UNESCO Chair Professor Paul Gready and UNESCO board member Jun-Professor Rosario Figari-Layus from the University of Bonn have secured funding from the Gerda Henkel Foundation for the project Activists in Exile in an Era of Mass Displacement: Universities as Sites of Protection and Supporters of Agency for Activists from Russia and Myanmar.

The rise of populist and authoritarian governments across the globe has led to a dramatic increase in a particular form of forced migration, the flight of human rights defenders (HRDs – used here interchangeably with the term activists) into exile. Crackdowns on civil society in general, and HRDs in particular, are becoming commonplace. Relevant support infrastructures, such as the refugee legal framework and temporary relocation programmes, provide responses that are fragmented, partial and ultimately inadequate.