Balakian
Biographic Data
| ID | 50827 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Balakian |
| FAMILY NAME | Balakian |
| SIGNATURE | BALAKIAN |
| AFFILIATIONS | George Mason University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9160-9502 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 41 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 9 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Precarious motherhood
Rachel Benchekroun’s book, Precarious Motherhood: Navigating Relationships and Support Post-Migration in the UK, charts the complexity of social relationships amidst the grinding insecurity of life...
In the hands of the UN”
In 2014, the Banyamulenge Congolese community in Nairobi commemorated the tenth anniversary of a massacre in Burundi’s Gatumba refugee camp. The anniversary coincided with a Kenyan government directive to deport refugees from the capital city to UN-run camps. In this context, the community invited UNHCR and NGO staff to the memorial, where they connected the violence they experienced in Gatumba to their resistance to future encampment. By hosting…
The fraudulent family
In 2012 the US government began requiring DNA testing in its Refugee Family Reunification Program, which was primarily used by refugees from African countries. The policy was established to allay concerns that refugees were committing "family-composition fraud," or including people outside their families in their resettlement and reunification cases. In humanitarian contexts "fraud" has often been understood as resulting from scarcity, corruption…
Working on resettlement
Of aunts and mothers
People living as refugees in Kenya have often reconstituted families and households in the wake of violence and displacement. Aunts and other kin act as primary caregivers for children who are orphaned or separated from biogenetic parents. Yet, state and non-governmental bureaucracies that manage refugee resettlement use the biogenetic, nuclear family as a standard for resettlement and family reunification. People whose networks of social care ex…
Navigating Patchwork Governance
Refugee resettlement is accomplished through the intersecting administration of state and non-state actors with competing claims and interests. These competing claims are caught between humanitarian imperatives to rescue the most vulnerable refugees on one hand and security demands to protect national borders from those deemed undesirable and undeserving on the other. Based on ethnographic research with Somali refugees in Nairobi from 2013 to 201…
Campus Policing
Money Is Your Government
During a 2014 security operation in Kenya known as Operation Usalama Watch, Somali refugees spoke of money as their only valid ID, knowing that only cash, in contrast to identity documents, would be accepted by police and military. The article argues that such extortion should not be interpreted uncategorically as an example of refugees' exclusion from state-derived citizenship rights. Rather, by paying bribes to resist forced removal from Nairob…
Poems
Money Is Your Government
During a 2014 security operation in Kenya known as Operation Usalama Watch, Somali refugees spoke of money as their only valid ID, knowing that only cash, in contrast to identity documents, would be accepted by police and military. The article argues that such extortion should not be interpreted uncategorically as an example of refugees' exclusion from state-derived citizenship rights. Rather, by paying bribes to resist forced removal from Nairob…
Navigating Patchwork Governance
Refugee resettlement is accomplished through the intersecting administration of state and non-state actors with competing claims and interests. These competing claims are caught between humanitarian imperatives to rescue the most vulnerable refugees on one hand and security demands to protect national borders from those deemed undesirable and undeserving on the other. Based on ethnographic research with Somali refugees in Nairobi from 2013 to 201…
Working on resettlement
The fraudulent family
In 2012 the US government began requiring DNA testing in its Refugee Family Reunification Program, which was primarily used by refugees from African countries. The policy was established to allay concerns that refugees were committing "family-composition fraud," or including people outside their families in their resettlement and reunification cases. In humanitarian contexts "fraud" has often been understood as resulting from scarcity, corruption…
Poems
Campus Policing
Money Is Your Government
During a 2014 security operation in Kenya known as Operation Usalama Watch, Somali refugees spoke of money as their only valid ID, knowing that only cash, in contrast to identity documents, would be accepted by police and military. The article argues that such extortion should not be interpreted uncategorically as an example of refugees' exclusion from state-derived citizenship rights. Rather, by paying bribes to resist forced removal from Nairob…
Navigating Patchwork Governance
Refugee resettlement is accomplished through the intersecting administration of state and non-state actors with competing claims and interests. These competing claims are caught between humanitarian imperatives to rescue the most vulnerable refugees on one hand and security demands to protect national borders from those deemed undesirable and undeserving on the other. Based on ethnographic research with Somali refugees in Nairobi from 2013 to 201…
Of aunts and mothers
People living as refugees in Kenya have often reconstituted families and households in the wake of violence and displacement. Aunts and other kin act as primary caregivers for children who are orphaned or separated from biogenetic parents. Yet, state and non-governmental bureaucracies that manage refugee resettlement use the biogenetic, nuclear family as a standard for resettlement and family reunification. People whose networks of social care ex…
In the hands of the UN”
In 2014, the Banyamulenge Congolese community in Nairobi commemorated the tenth anniversary of a massacre in Burundi’s Gatumba refugee camp. The anniversary coincided with a Kenyan government directive to deport refugees from the capital city to UN-run camps. In this context, the community invited UNHCR and NGO staff to the memorial, where they connected the violence they experienced in Gatumba to their resistance to future encampment. By hosting…
The fraudulent family
In 2012 the US government began requiring DNA testing in its Refugee Family Reunification Program, which was primarily used by refugees from African countries. The policy was established to allay concerns that refugees were committing "family-composition fraud," or including people outside their families in their resettlement and reunification cases. In humanitarian contexts "fraud" has often been understood as resulting from scarcity, corruption…
Working on resettlement
Precarious motherhood
Rachel Benchekroun’s book, Precarious Motherhood: Navigating Relationships and Support Post-Migration in the UK, charts the complexity of social relationships amidst the grinding insecurity of life...
Political science (5 works) · Sociology (5 works) · Law (4 works) · Migration, Refugees, and Integration (4 works) · Refugee (4 works) · Economic growth (3 works) · Ethnography (3 works) · Law (3 works) · Migration and Labor Dynamics (3 works) · Anthropology (2 works)