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Introduction: Globalizing rights
Book description: This book, based on the prestigious Oxford Amnesty Lecture series, investigates the relationship between globalization and human rights. The contributors come to the subject from a wide range of disciplines and perspectives, and include Noam Chomsky, Kwame Anthony Appiah, Homi Bhaba, Susan George, and Joseph Stiglitz, with introductions and commentaries by Richard Rorty, Alan Ryan, Charles Taylor and others. Their forthright and provocative essays challenge the view that the development of global markets and global investment, together with the widespread circulation of information on which this depends, make human rights abuses less likely.
Deportation and the liberal state: the forcible return of asylum seekers and unlawful migrants in Canada, Germany and the United Kingdom
This article is based on interviews with government officials, UNHCR staff and members of the NGO community in Bonn (2 February 1999), Ottawa (5–8 December 2000), Berlin (2 February and 24 May 2001) and [with British officials] Oxford (3 May 2001). Earlier versions were presented at the International Studies Association’s Annual meeting, Chicago, 23 February 2001, at the Council of European Studies Biannual meeting, Chicago, 14 February 2002 and at the Catholic University of Brussels, Institute of Political Sociology and Methodology’s seminar series, Brussels, 11 April 2002. We are grateful to participants for comments. The research was assisted by a grant from the Canadian Department of International Affairs and International Trade in association with the Foundation for Canadian Studies in the UK.
Institutional proliferation and the refugee regime
This article explores the impact of institutional proliferation on the politics of refugee protection. The refugee regime mainly comprises the 1951 Convention on the Status of Refugees and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Recently, however, new parallel and overlapping institutions have emerged in relation to two previously unregulated areas: internally displaced persons (IDPs) and international migration. This institutional proliferation has affected both state strategy and IO strategy in relation to refugee protection. It has enabled Northern states to engage in regime shifting. They have used the new institutions to prevent refugees reaching their territory, thereby avoiding incurring UN rules on refugee protection, and transferring burdens to Southern states. The resulting reduction in international cooperation in the refugee regime has contributed to UNHCR fundamentally redefining its strategy in order to become more relevant to Northern states. In particular, it has pursued states into the migration and IDP regimes into which they have shifted through a combination of stretching its mandate, engaging in the politics of the emerging regimes, and issue-linkage. The article's analysis draws attention to the potentially significant relationship between institutional proliferation and IO adaptation and change.
North-South cooperation in the refugee regime: the role of linkages
This article explores the role of issue linkage in North-South relations in the global refugee regime between 1980 and 2005. It argues that North-South cooperation has been crucial for overcoming collective action failure in the regime. However, it suggests that because of the absence of a binding normative framework or overriding interest impelling Northern states to support refugee protection in the South, the prospects for overcoming North-South impasse have depended upon the ability of states and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to use issue linkage to connect the “refugee issue” to states' wider interests in other issue areas of global governance—notably migration, security, development, and peacebuilding. The article makes this argument by examining the four principal case studies of UNHCR-led attempts to facilitate North-South cooperation in order to address mass influx or protracted refugee situations in specific regional contexts: the International Conferences on Assistance to Refugees in Africa of 1981 and 1984; the International Conference on Central American Refugees of 1987–1994; the Comprehensive Plan of Action for Indochinese Refugees of 1988–1996; and the Convention Plus initiative of 2003–2005.
Convention plus as a norm-setting exercise
This article reflects upon UNHCR's Convention Plus initiative, a multi-lateral process established in order to contribute to the development of a normative framework for global burden-sharing. Although the substantive achievements of the initiative have been limited, the article argues that Convention Plus has helped to develop significant new ideas relating to UNHCR's potential role in norm-creation within the refugee regime. Based on a regime theoretical perspective, and drawing on the wider literature relating to the role of norms in the refugee regime, the paper examines the procedural and conceptual innovations of Convention Plus, and how these might be adapted in future in light of the initiative's shortcomings. In particular, the article sets out two models for UNHCR's role in facilitating norm-creation, both developed in the context of the Convention Plus experience: firstly, a ‘top-down’ institutional bargaining model and, secondly, a ‘bottom-up’ good practice model. The former model emerges from the interests–linkages–norms approach implicit to the so-called ‘generic’ work of the initiative; the latter, from the situational work of the initiative, developed through the revival of ‘comprehensive plans of action’ and the use of pilot projects. The models are argued to be mutually supportive. The paper suggests that adapting these ideal-type models in light of the Convention Plus experience has implications for UNHCR's role in norm-creation, with regard both to developing a normative framework for global burden-sharing and also to developing other norms in response to other emerging challenges.
