Between Exclusion and Social Cohesion: Refugees and migrants in South Asia

Abstract

Migration has been a constituent of South Asia. People, goods and ideas have always been exchanged in the subcontinent, societies in South Asia have always dealt with `difference´. However, in post-Independence era new discourses emerge: the one on the `right to migration` (Bangla Desh), the other on `worthy´ and `unworthy´ migrants (Tibetans vs. Rohingya in India), the return of the `Southerners´, the Bhutanese refugees (Nepal). In Pakistan being host to the fourth largest refugee population in the world (mainly from Afghanistan) the discourse is shifting from refugees to illegal migrants´. Increasingly, migration is being considered a `problem´, refugees even a threat. The securitization of refugees and migrants has taken different forms with governments in South Asia. In consequence, new processes of Othering emerge. Drawing on refugee and migration literature and own field-work the paper brings together macro- and micro-level perspectives by asking: What images of the refugee are created by the migration regimes of the countries in South Asia? How do refugees navigate through adverse situations and labelling? How do they – at the backdrop of protracted displacement – built resilient communities? And: How do they contribute to social cohesion in the respective societies?