After the Fall: Indochinese Refugees in the United States

Abstract

Refugees have been a major phenomenon of the twentieth century. Since World War II, the massive numbers of refugees and displaced persons have occasioned large scale, programmatic responses by governments and international agencies. Aside from the resettlement efforts growing out of the Second World War, the United States has opened its doors four times to refugees since 1945—to the Hungarians in 1956, the Cubans in 1960 and again in 1980, and those from Indochina in 1975. Each of these four cases has been markedly different in its circumstances, and the nation’s response has been different each time.