Canada's Syrian Refugee Program, Intergroup Relationships and Identities

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INTRODUCTION
MICHAELA HYNIE – SPECIAL GUEST EDITOR
Canada’s Syrian Refugee Program, Intergroup
Relationships and Identities
This decade has seen a rapid escalation in forced migration. Never before has the
world seen so many people forcibly displaced, both within their countries, and
across international borders (UNHCR 2017). Those who are displaced across inter-
national borders as a result of violence and/or persecution, and whose country of
origin cannot, or will not, protect them, are refugees. Not only has the number of
refugees increased, but so too has the length of displacement for those in protracted
situations (Devictor and Do 2016). Unfortunately, the number of refugees who find
permanent solutions to this displacement (integration in the country of asylum,
return to the country of origin, or resettlement in a third country) make up a tiny
proportion of those who are displaced; only 765,500 out of 22.5 million refugees in
2016 (or 3.5%) achieved a permanent solution, of whom only 189,300 were offered
resettlement (UNHCR 2017). It is therefore important to examine the conditions
under which a greater number of permanent solutions are made possible, as models
that could be taken up more broadly. Canada’s initiative to permanently resettle a
relatively large number of Syrian refugees is one such example, with Canada’s unique
private sponsorship model being of particular interest internationally as a way of
increasing resettlement opportunities.
The continuing conflict in Syria is just one of many current drivers of forced
migration, but one that has displaced 6.6 million people internally, and 5.6 million
across international borders in the past seven years (UNHCR 2018). In 2015, the
newly elected Canadian federal Liberal government undertook a widely publicized
initiative to resettle 25,000 Syrian refugees under the slogan “Welcome Refugees.”
This initiative harkened back to the resettlement of 60,000 Indochinese refugees in
Canada in 1979-1980, which marked the beginning of Canada’s private sponsorship
program (Labman 2016). Mirroring the earlier initiative, the Welcome Refugees pro-
gram engaged large numbers of citizens, many as private sponsors, and garnered
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broad media coverage, both in Canada and abroad. Between November, 2015, and
February, 2017, more than 40,000 Syrians resettled across Canada, in over 350 com-
munities. Almost a third were sponsored by private citizens or non-governmental
organizations who provided financial and settlement support for the newcomers’
first year (Government of Canada 2017). Simultaneously, at a time when attitudes
towards refugees and immigrants are becoming increasingly hostile across Europe,
the USA and Australia, Canadian attitudes towards migration are among the most
positive in the world, with 92% of Canadians saying that where they currently live is
a good place for immigrants to live. By comparison, 65% agree with this statement
in other OECD countries (Environics Institute for Survey Research 2018). This spe-
cial issue of Canadian Ethnic Studies/Études ethniques au Canada explores whether
the Welcome Refugees resettlement initiative was made possible by the role that
refugee resettlement plays in Canadian notions of identity and citizenship, and the
implications this has for the relationships between established Canadians and Syrian
newcomers to Canada.
REFUGEES AND ASYLUM SEEKERS IN PUBLIC DISCOURSE
Discourses both supporting and rejecting refugees and asylum seekers rest on the
co-creation of two identities: that of a refugee “other”, and a national “self” (Bauder
2008). These constructions are nuanced by national identities and current political
realities (Akbari and MacDonald 2014; Berry, Garica-Blanco and Moore 2016;
Krzyżanowski, Triandafyllidou and Wodak 2018; Triandafyllidou 2018). Nonetheless,
there are common themes that emerge, particularly across high-income countries
that have been destinations for refugee resettlement and asylum, themes which have
been affected by highly publicized and debated events. These discourses tend to
focus on refugee identities rather than explicitly describing national identities, the
latter of which are assumed to be in opposition or contrast to the refugee “other”.
The Welcome Refugee initiative in Canada coincided with the time of the great-
est increase in asylum requests in Europe and multiple deaths during Mediterranean
crossings, from 2015 to 2016. Triandafyllidou (2018) identifies a critical discursive
shift among political, media and civic society debates in European media coverage
during this time. Discourse shifted from a focus on management of newcomers into
Europe, to the loss of life and dire conditions for refugees following several highly
publicized deaths of asylum seekers. The discourse shifted again following highly
publicized attacks in Germany and France, returning to a trend of framing refugees
as a threat to security, social order, and economic stability and of their arrival as a
crisis for Europe. As noted by Winter and colleagues, however, Canada’s discourse
did not shift in the same way (Winter, Patzelt and Beauregard 2018).
