Refugee ontology v1: ontology of refugee home return

Refugeehood is a multidimensional phenomenon and a complex challenge facing the world today. To equip policy-makers and civil organizations with knowledge tools that can improve their plans, programs, and evaluation, we develop an ontology of refugees’ home return. Home return is a sub-field of refugee studies and one of the most elusive. Modeling this sub-field, using the OntoClean method, helps us create a coherent whole, accounting for the complex relations between the various factors that construct home return. In addition, the ontology rigorously defines and (re)constructs the concepts from the literature on home return, providing clarity and rigor for scholars of refugee studies. We conclude with discussion of future plans to develop an online application that makes this ontology friendly for normal users.