LERRN extends its warmest congratulations to Rez Gardi as she begins her new role as Special Assistant to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

Rez’s courage, vision, wisdom and expertise will be such a tremendous asset to UNHCR as it works to navigate such a challenging moment in its history. Congratulations, Rez! We’re all cheering you on!

Dr. Stéphanie López-Villamil, Ana María Díez, Alejandro Gómez, Abdullahi Mire, María Guevara, and James Milner participate in the panel discussion at R-Space in Geneva. Building Bridges Across Regions: Refugee-Led Dialogue Between East Africa and Latin America. 15 December 2025.

On 15 December 2025, LERRN and R-SEAT co-hosted a panel discussion at R-Space in Geneva on the theme “Building Bridges Across Regions: Refugee-Led Dialogue Between East Africa and Latin America”.

Timed to coincide with the Global Refugee Forum Progress Review meeting, the event was a critical opportunity to highlight the shared challenges and opportunities to levering the expertise of refugee leaders in developing and implementing more efficient, effective and accountable responses to displacement. With the room at full capacity and with many key partners in attendance, the event highlighted the critical role that enhanced and meaningful refugee participation can play in ensuring that collective action to respond to the needs of refugees can be mobilized at a time of financial collapse for the humanitarian response sector and growing political skepticism around both multilateralism and upholding core refugee and human rights protection principles.

The event centered around the global launch of LERRN’s synthesis of its work on refugee-led organizations in East Africa and the Middle East and its more recent work, supported by the Gerda Henkel Foundation, on refugee leadership in East Africa and South America. Presented by the author, Dr. Stéphanie López-Villamil, the synthesis highlights the crucial role of refugee-led responses across regions, in areas as diverse as service delivery, advocacy, and policy development. By outlining the various ways that refugee leaders navigate shifting political opportunity structures, López-Villamil detailed the use of multi-level advocacy used across contexts to address power inequalities and enhance access and impact. The lessons of this analysis are particularly relevant given the moment currently faced by the global refugee regime.

The event then featured responses and perspectives from refugee leaders working in diverse contexts. In her intervention, MarĂ­a Guevara, Latin America Lead for R-SEAT, highlighted how the synthesis report captured the strategies employed by refugee-led organizations across Latin America and how the expertise of refugees is increasingly being recognized in national processes and regional efforts, such as the Cartagena +40 process. Abdullahi Mire, winner of the 2023 Nansen Refugee Award and founder of the Refugee Youth Education Hub, highlighted how the strategies outlined in the report are being used by leaders in places like the Dadaab refugee camps in Kenya to navigate the profound consequences of collapse of funding to UNHCR in 2025. Alejandro GĂłmez, with FundaciĂłn Refugiados Unidos in Colombia, noted that while there has been an increased recognition of the substantive value of refugee participation, it is important to highlight that disproportionate barriers remain for many, especially leaders from the LGBTQI+ community. Ana MarĂ­a DĂ­ez, President of CoaliciĂłn por Venezuela, noted that while refugee leadership had contributed to critical policy changes at the national and regional level, such as the regularization of status for some 2 million Venezuelans in Colombia, more work is needed to change the perception of refugees from a burden to a state to understanding refugees as individuals with skills and abilities to contribute to their host community.

The panel discussion was followed by a lively discussion with a highly engaged audience that illustrated the relevance of the results presented in the synthesis report to situations well beyond the contexts included in the report, along with the increased relevance of these issues in advance of the anticipated election of Dr. Barham Salih as High Commissioner for Refugees by the UN General Assembly later in the week.     

The panel highlighted how the challenges and opportunities faced by refugee leaders are remarkably similar across regions. While challenges persist around issues of funding, access and capacity, refugee-led initiatives have responded by drawing on the strength of coalitions, engaging with regional processes, leveraging the combined significance of their unique access to displaced communities and their moral and expert authority, and their ability to mobilize through alternate forms of media, such as social media and virtual networks. Ultimately, the event underscored the key lessons from the research on refugee leadership and refugee-led organizations: At a time of profound need and collapsing support from traditional partners, refugee-led responses bring the combination of moral authority, proven efficiency, technical expertise, and trust-based relationships with affected communities that are urgently needed to reimagine responses to forced migration in a rapidly evolving political reality.

