Transit to connection: aspirations and identities of asylum seeking young people.

Gale, Fran ; Bolzan, Natalie ; Momartin, Shakeh 等

Introduction

Australia has a longstanding history with fences. The rabbit and dingo fences for example, which lined our colonial state borders have served Australia well. Our latest fence building activity has been around asylum seekers, isolating them behind fences both physically and metaphorically. The processing of asylum seekers on Christmas Island effectively creates a 'moat' around this activity. The implications of this exclusion process for the mental health of asylum seekers have now emerged with research suggesting substantial mental health difficulties amongst asylum seekers and refugees (i) ( Steel , Silove, Brooks, Momartin, Alzuhairi & Susljik, 2006; Cardozo, Vergara, Agani & Gotway, 2000; Ellis, MacDonald, Lincoln &Cabral, 2008). Peak professional bodies pointed out to the Australian Government of the previous Prime Minister John Howard (under whose government many of the young people participating in this study were detained) the findings of such research and the trauma asylum seekers suffered through this method of processing. However, their correspondence remained unacknowledged (Higgins, 2003, p. 280). Whilst there have been research studies that have demonstrated that the detention process impacts on young asylum seekers' mental health (Mares, Newman, Dudley & Gale, 2002; Newman & Steel, 2008; Silove, Steel & Mollica, 2001; Silove, Steel & Watters, 2000; Silove , Austin, & Steel, 2007) questions remain around aspects of the transition from seeking asylum to building a life in Australia.

The young people who come to Australia seeking asylum have often experienced extreme trauma. Many are then detained and subjected to re-traumatisation through the detention process. Australia may offer a degree of sanctuary in either the long or short term depending on how the applications are assessed, but the manner by which young people understand themselves in this process is unclear. How are they attempting to negotiate the transition to Australian society? How do these young people make sense of who they are in their new country and possibly even more importantly who they can be? What steps do they take and what would help them in this journey as evolving Australians?

This paper presents the results of the qualitative section of a larger piece of research, (which included qualitative and quantitative components), undertaken from 2003 until early 2009, examining the mental health of young asylum seekers. We present from the exploration with young asylum seekers who have been detained, but have now achieved refugee status, those factors which they have identified as important for their own sense of who they are and for their transition to Australian society. We discuss what identities are on offer for young people emerging from this detention process and how they anticipate their future in Australia.

Here we draw on the qualitative accounts of young people's experience in their home country, their flight and subsequent asylum seeking experiences, and the factors which enabled or were barriers to their settlement. Traditionally, in migration and settlement research, young people have been generally ignored as 'tied migrants who lack agency' (Sporton, Valentine & Neilsen, 2006). Our emphasis is on listening to young people's stories and the meaning they give to events. This is central to the research as asylum seeking youth, most particularly young people who have been detained, do not have visibility or a voice.

The chief means of recruitment was through referral from the primary services for refugees and asylum seekers, particularly, the Service for Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma survivors (STARTTS). Due to the vulnerable nature of the people interviewed the project was explained to them by a researcher with whom they already had a relationship i.e. they were not approached by someone they didn't know. This research team member also gave the potential participants an information sheet explaining the project (translated into appropriate languages). In particular, it was made clear that participation in this study would have no impact on asylum claims, either positively or adversely. It was also made clear that no information would be released to the authorities.

If the young person (and consenting adult in the case of someone under 18 years old) was interested in participating, a member of the research team contacted them, explained the project further, and responded to any issues raised. If the young person was willing to proceed, an interview time was arranged. The interviews could not be taped as many of the young people were fearful of being so recorded. Notes were taken during interviews.

Quotations from these interviews that are used in the text are verbatim. All the young people interviewed were attending or were eligible to attend high school.

Fifty youth asylum seekers aged 12-18 years participated. Their experiences ranged from five years in Immigration Detention Centres to their immediate residency in the community with permanent refugee status on arrival in Australia. There were approximately equal numbers of young men and women.

