From Asylum to Post‐Arrival Geographies: Syrian and Iraqi Refugees in Belgium

Hala El Moussawi and Nick Schuermans

Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, 2021, vol. 112, issue 2, 164-178

Abstract: This paper investigates the spatial patterns of concentration and dispersal of recently arrived refugees from Syria and Iraq in a country without stringent dispersal policies, Belgium. In order to capture both the mobility and the immobility of refugees, we propose the term “post‐arrival geographies” for these patterns. Drawing on data from the national population register, we demonstrate that many refugees move to urban and suburban locations after they have been granted refugee status. Through a comparison with the geographies of the Belgian asylum system and with the spatial distribution of Syrians and Iraqis who arrived earlier, we also explore some explanatory hypotheses for these post‐arrival geographies. The observation that dispersal takes place in Belgium in an indirect way ‐ through the location of asylum centres and local reception structures – makes us endorse pleas for more attention to institutional contexts and local settings in refugee studies.

Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/tesg.12469

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:tvecsg:v:112:y:2021:i:2:p:164-178

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0040-747X

Access Statistics for this article

Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie is currently edited by Jan van Weesep

More articles in Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie from Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().