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Refugee and asylum seeker identities are typically constructed as (essentialized)
“others” whose nature is dangerous or incompatible with “our” cherished local val-
ues. Kyriakides and colleagues (Kyriakides, Bajjali, McLuhan and Anderson 2018)
draw on Edward Said’s (1978) theory of Orientalism in describing how this process
is applied to Syrian refugees (cf. Tyyska, Blower, DeBoer, Kawai and Walcott 2017).
They argue that Syrian refugees, as non-Western “others”, are constructed as barbaric
and uncivilized in contrast to “our” Western morality and civilization. These identi-
ties can be observed in media and policy discourse on refugees and asylum seekers
(Esses, Medianu and Lawson 2012). For example, in a study of memes on the inter-
net platform, Reddit, Glăveanu and colleagues (Glăveanu, de Saint-Laurent and
Literat 2018) identified that refugees, and particularly Muslim refugees, are depicted
as violent and disrespectful towards women. Another common theme that surfaced
across multiple studies is claims that refugees and asylum seekers are economic
migrants who are seeking entry in order to abuse welfare services and thus that
asylum seekers are not deserving of protection (Berry et al. 2016; Glăveanu et al.
2018; Goodman, Sirriyeh and McMahon 2017; Guidry, Austin, Carlyle, Freberg,
Cacciatore, Jin and Messner 2018; Krzyżanowski et al. 2018).
Negative discourses also construct refugee migration in dehumanizing ways by
representing refugees as an uncontrolled and deindividuated mass (Haslam and
Loughnan 2014). In Slovenia the media portrayal of the refugee situation repeatedly
uses the metaphor of water (flow, river, flood, tsunami) to denote an out-of-control,
dehumanized and agentless catastrophe (Vezovnik 2018). Common themes across
multiple studies are that these large and deindividuated refugee/asylum migration
flows are hiding terrorists within them, and that the (large but unspecified) numbers
will overwhelm available resources (Berry et al. 2016; Guidry et al. 2018; Huot,
Bobadilla, Bailliard and Rudman 2016; Triandafyllidou 2018). In this case the threat
does not come from individuals and so the denial of asylum is not directed towards
people but rather a catastrophic event.
With the increase in these discourses regarding asylum seekers has come an
escalation of hostility towards refugees and asylum seekers in Europe (with the terms
refugee, asylum seeker, and migrant often used interchangeably), and particularly
towards Muslim refugees (Bansak, Hainmueller and Hangartner 2016; IPSOS 2017).
As noted, these discourses are also connected to beliefs that those claiming asylum
do not deserve protection or that protection is impossible. Challenging the validity
of these asylum claims anticipates and counters humanitarian arguments for pro-
viding asylum, resettlement and support, thereby protecting the morality or human-
ity of those who argue against providing asylum.
Humanitarian themes focus on the suffering and hardship experienced by
refugees and asylum seekers prior to migration and on their migration pathway.
Some news and social media portrayals individuate refugees and emphasize perspec-
Michaela Hynie – Special Guest Editor | 3

tive taking, inviting the reader to “put themselves in the shoes” of people coping with
difficult situations (Cooper, Olejniczak, Lennette and Smedley 2017; Glăveanu et al.
2018; Guidry et al. 2018). But many humanitarian discourses still speak of undiffer-
entiated masses of people and portray refugees as passive victims (Berry et al. 2016;
Glăveanu et al. 2018; Goodman, Sirriyeh and McMahon 2017). In this way, human-
itarian discourses also fall into the Orientalist construction of an agentic “us” and a
passive “them” (Kyriakides et al. 2018). Vollmer and Karakayalf (2018) argue that the
discourse around refugees “deserving” protection actually depends on a representa-
tion of them being forced to move, as opposed to choosing to save themselves. For
example, in their analysis of UK news media, Goodman and colleagues (2017) noted
that a discursive shift occurred around the death of Alan Kurdi, a three-year-old
Syrian boy who drowned during an attempted Mediterranean crossing; asylum seek-
ers entering Europe were now identified as refugees in need of support. However, the
language describing their movements now showed a marked decrease in agency. For
instance, media now described refugees as “reaching” Europe and being rescued, as
opposed to actively “entering”.
