New Land, New Life: Long-Term Settlement of Refugees in New Zealand Main Report

Quota Refugees Ten Years On: Perspectives on Integration, Community, and Identity is a multi-year research programme that was developed to better understand the long-term journeys of refugees in New Zealand. The research programme was led by the Department of Labour, with the Ministry of Social Development and the Department of Internal Affairs acting as key partner agencies. The first phase of the research was an annotated bibliography and thematic review of the relevant literature, which provided evidence on the factors that act as facilitators or barriers to integration. The second phase gathered stakeholders’ perspectives on significant changes in the refugee resettlement sector since 1987 and on the development of refugee communities in New Zealand. The third phase, covered in this report, was a face–to-face survey of 512 former refugees who arrived in New Zealand under the Refugee Quota Programme between 1993 and 1999. The survey was designed to be representative of the population of refugees who arrived during this period and achieved a response rate of 41.5 percent. The report also includes findings from in-depth interviews and focus groups that were used to explore certain aspects of the survey in greater depth.