The invisibility of militarism in the making of the global health refugee crisis:
The case of Canada
Claudia Chaufan, MD, PhD
Associate Professor
York University, Toronto, Canada

Abstract

It is well-documented that refugees and displaced persons (R&DPs) experience multiple health and social problems. Observers in the mass media, social and health services, and academia sympathetic to the plight of R&DPs call for wealthier countries to provide safe havens, adequate health and social services, and a path to successful resettlement. However, even these sympathetic voices all too often fail to question why R&DPs become R&DPs in the first place.

In this study I investigate how the dominant narrative around the vulnerable health and social statuses of R&DP makes militarism invisible. By militarism I mean the belief that the military has a legitimate role to play in furthering national interests and settling international disputes. iI draw from critical political economy, critical functionalism, and critical discourse analysis to examine how documents from human rights organizations, policy circles, academia and the mass media frame the health and social problems of R&DPs resettling in Canada.

I find that Canada’s engagement in military missions that significantly impact the global refugee crisis is all but ignored, even by liberal and progressive sectors of Canadian society who otherwise advocate for the health, wellbeing, and rights of R&DPs. As these sectors neglect the geopolitical and neocolonial drivers of the crisis, while rightly underscoring its social and health effects, they effectively legitimize the militarization of the Canadian state and of Canadian society, precluding a solution to the crisis and its social and health effects any time soon.

I conclude that policies that frame R&DPs as “vulnerable” without seriously engaging the root causes of their vulnerability blame the victims, while reproducing the very circumstances causing the problems that these policies purport to address. I therefore call for policymakers, practitioners and academics to challenge the militarization of their societies that lead to continuing wars, threatening social and health equity at local, national and global levels. Short of the total abolition of these wars, the global refugee crisis will only intensify.

Keywords
Global health policy and politics; militarism; neo-colonial wars; refugee crisis









Introduction
There is currently significant debate around the crisis of refugees and displaced persons (henceforth R&DPs). A recent report by the United Nations refugee agency, Global Trends, indicates that 65.3 million people were displaced from their homes by the end of 2015, compared to 59.5 million a decade earlier. According to the report, this translates into 24 people who, in 2015, were forced to flee their homes every minute, compared to six a decade earlier – all of them staggering numbers. It is well-established that R&DPs experience poorer health, both mental and physical, compared to the non-R&DP population. Even when in good health, this population experiences a wide range of social problems, including food insecurity, homelessness, and precarious employment, among many others. Their precarious economic and social situation, as well as their vulnerable political status, in turn contributes to the poor physical and mental health status of R&DPs worldwide.

Confronted with this scenario, the usual response, from mass media, policy circles, and academia, is to underscore the inadequacy of the social and health services available to R&DPs, and the importance that wealthier and safer countries step up to the plate and provide safe havens to this population. And there is no denying that social and health services available to R&DPs are inadequate, especially as their numbers increase, alongside the engagement of Western nations in the “Global War on Terror”. There is also no denying that if Western nations will shoulder at least in part the responsibility of a “global war” with no end in sight, they should compensate the millions displaced by it from their homelands, by welcoming them into their own and providing adequate health and social services. Indeed, social and health researchers have often argued that focusing on the real or perceived vulnerabilities of R&DPs, or worse still, the real or imagined danger that they represent to host countries is tantamount to blaming the victim. Nevertheless, even well-meaning researchers all but fail to question why R&DPs become R&DPs in the first place, and why they would originate in certain areas of the world and not others. Indeed, the world distribution of R&DPs is not random: it is precisely residents in those countries that are at the crosshairs of the “Global war on terror” who are far more likely to become R&DPs than, say, a native born New Yorker.

Study goals, theoretical lenses, data and methods
In this study I investigate how the dominant narrative around the vulnerable health and social statuses of R&DP makes militarism invisible. By dominant narrative I mean an account of the situation that helps reproduce a social order and structure of domination that makes war either invisible or the need for war appear inevitable. By militarism I mean the belief that the military has a legitimate role to play in furthering national interests and settling international disputes.

I draw from critical political economy, critical functionalism, and critical discourse analysis to examine how a range of “communities of discourse”, represented by documents from human rights organizations, policy circles, academia, government and the mass media frame the health and social problems of R&DPs resettling in Canada. I also investigate the sophisticated discursive apparatus of avoidance or overt denial that as I hope to show has developed among leading liberal sectors of Western society, including the mass media, the nonprofit sector, and academia. I focus on liberal sectors as, unlike conservative and right-leaning sectors, liberal sectors are usually portrayed as advocating for, rather than demonizing, the vulnerable and dispossessed – in this case R&DPs.
Findings and analysis
I find that across several communities of this course Canada’s engagement in military missions that significantly impact the global refugee crisis is all but ignored, even by liberal and progressive sectors of Canadian society who otherwise advocate for the health, wellbeing, and rights of R&DPs, therefore making this narrative very persuasive. That being said, as these sectors neglect the geopolitical and neocolonial drivers of the crisis they effectively legitimize the militarization of the Canadian state and of Canadian society, precluding a solution to the crisis and its social and health effects any time soon.

Discussion and policy implications
Militarism driving the neo-colonial wars currently waged in the name of combating “terror”, is a critical, all but ignored political and social determinant of health. I conclude that policies aimed at assisting “vulnerable populations”, such as R&DPs, that do not seriously engage militarism as a major social and political determinant of health all but blame the victims, while reproducing the very circumstances causing the problems that these policies purport to address. My rationale is that it would be unreasonable to expect that the invasion and occupation of country after country driven by militaristic national policies would not lead to millions of R&DPs worldwide in poor health, much as it would be unreasonable to expect healthy populations under conditions of unemployment, food insecurity, or homelessness, even in the absence of invasions and occupations. Why focus in Canada, I argue that my findings have implications for Global health equity and social justice in other similarly situated Western, developed nations. Finally, we propose that the question of militarism should be included in any intersectoral collaboration engaged in the common goal of achieving health equity at local and global levels.