Using personal stories, honest reflections, and examples of newer research led by refugees and local researchers, the blog asks whether today’s changing research landscape might finally reshape how evidence informs humanitarian action.

Read the blog:

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1. Event Report – UNHCR at 75: Challenges and Opportunities

On 26 November 2025, LERRN in partnership with the Global Academic Interdisciplinary Network (GAIN), hosted a webinar titled “UNHCR at 75: Challenges and Opportunities.” The webinar was moderated by Liliana Jubilut, co-chair of GAIN. The panel consisted of four speakers: Jeff Crisp, research associate at the Refugee Studies Centre at the University of Oxford, Jean Marie Ishimwe, East Africa regional lead of Refugees Seeking Equal Access at the Table (R-SEAT), Ruvendrini Menikdiwela, assistant high commissioner for protection at the UNHCR, and James Milner, LERRN’s project director. The distinguished panel was joined by 98 participants online from 22 countries across the world.

With people displaced worldwide, the global refugee regime is confronting an unprecedented level of complexity and scale in forced displacement. This magnitude—further compounded by budget cuts and the withdrawal of political and humanitarian commitments by major donor countries—has raised critical questions about the capacity of leading organizations to effectively respond to the needs of refugees, stateless persons, internally displaced persons, and other forcibly displaced populations. On the eve of UNHCR’s 75th anniversary, this webinar convened academics, civil society actors, and refugee leaders to reflect on the organization’s historical role and its future in the global refugee regime. Ahead of the Global Refugee Forum Progress Review in Geneva later this month, the panel discussed both the obstacles and opportunities facing UNHCR in the current political climate and offered suggestions for future action. The panelists collectively agreed that in order to adequately safeguard refugee protection in an increasingly turbulent world, stakeholders must work towards greater solidarity, inclusion, and multilateral collaboration that centers refugees’ lived experience and expertise. 

Menikdiwela opened the session by noting that has evolved over the past 75 years in response to the changing context and increasing complexity of forced migration. She outlined the agency’s expanded scope—now encompassing stateless persons and, in some cases, internally displaced people—and its three core pillars: international protection, durable solutions, and adherence to the humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, neutrality, and independence. She emphasized the need for national and international support that benefits both refugees and host communities, while highlighting five key challenges: the scale of mass displacement driven by protracted conflicts, a shrinking humanitarian space and the politicization of asylum, persistent funding gaps and staffing shortages, the growing complexity of displacement, and the accelerating global climate crisis. To address these challenges, Menikdiwela underscored the importance of reliable data, cross-sector and inter-agency collaboration, participatory research, and inclusive practices that amplify refugees’ expertise. She highlighted how partnerships with academia and refugee-led organizations (RLOs), along with localization and multidisciplinary approaches, can strengthen the global refugee regime’s effectiveness and legitimacy.

Reflecting on 75 years of leadership in emergency response, protection, and the pursuit of durable solutions, Menikdiwela emphasized that UNHCR’s mandate remains as vital and relevant today as it was at its inception.

James Milner outlined several current challenges shaping discourse around the functioning of the global refugee regime and UNHCR’s mandate: a collapse in funding as traditional donors redirect resources toward defense rather than protection; rising political hostility to the asylum regime that undermines foundational refugee and human rights norms; and declining confidence in multilateralism. Despite this context, Milner expressed optimism, noting that the regime has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to adapt to geopolitical shifts. He reminded the audience that geopolitics have shaped UNHCR’s evolution since the early days of the Cold War. These transformations, he argued, have also created openings for stronger refugee-led responses, increased leadership from the Global South, and the emergence of new norms that may positively reform the regime. Looking ahead, Milner highlighted the importance of cooperation among like-minded actors and states, along with greater civil society participation—particularly by refugee-led organizations—as a pathway toward more effective co-governance within the regime. He underscored the value of innovative approaches and collective efforts aligned with the principles of the , including locally produced knowledge and equitable partnerships.

