People with Refugee Backgrounds: Innovating Career Research and Practice Through Systems and Narrative Approaches

Abstract

International migration is a daunting experience. The challenge of international migration for people with refugee backgrounds is further compounded by the often protracted migration process that may transcend the borders of several countries as well as by the trauma that stimulated their initial departure from their home country. In addition, for people with refugee backgrounds the challenge of beginning again in a culturally and linguistically unfamiliar host country is immense. The focus of this chapter is on people with refugee backgrounds who have been resettled. International migration, especially that of people with refugee backgrounds, also challenges host countries to find appropriate mechanisms to ensure safe and successful transitions. In the current climate of rapid societal change and high levels of international migration, career counselling seems to be in an ideal position to provide support for people with refugee backgrounds in resettlement countries. Indeed, career counselling was founded as a discipline at a time of great societal change and has always been underpinned by social justice values. However, career counselling is beset by challenges such as its western middle-class origins, its potential to lose touch with its social justice values, and its continued emphasis on individualised, psychological interventions. The complexity of the transition and resettlement of people with refugee backgrounds may be clearly understood from the perspective of systems theory and may be illustrated by systems mapping which facilitates the depiction of the recursive interplay of multiple influences. Systems mapping may be incorporated in narrative career counselling. In this regard, narrative career counselling has a role to play by eliciting the systemic stories of people with refugee backgrounds to better understand their career development and in facilitating inclusive and sustainable employment. Narrative career counselling promises more inclusive approaches although, to date, the evidence base is limited. The focus of this chapter is on an innovative response offered by systems and narrative approaches to career counselling and research in better understanding and responding to the career needs of people with refugee backgrounds in resettlement countries.