European values and the asylum crisis

International Affairs

Volumn 76, Issue 3, 2000, Pages 537-557

  Boswell, Christina ^a,b  

^a Royal Institute of International Affairs   (United Kingdom)

^b UNHCR   (India)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0040782533     PISSN: 00205850     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/1468-2346.00150     Document Type: Article

References (53)

1. Statement of the Portuguese Presidency of the EU on Behalf of XIV Member States, 31 Jan. 2000.
2. For a selection of literature on debates about multiculturalism, see Amy Gutmann, Multiculturalism: examining the politics of recognition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994); Will Kymlicka, Multicultural citizenship: a liberal theory of minority rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995); Andrew Geddes and Adrian Favell, eds, The politics of belonging: migrants and minorities in contemporary Europe (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998); Tariq Modood and Prina Werbner, eds, The politics of multiculturalism in the new Europe: racism, identity and community (London: Zed, 1997).
3. For a selection of literature on debates about multiculturalism, see Amy Gutmann, Multiculturalism: examining the politics of recognition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994); Will Kymlicka, Multicultural citizenship: a liberal theory of minority rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995); Andrew Geddes and Adrian Favell, eds, The politics of belonging: migrants and minorities in contemporary Europe (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998); Tariq Modood and Prina Werbner, eds, The politics of multiculturalism in the new Europe: racism, identity and community (London: Zed, 1997).
4. For a selection of literature on debates about multiculturalism, see Amy Gutmann, Multiculturalism: examining the politics of recognition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994); Will Kymlicka, Multicultural citizenship: a liberal theory of minority rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995); Andrew Geddes and Adrian Favell, eds, The politics of belonging: migrants and minorities in contemporary Europe (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998); Tariq Modood and Prina Werbner, eds, The politics of multiculturalism in the new Europe: racism, identity and community (London: Zed, 1997).
5. For a selection of literature on debates about multiculturalism, see Amy Gutmann, Multiculturalism: examining the politics of recognition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994); Will Kymlicka, Multicultural citizenship: a liberal theory of minority rights (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995); Andrew Geddes and Adrian Favell, eds, The politics of belonging: migrants and minorities in contemporary Europe (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998); Tariq Modood and Prina Werbner, eds, The politics of multiculturalism in the new Europe: racism, identity and community (London: Zed, 1997).
6. For detailed statistics, see Jeff Crisp/UNHCR, The state of the world's refugees: a humanitarian agenda (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997); for detailed statistics, see pp. 184-7.
7. There is extensive literature on these issues. See e.g. James Hathaway, 'New directions to avoid hard problems: the distortion of the palliative role of refugee protection', Journal of Refugee Studies 8: 3, 1995, pp. 288-304; Frances Nicholson and Patrick Twomey, eds, Refugee rights and realities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), esp. the contributions by Jens Vedsted-Hansen and Guy Goodwin-Gill. For a review of this book, see this issue of International Affairs.
8. There is extensive literature on these issues. See e.g. James Hathaway, 'New directions to avoid hard problems: the distortion of the palliative role of refugee protection', Journal of Refugee Studies 8: 3, 1995, pp. 288-304; Frances Nicholson and Patrick Twomey, eds, Refugee rights and realities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), esp. the contributions by Jens Vedsted-Hansen and Guy Goodwin-Gill. For a review of this book, see this issue of International Affairs.
9. There is extensive literature on these issues. See e.g. James Hathaway, 'New directions to avoid hard problems: the distortion of the palliative role of refugee protection', Journal of Refugee Studies 8: 3, 1995, pp. 288-304; Frances Nicholson and Patrick Twomey, eds, Refugee rights and realities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), esp. the contributions by Jens Vedsted-Hansen and Guy Goodwin-Gill. For a review of this book, see this issue of International Affairs.
10. Article 1A, Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, Geneva, 28 July 1951.
11. Ibid., Article 33.
12. The classic contemporary statement of this form of rights-based liberalism is found in John Rawls's Theory of justice.
13. Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, New York, 31 Jan. 1967.
14. For an excellent overview, see Ian Shapiro, The evolution of rights in liberal theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).
15. Writing in 1939, Sir John Hope Simpson urged west European states to admit refugees from Germany and Austria, using familiar liberal universalist rhetoric: 'There will always be politically active opponents of a regime, who to save life and liberty must seek sanctuary in other countries… It would be a humiliating degeneration of political practice if these persons, after release or escape, could not find asylum in another country while those conditions persist that threaten their lives and liberty in their own countries'. The refugee problem: report of a survey (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1939), p. 546.
16. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 Dec. 1948; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 16 Dec. 1966.
17. On the emergence of the 'exile bias' and the East-West conflict over the question of repatriation, see John George Stoessinger, The refugee and the world community (Minneapolis: University of Mineapolis Press, 1956), pp. 61-8; Kim Salomon, Refugees in the Cold War: toward a new international refugee regime in the early postwar era (Lund: Lund University Press, 1991), pp. 220-1.
18. On the emergence of the 'exile bias' and the East-West conflict over the question of repatriation, see John George Stoessinger, The refugee and the world community (Minneapolis: University of Mineapolis Press, 1956), pp. 61-8; Kim Salomon, Refugees in the Cold War: toward a new international refugee regime in the early postwar era (Lund: Lund University Press, 1991), pp. 220-1.
19. Indeed, the Dutch delegate 'wished to have it placed on record that the Conference was in agreement with the interpretation, that the possibility of mass migration across frontiers or of attempted mass migrations was not covered by Article 33 [the principle of non-refoulement]': Paul Wis, The Refugee Convention, 1951: the Travaux Preparatoires analysed (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 335.
20. Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, Article 32 (1).
21. These forms of state consolidation 'from above' largely resulted from the need to levy taxes, recruit soldiers and ensure support for international conflict.
22. Rogers Brubaker, Citizenship and nationhood in France and Germany (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992).
23. Aristide Zolberg, 'The formation of new states as a refugee-generating process', Annals 467, May 1983, pp. 24-38; Michael Mann, 'The dark side of democracy: the modern tradition of ethnic and political cleansing', New Left Review 235, May/June 1999, pp. 18-45.
24. Aristide Zolberg, 'The formation of new states as a refugee-generating process', Annals 467, May 1983, pp. 24-38; Michael Mann, 'The dark side of democracy: the modern tradition of ethnic and political cleansing', New Left Review 235, May/June 1999, pp. 18-45.
25. Mann, 'The dark side of democracy', p. 35.
26. Citizenship was in most cases defined by a concept of ius sanguinis, rather than ius solis.
27. Léon Poliakov, The Aryan myth: a history of racist and nationalist ideas in Europe (London: Chatto & Windus, 1974).
28. For example, a Romanian citizenship law of 1924 made 100,000 Jews inside Romania stateless, while almost 1 million Russians were stripped of citizenship in the early 1920s.
29. Michael Marrus, The unwanted: European refugees in the twentieth century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985).
30. Wolfgang Mommsen, ed., The convergence of the welfare state in Britain and Germany, 1850-1950 (London: Crown, 1981).
31. See e.g. Young-Sun Hong, 'World War I and the German welfare state: gender, religion, and the paradoxes of modernity', in Geoff Eley, ed., Society, culture and the state in Germany, 1870-1930 (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1996), p. 349.
32. As a Chatham House report of 1939 observed, '[e]ven France, which cherishes the right of political asylum as an essential principle of the Revolution, has strengthened frontier control', Sir John Hope Simpson, Refugees: a review of the situation since September 1938 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1939), p. 4.
33. John A. Garward, The English and immigration, 1880-1910 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 45-6.
34. Simpson, Refugees, p. 68.
35. Cited in Marrus, The unwanted, p. 150.
36. For theories of international justice that argue along these lines, see Onora O'Neill, Towards justice and virtue: a constructive account of practical reasoning (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Henry Shue, Basic rights: subsistence, affluence and US policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980); Charles Beitz, Political theory and international relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979).
37. For theories of international justice that argue along these lines, see Onora O'Neill, Towards justice and virtue: a constructive account of practical reasoning (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Henry Shue, Basic rights: subsistence, affluence and US policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980); Charles Beitz, Political theory and international relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979).
38. For theories of international justice that argue along these lines, see Onora O'Neill, Towards justice and virtue: a constructive account of practical reasoning (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996); Henry Shue, Basic rights: subsistence, affluence and US policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980); Charles Beitz, Political theory and international relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979).
39. Heinz Fassmann and Rainer Münz, 'Patterns and trends of international migration in western Europe', in Fassmann and Münz, eds, European migration in the late twentieth century (Laxenburg: International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, 1994), p. 7.
40. As Coleman points out, Britain has never had an official policy of recruiting or encouraging immigrants - with the exception of the recruitment of 75,000 'European Volunteer Workers' in 1947-50. See David Coleman, 'The UK and international migration: a changing balance', in Fassmann and Munz, eds, European migration in the late twentieth century, p. 38.
41. Christian Joppke, Immigration and the nation-state (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 107-8.
42. This seems to fit Crowley's observation that 'the political tone has, in most European countries, been set on the right since immigration became a major political issue. Policy, on the other hand, has generally been defined in the centre. This gives rise to a characteristic incoherence, whereby policy tends to be more liberal (or less crudely restrictive) than it claims to be': John Crowley, 'The politics of belonging: some theoretical considerations', in Geddes and Favell, eds, The politics of belonging, p. 23.
43. Karen Schönwälder, 'Migration, refugees and ethnic plurality as issues of public and political debates in (West) Germany', in David Cesarani and Mary Fulbrook, eds, Citizenship, nationality and migration in Europe (London: Routledge, 1996), pp. 164-9.
44. Subrata Mitra, 'The National Front in France - a single issue movement?', in Klaus von Beyme, ed., Right-wing extremism in western Europe (London: Frank Cass, 1988), p. 47.
45. See, for example, Gøsta Esping-Andersen, ed., Welfare states in transition: national adaptations in global economies (London: Sage, 1996).
46. Anthony Giddens, The third way: the renewal of social democracy (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1998).
47. Cited in Mitra, 'The National Front in France', p. 51.
48. The Guardian, 13 May 2000.
49. See e.g. Roger Scruton in the Financial Times, 22 April 2000.
50. See Asylum-seekers and race relations: the Commission on Racial Equality's view, 14 April 2000 (on website www.cre.gov.uk/misc/Asylnote.html).
51. There is EU legislation to try to prevent this form of 'country shopping' in the form of the 1990 Dublin 'Convention determining the state responsible tor examining applications for asylum lodged in one of the member states of the European Communities'. However, it has proved difficult to implement in practice. See Ben Hall, Policing Europe: EUjustice and home affairs co-operation (London: Centre for European reform, 1999), pp. 21-2.
52. There have been limited attempts to integrate these different instruments, especially through the High Level Working Group on Asylum and Migration. The October 1999 Tampere Presidency Conclusions also stress the need to achieve 'greater coherence of internal and external policies of the Union'. But refugee and migration issues remain peripheral concerns in Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and development policy.
53. For an overview of the debates, see Christina Boswell, 'The conflict between refugee rights and national interests: background and policy strategies', Refugee Survey Quarterly 18: 2, 1999.