In the last decade, there has been a renewed interest in ‘self-reliance’ as a remedy for protracted refugee crises. While self-reliance has been articulated as a key policy objective, scholars have been preoccupied with a key question: what is self-reliance and what interests does such a policy ultimately serve? Drawing on Jacques Derrida’s post-structuralist thought, this paper puts forward a deconstructive approach to examine how the concept of self-reliance is discursively constructed. Through an analysis…