Geopsychiatry 3 (2026) 100091 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Geopsychiatry journal homepage: www.sciencedirect.com/journal/geopsychiatry The Rohingya crisis and geopolitical tensions driving the failure of humanitarian governance and legal accountability among refugees in Bangladesh Khondoker Mahmud Parvez Department of International Relations, Gopalganj Science and Technology University, Gopalganj, Bangladesh A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Keywords: Rohingya crisis Geopolitics Statelessness Humanitarian governance International legal accountability The Rohingya crisis represents a protracted humanitarian and geopolitical emergency shaped by structural statelessness, constrained international accountability, and evolving forms of humanitarian governance. This study examines how these macro-level dynamics are experienced at the micro level through a qualitative investigation of 100 Rohingya refugees residing in camps in Cox's Bazar District, Bangladesh. Adopting an interpretive research design and a geopsychiatric analytical lens, the study explores the intersection of displacement, identity, governance, and psychosocial well-being. The findings reveal that trauma among Rohingya refugees is not limited to past experiences of violence but is continuously reproduced through con­ ditions of chronic uncertainty, restricted mobility, and indefinite encampment. Humanitarian governance, while essential for survival, has evolved into a system of containment that reinforces dependency and limits agency. Statelessness emerges as a central structural and experiential condition, shaping identity fragmentation, nonbelonging, and diminished self-worth. Additionally, gendered vulnerabilities intensify exposure to insecurity and psychological distress, particularly among women living under conditions of constrained mobility and protection gaps. By integrating qualitative evidence with insights from international relations and humanitarian governance, the study demonstrates how geopolitical tensions transform humanitarian response into a substitute for political resolution. The analysis contributes to geopsychiatric scholarship by highlighting how structural conditions of displacement produce sustained mental health impacts. The study argues that durable solutions require a shift from containment-based approaches to rights-oriented strategies that link humanitarian assistance with legal accountability and pathways to citizenship restoration or safe repatriation. Without addressing these structural drivers, the Rohingya crisis will remain a persistent condition of managed displacement and institu­ tional uncertainty. 1. Introduction The Rohingya crisis constitutes one of the most protracted and structurally complex humanitarian emergencies in the contemporary global order, shaped by the interplay of statelessness, forced displace­ ment, geographical proximity, and constrained international account­ ability [1]. Since the large-scale military operations in Myanmar in 2017, marking more than eight years of sustained crisis, over one million Rohingya refugees—belonging to a stateless Muslim minority—have fled into Bangladesh. This large-scale displacement has transformed a localized issue of ethnic marginalization into a multidimensional crisis with significant regional and global implications [2]. More broadly, the crisis unfolds within an international landscape marked by intensifying instability, where 61 active conflicts across 36 countries were recorded in 2025, underscoring the expanding scale and complexity of forced displacement worldwide. Earlier scholarship predominantly framed the Rohingya crisis through ethnic persecution and refugee protection perspectives. How­ ever, more recent studies emphasize its structural foundations, partic­ ularly the institutionalized denial of citizenship under [3] Citizenship Law, which rendered the Rohingya stateless [4,5]. In this context, statelessness extends beyond a legal classification and functions as a political mechanism of exclusion that perpetuates marginalization, re­ stricts rights, and legitimizes recurring cycles of violence and displace­ ment (Song, 2025). Consequently, the Rohingya remain positioned outside formal state protection, where vulnerability is continuously E-mail address: parvez@gstu.edu.bd. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geopsy.2026.100091 Received 4 April 2026; Received in revised form 4 May 2026; Accepted 7 May 2026 Available online 10 May 2026 3050-7138/© 2026 The Author. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/bync-nd/4.0/).