Canada has had similar discourses around immigration and refugees (Molnar
2016; Wallace 2018). Policy and discourse in Canada had been shifting to greater crim-
inalization of immigration in recent decades (Aiken, Lyon and Thorburn 2014). In
2013 the federal Conservative government introduced Bill C-31 (known as Protecting
Canada’s Immigration Security Act, House of Commons 2013), which separated out
different refugee claimant groups by country of origin and changed their entitlements
(Diop 2014; Huot et al. 2016). The policy and media discourse around these changes
focused on the familiar themes of security threats, economic threats, and the legiti-
macy of refugee claims, and remained dominant until 2015. In January 2015, concur-
rent with the European Union framing of Syrian refugee migration as a problem of
management, the Conservative government agreed to accept 10,000 Syrian refugees;
six months later, however, only about 1000 had been resettled. In September of 2015,
following the death of Alan Kurdi, and in the midst of a federal election campaign, the
Conservative government pledged to bring in another 10,000 Syrian refugees, distrib-
uted over four years. Citing security concerns, Prime Minister Stephen Harper stated
that increasing settlement of refugees from Syria beyond the numbers proposed would
be “reckless and irresponsible”(Campion-Smith 2015). This too paralleled shifts in
discourse in Europe (Triandafyllidou 2018). In contrast, however, during their cam-
paign Justin Trudeau and the Liberal Party promised to bring, by the end of 2016,
25,000 Syrian refugees to Canada, stating that it was just a matter of political will.
Following their election as the governing party in October 2015, the Liberal Party
acted on this promise, in partnership with thousands of Canadians who volunteered
to serve as private sponsors for Syrian refugees newcomers.
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The Canadian public was particularly moved by Alan Kurdi’s death and there
were demands that the Canadian government accept more Syrian refugees. Alan
Kurdi’s aunt lived in Canada and had tried, but failed, to privately sponsor the
family to come to Canada (Winter et al. 2018). This child’s death therefore seemed
easily preventable, and Canada seemed particularly culpable. Moreover, Canada had
a history of resettling a large number of forced migrants from Southeast Asia in
1979-1980, creating a model for a similar response in this case. However, a third
motivating factor may be that Canadian identity includes humanitarian resettlement
of “deserving” migrants as an important reflection of the nation’s compassionate
nature (Bauder 2008). In other words, Canadian identity may be particularly
amenable to a self-representation that includes refugee resettlement in ways that
made the Welcome Refugees initiative possible.
THE CO-CONSTRUCTION OF REFUGEE AND CANADIAN IDENTITIES
IN THE REFUGEES WELCOME RESETTLEMENT INITIATIVE
Two papers in this special issue explore the Liberal government’s initiative to reset-
tle Syrian refugees in terms of the construction of a Canadian identity. Drawing on
the work of Harold Bauder, Winter and her colleagues (2018) use media coverage in
“mainstream” national newspapers in Canada and Germany to document how the
media construction of Syrian refugee identities reflect each country’s general stance
with regards to immigration. In analyzing articles published between September
2015 and January 2016 in two national newspapers, Winter and colleagues found
both countries’ newspapers reported common themes of refugees needing assis-
tance, and of refugees posing a threat. In Germany, there was also a debate about
whether refugees and asylum seekers could integrate into German society. This lat-
ter theme suggested an essentialized refugee “other” at odds with the German self. In
the Canadian media, Winter and colleagues found that the vulnerability and need of
Syrian refugees was accompanied by a critique of the Conservative government for
not doing more to assist, contrasted against descriptions of how “true Canadians”
were providing support to refugees. This line of discourse emphasized Canada’s his-
tory of and commitment to helping refugees, thus explicitly aligning resettlement
with Canadian identity, while also drawing attention to Canadian virtuous helping
behaviour, rather than the experience from the perspective of the Syrian newcomers.
Winter and colleagues also found evidence of Bauder’s (2008) thesis regarding the
sublimation of refugee “others” into the Canadian self, with reports of how earlier
refugee newcomers had successfully integrated into Canadian society and promises
of how these refugees would also become new Canadians. Critical to these dis-
courses, however, is the emphasis on the “deserving” refugee, one who is passive,
Michaela Hynie – Special Guest Editor | 5

grateful, needy and female and/or a child, with the male Muslim refugee still por-
trayed as a threat, and with assurances being offered during this resettlement initia-
tive that only those refugees who fit the “good refugee” identity were being resettled.