Drawing on his personal experience working in East Africa— a region that is both a host and a producer of displaced persons—where meaningful refugee participation is becoming an emerging norm, Ishimwe emphasized the need to restructure the system by placing refugee leadership at the core of the refugee regime. He argued that partners must move beyond tokenistic approaches to participation and instead ground their policies and programming in collective solidarity and genuine recognition of refugees as experts and innovators, rather than as burdens or aid-dependent populations. He noted that while East Africa is seeing a growing number of refugee-led organizations (RLOs), these groups often struggle for recognition and sustainable funding, as governments and institutions frequently limit their role to consultation rather than leadership. True progress, Ishimwe suggested, requires resetting the humanitarian system with new leadership; institutionalizing meaningful refugee participation at the center of the system beyond project-based engagement; and positioning refugees in executive roles to ensure that policies and programs are effective, just, and reflective of their needs, aspirations, and lived realities.

Jeff Crisp shifted the conversation to the role of academia in shaping UNHCR’s policies, programs, and practices, and examined the extent to which academic research influences the organization’s mandate. He noted that while independent research has helped shape UNHCR’s broader intellectual framework—informing policy agendas on issues such as repatriation, refugee mobility, and refugee-led organizations—its direct impact on UNHCR’s day-to-day policies and practices has been difficult to measure. Crisp suggested that some of these challenges stem from academics’ tendency to use inaccessible language, produce research in formats misaligned with policy needs, or propose studies at moments when they are not actionable. Academic work also sometimes overlooks localized knowledge or recommends solutions that do not align with current priorities or available resources. From the organizational side, Crisp observed that UNHCR’s engagement with academia has historically depended heavily on leadership support, including initiatives like the open-access working paper series and partnerships with research centers worldwide. However, he noted that this support has declined in recent years due to growing skepticism toward independent researchers and, at times, an unwillingness to hear critiques of the organization. He recommended revitalizing and strengthening these relationships through timely, innovative collaborations—rather than simply expanding tokenistic networks.

Q&A Discussion

During the Q&A session, panelists’ interventions sparked a vibrant discussion in response to questions submitted by the audience. With growing concern that the regime is facing its most profound crisis—and that the protection of refugee rights may be at risk—the panelists were asked to share their calls to action for global leaders and their vision for UNHCR’s future.

In response, Milner emphasized that no single actor can reform the regime without broad consensus and multisectoral collaboration; UNHCR relies on partnerships to fulfill its mandate, and the importance of collective action cannot be overstated. Crisp called for a reassessment of UNHCR’s scope and activities to ensure the organization prioritizes its core mandate of refugee protection. Ishimwe stressed the centrality of refugee participation and the need for a mindset shift toward a system accountable not only to donor countries but to refugees themselves. He added that while the system may not yet be prepared for refugees to lead, such a paradigm shift is essential for meaningful change.

In their concluding remarks, all panelists underscored the importance of centering lived experience and localized knowledge in policy and programming. They recommended leveraging new technologies to co-create knowledge with researchers who have lived experience of displacement, using prominent platforms to elevate the work of refugee researchers, allocating sustainable funding to RLOs, and—most importantly—expanding refugee participation beyond storytelling to genuine leadership and substantive influence in executive spaces, ensuring participation is meaningful rather than performative.

Watch the full webinar:

Relevant Content

At a time when global displacement is at its highest, this synthesis report offers a timely and evidence-based perspective on how refugees themselves — not only external actors — are leading meaningful, locally rooted, and effective responses. By drawing together diverse regional experiences and deepening our understanding of refugee agency, the report reinforces the need for policy and funding frameworks, provides clear recommendations to strengthen support for RLOs and advance meaningful refugee participation.

