FRIPRO-Fri prosjektstøtte

Recent years have seen a dramatic increase in forced migration. At the end of 2017, nearly 70 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide, the highest figure ever recorded. While this is seen by some as a major challenge to Western societies, including Norway, the large majority of refugees are hosted in developing countries, with Africa accommodating the largest share. There is much concern about the trauma and suffering of displaced people - for very good reasons - but how are they received by their hosts, and what effects do their arrival have on the norms, attitudes, and perceived living standards of the local population? Surprisingly, these questions still have received little systematic attention by researcher so far, and existing relevant research focuses almost exclusively on Western countries. The TRUST project is in the process of identifying whether and how refugees shape social and political trust and wellbeing among host populations in Africa. This is accomplished by series of statistical analyses of public survey data of respondents across most African countries in combination with interviews of stakeholders, such as local government officials, NGO representatives, and journalists in relevant sites. The first phase of the project was devoted to practical and infrastructure-related tasks, such as establishment of project databases, adaptation of survey data to spatial data framework, start-up and coursework for the associated PhD candidate, as well as coordination of the first batch of empirical studies. Preparation of the survey data, in particular, turned out to be significantly more time-consuming than planned, due to need for comprehensive geocoding of a large number of survey clusters. In addition, the pandemic has resulted in delays due to illness among project members and related barriers to conducting fieldtrips to relevant African sites. Due to these circumstances, the project period has been extended by 12 months (new end date 31 December 2024) in order to facilitate catching up on planned deliverables. Thus far, the project has produced three peer-reviewed journal articles and 4 completed MA theses in political science at NTNU. The first of these articles (Rustad et al., 2021) explored consequences of refugee arrivals in Uganda on maternal health among the host population as well as the refugees trough original survey data. This study found little evidence of inequality in access to healthcare between the hosts and the newcomers, although it revealed greater disparities in perceived quality of these services. The second article (Ruiz & Vargas-Silva, 2022) investigated the effect of returnees across Burundi on local cohesion, a topic that has received scant scientific attention to date. The study revealed that the magnitude of returning refugees to a community was inversely related to social trust and perceived prospect of peace, and thus points to challenges with integration and reconciliation of formerly divided societies after conflict. Several of the project members presented academic work related to the TRUST project at various international conferences in 2023, as well as several internal seminars. In addition the project (Skramstad et al) has produces a systematic literature review on Migrant Exposure and Individual-Level Trust. TRUST brings together researchers from the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), University of Oxford, and Loyola Marymount University. In the current reporting period, the PhD candidate (Haugseth) has spent time at the University of Arizona (Jan.-April 2022) and University of Oxford (Sept.-Dec. 2022) as a visiting scholar, and another project member (Rustad) spend the academic year (Aug. 2021-July 2022) at the University of Arizona. Moreover, the overseas project members (Fisk and Vargas-Silva) spent some time at PRIO during the summer, 2022. In total, 11 people have been / are involved in the project over 4.5 years (2020-2024), and we hope that our research can provide new insights to policy makers and the general public alike.

Recent years have seen unprecedented levels of forced migration. At the end of 2017, 68.5 million people were forcibly displaced worldwide, the highest figure ever recorded. Despite vocal concerns about refugee arrivals in Europe, forced displacement is overwhelmingly confined to the Global South. In 2017, 85% of all refugees were hosted in developing countries, with Africa accommodating the largest share. Despite the magnitude of displacement, extant knowledge on how refugees affect host populations is derived almost exclusively from Western societies. We lack completely evidence-based, generalizable insights of such dynamics in the Global South, critically hampering the formation of effective and inclusive capacity building programs to assist people of concern. The TRUST project steps up to the challenge. It will provide the first systematic, comparative investigation of how refugee arrivals affect host perceptions of trust and well-being and how contextual factors shape this relationship. This will be accomplished by analyzing survey data of 200,000+ respondents across 37 African countries, coupled with new refugee settlement data, in a quasi-experimental analytical framework. Four dimensions of trust and well-being will be studied: (A) political trust, (B) social trust, (C) perception of economic security, and (D) perception of physical security. Special care will be taken to identify contextual and cross-cutting patterns. In addition, the project will conduct ca. 5-6 qualitative case studies, including stakeholder interviews, to validate survey findings, shed new light on deviant cases, and facilitate further theorizing. Overall, the project will result in a new PhD, at least 10-12 journal articles, 3-5 policy briefs plus a policy seminar series, and dissemination material intended for the general public. Hosted at PRIO, the project brings together talented scholars with diverse backgrounds and complementary skills from four institutions in three countries.