Rationale

Identity relates both to personal issues such as selfhood and loss and to broader cultural and socio-political issues of power, discrimination and oppression. It is informed by personal, cultural and structural factors (Thompson, 2000, p.31). At the personal level self-worth and psychological well-being are implicated in creating stable identity and biographical continuity. Culturally the forms into which we've been socialised and those surrounding us provide shared meaning enabling the development of a relatively stable sense of self, and biographical continuity. At the structural level identities can be circumscribed, thereby excluding a range of opportunities and life chances. Notions of ontological insecurity as discussed by Giddens (1991, pp.47-54) lead to a lack of "biographical continuity" and a lack of an enduring conception of aliveness. Oppressive or narrowly conceived options or pathways limit the identities possible.

It is these aspects of personal, structural and cultural factors that we seek to explore in this paper.

Findings and Discussion

The disruption and thwarting of connection and capacity for responsive interactions, as described by the young people, is characteristic of detention settings and was also experienced by the young asylum seekers in the wider Australian environment. Individuals define themselves through and take meaning from their relationships: "we come into being in a social context which is literally constitutive of us" (Freedman, 1999, p.237). Connection is fundamental for emotional and social development throughout the whole of life (Bowlby, 1980) and the young asylum seekers drew attention to the range of connections which were central to their being able to develop secure identities in this new country.

Family, Self and Suffering

All young people spoke clearly of their embeddedness in families and their well-being was usually seen in relation to both themselves as well as their families. Many spoke about concerns for the health of family members, most frequently their mother. There was limited or no access to appropriate medical services, particularly but not only in detention, for a range of physical problems. For example, two brothers (13 and 15 years old) described how they were concerned about their mother (whose husband was killed by the Taliban) having a cataract and eye problem, but the hospital being unable to operate for several months even though she was unable to see even with glasses.

A 14 year old girl reflects on similar concerns:

   I stay in my room all the time because I am too sad. My brother
   and I am worried about my mother. She has been to hospital many
   times with stomach problem. I can only tell my mother the easy
   things; I put everything in my heart. (G14)

Little or often no follow up care was provided for asylum seekers after they left Immigration Detention Centres (IDCs). Of particular note was lack of referral to appropriate health services. Even those asylum seekers with serious illness, such as diabetes, were often not given medicine to cover the transition period into the community nor were they connected with relevant health services (Briskman, Latham & Goddard, 2008, pp.334-335). Here young people reveal the impact this lack of organised health care for sick family members, has on themselves:

   I'm worried for my brother who was hurt in Afghanistan and has a
   heart problem, because my mother is worried about it. I'm worried
   all the time. (B15)

Young people appeared to be taking on a variety of roles in the family including caring for others and in many instances taking on the parenting role.

   I had to work in secret in Pakistan so my brothers and sisters
   would have food and clothes. My father was killed by the Taliban
   and I am here with my mother and young brothers and sisters. I have
   a part time job and I'm trying hard at school so I can get a job for
   the future for my family. I am a bit worried about money. (B17)

   I'm afraid to kill myself because my family needs me. I cry all the
   time but I'm afraid for my mother. (G17)

   I feel safe, but I am worried about money because I'm from a large
   family and I need a house and money but I will work when I'm 18. I'm
   working hard at school because I've lost a few school years and I
   need to catch up. (B16)

Young people's ideas of migration are culturally constructed and young asylum seekers from some cultural groups, according to research by Van Blerk and Ansell (2006), base their understandings of migration on a fluid family structure and notions of kinship, rather than seeing migration as an individual process.

   I need to look after the family, my mother has no English and it is
   hard for her so I must talk for her, I must continue at school so
   that I can get a job to look after my family. (B14)

Families, particularly parents, had been a source of security but could no longer provide assurance that the environment is safe and predictable as they have little control over it.