In this report:

• The report draws lessons from the LERRN two large research studies that involved participation of over 400 refugee-led organizations (RLOs) and more than 100 refugee leaders in 25 different locations across nine countries: Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Colombia, Chile, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Ethiopia.
• The report highlights the variety of RLO roles — from service provision (education, livelihoods, social support) to cultural activities, advocacy, and community-level governance.
• The analysis highlights both constraints an opportunities: how refugee-led responses build agency and resilience, and how political, legal and funding barriers continue to limit their full potential.
• The report includes practical recommendations for donors, governments, international agencies, and civil society to strengthen support for refugee-led organizations and to advance meaningful refugee participation.

Read or download the full report:

Upcoming Event:

We at LERRN invite you to explore this timely report and to join us for a panel discussion “Building Bridges Across Regions” in Geneva on 15 December!

Whether you are a researcher, student, policy-maker, member of a refugee-led organization, or simply interested in inclusive and community-led humanitarian responses, we invite you to join us for a panel discussion to learn more about this report findings and hear from the discussants.

LERRN will host an in person event, Building Bridges Across Regions: East Africa & Latin America, in Geneva on 15 December as part of the

Our panel discussion provides a critical opportunity to reflect on the report’s insights, consider their implications for refugee-led responses globally, and explore pathways to strengthen refugee agency across regions and within the global refugee regime.

For more information about the upcoming event, visit LERRN upcoming events.

On the 12th of September 2025, a panel discussion titled “Towards a New Response to Forced Migration through Local Engagement Refugee Research Network” concluded the three-day LERRN 2.0 launch in Ottawa. The roundtable brought together academia and civil society partners with lived experience of displacement to present to the public the newly launched global partnership between academia and forcibly displaced communities (LERRN 2.0)

The discussion was moderated by Rez Gardi, Co-Director of LERRN and Co-Managing Director of R-SEAT. Panelists included James Milner, Co-Director of LERRN; Mustafa Alio, Co-Managing Director of R-SEAT; Ana Maria Diez of CoaliciĂłn por Venezuela; and Stephanie Lopez Villamil, South America Project Lead and Researcher.

The panel highlighted the urgent challenges facing refugees globally and emphasized the need to prioritize new ways of incorporating the expertise of people with lived experiences of forced displacement into the functioning of the global refugee system. This includes fostering trust and investing in truly collaborative relationships between academics and forcibly displaced populations. By engaging refugees and displaced communities in the co-production of research, policy, and initiatives, stakeholders can leverage local knowledge, skills, and resources to create solutions that are more effective and accountable to the communities they aim to serve.

James Milner stressed the growing fragility of the global refugee system, noting that the political and financial foundations established after World War II have become increasingly vulnerable. He explained that the new phase of LERRN—built on a collective vision for change and trust-based partnerships among academia, civil society, and refugee leaders—aims to contribute to meaningful solutions. As Dr. Milner stated, “We respond by having the courage to think differently—no single set of actors has a monopoly on the truth.”

Ana Maria Diez, drawing on her expertise and knowledge of the regional crisis in Latin America—particularly the Venezuelan displacement—emphasized that sudden, unsubstantiated funding reductions have forced many regional initiatives to shut down. She noted that the closure of the Darién Gap illustrates the grave dangers that arise when escape routes are blocked, but it does not stop people from seeking safety.

Stephanie Lopez-Villamil shared findings from her extensive research in Colombia, Chile, and Brazil, highlighting how shifts in foreign aid policies and fragile asylum systems increase risks for people seeking refuge, placing them in more vulnerable and life-threatening conditions. She also underscored the crucial role of refugee leadership in safeguarding communities.

The discussion highlighted the urgent need for the international community to re-mobilize, strengthen protections to address systemic gaps, and foster deeper collaboration with displaced-led organizations to achieve effective and sustainable solutions.

