Researchers from the Local Engagement Refugee Research Network (LERRN) are looking to make research on refugees more inclusive and equitable.
The project partners with civil society organizations in Canada, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon and Tanzania and primarily focuses its research in the Global South, where most of the world’s refugees live.
The Charlatan sat down with James Milner, a professor at Carleton University and LERRN’s project director, to learn more about the initiative.
The Charlatan (TC): Can you explain what LERRN is?
James Milner (JM): LERRN is a partnership between academics and civil society actors around the world, but primarily in Canada, East Africa and the Middle East. Since 2018, we’ve been trying to change the dynamics of refugee research. Eighty per cent of the world’s refugees are in the Global South, but 90 per cent of the most-cited research comes from academics like me in the Global North. We recognize that there are forms of knowledge, perspectives and expertise that have been silenced in both the study of refugee issues and in global policy discussions. We’ve been working to try and amplify the perspectives of those who are most affected by displacement.
TC: What has been the impact of LERRN?
JM: LERRN has been part of piloting new approaches to thinking about how scholars in the Global North and those affected by displacement in the Global South can collaborate. There’s a long tradition of academic research on refugees being quite extractive. We take the results, and we leave. LERRN has created platforms for researchers in the Dadaab refugee camps in Kenya, for example, to publish their own working papers. This raises new questions and identifies new forms of knowledge.
We’ve had the greatest impact in public-facing spaces. In 2019, LERRN and other refugee advocates encouraged the Government of Canada to include a refugee advisor in its delegation to the Global Refugee Forum in Geneva. The government made that a standing commitment, as long as LERRN supported the creation of the Refugee Advisory Network of Canada. We also supported an initiative called R-SEAT (Refugees Seeking Equal Access at the Table) seeking to encourage other governments to follow Canada’s example.
When the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees executive committee meets in October, many countries will have refugee advisors in their delegations. LERRN trains refugee advocates with lived experience so when they go into meetings with policymakers, they know how to navigate those political spaces.
When LERRN started, the imbalance of power between states or international organizations and those who’ve been affected by displacement seemed insurmountable, but I think we’ve seen a very slow change towards equilibrium. LERRN played a very important role in bringing about that change.
TC: How has LERRN impacted academia?
JM: LERRN is very much part of a more general movement in academia to think about power, how we decolonize research and how we think about the relationship between those whom we research and those who own knowledge. We’re recognizing that the old model of academics being elites in ivory towers who extract knowledge, publish that knowledge and build their academic careers is no longer an ethically defensible position. LERRN is part of a tradition where knowledge is something that is shared, not something to be extracted.
TC: What does LERRN’s future look like?
JM: The first version of LERRN focused on civil society partners. The next phase is going to focus specifically on refugee-led organizations in different regions of the Global South and understanding the role they play in knowledge production and policy change.
At the last big UN meeting on refugees in December 2023, less than 10 per cent of participants were refugees. I would like to see our research continue to change that balance so the study of and policy discussions on refugee and forced migration issues are more systematically informed by the knowledge and the expertise of those who have experienced displacement.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Featured photo provided by James Milner.