Prior to their arrival in Australia asylum seeking young people have had multiple experiences of loss and trauma in their countries of origin. Living in a detention centre environment exposes young people to re-traumatisation through unrelieved contact with distressed, angry, hopeless and frequently suicidal adults (Gale & Dudley, 2006). Some spoke of watching the descent of parents into despair and mental illness and their worries about behavioural difficulties experienced by siblings such as bed wetting and night terrors.

   My mother tried to commit suicide (in detention), it really scared
   me and is always in my mind. I feel there is no one to rely on or
   help us. (B14)

   The detention environment is bad. People are already sick, they have
   seen people fighting, dying, it is not good for these people to be
   in detention ... life is difficult, there are many hard things, boys
   and sexual harassment. (G15)

These young people are trying to give care to their families whilst also struggling to deal with their own health and mental health issues.

The majority of all asylum seeking young people reported initially believing that Australia would be a safe and peaceful place to live, however, this putative connection to and positive expectation of Australia quickly dissolved for those who experienced IDCs.

   I thought Australia would be heaven, I was put in detention on
   Christmas Island, it was not pretty I thought detention was
   Australia and was sad there were no pretty places. (G12)

   I thought it was going to be good in Australia. That we would be
   safe. Then we were put in prison. I cried every day and night in
   Woomera (IDC). I thought all the time about killing myself. My life
   had no meaning. (G15)

Many reported feeling emotions such as fear, worry and anxiety with little idea of what was happening or why.

   I couldn't even talk, I couldn't talk, she (immigration officer)
   was scaring me, saying this was a crime. I couldn't understand. I
   was kept in small room till midnight. They didn't bring me anything,
   didn't care, I was so shocked I started bleeding, asked for a
   painkiller, and they didn't give me a painkiller. I was really
   frightened. (G18, pregnant)

Those young people who experienced IDC's also spoke of re-traumatisation

in detention. Stimuli do not have to replicate exactly the pre-existing triggers to cause flashbacks and intrusive phenomena. Detention centres, people in uniforms, prison like conditions, being shadowed by guards, water cannons at the gates, not having access outside and many other conditions can constitute stressors that reactivate and compound pre-existing reactions (Newman, Dudley & Steel, 2008; Becker & Silove,1993).

Those in the community also spoke of particular concerns around their own mental health and that of family members:

   Sometimes I get down and I don't like to sleep away from my
   mother. (B12)

   I wondered why my older sister didn't cry. Then I noticed at night
   my sister's bed was shaking because she was crying in secret. She
   didn't want to upset me or my mother. (G15)

A 16 year old girl describes how she is irritated by people and has temper outbursts over little things. She does not sleep well at night when thinking about the boat trip or detention. She feels distressed that she often feels very tired and can't concentrate in school, has recurrent memories of past terrifying events and sometimes feels she is 'going crazy'. She describes feeling down "almost all of the time, about life, study":

   I had to help my mother with the visa, and speaking to the
   authorities. I am so tired this is too much for me. We had nothing,
   no money, no job, no house. No one was here to help, just some
   organisations. (G 16)

Feelings of responsibility for their family's well being in many cases constrained young people's involvement in the wider community and limited their opportunities to learn about this new society, as much of the young people's energy was directed toward needing to provide care for their families. Whilst trying to attend to the needs of their families and also deal with issues of their own, such as post traumatic stress, these young people describe feeling painfully conflicted as they were very aware of wanting to be able to focus on determining what the new culture was and what it demanded of them. Young people were eager to learn about this new culture and one way to do this was through school and education.

School: Window to a New Society

   Going to school helps me understand Australia better. (G14)

School was most often described as a source of care and hope.

   School is my favourite thing in Australia. Education gave me hope in
   detention to go on. (G13)

   My hope to go to school made it easier in detention. (G14)

   I have friends in school and I'm learning how to read and write, I
   like school, the teachers care about what you do. (B12)

In the absence of markers and cultural guides, however, young people needed help with negotiating a different culture of learning. Many spoke of needing guidance, assistance in negotiating an Australian classroom and the culturally specific ways in which learning happens.

