Photo of Darfur Refugee Camp in Chad, taken by Mark Knobil, 2005 via Wikimedia Commons
I attended a talk recently by Professor James Milner at Carleton University which examined how responses to refugees varied before and after the end of the Cold War. The lecture is part of a series hosted by the Political Science department which examines how the world has changed since the end of the Cold War.
The aspect I found most profound in his talk was the effect of democratic transition in African countries on protracted refugee situations within countries, such as Tanzania. Protracted refugee situations have been used as leverage in political campaigns. As quickly as one leader can promise expulsion to garner a majority of votes, thus scapegoating refugees - many of whom only know life in a camp - another leader uses the opposite rhetoric and hands out citizenship in mass ceremonies, clearly admitting that refugee populations have significant and meaningful contributions and ties to a particular region. I came away curious about the arbitrary choices between expulsion and naturalization that some of these countries demonstrate. If it's so easy to naturalize citizens, why isn't it a widespread practice? What does naturalization actually mean for the refugees who have spent one or two generations in a camp? How are they, in fact, received by host populations? What are the economic calculations, if any, to naturalize, deport, or resettle refugees? I believe these are the questions we need to be seriously considering as we reconsider the future of the refugee regime and the inadequacy of present responses in light of changing characteristics of forced migration.
One sinister theme that emerged from Professor Milner's presentation was the growing restrictions, including freedom of mobility within the receiving country, guaranteed by the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. Less developed countries follow the example of developed countries and impose stringent and illegal restrictions on Convention refugees. The disturbing pre-emptive measures (such as carrier restrictions, interception, and extraterritoriality meaning that you have to be cleared by an embassy in your home country and not crossing an international border which is central to the 1951 Convention definition of a 'refugee') taken by such countries as Canada, the UK, the US and the EU to restrict flows of refugees has been extrapolated in such places as Thailand and Tanzania so that refugees are under lock-down situations in contravention of international law.
This photograph is of a United States Coast Guard cutter, that intercepted and transported the Haitian refugees who fled the turmoil in their country, in the port at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba in 1992. More than 14,000 refugees attempted to reach the United States by boat and were picked up by the Coast Guard in international waters and transported to the base at Guantanamo Bay. Courtesy of Wikimedia images - this image was taken by a US Official during duty and is therefore in the public domain.
