Finding Safe Harbour

The scale of the global refugee crisis is hard to grasp. The United Nations Refugee Agency reported 79.5 million displaced people worldwide in 2019, and more than half of them were under eighteen. As more children and teenagers seek asylum, there is a growing need to understand how displacement affects a young person's well-being and development over the long term.

In Finding Safe Harbour, Emily Pelley examines how Canada responds to refugee youth, using Halifax, Nova Scotia, as her example. As a mid-sized urban centre, Halifax has brought together services and resources to support young people who arrive seeking refuge. Pelley begins with a broad introduction to the global displacement crisis and the effects of violence and armed conflict on young people. She then turns to the reciprocal adaptation that long-term integration of displaced youth into the receiving society requires.

This concise study of refugee resettlement ends with an in-depth discussion of how cities can make the most of their resilience resources by engaging meaningfully with refugee youth.