Several described how the way of learning and studying at school in Australia is different from their homelands and that friends "helped most with learning about the differences" and "how to cope here and to understand the differences and ways of dealing with them" (B14).

School also offered young people an opportunity to connect, to find others in this new country who could acknowledge and even care about them.

   The teachers give me homework because they care for me. They know so
   much. Because I'm in Australia I can become a professional one day.
   My life was going nowhere in Sudan. (B16)

   I love school and I can't believe how safe it is, there are no
   stabbings in school. I love doing homework and I feel like that the
   teachers care whether I am happy or not. I feel that by coming to
   Australia I can reach my dreams. I can become a professional. I want
   a good job to feel secure. (G14)

   I have friends from many countries here, and I'm good at school. I
   love school, I've never been to school before. I think the teachers
   love me and take care of me, I do my homework to please them. (B12)

School, however, was also a place where a number of the young people felt keenly aware of racism directed towards them and of being made to feel 'different'. Some experience disconnection from their peers which is not always just about belonging to a different ethnic or religious group, but can also be about the broader experience of being 'black' (Sporton, Valentine & Neilsen, 2006), as this fifteen year old boy describes:

   If I could do more art and have more groups for activities people
   would get to know me and not just call me black. At present I have a
   lot of friends, mostly African because other kids call me black. I
   try not to let it bother me. (B15)

The last ten years has seen a big increase in forms of racism directed at asylum seekers, which, as Lyn and Lee (2003) observe, may affect asylum seeking young people's identity formation and practices. These young people find themselves located within narratives "not of their own making" and have to make sense of themselves within public discourses of asylum seekers and hegemonic narratives of racism (Pratt & Valverde, 2002; Ansell & van Blerk, 2004 ).

School, while seen as a chief source of information about the new society, was also a source of anxiety, not only related to experience of racism but also in relation to performance. This was partly tied to a lack of opportunity or interruption in their home land and a felt need to 'catch up' on what had been missed.

In IDCs school was often a source of frustration. It could have offered a source of connection but the young people reported that school was intermittent in detention and offered little more than 'colouring in'.

   I was hoping to go to school in detention, but there was no
   school. When I left detention and did go to school the other kids
   were mean to me and told me I would be sent back. I was scared and
   worried. (G13)

   I feel like I have lost my life, because in detention I have not
   studied. (G18)

Outside of detention it was stressful in terms of the negotiation of what was required particularly given issues around language, interrupted education and competing priorities for these young people.

   I don't like schools. I don't have an education. The teacher thinks
   I'm stupid, I want a group of friends so we can learn together.
   No-one helps us. (B13)

   At school in Afghanistan the teachers hit you, here there is
   freedom and hope. I find school hard to follow because I'm used to
   being hit. (G12)

   School here is very good but I miss my Sudanese school and friends.
   I got a scholarship here and the teachers are better here. (B12)

These young people's anxiety was also related to the need to secure their families' safety after the traumatic experiences that they had undergone, and providing for their families' futures. They aimed to obtain good education to be able to afford such things as a good house and health care for their parents, and avoid welfare. Some were attending school, trying to find simultaneous part-time work, worrying about their families' health (for example, medical operations where there was no money), and expressed urgency about these needs being addressed. Briskman, Latham and Goddard document the story of a 17 year old girl who in trying to resolve these kind of dilemmas went so far as to sacrifice her chance to go to school so she could help her family (2008, p.358). The young people in this study also had to struggle with and somehow reconcile such conflicts and concerns.

   I can't wait to leave school. I've missed too much and can't catch
   up. I don't like school I want to work and help my family, I'm
   worried about money. (B15)

   I am looking for a part time job and trying to work at school too.
   I find school really hard and lost many years in Pakistan. When I
   was in Pakistan I had to steal books so that I wouldn't forget how
   to read. I really like school and I'm learning a lot. (G16)

By studying hard and working hard, they regarded themselves as acting for their families, connecting them to the wider neighbourhood and society. This can happen not only indirectly, but sometimes directly through school activities shared with the young person's family.

