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Chapter 16 - Re-building Trust and Connectedness in Exile

The Role of Health and Social Institutions

from Part III - Intersectoral Psychosocial Interventions in Working with Refugee Families

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 August 2020

By
Radhika Santhanam-Martin
Edited by
Lucia De Haene  and
Cécile Rousseau
Lucia De Haene
Affiliation:
University of Leuven, Belgium
Cécile Rousseau
Affiliation:
McGill University, Montréal
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Summary

"This chapter considers the role of institutions in re-building trust and connection for families in exile. It introduces the evolutionary evidence that human beings are co-operative breeders and that, as a result, the need to belong and connect to communities or groups is central for human flourishing. It draws on reflections on the experiences of refugees, which are shaped by the destruction of human connectedness. In this context, the chapter explores the role of the institutions and service providers who come in contact with refugee people and families. It discusses the approaches systems create to re-build trust and connection in the post-trauma phase and argues that these approaches can indeed lead to the re-building and re-making of trust, but that they can also create a re-enacting and re-breaking of trust and connectedness. Thus, it is useful to explore frameworks and principles that may assist in shaping approaches so that relational repair, and not further rupture, can occur. In the final section, the chapter recommends therapeutic practices for practitioners to consider when doing the work of re-building trust for refugee families."

Keywords

refugeestraumatrustconnectionrepairruptureparallel process
Type
Chapter
Information
Working with Refugee Families
Trauma and Exile in Family Relationships
 , pp. 265 - 276
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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