Skip Navigation


Journal of Refugee Studies Advance Access originally published online on February 11, 2009
Journal of Refugee Studies 2009 22(1):97-121; doi:10.1093/jrs/fen049
This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
22/1/97    most recent
fen049v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Hynes, P.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author [2009]. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Contemporary Compulsory Dispersal and the Absence of Space for the Restoration of Trust

Patricia Hynes

NSPCC Fresh Start, Alexandra Ciardi House, 7-8 Greenland Place, London, NW1 0AP1

patricia.hynes{at}NSPCC.org.uk

This paper investigates the issue of trust, or mistrust, specifically in relation to single adult asylum seekers and asylum seeker families compulsorily dispersed across England. It draws upon doctoral research on the social exclusion of asylum seekers as a result of dispersal and their separation from mainstream welfare provision due to the creation of the National Asylum Support Service (NASS) following the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999. Trust is an ambiguous term and four forms of trust are delineated to assist conceptualizing the experience of forced migration: social, political, institutional and restorative trust. This paper provides an overview of the aims and each phase of the implementation of dispersal. It is argued that the dispersal system leaves little room for political or institutional trust to be restored and hinders the restoration of social trust. It is suggested that this lack of space for the restoration of trust has negative implications for the longer term resettlement process of asylum seekers who obtain refugee status. It is also suggested that trust is an essential component of UK government policies promoting social or community cohesion, community engagement and initiatives to combat trafficking, forced marriage and ‘honour’ based violence and that mistrust of asylum seekers as a group directly contradicts such policies and initiatives.

Key Words: refugees • asylum seekers • trust • mistrust • compulsory dispersal • National Asylum Support Service (NASS) • community cohesion • social cohesion

MS received August 1, 2007 ; revised MS received June 1, 2008
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.