Displaced people wait to board the ship
After World War II, many European countries were destroyed as well as people’s homes. Europe had a surplus of displaced persons and not enough space or work for everybody who had been moved around during the war. Some people also did not want to return to their homeland and wanted to stay where they were currently or try to go overseas. Many left their homeland because of political reasons, with the rise of Fascism and Communism in eastern Europe. Jewish Europeans were wary of returning to their home after being released from the Nazi camps. Due to the surplus of displaced persons the International Refugee Organization (IRO) stepped in to help relocate people.
The IRO helped to relocate displaced persons to other European countries, Canada, the United States, South America and many other countries. This was not the first time an international body helped with the redistribution of the population. However, the IRO was the most effective and it “enjoyed an ‘authority comparable to the government of an emigration country'” (Cohen 101). It had the capability to move people around to help with the surplus of people in Europe and labor shortages elsewhere. “The IRO was the first ‘supernational authority’ to regulate refugee migration on a worldwide scale”( Cohen 103). This meant that the IRO played an important role that affected multiple people and countries when they moved people around. The redistribution of the population in Europe was done in order to recreate stability and help with the increased need for labor elsewhere.
Despite the IRO’s increased efforts to help relocate displaced persons there were still issues with the relocation program. First off the government’s of countries the displaced persons were emigrating to were picky of who they would let into their country. For example, whites were preferred compared to black immigrants from the West Indies (Cohen 104). Another issue was that countries wanted single men to emigrate to their country over married men because the single men would have more time to do the hard labor. The refugee workers in Belgium were left the hardest part of the mine operations (Cohen 105). The countries that were taking in refugees didn’t see the newcomers as people, but as products that could do their work for them. Cohen reinforces this idea when he is describing how French looked at the refugees that were leftover, “What remains available looks to be of bad quality” (107). Since refugees were sought out for labor, intellectuals were often looked over. Although intellectual refugees were smart and helpful, the rest of the world was looking for people who could do labor jobs not a specialty, like medicine.
From the picture above we can see how overpopulated Europe was after WWII and how eager people were to move away to someplace new in hopes of better opportunities. That is why the IRO tried very hard to convince other countries to take in these refugees. Taking in refugees would help with the labor shortages and increase revenue. The IRO gave the displaced people a positive image saying they were “an energetic community of hard workers and freedom-loving people” (Cohen 110). The IRO pointed out their strength and how they were good democratic people(110).
This is not my full blog post, please go to the following link, https://blogs.lt.vt.edu/meaghan5postwwii/the-iro-to-the-rescue/ , to read the completed blog. Thanks!
You wrote a really great blog here! There’s a lot of evidence showing how exactly countries were selecting the specific people they wanted to receive. Facts like this sorta make it hard to see all of this displaced persons efforts as a humanitarian effort. Obviously the countries were trying to get the best they could out of everything as opposed to letting anyone come in.