A teacher at a school with a high number of refugee young people, for example, describes events such as the school concert and a multicultural festival, where Afghan young people were involved in performances; their families all attended and were "slowly becoming a part of community life" (Briskman, Latham & Goddard 2008, p.359). In community spaces, and in particular public events, relations of identity are articulated in social interaction, as Sporton, Valentine and Neilsen, (2006) point out, yet community spaces remain a vastly under-researched site of identity formation.

Beyond school there were few opportunities for young people to connect to the broader Australian culture.

Culture or Cultures? : Mirror to our State

The young people in this study were very aware of the need to familiarise themselves with the workings of Australian social institutions and their own relationships with them, in order to assess the possibilities for their enhanced involvement and avoid being marginalised. Connection to social institutions is crucial to the consolidation of identity because such connection helps the young people to understand the new culture and avoid being a part of a "devalued social group". Mullaly (1997, p.145) notes that structural oppression occurs through the systemic constraints on subordinate groups that take the form of unquestioned norms, behaviours and symbols, and the underlying assumptions of institutional rules.

This group of young people were clearly searching for ways of negotiating an identity within what they saw as Australian mainstream culture whilst not abandoning, relinquishing or denying their home culture. Other researchers have noted this phenomenon with particular reference to young people as distinct from adults or parents who struggle to retain more of their home culture (Valtonen, 2004, p. 83).

Being keen to adopt the 'symbols' of what they saw as the Australian culture and being Australian, the young people in our study openly embraced Australian icons. During interviews reference was often made to iconic Australian symbols, such as the Harbour Bridge and native Australian animals, which the young people associated with a new life of opportunities and freedoms.

A number, for example, spoke about seeing pictures of Sydney Harbour on TV in their countries of origin and in refugee camps prior to arrival in Australia. Going into the city of Sydney was for them a pivotal event and writ large as a part of their journey into being 'Australian'. One young person described seeing the New Year fireworks over Sydney Harbour on a TV while in a refugee camp in Africa--they described how actually going to the New Year fireworks on the harbour was important part, for them, of feeling like they could be a part of Australian life. Other examples were young people who had associated Australia with particular animals such as koalas or kangaroos and on arrival in Australia had bought themselves everyday objects with these motifs such as coasters or tissue boxes with koalas on them. By appropriating these outward symbols, and by emulating how an 'insider' is perceived to act, it is possible that they hoped to 'fast track' belonging, to confirm their Australian identities.

Despite this, many young people spoke of the difficulties of making the transition to living and being in Australia.

   We had persecution in Iran, but also in Australia, just different.
   Someone else is always deciding my life. (B18)

   People hate us that's why we can't find a house (they had approached
   the Department of Housing and been rejected twice). (B12)

Some who had been detained in IDCs, had not been referred to appropriate services or resources on their release into the community. Such experiences have also been documented elsewhere, for example, a refugee workers speaks of finding a man who could not speak English and who had been sleeping out for 17 days after his release from immigration detention (Briskman, Latham & Goddard 2008, p. 332).

   After being in detention I don't trust anyone, but now I'm out of
   detention I feel like running back in as there is no help in the
   outside world. (G17)

   No one helped us when we got out of detention only other people from
   detention. I would like to stay in detention if we could leave any
   time. (B12)

Many of the young people spoke about the need to feel safe. One consistent finding for young people who'd not been detained in IDCs was that for the first time in many years, and for some their whole life, they now felt safe. One 16 year old boy explained:

   I thought Australia would be like Heaven, like in the story books,
   that it would be safe and nice and there would be lots of food. I
   think I am now in Paradise. (B16)

Others shared similar experiences:

