Refugee Resettlement Policy in an Era of Neoliberalization: A Policy Discourse Analysis of the Refugee Act of 1980

Abstract

Refugee resettlement policy in the United States has not been viewed in terms of market-based analytics in the same way that welfare policy has, despite their similarities. Both are antipoverty policies that originated in the neoliberalizing policy environment of the 1980s. The Refugee Act of 1980 was legislated just 1 year before the Omnibus Act of 1981, but it is largely neglected in analyses of social policies in the neoliberal context. Drawing from literature on welfare policy, this study examines policy discourse surrounding the Refugee Act-specifically devolution of authority, privatization, managerialism, and workfare-as elements of neoliberal governance. Its findings illustrate how discourse served to rationalize and promote neoliberal practice in refugee resettlement policy. Juxtaposing refugee policy with welfare policy in terms of its temporal dimensions raises questions about citizenship rights and obligations as articulated by market-oriented policy, both for refugees who are not citizens and for welfare recipients who are. 1. This article analyzes solely the latter policy aim.

Discursive decisions: Signposts to guide the use of critical discourse analysis in social work

“…As much of social work research is concerned with issues of power, one way to warrant the use of a discursive framing and analysis is to illustrate the implications of language for less powerful groups. For example, Gonzalez Benson (2016) examined how the "refugee" became constructed through neoliberal discourse in refugee policy. To frame her study, Gonzalez Benson described the links between how refugees are defined and constructed in policy, how the administering government perceives this population within the broader context of U.S. social life, how refugees will be served in implementation of the policy, and the ways their life possibilities might be constrained or expanded as a result.…”

“…In our projects, the sample size ranged from 1 to 3,150. In Gonzalez Benson's (2016) study, a sample of one was sufficient because there exists a single federal policy document, composed of over 500 pages of public testimony, that arguably reflects policy and public sentiments that impact refugees across the U.S. In contrast, Storer and Rodriguez (2020) drew their initial sample from a population of 63,000 tweets with the hashtags #WhyIStayed and #WhyILeft in a 30-day period.…”

“…In contrast, Gonzalez Benson (2016) began her analysis of policy documents using a deductive approach. Recognizing that discourses may be absorbed, borrowed and/or subsumed from one arena into another, an idea summarized by the discursive concept of intertextuality (Allen, 2000), Gonzalez Benson (2016) explored whether and how neoliberal discourses found in general U.S. social welfare policy manifested within U.S. refugee policy.…”

“…In contrast, Gonzalez Benson (2016) began her analysis of policy documents using a deductive approach. Recognizing that discourses may be absorbed, borrowed and/or subsumed from one arena into another, an idea summarized by the discursive concept of intertextuality (Allen, 2000), Gonzalez Benson (2016) explored whether and how neoliberal discourses found in general U.S. social welfare policy manifested within U.S. refugee policy. Before beginning her analysis, she drew on previous literature and theory to identify four categories of neoliberal discourse based on core elements of neoliberalism in welfare scholarship: 1) devolution of authority, 2) privatization, 3) managerialism, and 4) workfare.…”

“And Slowly, the Integration and the Growing and the Learning”: Nuanced Notions of Integration of Bhutanese Refugees in US Cities

“…Additionally, this measure may be more tailored to the federal level of programming, without understanding of how local communities integrate new arrivals. The prioritization of economics in resettlement policy may have been necessary to gain political support for acommunity (Gonzalez Benson 2016), but institutional economic priorities may be at odds with the daily lives of particular people placed in particular places. It is unclear how integration in communities and cities compares to definitions of integration that come from policy.…”