When does a refugee stop being a ‘refugee’? The social construction of refugeehood after cessation

Abstract

Does the loss of refugee status bring refugeehood to an end, or does it reshape how it is lived, perceived, and governed in new ways? Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with postcessation Liberians in the defunct Oru Camp in Nigeria, this paper explores how the refugee label persists as a socio-political construct beyond legal designation. It examines three interrelated dimensions: the institutional and social factors that shape continued identification with or rejection of the label; the everyday strategies used to reframe or resist it; and the host’s role in sustaining exclusionary perceptions. The study reconceptualizes refugeehood as an evolving process rather than a fixed legal condition and shows how the refugee label remains embedded in interactions, resource access, and identity, even in the aftermath of refugee status cessation.