LERRN’s new six-year partnership underscores a commitment to innovation and the development of a new response framework for forced migration. Broader collaborations with RLOs around the world create more opportunities for equal research partnerships and for amplifying refugee voices in key areas such as academia.

emphasized that academia can play the role of building trust with refugees and decision-making authorities that can influence positive outcomes for people forced to flee. Collaborations with academic institutions offer platforms for shared knowledge exchange and creation of innovative responses to displacement.

Central to LERRN 2.0 is the effort to elevate the voices of forcibly displaced communities and ensure their experiences inform research, policy, and practice. The partnership aims to promote inclusive approaches that benefit both refugees and host communities, fostering hope that coordinated, courageous action can drive change even in challenging times.

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ĐÓ°ÉÔ­´´ University President and Vice-Chancellor Wisdom Tettey opened the event by underscoring the transformative power of inclusive research partnerships between academia and communities. He highlighted the vital role of collaborative approaches in advancing epistemic justice—reimagining spaces, structures, and processes by placing community expertise at the center of knowledge creation. President Tettey also recognized the past accomplishments of the LERRN partnership since 2018, including James Milner’s selection as a finalist for the 2025 SSHRC Impact Partnership Award, one of Canada’s highest distinctions in the social sciences and humanities.

LERRN Project Director James Milner emphasized that the partnership’s launch comes at a pivotal moment in history. With global displacement at record levels and access to protection and durable solutions becoming increasingly uncertain, the international refugee regime faces urgent and complex challenges. Co-Director Rez Gardi highlighted the need for bold thinking and innovative forms of collaboration, stressing that amid mounting threats to asylum, international cooperation, and multilateralism, it is more important than ever to unite and center the knowledge, agency, and expertise of displaced people.

The two-day program focused on four core objectives: affirming the shared goals and vision of the partnership; refining working group plans and identifying points of collaboration; articulating foundational principles; and establishing strategic priorities for the next six years ahead.

Across these discussions, participants reaffirmed their collective commitment to reshaping forced migration research, policy, and practice through inclusive, interdisciplinary, and localized approaches. The dialogue emphasized co-production of knowledge, meaningful capacity sharing, and advocacy that amplifies the voices and expertise of those most affected by displacement. The launch marks a significant step forward in building a more equitable, community-centered, and solutions-focused approach to understanding and responding to forced migration worldwide.

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This study sheds light on the often overlooked relations between local actors in the localisation of humanitarian assistance. It examines how local NGOs and refugee-led organisations (RLOs) in Turkey approach humanitarianism and localisation. By focusing on RLOs led by three distinct displaced communities—and their visions of humanitarianism rooted in faith, justice, and rights—the article offers a fresh perspective that highlights how refugees themselves shape humanitarian responses in similar displacement contexts.

Abstract

Two of the main recent trends in humanitarianism have been the increasing focus on decolonialisation and localisation of humanitarian assistance. Donors have committed to raising funding for local actors, especially to refugee-led organisations, with the hopes of tackling colonial power inequalities in humanitarianism and empowering local actors. Yet, the narratives used to maintain the hegemonic understanding of humanitarianism in localisation efforts and dismiss refugee-led organisations have not been comprehensively studied. Drawing on 130 interviews with refugee-led organisations, non-governmental organisations, international organisations and state officials in Turkey, this article shows that by characterising refugee-led organisations as charities with an assumed religious agenda, instead of humanitarian actors, national non-governmental organisations disparage these actors. I argue that the preconceived idea that refugee-led organisations do not adhere to traditional humanitarian principles fuels other non-­governmental organisations’ labelling of refugee-led organisations as charities, but this dismissal is also driven by worries about competition in the humanitarian sector. Adopting a decolonial framework, I assert that the reluctance to shift more power and resources to refugee communities is not only about ideology but also about political economy, an under-examined factor in the literature to date.”

