Rohingya Circle: Left Unbroken, Squared, or to Evaporate?

Abstract

What conclusions can the volume draw from so many ‘lesser roads’ traveled, that is, different camp narratives? Though the ultimate reality of Rohingya refugees wanting nothing more than a return to Rakhine and the Myanmar government refusing to accept them remains steadfast, five takeaways have been drawn, with various theoretical implications squeezed out.

The takeaways include institutionalized humanitarianism; ecological costs; host community–refugee relations; camp innovations and education; and personalized humanitarian work. Theoretically, the influxes cannot be explained by any paradigms from the realism school of thought, though all alternate paradigms (liberalism, in all its various forms; interdependence; and turbulence), shed partial light on the puzzles generated. Putting these alternate paradigms together in the ivory tower for coherent explanations leaves us where policy-makers and relief workers remain on the ground with realities: stranded.