   I really wanted to come to Australia for the safety and beauty and
   there is no violence. I had good images of Australia and my good
   images were all true. (G18)

   I imagined Australia to be beautiful, with big houses, safe and with
   clean food. It is what I imagined. (B15)

   I thought Australia would be like Heaven, and I was happy to see
   Australia and it is exactly like I thought. (B12)

For those who had been detained the safety was conditional. Young people felt they could not be totally open with others and all 'connections' were conditional. After detention some described an ongoing fear of being punished should they breach any rules, such as "don't talk of your time in detention or you might get sent back". For some it depended on them not talking, they feared that by speaking out about their time in detention that they could be deported, for others who had had yet to gain permanent refugee status their lives were vulnerable.

   I'm too scared to ask questions, I can't talk with the Taliban, or
   the smugglers, and then detention officers. I'm always scared of
   somebody. I'm worried about being deported and I don't want to talk
   anymore. (B17)

There remained for detained young people on leaving detention a high degree of uncertainty about the safety of both themselves and their families with minimal communication given to them about these issues.

   I can't concentrate on study because I am scared I might be
   deported..(G 16)

Many asylum seeking young people spoke of needs for security, safety and reliability, predictability and trust--they describe how these were not met. Even when connections to community resources existed, they could be tenuous:

   The refuge kept asking us to leave and I'm upset because my mum is
   upset. We had interpreters but no-one gave us the right information.
   I feel upset for my mum. (B 15)

   We don't have friends here only the refuge people and they keep
   asking us to leave. (B12)

The issues those young people who had been detained talked about experiencing due to being in transition mainly centred around continued anxiety and re-traumatisation.

   Being in detention made it more difficult when I got out, I was not
   used to going anywhere and didn't know how to get help... I lost
   confidence. (G 15)

Other explicit issues young people who had been in detention identified were around the uncertainty about their future; this uncertainty was associated with a high level of anxiety both for themselves as well as for their families. While in detention this was mainly concerned with obtaining a visa.

   I used to think "what is the difference between me and the other
   girls who are able to get out". Everyone waits for Tuesday and
   Thursday to see if the visa will come. We never knew what was
   happening. (G 17)

   I am scared about being sent back to Afghanistan, I don't want to
   go back because I have no safety or food there. (B 14)

Post-detention the indeterminate status that many of these young people found themselves in, in relation to the immigration process, was cause for great distress and prevented or delayed any opportunity for connecting to the wider Australian community.

Those who describe their immigration status as unresolved expressed a series of concerns such as an 18 year old boy says he has trouble getting a job due to not knowing how long he is staying. This means the threat of poverty is a major issue for him, he says, and he also describes feeling isolated and lonely quite often.

Others spoke about how their position prevented them from making plans and not forming serious attachment for fear that this may be taken away at any time, their identity was 'on hold'.

From their responses, while in detention young people had few resources to support their emotional well being during this time, even relationships built within detention were fraught:

   I didn't make friends in Curtin (IDC) after a while, because it
   was just too painful when they go. (G16)

There was a real hope and belief that once they were able to make connections within the broader Australian community they would feel safe and secure about having a future.

Despite having identified issues and factors which inhibited connection to sources important in the development of a stable/secure identity, young people were able to articulate a range of strategies and processes which they felt could have facilitated this. When asked what would be most help to them particularly in the transitional stages they experienced and what might help others, the most common themes identified were as follows.

Firstly, have friends, be able to go to school while in detention. They were keen to attend school and some saw this as an opportunity to belong in Australian society. Others said they would like help finding young people's groups and friends in the broader Australian community.

   I like school because the teacher cares if you actually exist or
   not and they don't hit you like in Iraq. (G12)

Secondly, being assured of not having to return to country of origin, not living under the threat of deportation. As one 15year old girl described she "needs a visa to be happy", she doesn't want "handouts from the Government, just a visa and we can then work".

   Young people need the confidence of a visa to be happy and refugees
   need to be treated with respect that would help young people (B 14).

