Bridging the Implementation Gap: Refugee Governance and Institutional Coordination in Uganda’s Borderlands

Executive summary This article analyzes how Uganda’s progressive refugee governance model encounters structural implementation barriers in the West Nile borderlands, where institutional pluralism, spatial marginality, and porous borders reshape the delivery of protection and integration. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and stakeholder interviews in Nebbi and Yumbe districts, the study examines how national frameworks are reinterpreted through local governance arrangements marked by overlapping authorities, contested land tenure, and uneven resource distribution. The analysis shows that implementation challenges are not solely technical or financial but are rooted in deeper tensions between statutory and customary systems of authority, as well as the enduring influence of colonial legacies and kinship networks. These factors combine to fragment service delivery, constrain institutional coordination, and shape the lived experience of both refugees and hosts.