Community-based interventions for building social inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia: A systematic review

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Author(s)
Mahoney, Di
Siyambalapitiya, Samantha
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2017
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As refugee and asylum seeker numbers increase in Australia, their effective integration into society is facilitated by inclusion in social, economic and community life. This systematic review of the literature explored community-based programs that contribute to inclusion and social participation of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia. Four scholarly databases were searched for articles published between 2007 and 2017 resulting in five articles which met inclusion criteria. Although the studies identified were of variable quality, the findings suggest a number of factors that facilitate program effectiveness. These ...
View more >As refugee and asylum seeker numbers increase in Australia, their effective integration into society is facilitated by inclusion in social, economic and community life. This systematic review of the literature explored community-based programs that contribute to inclusion and social participation of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia. Four scholarly databases were searched for articles published between 2007 and 2017 resulting in five articles which met inclusion criteria. Although the studies identified were of variable quality, the findings suggest a number of factors that facilitate program effectiveness. These included where: (a) English language and communications skills were considered; (b) programs built on refugees’ own skills and experience prior to resettlement; (c) volunteers and mentors were involved; and (d) participants engaged in diverse projects that enabled new connections. The review highlights the paucity of well-researched interventions that build social inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia. Emerging evidence suggests that communitybased programs can positively increase social inclusion and connectedness amongst refugees and asylum seekers. Additional well-designed programs and evaluation of such programs are needed to better understand and identify effective interventions targeting social inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers.
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View more >As refugee and asylum seeker numbers increase in Australia, their effective integration into society is facilitated by inclusion in social, economic and community life. This systematic review of the literature explored community-based programs that contribute to inclusion and social participation of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia. Four scholarly databases were searched for articles published between 2007 and 2017 resulting in five articles which met inclusion criteria. Although the studies identified were of variable quality, the findings suggest a number of factors that facilitate program effectiveness. These included where: (a) English language and communications skills were considered; (b) programs built on refugees’ own skills and experience prior to resettlement; (c) volunteers and mentors were involved; and (d) participants engaged in diverse projects that enabled new connections. The review highlights the paucity of well-researched interventions that build social inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers in Australia. Emerging evidence suggests that communitybased programs can positively increase social inclusion and connectedness amongst refugees and asylum seekers. Additional well-designed programs and evaluation of such programs are needed to better understand and identify effective interventions targeting social inclusion of refugees and asylum seekers.
View less >
Journal Title
Journal of Social Inclusion
Volume
8
Issue
2
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2017. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Australia (CC BY-NC-ND 2.5 AU) License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/au/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, providing that the work is properly cited.
Subject
Social work
Social work not elsewhere classified
Sociology