Policy Briefs & Testimonies

4 Items

A close up of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security seal on the front of a wooden podium.

Mariah Cisse/NPS

Policy Brief - Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Toward a Better Immigration System

    Authors:
  • Doris Meissner
  • Ruth Ellen Wasem
| Apr. 11, 2022

This paper examines questions of structure—as compared with leadership and policy—and proposes changes that would enable more effective and humane implementation of the nation’s immigration laws. It identifies four key organizational areas of concern—mission, institutional structures, funding priorities, and institutional culture—essential to the vitality and governance of the U.S. immigration system.

A Syrian woman, who fled her home in Aleppo due to government shelling, rests while her son constructs a makeshift tent made of sheets, as they take refuge at Bab Al-Salameh crossing border, hoping to cross to one of the refugee camps in Turkey, near the Syrian town of Azaz, Thursday, Sept. 13, 2012.

AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen

Policy Brief - Council on Foreign Relations Press Foreign Affairs

What Do Syrians Want Their Future to Be?

| May 1, 2017

"An overwhelming majority of those we surveyed—close to 90 percent—embraced the idea of returning to Syria when the war is over. These interviews thus provide a rare glimpse into the views of those who consider themselves part of the country’s future. A number of lessons about how Syrians envision the future of their country stand out, many of which undermine the prevailing wisdom about the conflict and the peace process."

A Yazidi refugee family from Sinjar, Iraq arrives on the Greek island of Lesvos after travelling on a vessel from the Turkish coast. Dec 3, 2015.

AP Images/M. Muheisen

Policy Brief

"2015: The Year We Mistook Refugees for Invaders"

| January 4, 2016

"As 2015 comes to a close, the annual numbers of migrants smuggled to Greece and Italy and asylum claims lodged in Germany have passed a million, as well as the number of additional displacements produced this year by the conflict in Syria. Moreover, Europe’s Mediterranean shore has now the unchallenged title of the world’s most lethal border. Not only this. The migrant crisis is also putting to the test some of Europe’s most fundamental values, from the freedom of circulation within its territories, to international protection beyond..."

Fixing the Department of Homeland Security

Policy Brief - Progressive Policy Institute

Fixing the Department of Homeland Security

| November 2007

In November 2002, Congress passed legislation creating the first new Cabinet department in more than a decade — the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Now in its fourth year, the department is plagued with problems and chronic mismanagement. If DHS is to fulfill its mission, the next president will have to take a hard look at the agency and make some major structural changes....This paper proposes a redirection and redefinition of DHS, with an aim toward helping it more effectively pursue its core mission: protecting the American people.