What you need to know

The benefits of refugee participation for organisations

Participation can have very tangible benefits to your service or organisation and to refugees and refugee communities. There are practical reasons why refugee participation should be developed:

• You will get a better understanding of refugees’ needs and aspirations, as well as of their current circumstances (including the impact of the asylum system and other legislation), and of how your service or organisation impacts refugees’ lives.
• You will have access to expertise and human resources that would be otherwise missed. This could include new perspectives that can help improve services.
• Participation can foster community cohesion, especially when refugees have opportunities to meet and participate with people from other backgrounds. It can help develop mutual understanding and reduce tension and conflict.
• Participation provides everyone involved with insights into the quality and cost-effectiveness of services. Effective feedback mechanisms can identify gaps and inefficiencies, and co-production practices can foster innovation. Participation helps organisations reflect on emerging issues, and can support more proactive approaches, as well as increase the resilience that is needed to deal with urgent and unexpected matters.
• Participation creates opportunities for all to learn and reflect on biases and misconceptions. Very often service delivery issues arise out of lack of cultural awareness and intercultural communication skills. Participation entails dialogue and listening, and these can be fundamental for developing more effective services.
• Participation helps remove stigma and mistrust among refugee communities and between them and providers. Refugees and asylum seekers are often wary of authorities because of their previous experiences. This usually includes police forces, local authorities, government departments, and other public services. Through participatory practices, refugees develop more trust in institutions and providers in the UK.
• Participation is a key aspect of tackling the factors that lead to the marginalisation of refugee communities.
• Participation creates opportunities for refugees to scrutinise performance, assess services, and challenge policies, thus increasing transparency and accountability.

This list is not exhaustive, but provides evidence that, apart from providing opportunities for developing more effective services, participation can have a range of benefits that support the wider integration of refugees and the positive impacts of this work go well beyond your service or organisation.

The benefits of refugee participation for refugee communities

• Refugees are better informed about their rights, entitlements, and responsibilities. They also have a deeper understanding of how services are planned and delivered in their area, which leads to better access and engagement, and more realistic expectations.
• Refugees develop leadership and other skills that can improve their communication and engagement with other stakeholders as well as lead to the development of more resilient refugee communities and robust refugee community organisations.
• Participation keeps people active, which has a positive influence on their wellbeing, and can help tackle social isolation in refugee communities. Most asylum seekers are not allowed to work, and refugees have lower employment rates than the general population, with the biggest gaps in the first few years after arrival in the region. 
• Through participation, refugees develop skills and knowledge that can help their economic and social integration. Participation activities can also help them improve their English, which has a positive effect on wider integration. Refugees also meet new people and networks, which can help improve their integration outcomes on several areas, and faster than without those opportunities.
• While refugees face numerous barriers to integrate in the UK, which can have a negative impact on their wellbeing. For many, these experiences can lead to re-traumatisation. Participation, on the other hand, can turn lived experience into opportunity and hope.

Suggested actions

• Think about and write down the potential benefits that developing refugee participation can have on the lives of refugees you work with, and their ability to rebuild their lives. Consider the benefits that refugee participation in other contexts can have on your service as well. You are probably already benefiting from refugees participating meaningfully in several other contexts, but there is a lot more to do.
• You can add these benefits to the briefing for senior leaders in your organisations that you are already working on. You will soon start working on a description of a participation opportunity, for which you need to recruit refugees, and to whom you need to advertise it. How would you make the role attractive? How would you communicate the benefits of the role to the refugees you want to recruit?