Recommended Citation

Erdilmen, M. (2025). Against the charge of charity: refugee-led organisations, localisation and decolonising humanitarianism. Third World Quarterly,Ěý46(13), 1543–1564. 

On 10 September 2025, the Migration and Diaspora Studies (MDS) program launched its Guest Speaker Series for the 2025-2026 academic year. The event welcomed MDS students into a thought-provoking dialogue with , LERRN partner, a distinguished scholar in the political economy of education and Co-Director of the Centre for Asia Pacific Research Studies (CAPRS) at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. In this conversation, Dr. Shah invited participants to reflect on the key themes of his draft paper, “The Tangled Web between Refugee Rights, Capitalism, Race, and Education”. Drawing on his extensive research, Dr. Shah encouraged students to critically examine how these forces intersect within education in emergencies, positioning it as a key site for understanding the complex intersectionality of forced migration.

Borders are more than lines—they shape who belongs

Dr. Shah began by discussing contemporary bordering and its connection to racialization, highlighting how these practices continue to impact refugee education. He defined bordering as the “practices and policies that construct, maintain, and enforce borders,” emphasizing that borders are not only physical but also social and political practices embedded in everyday life. Beyond geographic boundaries, bordering shapes who is included or excluded, and also influences individuals’ sense of belonging. Racialization, through groupings, labels, and categories, justifies mobility for some while criminalizing or securitizing movement for others. Furthermore, this racialization determines the levels of protection and access to rights available to different individuals and groups.

Drawing on the work of Nira Yuval-Davis et al. in , Dr. Shah elucidated the concept of “gray zones” — spaces where national sovereignty and accountability become blurred in contemporary migration management, leading to the externalization of migration. He argued that the provision of education has itself become a “gray zone” within this context. Much of contemporary externalization is observed within the Global North, which prioritizes security over human rights, leaving many refugees in an “unsettled present and uncertain future.” Dr. Shah presented examples of how non-state actors in the Global North have come to profit from the externalization of mass migration.

Dr. Shah suggested that the work of refugee teachers and learners in and through these gray zones is both necessary and vulnerable to global capitalism. For learners, the primary challenge is accessing education, whilst teachers navigate gray zones by creating opportunities in informal and unrecognized education programs. Due to the unaccredited nature of these programs, learners often struggle to find higher levels of education or navigate their way into the workforce. Refugee teachers often face restrictions that limit their ability to join the workforce due to host country fears of increased unemployment for citizens. Additional barriers include the non-recognition of refugees’ credentials and qualifications or, when recognition is possible, a process that is often complex, bureaucratic, and difficult to navigate.

Global capitalism profits from exclusion

Dr. Shah and students reflected on the question of why there has been no national political will for enabling refugee teachers to help address the growing teacher shortage. To answer this question, Dr. Shah turned to the work of Nancy Fraser, who argued that global capitalism is fueled by exploitation and expropriation, relying on conditions that are created outside the formal economy, which help sustain and expand its operations. Capitalism thus thrives off emerging spaces outside the traditional realm of commodification and economic activity. Dr. Shah argued that contemporary political and social structures of the Global North are indicative of racialized capitalism.

Dr. Shah concluded by arguing that capitalism’s dual logic — expropriation and exploitation — is enabled by racialized social relations that compel refugees to participate in economic systems that marginalize them and push them to the peripheries of capitalism. Drawing on his work on refugee education, he illustrated how forced migration is not a crisis for global capitalism but rather essential to its survival. As the Global North continues to securitize its borders and profit from the externalization of migration, the global political economy thrives on the precarious conditions imposed on refugees.

What an inspiring start to a year of critical dialogue and new ideas at the Migration and Diaspora Studies Program! Through critical cross-disciplinary scholarship and open dialogue MDS fosters deeper understanding of movement and transnational settlement of people.

To learn more about the program and join the conversation by visiting Migration and Diaspora Studies – ĐÓ°ÉÔ­´´ University

This event was in part supported by LERRN, Local Engagement Refugee Research Network.

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