Towards a Mediterranean solution: implications for the region of origin
The article considers the prospects for a ‘Mediterranean Solution’ to address European Union (EU) concerns with transit migration from Sub-Saharan Africa via the Maghreb states and the Southern Mediterranean. It highlights how, in focusing almost exclusively on exclusion and interdiction, the current transit country-focused proposals and approaches of the EU fail to address the underlying causes of transit migration. Furthermore, the existing Maghreb-focused approaches of the EU have exacerbated trafficking and smuggling, and led to human rights abuses and the refoulement of refugees. The article argues that in order to reconcile the EU's concern to reduce ‘irregular migration’ with ensuring access to protection for refugees and respect for the human rights of other categories of migrants, a comprehensive approach is required that engages with the underlying causes of irregular migration. Drawing upon the existing empirical research on transit migration via the Maghreb, which indicates which migrants are coming from where and why, the article attempts to sketch the elements of a comprehensive ‘Mediterranean Solution’. The article assesses the implications such an approach would have for EU policy towards countries of origin and host states of first asylum in Sub-Saharan Africa, the institutional and political obstacles to such an approach and how these might be overcome.
What does 'efficiency' mean in the context of the global refugee regime?
The language of ‘efficiency’ has increasingly been used as a rhetorical device to legitimate new approaches to refugee policy; in particular, extraterritorial processing and ‘protection-in-regions-of-origin’. This article aims to explore what ‘efficiency’ might mean from the perspective of the global refugee regime in order to, firstly, expose the hidden assumptions implicit in the use of the ‘efficiency’ discourse in the current debate and, secondly, to explore what the concept might offer in defining the normative contours of a future regime structure. Although the concept is acknowledged to be inevitably political and to carry epistemological assumptions, reconstructing the concept by drawing on economic theory is argued to offer a means to improve the quality of debate on the allocation of resources within the refugee regime. Indeed, a critical application of the concepts of productive, allocative and dynamic efficiency is shown to offer far more nuanced insights for sustainable refugee protection than is implied by the contemporary debate's political manipulation of the term. The article assesses both the theoretical and policy implications that derive from a more rigorous conceptualisation of the meaning of efficiency.
Should approaches to post-conflict justice and reconciliation be determined globally, nationally or locally?
This article responds to the normative question of whether post-conflict justice and reconciliation should be determined at the global, national or local level through an analysis of the tripartite judicial framework that has emerged in Rwanda in the aftermath of the 1994 genocide. It evaluates the experience of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), national courts and gacaca courts across two interdisciplinary theoretical debates: first, the anthropological and philosophical question of relativism versus universalism; second, the socio-legal question of retribution versus restoration. The article argues that these two theoretical debates, pervasive in the literature, represent false dichotomies and that, in the case of Rwanda, there has been a complex and dynamic relationship between approaches to justice adopted at each level. Although in practice political tensions and elite interests have created contradictions and undermined judicial credibility at every level, the experience points to how each level could potentially be complementary.
The international relations of the 'new' extra-territorial approaches to refugee protection
During 2003 there was an immense amount of debate about the possibility of states adopting extraterritorial approaches to asylum processing and refugee protection, and about such policies’ compatibility with international refugee and human rights law. The debate has centred on two central policy initiatives: the so-called “UK Proposals” and UNHCR’s “Convention Plus.” It has so far focused primarily on the practical and legal consequences of these initiatives. What has been less clear is any explanation of the UK’s (and other supportive states’) motivation in aspiring to de-territorialize refugee protection and of UNHCR’s strategy in the evolving consultations. After clarifying the conceptual and political relationship between the two sets of proposals, the article explores the motivation and international relations underlying them, from the perspectives of the UK Government and UNHCR.