Like Winter et al., Macklin and her colleagues (Macklin, Barber, Goldring,
Hyndman, Korteweg, Labman and Zyfi 2018) evoke an underlying assumption that
refugee resettlement involves the making of new Canadian citizens, transforming the
“other” into “us”. One of the routes to privately sponsor refugees allows Canadian
private citizens to unite as groups of five (or larger) to personally undertake spon-
sorship, providing financial and settlement support to sponsored individuals and
families, and personally engaging in this act of creating new citizens. Private spon-
sors’ engagement in refugee resettlement can therefore have direct implications for
sponsors’ own sense of identity. Macklin et al. (2018) surveyed 530 private sponsors
in Canada, theorizing that private sponsorship could be construed as the “perfor-
mance” or practice of active Canadian citizenship and identity. The authors explored
this theory in private sponsors’ motivations for sponsorship, and also whether the
act of sponsoring changed sponsors’ sense of self as citizens.
Many of the sponsors who responded to the survey were sponsoring for the first
time, and indeed reported being motivated by a sense that private sponsorship was an
expression of Canadian responsibility and identity. Other motivations included reli-
gious or ethical commitments (e.g., to “welcome the stranger”) and having a personal
or family history of migration, reflecting how Canada’s history as a settler nation may
be influencing how refugee resettlement and sublimation of the refugee “other” is
incorporated into Canadian identity. However, a striking aspect of Macklin et al.’s
survey is the homogeneity of the sample. Respondents were predominantly highly
educated, older, upper middle class white women in Ontario. There was also an
almost complete lack of representation of Conservative party voters. These differ-
ences seem too large to be attributable to self-selection by participants. As noted by
the authors, refugee sponsorship may have been particularly identified with the
Liberal government, since it formed a clear part of their election campaign. However,
it may also reflect a deeper disconnect in Canadian identity, which is supported by the
presence of contradictory themes in Canadian media (Molnar 2016; Tyyska, Blower,
DeBoer, Kawai and Walcott 2017). While the media focus on the extent to which
refugee resettlement reflects the “generous” nature of Canadians, there is also a con-
tinued focus on constructions of refugees as a threat; Canadian identity thus includes
the dialectic between these positions and in this sense may mirror the divisions seen
in the German media reviewed by Winter and colleagues. What seems unique,
though, is the perspective of refugees as “citizens in the making.”
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IDENTITY AND INTERGROUP RELATIONSHIPS
Kyriakides and colleagues (2018) re-label privately sponsored refugees (PSRs) as “per-
sons of self rescue” to challenge the ongoing discourse of the passive refugee in need
of saving. They then explore the consequences of these co-constructed identities for
relationships in private sponsorship. In their interviews with 109 sponsors (hosts),
sponsored refugees, and community agencies, they found numerous examples of pri-
vate hosts failing to acknowledge the agency, dignity and competencies of the people
they are sponsoring, resulting in misunderstandings, conflict and mistrust when spon-
sored newcomers tried to assert their agency and challenge the unequal power rela-
tionship being imposed on them (Bauder 2008). Research in the psychology of
intergroup relationships finds that those in a “helper” role can persist in offering help
that imposes or encourages passivity and helplessness in the recipient. Doing so rein-
forces the power imbalance between them, which can generate discomfort and resist-
ance from those being helped. This resistance is often received with hurt and surprise
by those offering the help (Nadler, Halabi, Harapz-Gorodeisky and Ben-David 2010).
However, Kyriakides et al. (2018) also identify ways in which hosts and sponsored
newcomers can and did challenge these constructed identities, actively asserting
and/or acknowledging newcomers’ pre-migration identities, and the need for resettle-
ment programs to recognize and support agency and autonomy for newcomers. In so
doing, hosts also developed a new understanding of their own identities as sponsor-
ship groups and, indeed, as Canadians.
Veronis, Tabler and Ahmed (2018) explore the co-creation of newcomer and
Canadian identities from the perspective of Syrian Canadian youth. Veronis and her
colleagues conducted focus groups with 29 Syrian newcomer youth to document
how they explore and communicate their identity as Syrian Canadians and develop
relationships with other Canadians through their use of social media. The authors
challenge the “us-them” demarcation that is inherent in the discourses of refugees
and asylum seekers. Drawing from theories of transculturalism, hybridity and bor-
derlands, Veronis and colleagues emphasize the fluidity of the constructed self, par-
ticularly in the space between cultures. Social media, such as Facebook and
Instagram, are a source of information about Canada for newcomers seeking to
learn about their peers and community. However, they are also platforms for shar-
ing information about Syria with their new Canadian peers. These youth were not
the subject of social media but rather the authors of their representations, and cura-
tors of the information that is shared about them. In this way, youth in these focus
groups actively challenged the refugee identities constructed in social and news
media about them, with its unidimensional stereotypes and notable silence about
their premigration self (Kyriakides et al. 2018).
