Between hope and harm: the fragmentary effects of resettlement for Congolese refugees in Uganda

This paper advances the concept of fragmented settlement to conceptualize the impacts of international resettlement policy on refugee populations in countries of asylum and transit.Drawing on fieldwork with Congolese refugees in Kampala, Uganda, I show that hopes of attaining resettlement interact with limited spaces and entrenched uncertainty to exacerbate refugees' liminality and generate mistrust among community members.Bridging refugee and migration studies, I show that this fragmentation of social time and social trust undermines the already precarious settlement of refugees in Uganda, indicating that resettlement has impacts beyond the few who eventually depart.These harms do not go unchallenged however, as community leaders frame resettlement as corrupting and disempowering, seeking to reorient refugees toward collective projects of claims-making, community building, and incorporation.In turn, this paper extends critical approaches to resettlement as a "solution" to displacement, while centering refugee agency in understanding the outcomes of this humanitarian program.