Home again? Categorising obstacles to returnee reintegration in Iraq

As of December 2020, Iraq has witnessed the return of 4.8 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) to their places of origin in the aftermath of the ISIL conflict. This is a significant returnee population and, while the movement home is a first step toward reintegration, it is not necessarily an indication of longer-term sustainability per se. The analysis in this report, by IOM Iraq, the Returns Working Group (RWG), and Social Inquiry, builds upon on and complements previous assessments on durable solutions, mainly with regards to obstacles to return as well as progress toward local integration for IDPs. The focus here is specifically on returnees and obstacles to their sustainable reintegration upon return.

In practical terms, this analysis gathers existing indicators from secondary datasets recently produced in Iraq to compile a composite view of 24 key obstacles for reintegration based on a context-relevant version of priority criteria as proposed by EGRIS, with the aim of identifying which obstacles affect returnees more severely and where.