Refugee Resettlement Is Not Immoral

By request, re-posting this from my Facebook page.  It was a response to an article entitled "Refugee Resettlement is Immoral" on the National Review website.  Link to article below.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/427153/refugee-resettlement-immoral?kffpvmWItCPWUwS1.01

I’ve seen this posted a few times, so I wanted to address it directly. I have to forcefully disagree with this article. And I believe that it is articles such as this that indirectly result from the escalation of fear and the undercurrent of xenophobia that is sneaking up in the wake of the discussion about Syrian refugees. Whoever wrote this has a very limited understanding of the overall refugee experience and is severely misguided regarding the purpose of the resettlement program.

It is true that less than one percent of the millions of refugees around the world are resettled permanently to a third country. So, in a sense, the ones who get resettled are certainly “lucky”. The author argues that financial resources would be better used to help refugees where they are, rather than to resettle a lucky few to another place. Unfortunately, he misses the most crucial piece of information: the very reason these “lucky few” are resettled is because they CANNOT stay where they are.

We do not simply “roll the dice” and randomly choose refugee cases for resettlement. There is a very measured process in place for specifically selecting cases of refugees living in the most dangerous situations or the most intractable circumstances. In reality, many more refugees would benefit from resettlement. But, by and large, only the most desperate situations are selected since the overall percentage of refugees who can be resettled is so small.

The hope is always for a refugee to be able to return home, or to be able to find sanctuary in an area close (geographically and culturally) to their own home. But often this is simply not possible. The one percent that are resettled get selected specifically because they CANNOT be adequately helped in their current situation or “closer to home”. The only viable option, at that point, to preserve their lives is resettlement. Some refugees, once they flee their homeland, languish in a refugee camp their entire lives. Entire generations grow up living in limbo. Many refugees die waiting for a solution or a way out of the hell that they find themselves in. So, yes, those who are resettled are lucky. They get to keep their lives and vastly improve the future for their children.

Refugee resettlement is not about patting ourselves on the back for doing something “righteous”. It is about genuinely helping those in very real need. What is “morally wrong” is failing to do everything we can – *within reasonable means* – to help innocent people caught in the wake of conflict. Especially as a nation with great power and great resources. We absolutely cannot help them all. But we can help some. And resettlement provides the most qualitative way of genuinely improving the lives of refugees in the most difficult circumstances.

A final thought: Do we measure “humanitarian success” or, for that matter, the moral rectitude of an issue merely by data figures and financial feasibility? Can this be quantified? Or do we measure it through the emergence of hope, the element of courage, and the quality of the lives that are changed?