Description:

Does hosting refugees affect state repression towards the local population? Although there has been some attention paid to the link between refugee inflows and host state repression, an examination of the target of repression is lacking. Why do states repress local populations when they receive large numbers of refugees? Using in-depth case analysis of repression in Kenya during the presidencies of Daniel Arap Moi and Uhuru Kenyatta, our findings have important implications for understanding how refugee flows affect the repression-dissent nexus.

Shweta Moorthy is a Buffett Institute Visiting Scholar. She specializes in international politics, and her research explores the causes and consequences of conflicts. Her current projects are focused on understanding the politics of refugee treatment by their host states. Her doctoral work at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was on third-party intervention in ongoing international conflicts. In 2011, she was a visiting research scholar at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL), Belgium and is currently an assistant professor of political science at Northern Illinois University. She has also conducted policy research on nuclear proliferation issues at the India chapter of the Pugwash Conference. She teaches courses on international politics, interstate conflicts, South Asian security and quantitative methods.

This is part of the Faculty & Fellows Colloquium Series.