Who’s responsible for intellectual displacement? Objective representations of exiled professionals in Canada

The twenty-first century has brought an upsurge in intellectual exile due to protracted crises: important migrant flows from Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela, to name a few, include professionals with huge integration challenges due to collective trauma, language and recertification barriers. Based on original research with intellectual exiles in Canada, underemployment provokes emotional and physical damage that can be avoided through a more encompassing approach to the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). I propose a model to redefine R2P in terms of hospitality and protection of people displaced by crises, including recognising their past credentials. Our model contributes to previous literature on skilled migration, bridging the fields of conflict resolution and the ethnography of forced displacement. I propose that credential recognition should be an integral part of R2P.