A preoccupation of much refugee research is the use of government and community services by refugees. The question often asked is whether government or local community organizations provide the best services for refugees. Another concern involves the lack of training of social workers who, it is believed, do not understand the special needs of some refugee groups.
The federal government and various community organizations are especially concerned with providing services that are beneficial to refugees. This has spawned a number of research projects evaluating existing services. In Edmonton, Seffeiddine (1997) analyzed the efficacy of refugee serving agencies. Seffeiddine's work is a longitudinal study looking at the ability of community organizations to facilitate the long term integration of refugees. She evaluated service agencies by asking refugees about their experiences with existing services and their suggestions for improvement.
Gingrich (1995) in Regina and Shearer (1989) in Vancouver have used similar types of examination in their respective cities and attempted to undertand the complex process of resettlement by contrasting successful and unsuccessful cases of integration. Neuwirth and Eyton (1989) have identified several factors influencing the successful integration of immigrants and refugees in a Canada-wide context. As well, MacLeod and Shin (1993) have produced a needs assessment of immigrant services in Canada in context to the needs of female refugees.
Ho (1996, 1997) finds that refugees are largely under-served by settlement agencies in Edmonton. This is due to two factors. First, many refugees are not aware of all the services available to them. This problem could be resolved by increased advertising and making social service workers aware of existing programs. Second, of the refugees that are aware of these services, many believe that such services are available only to immigrants because of the titles of organizations (for example, the Millwoods Centre for Immigrants), or that they are available only to refugees from certain countries. Ho also finds that immigrants experience similar problems in identifying with service agencies. They too misunderstand organizational titles as referring to services for particular groups of immigrants and refugees. She suggests these problems may be alleviated with additional training of social workers and possibly changing the names of certain programs to reflect their inclusiveness of all immigrants and refugees. In addition, the recruitment of social service workers from refugee communities could help the organization and operation of existing services.
Like Ho, Matsuoka and Sorenson (1991) and Gold (1989) agree that refugees should be included in the operation of service organizations for refugees. This is because the service needs of refugees are not the same as other groups. It is felt that intimate knowledge of the refugee experience can better facilitate their integration into society and this can be accomplished by hiring refugees as social workers and service providers. Matsuoka and Sorenson's research on Ethiopian refugees and Gold's interviews with Vietnamese and Soviet Jewish refugees reveal that the internal political and ethnic divisions of certain refugee groups must also be considered when providing community services. This is because there are different needs within a seemingly homogenous refugee community and in the utilization of services. According to Matsuoka and Sorenson, the most successful model for delivering services to diverse communities is the bridging approach, developed by Immigrant Access Service in Winnipeg. In this approach, agencies hire workers from different ethno-cultural and political backgrounds to serve clients from similar backgrounds. This helps to provide more relevant services in a non-discriminatory manner.
Despite the emphasis in Canada on the control and active participation of refugees in the provision of services, there is some research to suggest that the hiring of refugees as community workers is not necessarily beneficial for service organizations. Hardy (1994) examines the under-organization of refugee services in both the government and community sectors. She indicates that organizations run by refugees are not necessarily the best organized or the best equipped to provide services. Although they may have more intimate understanding of other refugees, these workers are not in a position to direct other refugees to services that they require. Similarly, Lengyel (1989) finds in his study of a refugee-run resettlement camp in Wisconsin that refugee involvement can end in failure. The major flaws with this approach include: (1) treatment of the activities of certain individuals as though they represented the beliefs and ideas of all others in the camp; (2) that the real motive of the government is to reduce their costs in maintaining this resettlement camp, not to increase involvement of refugees; and (3) the relationship between refugees and administration were characterized by elitism.
Related to the debate of training of refugees as service providers is the training of social workers to handle the special needs of refugees. Cheung and Canda (1994) and Burgess and Reynolds (1995) describe a unique approach for preparing social workers to work with refugees. Instead of placing the emphasis on the refugee to integrate, social workers work with refugee families and the larger community so that integration occurs with both the refugee and receiving society. It is believed that this dual emphasis will better facilitate the integration of refugees.
As suggested above, the successful resettlement of refugees cannot be accomplished by social workers and refugees alone. Ryan and Epstein (1987) point out that although extensive training of social workers on the unique situation of refugees is important in providing services better suited for refugees’ needs, this is not enough. Understanding from the larger community and other organizations is needed in order to aid the integration process since it is a community-wide endeavor. McInnes (1986) agrees. Additional refugee-specific training for social workers can work if different institutional areas cooperate, including all government organizations, the education system, healthcare delivery services and commercial businesses.
There are other research areas in the service provision for refugees that are not as contentious. These include studies which focus on the needs of specific groups. In the United States, Jenkins' (1983) study on service utilization pays special attention to the needs of refugee children. The needs of children are often very different from those of adult refugees and existing services do not adequately address the situation of these children. Although Le Doux and Stephens (1992) do not focus specifically on the special needs of children, they also recognize the need for more diverse services targeted to specific immigrant and refugee groups.
Access to healthcare services by Vietnamese refugees in Victoria is the subject of Stephenson's (1995) study. The acquisition of healthcare by refugees in Victoria is characterized by a lack of understanding on the part of service providers of traditional remedies, problematic interpretations of patient symptoms and other language barriers. This problem may be even greater for refugees living in smaller urban centres. Healthcare services in rural and remote areas are often small-scale and the communities often lack a sufficiently large ethnic population to assist in the integration of new refugees. Stephenson suggests that healthcare providers in large and small centres should concentrate on the diverse needs of their clients and receive special training and interpretation services to eliminate some of these accessibility problems.