Revisiting the “Imperative of Categories”: Women at Risk in Resettlement Practice

2026/01/28 by Jessica Schultz · 1 voice
Psychology · Social Sciences · #Education and experiences of immigrants and refugees #Migration, Health and Trauma #Migration, Refugees, and Integration

paper · doi:10.25071/1920-7336.41713

openalex publication_date 2026/01/28 · openalex created_date 2026/02/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/22

Abstract

Refugee “women at risk” (WaR) have been prioritized since the late 1980s as candidates for third-country resettlement. Drawing on Macklin (1995), this article interrogates the logic and consequences of the WaR category. Through the lens of Norwegian practice, it shows how restrictive interpretations of UNHCR’s criteria and securitized resettlement processes reinforce a culture of disbelief and a focus on non-state protection by men. The application of WaR incentivizes family separation and perpetuates essentialist ideas about women’s vulnerabilities. While a broader category for gender-based risks can moderate WaR’s exclusionary effects, it similarly contributes to legitimizing harmful border regimes.

Citations

• Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others
• Categories that Blind Us, Categories that Bind Them: The Deployment of the Notion of Vulnerability for Syrian Refugees in Turkey
• Saving Brown Women from Brown Men? “Refugee Women”, Gender and the Racialised Politics of Protection

Discussions

• 🚨 Publication Alert 🚨 @jesslschultz.bsky.social scrutinizes the logic and consequences of the refugee “women at risk” category, weighing the value of a gendered category in addressing women’s prote [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]