The UNHCR reports an anticipated growing number of migration movements in Africa that will increase the amount of prolonged refugee situations, with the international debate regarding refugee policies discussing local integration as a durable solution. Local integration policy is dependent on the acceptance and willingness of the host population and can engender tensions between refugees and hosts, which could be a result of their uneven power distribution, with one group possessing more social power, leading to more opportunities in the community. The objective of this study is to examine the relationship between refugees and host community in a settlement and seeks to expose any tensions that could arise between the groups from an uneven power distribution by using an analytical framework based on Norbert Elias’ book The Established and the Outsiders, which focuses on community problems between two groups. This thesis draws on a field study of the Nakivale Refugee Settlement in southern Uganda that has a refugee policy partially aimed towards local integration. The data has been collected through semi-structured interviews and observations as part of an ethnographic approach. The interviewed key stakeholders have been refugees and host populations living within the settlement as well as government officials and representatives from international organisations, IGOs and NGOs. Using Elias’ theory as a universal analytical tool showed us that there are established-outsider constellations creating tensions in a community, however these tensions do not fully rely on the qualities of the relationship. Moreover, results from the study indicate that the relationship between nationals and refugees in the settlement and the tensions it fostered are to a very large degree influenced by external factors, more specifically by the Ugandan government and international organisations as well as the complexity of group dimensions and situations, which contributed to a weakened host population.

This thesis investigates young refugee women’s experience of the process of seeking access to justice for cases of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in Nakivale refugee settlement in Uganda. A Human Rights-based Approach (HRBA) is chosen as an analytical framework to help conceptualise access to justice and to recognise Uganda’s commitment to refugees. A qualitative explanatory approach follows the narrative of Burundian and Congolese women.    Findings show that Nakivale refugee settlement has an overwhelming demand for legal services and support. Refugee women can raise a claim for justice through the established administrative structures in place within the settlement. All refugee women were aware of their entitlements to a remedy and on the process of reporting SGBV. Yet, the analysis shows that none of the SGBV-survivors of rape or sexual exploitation was able to have access to justice. Several barriers were brought forward, such as corruption among refugee welfare committees; limited staff and resources among partner organisations; a bureaucratic referral system; poor police investigations and an inability to persecute perpetrators. The consequences without effective and timely remedies led the interviewed women into further poverty and a continuation of violence and abuse.   This thesis concludes that Refugee Welfare Committees have to be attributed to some sort of compensation as validation for their work as justice providers to mitigate corruption among their leaders. Further research is encouraged to look into possibilities of extending the mandate and training for Refugee Welfare Committees, for refugee-based structures to be able to handle cases of SGBV.