|
Article Excerpt
Abstract
Arising out of UNHCR's Global Consultations was a renewed emphasis on the role of resettlement as a protection tool, durable solution, and burden-sharing mechanism. Resettlement is a useful instrument for all three reasons enumerated by UNHCR. Its malleability, however, also makes it prone to manipulation. It can be, and has been, used by states to obfuscate an unwillingness to meet their international legal obligations through a replacement of refugee protection by migrant selection. The argument is made here for why resettlement is a necessary component of refugee protection, particularly in the current period of securitization following the events of 11 September 2001. This is followed by a discussion of the dangers of the abusive use of resettlement to the overall refugee protection scheme. Models for more structured resettlement are examined with a view to understanding what reform is needed. In conclusion, recommendations for resettlement reform are provided.
Resume
Suite aux Consultations mondiales du HCR, on a assiste un regain d'emphase sur la reinstallation comme instrument de protection, comme solution durable et comme meanisme de partage international de la charge. La reinstallation est un instrument utile pour chacune des trois raisons enumerees par le HCR. Cependant, sa malleabilite la rend aussi susceptible a la manipulation. Elle peut-et cela a deja ete le cas-etre utilisee par certains etats pour dissimuler leur reticence a honorer leurs engagements legaux internationaux en substituant la selection des migrants a la protection des refugies. L'article met de l'avant des arguments demontrant pourquoi la reinstallation est un element essentiel pour la protection
des refugies, en particulier en la presente periode de "securisation "suivant les evenements du 11 septembre 2001. Une discussion s'ensuit sur les dangers de l'utilisation abusive de la reinstallation au detriment du cadre global de protection des refugies. Pour conclure, des modeles de reinstallation plus structuree sont examines dans le but de determiner les reformes requises.
A refugee, by definition, is an individual who has fled his or her homeland on the basis of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.(1) While the refugee definition applies equally to all who are found to meet it, the protection attached to refugee status can differ greatly. Protection ranges from new citizenship to crowded camps. The determining factor is where refugee status is claimed. The Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (Refugee Convention) obliges signatory states to not refoule refugees who have arrived within the state's territory. (2) While signatory states grant refugee status and sometimes citizenship to the refugees who reach their shores, other states, often overwhelmed by refugees and determined to discourage further flows, have not signed the Refugee Convention.
In signatory states, refugee protection is conferred under domestic legislation once the state determines that an individual meets the refugee definition. In non-signatory states that lack similar refugee laws or status determination procedures, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) may grant mandate refugee status under the Statute of the United Nations High Comrnissioner for Refugees. (3) UNHCR then seeks "durable solutions" for refugees. Durable solutions comprise local integration in the receiving country, voluntary repatriation to one's country of origin where the situation has changed so as to make this a possibility, or resettlement to another country. (4) Where neither local integration nor repatriation is possible, resettlement is the only option.
Resettlement requires a third country to be willing to accept refugees into its territory. While signatory states to the Refugee Convention have promised not to refoule asylum seekers at their borders, they have not committed to accept refugees for resettlement. Too many of the world's refugees are therefore left to linger in non-durable conditions in countries of first asylum that are often only minimally safer than the countries they have fled. This article provides an examination of resettlement and an argument for its increased use as a tool of protection and responsibility-sharing while also warning against resettlement's vulnerability to manipulation.
Resettlement
As it approached its fiftieth anniversary in 2001, UNHCR was in the midst of an identity crisis. States that were the very authors of the Refugee Convention were vocally challenging its continued relevance and surreptitiously evading their obligations. (5) In both response to the crisis and in celebration of the anniversary, UNHCR initiated the Global Consultations on International Protection (Global Consultations) to address the situation through ministerial meetings, expert roundtables, and policy formulation. (6) One of the key developments to arise out of the resulting Agenda for Protection was a renewed emphasis on the role of resettlement. (7)
Resettlement is defined by UNHCR as "the selection and transfer of refugees from a State in which they have sought protection to a third State which has agreed to admit them--as refugees--with permanent residence status." (8) The decision to resettle a refugee is only made in the absence of other options--local integration or repatriation. (9) There is an undercurrent of debate as to whether resettled refugees should be granted permanent residence. (10) Nor does refugee resettlement only occur through arrangements between UNHCR and states. It can also occur in certain countries through referrals from organizations other than UNHCR or through private sponsorship by an organization or individual of the third state. This article, however, is confined to a consideration of "government-assisted" (11) permanent resettlement through UNHCR.