Public goods theory and the provision of refugee protection: the role of the joint-product model in burden-sharing theory
Much of the existing forced migration literature on burden‐sharing implicitly or explicitly assumes humanitarian provision to refugees, whether in the form of asylum or contributions to international refugee agencies, to be an international public good. This assumption has profound implications because it is interpreted to imply that refugee provision is inevitably characterized by collective action failure in the absence of a highly integrated formal regime structure. However, the existing debate has yet to identify explicitly what those public benefits are or to distinguish between the range of benefits and their varying degrees of excludability between states. This paper attempts to address these shortcomings by introducing the notion of ‘joint‐products’ to the burden‐sharing debate, arguing that there are multiple benefits, varying in their degree of excludability, that accrue to the providing states. The policy implications for regime structure and the incentives required to induce provision are explored.
Global Refugee Policy: varying perspectives, unanswered questions
Global Refugee Policy (GRP) is a phrase often used by scholars, practitioners and policymakers, but one that is seldom conceptualised, defined or unpacked. Indeed, understanding of GRP is highly contingent on the ontological assumptions and disciplinary lenses applied from the beginning. And yet despite its hazy nature, scholars of all persuasions generally agree that policies have the potential to deeply affect the lives of refugees and other forced migrants in significant ways, from constraining their access to basic human rights, to influencing how, when and where refugees may choose to move. The paper attempts to form an understanding of what we mean by GRP and how policies affect the lives of refugees. It seeks to highlight several approaches to understanding GRP, drawing most notably from political science/international relations and anthropological/sociological perspectives. While the two are not opposed – indeed in many instances they are complementary – they exemplify useful ways of understanding GRP. Ultimately this paper seeks to highlight these perspectives in order to draw out key questions for further debate, and to provoke additional scholarship on the subject. This paper was prepared for the RSC 30th Anniversary Conference, 6-7 December 2012.
Forced Migration and Global Politics
Using real-world examples and in-depth case studies, Forced Migration and Global Politics systematically applies International Relations theory to explore the international politics of forced migration: Provides an accessible and thought-provoking introduction to the main debates and concepts in international relations and examines their relevance for understanding forced migration; Utilizes a wide-range of real-world examples and in-depth case studies, including the harmonization of EU asylum and immigration policy and the securitization of asylum since 9/11; Explores the relevance of cutting-edge debates in international relations to forced migration.
Introduction
Book description: Refugees lie at the heart of world politics. The causes and consequences of, and responses to, human displacement are intertwined with many of the core concerns of International Relations. Yet, scholars of International Relations have generally bypassed the study of refugees, and Forced Migration Studies has generally bypassed insights from International Relations. This volume therefore represents an attempt to bridge the divide between these disciplines, and to place refugees within the mainstream of International Relations. Drawing together the work and ideas of a combination of the world's leading and emerging International Relations scholars, the volume considers what ideas from International Relations can offer our understanding of the international politics of forced migration. The insights draw from across the theoretical spectrum of International Relations from realism to critical theory to feminism, covering issues including international cooperation, security, and the international political economy. They engage with some of the most challenging political and practical questions in contemporary forced migration, including peacebuilding, post-conflict reconstruction, and statebuilding. The result is a set of highly original chapters, yielding not only new concepts of wider relevance to International Relations but also insights for academics, policy-makers, and practitioners working on forced migration in particular and humanitarianism in general.
International cooperation in the refugee regime
Refugees lie at the heart of world politics. The causes and consequences of, and responses to, human displacement are intertwined with many of the core concerns of International Relations. Yet, scholars of International Relations have generally bypassed the study of refugees, and Forced Migration Studies has generally bypassed insights from International Relations. This volume therefore represents an attempt to bridge the divide between these disciplines, and to place refugees within the mainstream of International Relations. Drawing together the work and ideas of a combination of the world's leading and emerging International Relations scholars, the volume considers what ideas from International Relations can offer our understanding of the international politics of forced migration. The insights draw from across the theoretical spectrum of International Relations from realism to critical theory to feminism, covering issues including international cooperation, security, and the international political economy. They engage with some of the most challenging political and practical questions in contemporary forced migration, including peacebuilding, post-conflict reconstruction, and statebuilding. The result is a set of highly original chapters, yielding not only new concepts of wider relevance to International Relations but also insights for academics, policy-makers, and practitioners working on forced migration in particular and humanitarianism in general.
