How and why might time matter in the politics of refugee assistance and global governance more broadly? Although core historical institutionalist concepts such as path dependence and critical junctures represent vital foundational constructs, they tend to overlook the social influence of time. By integrating social constructivist insights, this article examines the constitutive effects that time can have on the creation and subsequent development of governance arrangements through a political developmental analysis of one of the world's most protracted refugee crises. For almost three decades, thousands of refugees fleeing from political persecution or development displacement in Burma (Myanmar) have resided in neighbouring Thailand. Throughout this period, multiple actors have struggled to collaborate in a shifting political environment in order to provide refugee assistance and protection, all the while attempting to find what much of the humanitarian community terms "durable solutions." Drawing on interviews of a variety of stakeholders conducted amid a period of rapid change between 2010 and 2013, the article highlights how temporality conditions the social interaction between agents and structures in ways that affect change. © 2015 Author(s). All rights reserved.

Time Refugee Historical institutionalism Social constructivism Governance

immigration policy governance approach border region policy development refugee Myanmar Thailand asylum seeker