Syrian Refugee Resettlement in Canada

This web archive strives to offer a documented commentary on the most recent addition to the Canadian resettlement scheme, the Blended Visa Office-Referred (BVOR) program. The program constitutes a modified version of private sponsorship of refugee and immigrant applicants; it has to be examined in relation to both private and government resettlement schemes, and in comparison to the historical use of private sponsorship for Indochinese refugees. The documents presented here allow an examination of the background debates that led to the institutionalization of the BVOR program, the challenges BVOR is intended to address, public and political debates concerning the proposed division of public and private responsibility, and the links made between this particular model and the public acceptance of the en masse resettlement of select Syrian refugees in Canada​.

This refugee crisis raises important political and legal questions for both the Canadian public and Canadian policymakers. Who is deemed to be a deserving refugee, who is eligible for resettlement and based on what criteria, keeps changing. The current and future saliency of migration could be succinctly revealed by examining factors such as which categories of migration hold significance, how they are constructed and determined, and by whom. The debate continues and must do so above and beyond policy measures, legal requirements and formal immigration regimes. It is also of utmost importance to underline that private sponsorship programs are to be in place as a complementary element to government-assisted resettlement commitments. They cannot eradicate the necessity of the Canadian government to fulfill its international obligations and humanitarian commitments in the face of mass displacements. The Syrians are unlikely to be the last group to suffer such a fate.