International Migration Special Issue Call for Papers


Click here to download the call for papers.

Journal: International Migration (ABDC ranking - A)

Career Reestablishment of Refugees: Qualification Recognition, Skill Upgrade, and Employment Acquisition

Special Issue Editors:
1. Zhou Jiang (Centre for Refugee Employment, Advocacy, Training and Education [CREATE], Deakin University, Australia)
2. Alex Newman (CREATE, Deakin University, Australia)
3. Karen Dunwoodie (CREATE, Deakin University, Australia)
4. Maike Andresen (University of Bamberg, Germany)

Over the last five years, we have witnessed the largest forced displacement of people in history. As of July 2019, there were more than 25.9 refugees and 3.5 million people seeking asylum in the world (UNHCR, 2019). A large proportion of these refugees have fled the Syrian civil war and the growth of ISIS in both Syria and Iraq. Other notable source countries of refugees include Afghanistan and South Sudan. Although the large majority of the refugee population live in refugee camps in the Middle East, a significant number have also sought asylum or been resettled under humanitarian programs in countries such as the Germany, United States, Canada and Australia. In 2018 alone, 55,692 refugees were resettled under the UNHCR program. 
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A major problem faced by refugees or arriving in a host country is getting their skills and experience recognized (Correa-Velez, Spaaij, & Upham, 2012). In many cases, their qualifications are not deemed equivalent, and they find it difficult to obtain work that is commensurate with their skills and experience (Colic-Peisker, 2011; Willott & Stevenson, 2013). Policy makers and community sector organizations increasingly realize the importance of supporting refugees to re-establish their livelihoods (Colic-Peisker & Tilbury, 2006). While it is clear that stable employment reduces welfare dependency and improves the health and education outcomes of family members (Derose, Escarce, & Lurie, 2007; Khoo, 1994), the provision of support has tended to focus more substantially on meeting the immediate needs of refugees and their families. Such an approach often results in refugees being encouraged to undertake ‘survivor jobs’ such as cleaning, taxi driving, factory work, and catering, rather than obtain work that is commensurate with their skills and work experience in their home country (Hugo, 2014). These cases may lead to re-traumatization and may not always help refugees integrate into the host society (Yoon, Bailey, Amundson, & Niles, 2019).

At present, we have limited knowledge of what constitutes ‘best practice’ in terms of the approaches that community sector organizations and policy makers might adopt to help people from a refugee background re-establish their careers post resettlement (Campion, 2018; Newman, Bimrose, Nielsen, & Zacher, 2018). Although some research has started to pinpoint factors such as personal characteristics, social networks, and employment programs that assist people from a refugee background to transition into employment (Cheung & Phillimore, 2013; Correa-Velez, Barnett, & Gifford, 2015; Eggenhofer-Rehart et al., 2018; Gericke, Burmeister, Löwe, Deller, & Pundt, 2018; Pajic, Ulceluse, Kismihók, Mol, & den Hartog, 2018; Torezani, Colic-Peisker, & Fozdar, 2008), more work is required to understand how individuals may be supported to re-establish their careers post resettlement. 
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In order to improve our understanding in this area we call for manuscripts that examine how community sector organizations, commercial organizations, and policy makers might best support refugees to get their qualifications recognized, access training and education to upgrade their skills, and transition into employment that is commensurate with their skills and experience. In particular, we call on research that answers the following or similar questions: ​
  • What forms of careers counselling and employment support work best for people from a refugee background?
  • How should careers counsellors adapt traditional, and initiate innovative new approaches to meet the needs of skilled people from a refugee background?
  • How do people from a refugee background ensure that they get their qualifications, skillsets, and work experience recognized in new societies? 
  • What role do higher education institutions and vocational education providers have in assisting refugees to upgrade their skills and re-establish their careers?
  • How should policy makers work with community sector organizations and employment partners to get the qualifications of skilled refugees recognized and transition into employment and/or self-employment?
  • What barriers do people from a refugee background face in seeking employment and/or self-employment? How can refugees themselves and community sector organizations work together to overcome such barriers?
  • How effective are mentoring and internship programs in helping people from a refugee background to obtain employment and/or self-employment and prosper in their career?

