Respuestas humanitarias para personas en movimiento. La experiencia del Programa Casa Refugiados

EDUCATION FOR PEACE
Every day, a significant number of individuals arrive in cities like Mexico City driven by various factors, including tourism and business, among many other reasons. There also exists a certain group of people who travel to Mexico City in search of favorable conditions for the development of incorporation procedures, which lead to eventual local integration and community engagement. In these situations, the actions of a wide variety of actors play a crucial role. Since its inception as a collective in 1988, the Programa Casa Refugiados (PCR) in Mexico City has been working toward community transformation through socialization spaces provided by peace education, starting from community work. After operating as a community center, Programa Casa Refugiados was officially established as an organization through efforts of its co-founder, José Luis Loera, in collaboration with Amnesty International and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). PCR focused on refugee-related advocacy actions and activism. In the mid-2010s, the growing need for humanitarian actions led to PCR’s transformation into a civil association and separated from Amnesty International to embark on its own path. In 2015, PCR launched its humanitarian program, which has played an important role in supporting migrant caravans since 2010, and later during the COVID-19 pandemic period.

Today it operates four active centers that offer refuge, humanitarian assistance, workshops and other services [see box]. The organization extends its support to individuals displaced by violence who seek international protection in Mexico. PCR’s humanitarian effort focuses on facilitating local integration processes and promoting conditions that enable individuals to exercise their rights adequately. One PCR’s primary function is education: it conducts training activities and conferences that address refugee conditions from the perspective of asylum as a human right, and aim to materialize such a right for this way of migration that is subject to international protection.

A key objective of the organization is to make communities aware. The organization was founded on the principles of education and community work, aiming to foster a multicultural environment and to create spaces for coexistence. Over time, PCR has transitioned towards humanitarian work. The approach differs from that of many other civil society organizations [see p. 164 of this number]. While most start from a humanitarian perspective, assisting migrants based on detected needs, and then moving towards humanitarian aid, PCR takes an inverse path. The organization starts from community transformation and assumes that the individuals it works with intend to settle in Mexico. Therefore, we’re not talking about migrants, but people who will become part of the local community. PCR’s community work focuses on peace education and humanitarian assistance.

Another key objective of the organization is to engage in networks, which are considered essential for creating meaningful impact. PCR collaborates with the 13 existent refuges in Mexico City, legal advisory organizations, the United Nations and governmental institutions such as the Mexican Commission for Refugee Aid.


PROGRAMA CASA REFUGIADOS AND UNAM
PCR maintains a strong connection with UNAM, particularly with the University Seminar on Studies on International Displacement, Migration, Exile and Repatriation (SUDIMER, Spanish initials), among various schools, faculties and institutes that foster dynamic and regular relationships through the capacity of students and teachers to contribute and learn in a complex and evolving context. People that have studied at UNAM, and later involved in reality transformations like PCR, have played a crucial role in the survival of thousands of people and contributed to the construction of peace. Students and academics have incorporated solidarity actions, integration initiatives, awareness efforts, and agency for community development.

PCR has provided support to individuals from over 100 different countries, many of whom are fleeing armed conflicts in emergency situations. For instance, PCR has developed good effective practices in assisting a group of people from Afghanistan, survivors of an armed conflict who were forced to leave their homeland to save their lives. They were able to build a protection bridge through personal social networks, collaborating with experts like Dr. Luciana Gandini from UNAM’s Institute for Legal Research and SUDIMER coordinator; Dr. Rodrigo Medellín from the Institute of Ecology, and Dr. Pedro de la Cruz from the National School of Social Work. This multidisciplinary inter-university group aimed to transform the reality of newly arrived refugees, addressing the vulnerabilities they faced before arriving in Mexico—they faced challenges such as language, lack of information, and pressing needs for medical care, nutrition and housing. By working together, it was possible to develop dignifying actions that enabled refugees to build their necessities for a new life in their host country. Beyond providing refuge and food in collaboration with other institutions, PCR’s accompaniment for migrants begin with an initial interview, in which PCR provides useful information to assist them in making informed decisions about their journey or about seeking residence in Mexico. For refugees that can stay, PCR offers legal advice and support. If migrants have children, PCR initiates educational processes, through the recognition of education as a form of protection: this continuous educational accompaniment is provided regardless of the migrant status. For those who decide to settle in Mexico, PCR offers support in their local integration process. This includes skill certification, employability assistance oriented to combating labor informality, which can be a source of risk for migrants. Thus, PCR offers psychological assistance and community action areas that work towards changing the narrative that criminalizes migration. In essence, PCR’s actions aim to empower migrants.

An example of the positive outcomes from the collaboration between civil society, PCR, particularly, and UNAM, is the series of workshops conducted with teachers and students from the National Preparatory School No. 5 “José Vasconcelos”. These workshops and conferences aimed to educate about the challenges people face during mobility in the undergraduate programs of International Relations, Psychology, and Law. In collaboration with the School of Social Work, the International Observatory of Humanitarian

Assistance for Migrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers was established as a space born out of the need to structure humanitarian responses with critical analysis and documentation capabilities. The observatory serves as a platform that can structure and articulate different groups to address the needs and problems faced by people during mobility. The activities developed include language lessons, volunteering opportunities, social service projects, professional internships, participation in forums, intercultural fairs, and celebrations, among many others.

REFUGEES’ PERSPECTIVES
In the initial stage of PCR’s intervention with refugees, the organization sees a vast and diverse population. PCR provides counseling, initial information, and integration support to a large group of people. The organization has been present in caravans and camps where the number of people is immense: in the past year alone, more than half a million people passed through Mexico City. While PCR is unable to assist the entire half-million people, it strives to provide as much information as possible to those who seek their help. PCR estimates that approximately 40 per cent of this population—about 200,000 people—will decide to settle in Mexico. This is the group that PCR focuses on, providing accompaniment to help them register as asylum seekers under the refugee condition. Of the 40 per cent PCR assists, a third are men, another third are women over 18, and the remaining 30 per cent are infants dependent on adults. This means that close to half of the people PCR accompanies arrive in family units.

Through the accompaniment for local integration, whose services are free, these individuals can obtain documentation and so be able to get a job, access to health care services, and overall, exercise their rights. Integration may be jeopardized if this does not take place in the initial stage following the migrants’ arrival; it would be as if to tell them there is no interest in their integration into Mexico when we do not provide them necessary tools to be employed. If inequality was a factor among the circumstances that compelled people to flee, then upon arriving here, inequality would be perpetuating itself. There will most likely be a second or third migration if there are no integration conditions, and in the direst scenario, they would have to return to the environment that made them move.

Over the last two years, due to the policies implemented by several governments, many people who should have been deported to their homeland were instead deported to Mexico. These policies have also generated the comeback of people that will no longer seek to reach those countries again. This implies that they must begin the process of integration into Mexico, as they have no desire to return to their country of origin nor enter the United States; the alternative is Mexico.

The examples illustrate how PCR, in collaboration with other citizen initiatives and the committed participation of diverse UNAM entities, constructs bridges that acknowledge the complex and dynamic reality of refugees. These collaborative efforts are crucial in highlighting the transformative power of community-driven construction, where diverse willingness and intentions to create a better reality converge, leading to emergent changes.

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