On November 7, 2015 Prof. Jaya Ramji-Nogales, Co-Director of Temple’s Institute for International Law and Public Policy, presented on Labor Laws and Access to Livelihoods at the “Beyond Survival: Livelihood Strategies for Refugees in the Middle East” conference at Cornell Law School.
The three-day conference was held at Cornell University, in Ithaca, New York. This conference was co-hosted by the Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East and North Africa, Cornell University Law School, Weill Cornell Global Emergency Medicine Division, and Ottoman and Turkish Studies Initiative.
The conference aimed to engage academics and practitioners in a multi-disciplinary exploration of strategies to improve short and long term livelihood opportunities for refugees in the Middle East and the Mediterranean basin. Discussion focused on evidence-based interventions for overcoming legal barriers and policy impediments to refugees’ access to education, health care and work. Lastly, the conference sought to draw attention to the role that universities can play to help improve the lives of refugees and asylum seekers at a time of surging global population displacement crises.