Introduction: Understanding Global Refugee Policy

Researchers visiting the Headquarters of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Geneva will frequently encounter discussions about efforts to develop ‘global refugee policy’. These efforts may relate to changes to existing UNHCR programmes, such as its approach to refugees in urban areas, or to new areas of activity, such as the organization’s response to displacement resulting from natural disasters. These efforts become ‘refugee policy’ when they result in a formal statement of a problem relating to protection, solutions or assistance for refugees or other populations of concern to the global refugee regime and a proposed course of action to respond to that problem. According to Soroos (1990: 318), this policy is ‘global’ when it takes the form of ‘either regulations that define the limits of permissible behavior for national governments and those under their jurisdiction or, alternatively, as programs administered by international agencies,’ such as UNHCR.