Book Forum hosted by
the International Human Rights Program and the
David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights

People Forced to Flee: History, Change and Challenge (Oxford University Press 2022) by Ninette Kelley

Program

• Words of welcome from Dean Jutta Brunnée
• Book overview by Ninette Kelley

Commentators

• Erin Simpson (JD 2013)
  IHRP alumna, founding partner of Landings LLP, practicing refugee and immigration law in Toronto
• Professor Yin-Yuan Chen (MSW 2005, JD 2010, SJD 2020)
  University of Ottawa Faculty of Law (Common Law section), researching refugees’ access to health care
• Professor Ghizaal Haress
  Visiting Scholar and Scholar-at-Risk, University of Toronto Faculty of Law and Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy
• Fen Hampson (attending virtually)
  President, World Refugee and Migration Council
  

Response by Author

Ninette Kelley is a former senior officer in UNHCR. She recently completed a book for UNHCR to commemorate the 70th anniversaries of the creation of the Office (2020) and of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (2021). People Forced to Flee: History, Change and Challenge (Oxford University Press, 2022). It reflects back and looks forward: drawing on the lessons of history to probe how we can improve responses to forced displacement. Prior assignments included UNHCR Director, New York (2015-2019) and UNHCR Representative, Lebanon (2010-2015).

Kelley has also held various policy and consultative roles with international humanitarian agencies focusing on development, immigration and refugee issues. In Canada she served eight years on the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB). She is the author of The Making of the Mosaic: The History of Canadian Immigration Policy, University of Toronto Press, 2nd edition, October 2010 (with Michael Trebilcock) and has published in the areas of human rights law, citizenship, refugee protection, gender related persecution and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. She is a lawyer by training.