Rationale
In 1985, UNHCR’s Executive Committee confirmed the legitimate concern of the
High Commissioner for Refugees for the consequences of refugee return. At this
time, ‘legitimate concern’ was interpreted primarily in relation to protection, and
specifically in monitoring states’ adherence to guarantees and amnesties granted to
returnees (UNHCR, 1985).
Since that time, UNHCR’s involvement in the reintegration of returning refugees has
expanded significantly. This expansion has been one of scale: in the five years to
1990 an estimated 1.2 million refugees returned to their home countries; in the
following five years, the number rose to nine million. There has also been an
expansion in the scope of UNHCR’s support for returning refugees.1
In addition to
providing a basic package of material support, UNHCR’s approach has become more
ambitious, concerned not simply to secure physical survival but also to enable social,
economic and even political processes which it sees as crucial to ‘sustainable return’.
So, for example, a 1997 policy paper defined reintegration as
virtually synonymous with ‘sustainable’ return, which implies a
situation where a constructive relationship between returnees, civil
society and the state is consolidate. (UNHCR, 1997a