees and Australian resettlement professionals and found that Bosnians were still struggling with their new circumstances.

“Employment rates and other economic indicators are commonly used to assess the integration of refugees into a community,” said Dr Colic-Peisker.

“Once people have jobs they disappear from the ‘problem statistics’ but just because someone has a job and they are able to meet payments on a home loan does not automatically mean that people are fine.”

Dr Colic-Peisker discovered many underlying problems while exploring the resettlement of Bosnians from a broader, and not just economic perspective.

Her investigations included Bosnian identity and communities in Australia, language skills, acculturation, social inclusion in mainstream society as well as labour market participation and the refugees own assessment of different aspects of government-sponsored refugee resettlement assistance.

“Simple economic indicators do not show the full picture of how people are integrating into Australian society. Refugees are not screened as ‘human capital’ before obtaining visas like other migrants, and so are less likely to have a good command of English language and other qualities to help them thrive in Australia,” she said.

“The research findings suggest that many Bosnians in Perth and Sydney have been occupationally downgraded – they did not succeed to re-enter their professions in Australia. This is particularly true for middle-aged professionals who arrived in Australia without adequate language skills and were thus unable to continue in their area of expertise or found their qualifications such as medical and law degrees were not recognised in Australia. This can lead to frustration and depression, and reflect on families.

“Existing policies need to place more emphasis on practical work-oriented language training and helping skilled migrants reach their full work potential. This is the interest of the host society as much as the interest of migrants.”

Dr Val Colic-Peisker is a sociologist in the area of immigration and settlement in Australia and a Research Fellow at Murdoch University.