Finally young people spoke of moving out of the detention environment and into the Australian community. Connection with others such as refugee advocates while inside detention was seen by the young people as extremely helpful; it made a big contribution to their orientation, belonging and mental wellbeing. Young people spoke of a faith in Australian people, "if they know they will help". The activists enabled the detainees to hold this opinion.

Findings reveal that asylum seeking young people identify their 'connections' with family members and, equally as significant, with others in the broader Australian community along with reliable access to education, as factors most crucial for their emotional well being and mental health.

Identity and connection / belonging are polarised in public discourse, so that particular groups are viewed as 'ghettoised' and wanting to 'stick together', or else that they 'should become like us', be assimilated and give up their particular language and cultural rituals. For the young people such either /or choices support the status quo and can cause their division and silencing.

Whilst many young people spoke of the importance of education as the opportunity for connection into the broader Australian community, they also described suffering emotionally stressful, fractured unreliable 'connections' in the areas of family, culture and education. These are highlighted in the literature as a stable sense of self and identity, characterised by Thompson as 'cultural, structural and personal and identified as pivotal to a sense of identity (Thompson, 2000, p.31).

Conclusion

In the absence of formal frameworks for negotiating their entry to wider Australian society, these young people felt the weight of responsibility acutely--they had to work out the specific conditions conducive to their own and their families' settlement (Valtonen, 2004, p.79), so that this was like a 'DIY' ('do it yourself) settlement process. This lack of control was in some part related to a lack of knowledge of this new culture and environment.

Many young people acted as cultural interpreters and guides for their family, and an important part of the identity of many was as providers and mediators for their families in a new and untested environment. In articulating the responsibility they felt for fostering and preserving the health and well-being of their families they had created circumscribed identities tied to their family. Their role as carers removed them from active social engagement in their new culture, limiting their opportunities to understand and develop their relationships with Australian social institutions, and to shape a bicultural identity.

School was integral to their sense of belonging and securing a bicultural identity for themselves. Having a genuine relationship with a teacher whom the young people felt cared about them, and with other students from different ethnic backgrounds to their own, enabled them to express their perspectives and to grow in confidence. When this occurred, the result was they felt they had visibility in this society, and experienced themselves as part of a listening and receptive community.

Understandings of identity often focus on the individual, or in the case of young people sometimes also on their families. The implicit assumption is that if young people struggle to belong the problem is with them or their family. The young people interviewed are pointing to the need also for interventions at a broader systemic level.

Young people are telling us they seek a variety of identities. The identities available to them need to acknowledge their past as well as their futures and reflect opportunities to understand and develop relationships with Australian social institutions. Identity cannot be detached from political and social concerns. The state's treatment of asylum seeking young people fails to recognise this.

The young people do not want to mix only with people of their own culture; they are telling us that their identity is not static thing; it is a continuous process of self-definition (Valtonen, 2004, p.72). Young people point to the need to respect difference and allow for bicultural identities. If the government is serious about accepting young refugees, there needs to be a transformation of the state's response: a transformation which will open up opportunities not only for asylum seekers but for all Australians.

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Authors: Fran Gale Phd, Lecturer, Social Work Program & Senior Research Fellow Social Justice Social Change Research Centre, University of Western Sydney. Email: fw.gale@uws.edu.au Natalie Bolzan Phd, Associate Professor, Social Work Program, University of Western Sydney. Email: n.bolzan@uws.edu.au Shakeh Momartin, Research Psychologist, Service for Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors (STARTTS). Email: Shakeh.Momartin@sswahs.nsw.gov.au_

(i) An asylum seeker is a person who has left their country of origin, has applied for recognition as a refugee in another country, and is awaiting a decision on their application. The term refugee is a very specific definition covering only people who have fled their homeland and sought sanctuary in a second country (UNHRC Definitions http://www.unhcr.org.au/basicdef.shtml accessed Jan 2010).