Lisa Richlen, a Canadian citizen through her mother, is a Seattle native. She lived in Israel from 2000-2021 and, from 2004-2021 worked as an employee of and a consultant for tens of social change and human rights organizations. In 2021, Richlen completed a PhD at Ben Gurion University of the Negev in the Department of Politics and Government focusing on community organizing amongst Sudanese Darfurian asylum seekers in Israel.

She has taught courses on human rights, ethnicity and ethnic relations, non-violent social change, race and ethnicity and social inequality in Canada at the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University and Langara College. She currently serves as a Board Director with ISSofBC.

My research interests are forced migration and refugees, ethnicity, diaspora and transnationalism, community organizing, minority rights and African studies.

Along with two Israeli-based researchers, I am currently a researcher on a three year Israel Science Foundation funded project examining onward migration from Israel to Canada. We are examining three groups of immigrants to Canada: Filipino migrant workers, Eritrean refugees and Russian-speaking Israelis.  All three groups were born in one country, subsequently spent a significant amount of time in Israel and now live in Canada. We want to learn more about how their home country and their time spent in Israel influences their integration outcomes in Canada. We hope that this research will help researchers to better understand the experience of migration to two different countries.

This research can also influence both Israeli and Canadian policy in relation to how to work with migrants more effectively. Through this project, I am currently a Fellow with the S. Daniel Abraham Center for International and Regional Studies at Tel Aviv University.

Richlen, L., (2021). Liminality As An Antidote? Ethnic Organizing Amongst Darfurian Asylum Seekers in Israel. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2021.1956559

Richlen, L., (2021).  Imported Conflict? Regime Change in Sudan as a Trigger for Unity Amongst Sudanese in Israel. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2021.1970518

Richlen, L., Representation, Trust and Ethnicity Within Refugee Communities: The Case of Darfurians in Israel. (2021) Journal of Community Development.

Richlen, L., (2022). The Constructive Influence of the Homeland in Refugee Organizing: Darfurian Asylum Seekers in Israel. Journal of Refugee Studies, 35(3), 1250-1269.

Machar [Tomorrow] Award for Outstanding Student Article — Ben Gurion University 2022

Short-Term Post-Doctoral Fellowship — Ben Gurion University of the Negev 2021

Scholarship for Excellent Doctoral Students – Ben-Gurion University of the Negev 2017-2021