Reflections on Refugee Week 2025
By Nick Lancaster
It’s been heart warming to see the vast range of celebrations, resources, materials, and solidarity shared already around the world during Refugee Week. The theme this year – “Community as a Superpower”– feels well chosen, creating space to highlight vital activities and contributions that might otherwise risk going unrecognised.
At Neighbourly Lab we have been lucky enough to work on lots of research exploring the experiences of refugees and people seeking sanctuary. This work falls within our “Accelerating Welcome” Mission Area – a programme of work dedicated to understanding how people can feel welcome as quickly and richly as possible. Although the exact purpose and focus of our research varies, the power of community – in its many different shapes and sizes, is the thread that fastens together the work we do most tightly.
Whether it’s powerful networks of solidarity amongst refugee communities, support and celebration offered by communities who have not experienced displacement, or the incredible work that is being done on the frontline of the Voluntary and Community Sector all over the UK, so many of our places and spaces are characterised by energy, brilliance, and love.
These local expressions of welcome are critical for ensuring that newcomers to the UK can feel safe, supported, and able to flourish. That’s why we’ve teamed up with a range of organisations including The Good Faith Partnership, The Pickwell Foundation, and the Community Sponsorship Alliance to create the Welcome Coalition, an umbrella initiative to promote national support for local welcoming efforts. Partnerships across our sector have been and continue to be essential, and our ambition is that the Welcome Coalition becomes a connective tissue that both reinforces existing relationships between communities and organisations, and also helps to create new ones.
At Neighbourly Lab, we are committed to strengthening the evidence base around what works for local welcome, providing insight and tools to support communities and the wider sector. Through this approach we already know that community, and its endless superpowers, is the most integral force for shaping a feeling of welcome.
Looking forward – through partnership with friends and partners across the sector, we want to continue spotlighting and unpacking these superpowers and helping where we can to enable welcoming communities to thrive.
To find out more about the ‘Welcome Coalition’ contact Beth Worku-Dix at beth@neighbourlylab.com