Faith-Based Organisations and Welfare Provision for Asylum Seekers in Australia

Religion operates in multiple ways as it shapes the experiences of forced migrants. It is often a causal factor in migration, and may either facilitate or impede integration in the country of settlement. Religious identity also plays a significant role in responses to asylum-seeking, with faith-based organisations, or FBOs, providing significant support to asylum-seekers in Western countries. FBOs are ideal service providers because of their strong local contacts, their public legitimacy, theological motivations for service and material resources. In Australia, the state has developed significant contractual relationships with FBOs to deliver welfare services, particularly to refugees and asylum seekers.

This paper examines the role of FBOs in welfare provision to asylum seekers using fieldwork conducted in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. Within each city, interviews and participant observation were conducted with practitioners at FBOs who provide services to asylum seekers. The study sought to understand the way that religion shapes the organisational structure, ethos and motivations of the FBO and its practitioners. It also explored the way in which FBOs use religious resources in the construction of settlement programs, how they addressed the cultural specificity of asylum-seekers in program delivery, and how they negotiated their role as ‘neutral’ state-contracted service-providers while maintaining religious identity. The results of the study find that religion is often an important and explicit motivator for practitioner action. Results indicate tensions between practitioners who understand the work in a “human rights” frame and those who may narrate or understand their work theologically. The study also revealed multiple understandings by practitioners of the importance of religious practice to asylum seekers. Finally, the results of this study point to tensions that increased government contractualisation poses for FBOs who deliver government services to asylum seekers, as FBOs have traditionally been strong critics of government policy on asylum seekers.