Refugees in Countries without Refugee Laws: Exiled Tibetans in India, Nepal, and Taiwan

Principle Investigator：Mei-Lin Pan、Dolma Tsering

According to the definition by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR): “Refugees are persons who are outside their country of origin for reasons of feared persecution, conflict, generalized violence, or other circumstances that have seriously disturbed public order and, as a result, require international protection." Based on the UNHCR report, the number of refugees rose to 82.4 million in 2020, and the war between Russia and Ukraine increased even more to set records. It has demonstrated that refugees are not a transient issue but a global reality that cannot be ignored. How do refugees survive? Different from the existing discourses, such as treating refugees as social problems or discussing the life situation of political philosophy, this study adopts the survival strategy orientation of refugees as human beings, especially in countries without refugee laws. This study will focus on exiled Tibetans in  India, Nepal, and Taiwan. How do they negotiate with structural constraints to make a living in these receiving counties? These are the questions to be explored.