Gendered priorities, peace, and protection in private and homestay hosting for displaced and refugee women in Canada

Abstract

Global displacement has increased reliance on private and homestay hosting as community-based responses to humanitarian crises. While these arrangements provide immediate shelter and opportunities for social integration, they also create complex and often unequal dynamics, particularly for displaced women. This policy brief draws on emerging evidence and lived experiences from displaced Ukrainian women in Canada to highlight how homestay hosting operates at the intersection of housing, health, and social care systems. Hosting functions as both refuge and risk: it can foster safety, connection, and temporary stability, while also creating challenges related to limited privacy, unclear expectations, dependency, and unequal power relations. Gendered caregiving roles and emotional labor further shape women’s well-being, access to healthcare, and integration trajectories. Structural gaps, including fragmented policy frameworks and limited coordination with health and social services, contribute to ongoing vulnerabilities. Homestay hosting is therefore positioned as a critical yet under-recognized social determinant of health. To address these challenges, this policy brief calls for the development of a coordinated national framework that integrates hosting within health and social care systems, ensures access to trauma-informed and culturally responsive supports, and strengthens guidance for both hosts and guests. Establishing monitoring mechanisms and linking hosting to long-term housing and integration pathways are essential to promote equity, safety, and sustainable outcomes for displaced women.

Keywords

Homestay Hosting / Gender Equity / Policy / Health Equity / Access to Care

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