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IntroductionBangladesh currently hosts over a million Rohingya refugees in 33 fetid, dire, and confined camps, with the majority arriving after the 2017 military crackdown in Myanmar’s Rakhine state. Although Rohingya refugees have been arriving in Bangladesh since the 1970s, the mass influx following the 2017 military hostilities in Myanmar’s Rakhine State marked a significant crisis escalation. Initially, the local host communities displayed positive, sympathetic attitudes toward the refugees. However, recent evidence suggests a significant decline in social cohesion and peaceful coexistence, with host communities expressing diminished sympathy and growing concerns over the refugees’ prolonged presence in Cox’s Bazar.ObjectivesThis paper investigates the factors influencing the peaceful coexistence between Rohingya refugees and host communities, drawing on the perspectives of development and humanitarian service providers in the Ukhiya and Teknaf sub-districts of Cox’s Bazar.MethodsThe study utilized a mix of theoretical literature and empirical data to identify five determining factors: economic, social, political, cultural, and environmental. Data collection included 18 in-depth key informant interviews, supplemented by analyses of secondary sources drawn from both gray and academic literature.FindingsThe findings indicate that perceived outgroup threats are increasingly undermining peaceful coexistence, despite the absence of direct conflicts between the host and refugees. While political and cultural factors have remained relatively stable, social, economic, and environmental factors continue to erode the current status of peace.DiscussionThe study highlights spatial and psychological proximity as critical overarching factors in fostering peaceful coexistence. It concludes that closer proximity heightens integrated threats, whereas maintaining optimal distance enhances the likelihood of peaceful coexistence. Therefore, the Rohingya response plan should incorporate conflict-sensitive strategies to tackle the adversity of threat factors while maintaining social cohesion as promoting peaceful coexistence between hosts and refugees.

Abstract The article spotlights the impediments of the localization agenda in the Rohingya response in Bangladesh through the notion of humanitarian space. The Rohingyas rely entirely on material aid and humanitarian services in the camps, mainly stemming from international actors committed to the localization agenda, which, however, has not been effectively implemented. Drawing on the definition of humanitarian space as an arena, we investigate the main negotiations within humanitarian space in the Rohingya response and how they impede the realization of the localization agenda. We conducted secondary data analysis on reports published by organizations involved and validated the findings with ten telephone interviews with organizations in Bangladesh. We identified three main negotiations. First, negotiation on the nature of the partnership between local and international humanitarian actors, including the debates on the definition of “local”; second, negotiation concerning the characteristics and appreciation of local capacity; and third, the negotiation related to constraints within the operating environment for humanitarian actors in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. We conclude that the lens of humanitarian space is necessary for further understanding the dynamics impeding localization in the Rohingya response in particular and humanitarian action in general.