Resettlement has a checkered past that predates the Refugee Convention. The International Refugee Organization, established in 1946, resettled over 1 million refugees between 1947 and 1951. (12) In fact, resettlement was the tool of choice of all refugee organizations that preceded UNHCR. (13) James Hathaway notes there was an assumption during this earlier period that "there was little likelihood that refugees would be accommodated in the first asylum country." (14) As enshrined in Article 33 (1), the Refugee Con vention shifted the focus of refugee protection to the principle of non-refoulement. The boat people crisis of the 1970s and early 1980s brought a resurgence in resettlement enthusiasm with 1.2 million Indo-Chinese resettled by UNHCR between 1976 and 1989. Gary Troeller, a UNHCR representative, reports that by the late 1970s UNHCR was involved in the resettlement of 200,000 persons per year, and that at one point in 1979 "resettlement was viewed as the only viable solution for 1 in 20 of the global refugee population under the responsibility of UNHCR." (15) Beginning in the late 1980s however, resettlement came to be viewed by UNHCR as the least preferred durable solution. Concerns that large-scale resettlement was leading to the abandonment of asylum in first countries and serving as a pull factor for individuals to leave home for social and economic reasons, combined with an increased emphasis on voluntary repatriation following the end of the Cold War, limited enthusiasm for resettlement. (16) By 1996 UNHCR resettled only 1 in every 400 of the global refugee population under its care. (17) In its current reinvigorated state, UNHCR has proclaimed that resettlement "serves three equally important functions:"
First, it is a tool to provide international protection and meet the special needs of individual refugees whose life, liberty, safety, health or other fundamental rights are at risk in the country where they have sought refuge. Second, it is a durable solution for larger numbers or groups of refugees, alongside the other durable solutions of voluntary repatriation and local integration. Third, it can be a tangible expression of international solidarity and a responsibility sharing mechanism, allowing States to help share each other's burdens, and reduce problems impacting the country of first asylum."(18)
While the re-emergence of resettlement discourse is to be applauded, the difficulty with UNHCR's current tripartite construction is that it risks sending resettlement into its own dizzyingly schizophrenic identity crisis-- uncertain of how to actualize its role in an effective manner.
Resettlement is a useful tool for all three reasons enumerated by UNHCR. Its malleability, however, also makes it prone to manipulation. It can be, and has been, used by states to obfuscate an unwillingness to meet their legal obligations under the Refugee Convention through a replacement of refugee protection by migrant selection. What follows can best be termed "cautionary advocacy." The argument is first made that resettlement is a necessary component of refugee protection, particularly in the current period of securitization following the events of 11 September 2001. This section is followed by a discussion of the dangers of the abusive use of resettlement to the overall refugee protection scheme. Models for more structured resettlement are then examined with a view to at least understanding what reform is needed. In conclusion, recommendations for resettlement reform are provided.
Why Resettlement?
UNHCR reported that by the end of 2005 the global number of refugees was an estimated 8.7 million persons. (19) One in four of these refugees, 24 per cent, are in either Pakistan or the Islamic Republic of Iran. (20) In total, by UNHCR bureau divisions, over 2.5 million refugees are hosted in Africa, excluding North Africa, and almost another 2.5 million are in CASWANAME, UNHCR's bureau encompassing Central Asia, South West Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East. Europe hosts just under 2.0 million refugees and there are over 800,000 in Asia and the Pacific. In the Americas, in total, there are fewer than 600,000 refugees. (21) The numbers highlight "that refugees and mass movements are first and foremost a "developing country" problem and...
|