Historical lessons for overcoming protracted refugee situations
Over two-thirds of the world’s refugees are trapped in protracted refugee situations, struggling to survive in remote and insecure parts of the world. This volume brings together a collection of eminent scholars and practitioners to explore the sources, nature and consequences of these situations and the record of the international community’s attempts to find durable solutions. On this basis, the volume presents new thinking to address protracted refugee situations that incorporates security and development—as well as humanitarian—actors and attempts to reconcile the policy difficulties which have obstructed progress for many years.
Rethinking durable solutions
Report description: The majority of today’s refugees have lived in exile for far too long, restricted to camps or eking out a meagre existence in urban centres throughout the developing world. Most subsist in a state of limbo, and are often dependent on others to find solutions to their plight. Their predicament is similar to that of the tens of thousands of refugees who stagnated in camps in Western Europe in the 1950s and 1960s. The High Commissioner for Refugees at the time, Gerrit van Heuven Goedhart, called those camps ‘black spots on the map of Europe’ that should ‘burn holes in the consciences of all those privileged to live in better conditions’. If the situation persisted, he said, the problems of refugees would fester and his office would be reduced to ‘simply administering human misery’. The issue of displaced persons in Europe was finally settled some 20 years after the end of the Second World War; today’s protracted refugee crises, however, show no signs of being resolved in the near future.
Towards a soft law framework for the protection of vulnerable irregular migrants
Since the 1980s, an increasing number of people have crossed international borders outside of formal, regularised migration channels, whether by land, air or sea. Policy debates on these kinds of movements have generally focused on security and control, to the neglect of a focus on rights. In a range of situations, though, irregular migrants, who fall outside of the protection offered by international refugee law and UNHCR, may have protection needs and, in some cases, an entitlement to protection under international human rights law. Such protection needs may result from conditions in the country of origin or as a result of circumstances in the host or transit countries. However, this article argues that, despite the existence of international human rights norms that should, in theory, protect such people, there remains a fundamental normative and institutional gap in the international system. Rather than requiring new hard law treaties to fill the gap, the article argues that a ‘soft law’ framework should be developed to ensure the protection of vulnerable irregular migrants, based on two core elements: firstly, the consolidation and application of existing international human rights norms into sets of guiding principles for different groups; secondly, improved mechanisms for inter-agency collaboration to ensure implementation of these norms and principles. The article suggests that learning from the precedent of developing the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, and its corresponding institutional framework, could be particularly instructive in this regard.
Advocating multi-disciplinarily in studying complex emergencies: the limitations of a psychological approach to understanding how young people cope with prolonged conflict in Gaza
The paper looks at the limitations and strengths of using the A-cope questionnaire for measuring strategies for coping with prolonged conflict by Palestinian young people in Gaza. The scale was administered to young people between the ages of 8 and 17. The results show some gender differences in coping strategies. However, some items on the subscales are not relevant for Muslim societies or societies in situations of prolonged conflict. The authors suggest that combining an anthropological contextual perspective and qualitative data with psychological instruments is an effective way of addressing the limitations of using a single quantitative method of assessment in non-Western complex social and cultural settings.
Animal reintroduction projects in the Middle East: conservation without a human face (In: Conservation and Mobile Indigenous Peoples: Displacement, Forced Settlement, and Sustainable Development)
Conservation in the Arabian Peninsula, unlike Africa and elsewhere, does not have a long history. In other parts of the world, ideas and policies for the 'preservation of nature' and the conservation of plant and animal species were exported with the colonial administrations of, mainly, France and Great Britain. The Arabian Peninsula, however, was never a 'colony' of a Western power. Its neo-colonial period, which might have served to develop such an interest, was very short, and only lasted a few decades between the ends of the two World Wars. In addition, its mainly arid land mass was not suitable as a wooded reserve. Furthermore, it had few species of large mammals, making it unattractive for the development of wildlife reserves. Conservation and eco-tourism were therefore largely irrelevant in the Arabian Peninsula for most of the twentieth century. Only as the millennium began to draw to a close did a particular form of conservation - animal reintroduction - manifest itself in the region. Without the colonial baggage most other parts of the world had to carry, these conservation projects should have been able to avoid the mistakes and pitfalls that plagued similar efforts in other regions. That, sadly, has not been the case.