Sexual Violence in Refugee Settings: A Critical Systematic Review

This systematic review identifies and analyses 206 articles published in the last 20 years that address the topic of sexual violence in refugee settings. Utilizing the PRISMA tool for systematic reviews, we apply critical theory approaches to map the presence and orientation of studies published in this subfield in English, French and Spanish. Overall, we find that the number of published articles addressing sexual violence in refugee settings has grown exponentially in recent years (presence) and that although both the causes and effects of this violence are addressed, more articles are published on the effects than on the causes (orientation). In considering potential explanations for this relative imbalance, we observe that certain methodologies and disciplines are more likely to report on the effects than on the causes of sexual violence in refugee settings. However, we find no effects associated with the proportion of female authors. The implications of these results are discussed with special attention to the potential effects on the design of public policies that are informed by academic knowledge.