Courtesy of Ana De La O

As the population of displaced people soars globally, this year’s Litowitz Lecturer insisted that the United States protect migrants at risk.

At the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, attorney and legal advocate Mariko Hirose ’03 spoke to faculty and students about ongoing displacement situations and legal pathways toward refugee resettlement. She highlighted the humanitarian crisis affecting over 83 million individuals who have been forcefully displaced from their homes worldwide, a statistic expected to worsen with the invasion of Ukraine. 

“What is our moral obligation as human beings to other human beings?” Hirose asked. 

Hirose serves as the current Robert H. Litowitz Lecturer in Ethics and Public Policy. Appointed by the Ethics, Politics & Economics Department, she was chosen to teach University students and faculty about the ethical dimensions of social policy. 

“I thought the lecture was fascinating, especially learning about how the narrow definitions of refugee and asylum seeker have made it very difficult for displaced people to seek assistance,” said Nathan Mu ’26.

In her talk, Hirose discussed her career as U.S. Litigation Director and founder of the International Refugee Assistance Project, an organization which provides legal aid to individuals seeking refuge. Many of their clients come from vulnerable populations fleeing persecution, gang violence, climate disasters and other dangers.

While the United Nations has identified three solutions to displacement — voluntary return, local integration and resettlement — these methods have been outpaced by rapidly climbing refugee numbers, Hirose said. According to her, on both moral and legal grounds, it is the United States’ responsibility to create new, long-lasting systems of assistance for such migrants. 

Hirose praised the Refugee Act of 1980, which formalized the process for reviewing and admitting refugees into the United States. She spoke positively of its commitment to resettlement support, offering cultural orientation, travel planning and medical checks for its beneficiaries. 

However, former President of the United States Donald Trump’s election brought the act’s power to an all-time low. Hirose emphasized the need for “bigger solutions” beyond resolving individual cases. Her litigation work seeks to undo Trump-era restrictions on migration, including by suing the United States government for delaying the Special Immigration Visas it promised to Afghan refugees. 

Mu added that he was “inspired” by Hirose’s work in helping displaced people, but especially “impressed that she recognized the limited scope of her work and has been pushing for larger changes.”

The key message of Hirose’s presentation was that most refugees reside in middle- and low-income countries, but America’s status as a powerful, wealthy and geographically large nation makes it optimal for sheltering migrant populations. 

Moreover, she argued that America must reconcile its legacy of fueling displacement crises. Hirose brought up the United States’s interference in Afghan and Syrian geopolitics, as well as its role as a fossil-fuel country whose pollution exacerbates climate migration.

A twenty-minute question-and-answer section followed Hirose’s presentation, during which several listeners commented on the entrenched anti-refugee views across the GOP. 

“The exchange of ideas between our speaker and the audience is an excellent example of the dialogue we aim to foster at EP&E,” said host Ana De La O, associate professor of political science and affiliate of the Institution of Social and Policy Studies. “[Our] mission is to provide students with the skills and knowledge to examine social and political questions from several disciplinary perspectives.”

Hirose clarified that integrating migrants into the labor market does help out small towns — especially those in Republican strongholds. She asserted there should not be controversy on whether accepting refugees is economically beneficial.

“A lot of the hysteria that the Republican Party has been able to whip up is just … a talking point,” Hirose said. “We need to focus on changing the narrative.”

But such a narrative shift does not only occur on a national scale, according to Hirose. In the last minutes of her talk, she asked students, faculty and other attendees to examine their own position as affiliates of Yale. The privilege afforded by this, she noted, entails an empathy and moral obligation toward less fortunate groups.

“Even if you choose a career that’s not related to these issues, there will still be opportunities to weigh in,” Hirose told the News. “I think that as you go out into the world, you’re going to have a lot of opportunities to make a difference.”

The Robert H. Litowitz Lecture Series hosts one speaker each year.