Internal displacement has become one of the most pressing humanitarian crises today, with the Global South being especially affected. Despite this, internally displaced persons (IDPs) remain underrepresented in humanitarian policy and academia. While attention for IDPs is increasing, the extent to whether the label actually embraces all circumstances of internal displacement can be questioned. We argue for a revision of contextualisation and conceptualisation of IDPs. Hence, drawing on a survey of literature and concrete examples from Ethiopia, the article revisits the concept of IDPs with the central aim of broadening its understanding. By tracing its emergence, evolution, and underlying assumptions, the findings show that the IDP label dominantly refers to displaced people in refugee-like situations. As a result, a large number of IDPs, such as those who are forcedly resettled and left unintegrated, are rendered invisible. Concretising processes of displacement within the Ethiopian case further illustrates the impacts of narrow conceptualisations and consequently, advances insights into possible drivers and types of IDPs. This illustrates the need for the scholarship to go beyond policy labels and adopt a contextualised understanding of IDPs while also contributing towards improving research and governance on the subject of IDPs.

In cities in the global South, internally displaced persons (IDPs) often end up in marginalized places created by uneven processes of urbanization. While IDPs experience similar disadvantages to the urban poor living in these places, they face additional vulnerabilities related to their displacement. Building on insights from urban studies and forced migration studies, we argue in this article that a multidimensional understanding of urban marginality is a useful analytical lens with which to examine the conditions of urban IDPs. Based on multi‐sited ethnographic research in Kersa and Sululta IDP settlements of Ethiopia, this study reveals how IDPs experience similar spatial, social and symbolic marginality in different urban contexts. Our findings show the relational manifestation of segregation, social distance and stigmatization that impede IDPs’ access to urban space and services. This study also highlights how these dimensions of marginality interact and reproduce an additional layer of marginality. Our research suggests the need for inclusive urban governance in which IDPs contribute to and benefit from urbanization as citizens.