We are looking for empirical research that employs quantitative, qualitative, or mixed methods. Empirical research that takes an interdisciplinary approach is also welcome. We encourage authors to draw upon theoretical perspectives such as career construction theory, social cognitive career theory, social capital theory, career motivation theory, and recognition theory when developing manuscripts for this special issue. We require that all articles explicitly articulate the policy implications of the research. Please also note that this special issue does not accept theoretical papers. 

Manuscripts must be prepared in line with the International Migration’s Author Guidelines: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal/14682435/homepage/forauthors.html. All papers will go through the journal’s standard double-blind peer review process. Authors are encouraged to discuss with the guest editors about their papers before submitting via the journal’s online submission system. 
Full papers should be submitted before 15 December 2019 at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/imig, selecting the special issue “Career Reestablishment of Refugees”.  Inquires related to the call for papers should be directed to Zhou (Joe) Jiang (dr.zhou.jiang@gmail.com), Alex Newman (a.newman@deakin.edu.au), Karen Dunwoodie (k.dunwoodie@deakin.edu.au), or Maike Andresen (maike.andresen@uni-bamberg.de). 

​Inquires related to the online submission should be directed to imigeditoorial@wiley.com and IMIG@wiley.com.   

References
Campion, E. D. (2018). The career adaptive refugee: Exploring the structural and personal barriers to refugee resettlement. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 105, 6–16.
Cheung, S. Y., & Phillimore, J. (2013). Refugees, social capital, and labour market integration in the UK. Sociology, 48(3), 518–536.
Colic-Peisker, V. (2011). ‘Ethnics’ and ‘Anglos’ in the labour force: Advancing Australia fair? Journal of Intercultural Studies, 32(6), 637–654.
Colic-Peisker, V., & Tilbury, F. (2006). Employment niches for recent refugees: Segmented labour market in twenty-first century Australia. Journal of Refugee Studies, 19(2), 203–229.
Correa-Velez, I., Barnett, A. & Gifford, S. (2015). Working for a better life: Longitudinal evidence on the predictors of employment among recently arrived refugee migrant men living in Australia. International Migration, 53(2), 321–337.
Correa-Velez, I., Spaaij, R. & Upham, S. (2012). 'We are not here to claim better services than any other’: Social exclusion among men from refugee backgrounds in urban and regional Australia. Journal of Refugee Studies, 26(2), 163–186.
Derose, K. P., Escarce, J. J., & Lurie, N. (2007). Immigrants and health care: Sources of vulnerability. Health Affairs, 26(5), 1258–1268.
Eggenhofer-Rehart, P. M., Latzke, M., Pernkopf, K., Zellhofer, D., Mayrhofer, W., & Steyrer, J. (2018). Refugees’ career capital welcome? Afghan and Syrian refugee job seekers in Austria. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 105, 31–45. 
Gericke, D., Burmeister, A., Löwe, J., Deller, J., & Pundt, L. (2018). How do refugees use their social capital for successful labor market integration? An exploratory analysis in Germany. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 105, 46–61.
Hugo, G. (2014). The economic contribution of humanitarian settlers in Australia. International Migration, 52(2), 31–52. 
Khoo, S. E. (1994). Correlates of welfare dependency among immigrants in Australia. International Migration Review, 28(1), 68–92.
Newman, A., Bimrose, J., Nielsen, I., & Zacher, H. (2018). Vocational behaviour of refugees: How do refugees seek employment, overcome work-related challenges and navigate their careers. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 105, 1–5. 
Pajic, S., Ulceluse, M., Kismihók, G., Mol, S. T., & den Hartog, D. N. (2018). Antecedents of job search self-efficacy of Syrian refugees in Greece and the Netherlands. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 105, 159–172.
Torezani, S., Colic-Peisker, V. & Fozdar, F. (2008). Looking for a ‘missing link’: Formal employment services and social networks in refugees’ job search. Journal of Intercultural Studies, 29(2), 135–152.
UNHCR. (2019). Figures at a glance. Retrieved from https://www.unhcr.org/en-au/figures-at-a-glance.html
Willott, J. & Stevenson, J. (2013). Attitudes to employment of professionally qualified refugees in the United Kingdom. International Migration, 51(5), 120–132.
Yoon, H. J., Bailey, N., Amundson, N., & Niles, S. (2019). The effect of a career development programme based on the Hope-Action Theory: Hope to work for refugees in British Columbia. British Journal of Guidance & Counselling, 47(1), 6–19.