Michaela Hynie – Special Guest Editor | 7

In contrast to face to face interactions, these virtual interactions also allow youth
to have control over the speed and amount of interaction, providing the option of
observing social spaces until they are ready to step in with their own contributions.
Virtual interactions may lack some of the nuances of physical interactions and thus
have their own dangers and difficulties. But for many of these newcomer youth, the
virtual world is a safe social space in which to start building relationships, sharing
personal histories, and trying out new ideas and behaviours as they navigate the
boundaries between cultural spaces to build identities as Syrian Canadians.
THE INTEGRATION OF NEWCOMER AND ESTABLISHED COMMUNITIES
Private sponsorship, in particular, is thought to provide not only immediate settle-
ment support and information but also intergroup relationships. These social con-
nections should translate into social capital for better employment, housing, and
educational access, but also friendship across cultural groups (Kumin 2015). Civic
engagement and intergroup relationships are also expected to shape newcomers’
identities by providing general information about national norms and values. The
final two papers in this special issue allow us to contrast the representation of
Canadian engagement with Syrian newcomers as an expression of Canadian iden-
tity, against Syrian refugees’ reports of their engagement with other, more estab-
lished, Canadians, and what role that plays in Syrian newcomers’ settlement.
Hanley and her colleagues (Hanley, Al Mhamied, Cleveland, Hajjar, Hassan,
Ives, Khyar and Hynie 2018) conducted surveys with 697 Syrian refugees in
Montreal, Quebec, 90% of whom arrived through some form of private sponsor-
ship. A range of initiatives were developed around the city to enhance settlement
support for Syrian newcomers in the areas of health, employment, housing and legal
rights, and to create opportunities for intergroup relationships with other
Montrealers. Nonetheless, respondents reported that it was primarily friends and
family who helped them find employment. Respondents were actively engaged in
their social networks, with almost all reporting having friends in the city. Two thirds
reported having four or more friends locally, and 70% reporting seeing them on a
weekly basis. Most respondents’ friends came from their own ethnic community,
which is particularly likely in Montreal given that the province had a relatively large
Syrian Canadian community prior to the conflict, and that many of those sponsored
were sponsored by the pre-conflict Syrian Canadian community. On the advice of
their sponsoring organizations, the majority settled in neighbourhoods with a pre-
existing Arab community presence and thus may have formed co-ethnic clusters.
Participants in their sample did build friendships with members of other ethnic
communities over time, but only half of those in Canada for over a year reported
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having friends from other communities. The strength of relationship with those in
their co-ethnic community did not seem to be a barrier to forming a sense of local
identity, however. Sense of belonging to the city overall (71%) was comparable to
that with their ethnic group in the city (69%).
Drolet and her colleagues (Drolet and Moorthi 2018) conducted surveys with 100
Syrian refugees who had resettled into five cities in Alberta: the large cities of Calgary
and Edmonton, and the smaller cities of Lethbridge, Medicine Hat and Red Deer. In
addition they collected in-depth interviews with 20 individuals across all of the cities
except Lethbridge. Drolet and colleagues compared large and small cities because larger
urban centres are thought to result in more segregation between communities, and thus
the goal of developing strong intergroup relationships may be more challenging in
larger cities. However, the authors note that smaller centres may not be able to provide
the resources and services refugee newcomers need for settlement, such as employment
and language support. Social connections played a central role in the settlement path-
way of Syrian refugees in all five cities. Syrian newcomer respondents, the majority of
whom were government rather than privately sponsored, reported relying on settle-
ment agencies and community organizations for the material aspects of settlement sup-
port and found these supports helpful. Relationships with other members of the Syrian
community were also very important for a range of social supports and these co-ethnic
and co-religious relationships formed the core of their social lives. For those who were
privately sponsored, however, relationships with private sponsors were variable, with
some forming strong relationships but many others reporting little assistance.
