Spreading the 'burden'? A review of policies to disperse asylum seekers and refugees

Europe´s changing position in the global refugee system has brought many more asylum seekers to the continent than was previously the case. Many of these people have chosen to settle in particular towns and cities, either near their port of entry or near communities of people from their own country. Politicians, the media and the public have perceived this concentration of asylum seekers as a 'problem' and have demanded that the 'burden' be spread more evenly. As a result, European governments are now engaging in one of the largest exercises in social engineering that the continent has seen since the Second World War. Hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers and refugees in Europe are now being denied their basic right to choose where they live and are instead being compulsory dispersed.

This topical book outlines the expressed rationale for dispersal policies, reviews how such policies have been implemented in three European countries (The UK, Netherlands, Sweden), identifies good practice, and, finally, challenges the need for dispersal.

Spreading the 'burden'? is:

• the first book-length study of dispersal policies;
• explicitly comparative in nature and written by three national experts;
• highly topical and controversial as the review of dispersal policies is under way in many countries;
• a valuable case study of how society deals with 'outsider' groups and space.

The book is essential reading for national and local policy makers, those interested in human rights, social policy and refugee studies, as well as human geographers and sociologists.

Vaughan Robinson is Professor in Human Geography at University of Wales, Swansea and is the Director of the Migration Unit there. Roger Andersson is a Professor of Social and Economic Geography in the Institute for Housing and Urban Research at Uppsala University, Sweden. Professor Sako Musterd is Director of the Study Centre for the Metropolitan Environment at the University of Amsterdam.

"Dispersal policies have been a political placebo, not an effective policy. This excellent book throws open this debate. It provides a systematic analysis of the effectiveness of dispersal policies and demonstrates best and worst practice."
Ceri Peach, Department of Geography, University of Oxford, UK