Uprooting and Social Change (The Role of Refugees in Development)

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Political change through the ages has created refugees: groups of people who, because of the conjunction of some element of their identity and shifts in power relationships are uprooted from their native place and forced to migrate to new abodes. One of the more tragic developments of the twentieth century has been that the rapidity and scale of political changes such as partitions, independence, civil wars and changes of regime have resulted in large numbers of refugees, mainly in the developing areas of Asia and Africa.

Despite the vast number of refugees in the world (over 40 million, according to some estimates) there has been, until now, no systematic study of the refugee experience. Stephen Keller, in this book, integrates earlier studies of victims of natural disasters and nuclear explosions with actual accounts of Punjabi refugees from what is now Pakistan to develop a dynamic psychological model of the trauma of becoming a refugee. Through the use of extensive interviews and psychological tests he proceeds to show how 25 years after the event, the experience still affects the personalities and attitudes of the refugees. These long-term effects can help us understand much of the economic and political change that has occurred in areas of heavy refugees concentration.

Stephen L. Keller (1937) received Bachelor's and Master's degrees in engineering before shifting his field and receiving his Ph.D. in Political Science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1970.

Dr. Keller's interest in refugees stems from his first visit to India as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Punjab. Among other things Dr. Keller has worked as an engineer, directed large scale survey research and taught university courses relating to India.

Because of radical shifts in the realities of international power and the burgeoning of communications channels in the past two decades the people of the more developed nations have been forced to focus their interest on the hitherto remote areas now known as "emerging," "developing," and "new." For the layman the exposure has been spotty, but even he, because of the pervasiveness of modern communications media, could not help but be aware of secession in Nigeria, war in Laos, guerrilla movements in Latin America, and the emergence of Bangladesh. For intellectuals, and social scientists in particular, the emerging areas were the object of a more conscious, less passive interest. In general it could be said that we have been attracted to the new nations for a number of reasons, not least among which is the desire to empirically examine the theories of predecessors in an attempt to deter-mine whether any universal truths exist in the field of social, political, and economic change. Daniel Lerner in The Passing of Traditional Society says "What the West is...the Middle East seeks to become" (p. 47). In part our fascination with the developing areas could be similarly phrased : "What they are, we once were." To use a rather cold-blooded metaphor, the developing areas present the social scientist with a unique laboratory where the bare bones of abstract theories can be clothed with the solid flesh of empirical data. Indeed this is the scientific method exemplified just as the physicists' theories often outrun their ability to empirically test them, so have the social scientists until very recently. Now, newly refined techniques of survey research, funds for area studies and field work, and high-speed computational devices have developed concurrently with the dissolution of colonial empires making the study of development a great deal more practicable than it had been.

During the fiftees and early sixties India was the scene of exciting social science research as scholars from many quarters sought to understand better the processes of social change and economic development. Much of this scholarly activity involved the creative adaptation of theories and research methods developed in other settings. Very frequently the results demonstrated that presumed scientific generalizations did not apply in the Indian case, and thus there arose a need for more modesty about "general theories" and a deeper understanding of Indian society. Against this intellectual background Stephen L. Keller's study, Uprooting and Social Change : The Role of Refugees in Development, stands out sharply, for this remarkable piece of scholarship represents the rare case in which a field study conducted in India has produced a general theory which now calls for testing in other situations.

It is appropriate that the study of the psychology of refugees should begin in the subcontinent because in the region there are some 25 million permanent refugees, and if the people who have experienced temporary dislocations are added, the number nearly doubles. Elsewhere in the world, there have also been massive flows of refugees since World War II : the division of Europe forced hundreds of thousands to leave their homes in Poland and East Germany and move to the west; the establishment of Israel produced the Arab refugee camps; and the historical events in mainland China, Tibet, Cuba and several parts of Africa created further homeless people.

The Partition of India on 15 August, 1947 led to the creation of a new country, Pakistan. Its western and eastern wings were separated by a long distance. The father of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, demanded an 800-mile corridor through India to link East Pakistan with West Pakistan. This fantastic demand was not accepted. West Pakistan included Sind, North-West Frontier Pro-vince, Baluchistan, Bahawalpur and sixteen prosperous districts of Punjab including the famous canal colonies. The canal colonies were developed by the skill and stamina of the Sikh farmers who had to migrate from the districts of Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Jullundur, Hoshiarpur and Ludhiana which are in Indian Punjab. On the creation of Pakistan the Hindu-Sikh population felt that it could not stay in that country with honour. The entire Hindu-Sikh population of West Pakistan, about 5 million, was soon on the move after 15 August. As the railway trains were attacked most of the migration was in the form of bullock-cart caravans or in foot convoys. Arrangements were made by the Government of India for feeding these convoys during transit. Truck-loads of parched gram, wheat floor and gur accompanied the convoys. All the roads leading from Pakistan to India were choked with men, women and children as well as bullock-carts and cattle. On all the roads a seething mass of humanity stretched over many miles all moving towards India urged onwards by a relentless destiny. It was an awe-inspiring spectacle the kind of which had not been seen for centuries in human history. When they reached India they were given shelter in colonies of tents, the refugee camps.