Respondents reported actively seeking out relationships with more established
residents from other ethnic communities, explicitly acknowledging the expectation
for integration into local norms and values and the role that intergroup relationships
play in this process. Their efforts demonstrate that the process of “becoming
Canadian citizens” is actively undertaken by refugees, rather than something that
they are passively exposed to. Respondents reported both welcoming and discrimi-
natory interactions with other Canadians, with just under two-thirds reporting that
they found Canadians welcoming and supportive. Almost all reported a sense of
belonging to Canada, but respondents also identified barriers of cultural distance,
difficult living conditions, and a loss of social connections, emphasizing that build-
ing social relationships is an important step in developing a Canadian identity but
so is inclusion in economic and material aspects of Canadian life.
CANADIAN IDENTITY, REFUGEE IDENTITY, AND BECOMING CANADIAN
The papers in this special issue reveal the heterogeneity of discourses and attitudes
regarding refugee resettlement and Canadian identity. Policy, news and social media
Michaela Hynie – Special Guest Editor | 9

discourses construct refugee identities as dangerous and dishonest and threats to
Canadian morality and decency; as helpless victims for whom Canadians feel com-
passion but who threaten Canadian well-being by overwhelming their resources; or
as grateful and passive recipients of Canadian generosity. However, one aspect of
Canadian identity also includes the act of reproducing itself in the making of new
Canadians out of refugee “others”, particularly through the engagement of civil soci-
ety in private sponsorship. It is the latter discourse that may be particularly effective
at opening the door for more refugee resettlement in Canada, and that may under-
lie Canada’s relatively positive attitudes towards refugees and immigrants. This dis-
course may also be open to reconstruction and challenge.
Nonetheless, suspicion and mistrust of the “other” are not far below the surface,
and the representation of Canadian identity that motivated so many private spon-
sors in Macklin et al.’s (2018) paper to participate in refugee sponsorship may not be
so widely embraced. The narrowness of the demographic profile of the private spon-
sors in Macklin et al.’s study may be indicative of tensions that exist within
Canadians’ self-representations vis-a-vis refugee newcomers, dichotomies that are
revealed not only in the multiple discourses present in the media, but also by
national surveys on attitudes towards immigrants and refugees (Environics Institute
for Survey Research 2018). Studies asking Syrian Canadians to report on their expe-
riences of resettlement show that their social relationships with individuals from
other social groups are generally fairly limited, at least in early years, and Kyriakides
et al.’s (2018) paper warns that the nature of these relationships may in themselves
be “othering” and be barriers to meaningful inclusion. The “othering” of these new-
comers also occurs through material exclusions, in the form of housing, employ-
ment and income, and the data presented here suggest that both forms of exclusion
have implications for resettled refugees’ sense of belonging to Canada.
Symbolic “others” become real people once they arrive in communities. Newcomer
Syrians come with their own agendas, personal narratives, expectations, motivations
and identities. The papers in this special issue indicate the range of ways in which they
are actively engaged in constructing their own Syrian Canadian identities, representa-
tions and intergroup relationships, both virtually and physically, and independent of
what sponsors, government and media may have expected. This may lead to tension,
but it also leads to the opportunities for real relationships, and the construction of new
Canadian identities for all involved. The papers in this special issue also reveal the opti-
mism, resilience and openness of many people involved in the Welcome Refugees
Syrian resettlement initiative, from the Syrian newcomers, to the sponsors, to the
media, to government policy makers who supported this initiative. Perhaps this is a
new shared identity that could be created out of the Welcome Refugees initiative as a
model of a dignified, respectful and humanitarian response to forced migration.
Canadian Ethnic Studies/Études ethniques au Canada
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Undesirables: A Critical Discourse Analysis of “Othering” within the Protecting Canada’s
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MICHAELA HYNIE, Ph.D., is a social and cultural psychologist in the Department
of Psychology and the Centre for Refugee Studies at York University and past presi-
dent of the Canadian Association for Refugee and Forced Migration Studies. Dr.
Hynie conducts both qualitative and quantitative community-based research with a
focus on situations of social conflict and forced displacement, and the development
and evaluation of interventions that can strengthen social and institutional relation-
ships to improve health and well-being in different cultural, political and physical
Canadian Ethnic Studies/Études ethniques au Canada
12 |

environments. Her work in Canada, India, Nepal, Rwanda and South Africa has been
funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Grand Challenges
Canada and the Canadian Institutes for Health Research. She is currently leading
Syria.LTH, a five-year longitudinal study on Syrian refugee integration in Canada.
Michaela Hynie – Special Guest Editor | 13

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