Domination and misframing in the refugee regime

ABSTRACT

The current practices of refugee protection refugees largely leave the burdens of the refugee regime to lie where they fall. Those states which are geographically proximate to refugee-producing regions, already amongst the least advantaged, bear the bulk of these burdens. In this paper, I critically assess two proposals which seek to address this maldistribution: a market in asylum services and a principle of comparative advantage. I argue that from the standpoint of justice, these proposals share two objectionable features. First, they enable relations of domination between states, because they ignore the background relations of inequality upon which they depend for their effectiveness. Second, they institute an injustice of ‘misframing,’ in that they preclude consideration of refugees’ legitimate claims to be hosted (or not to be hosted) in a particular state. The failings of these approaches are illuminating and, I argue, provide us with some theoretical desiderata for a positive account of justice in the distribution of responsibilities to refugees.

KEYWORDS:

• Refugees
• Domination
• Misframing
• Markets
• Comparative Advantage
• Global Justice

Acknowledgments

This paper has benefitted from the comments from audiences at the Warwick Graduate Conference in Political and Legal Theory, the Oxford Graduate Conference in Political Theory and the Braga Meetings in Ethics and Political Philosophy. I am also grateful to Rob Jubb, Patrick Tomlin, Aart Van Gils, Adam Pearce, Africa Bauza Garcia-Arcicollar, Alex McLaughlin, Daniel Hammer, Hallvard Sandven and Josh Wells for written comments on draft versions of the text.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The distribution of responsibility generated by the tyranny of geography should not be naturalised. Borders have been shaped by historical processes of state-formation, including unjust processes of state-formation in which colonial powers have played a significant role. As such, the dynamics in the distribution of responsibility to refugees are at least in part a legacy of that historical injustice. Even if state borders had been formed in just ways, however, the problem presented by the tyranny of geography – that states’ obligations to refugees are determined by morally arbitrary facts about where refugees can physically present themselves to state authorities – would remain. I thank an anonymous reviewer for raising this point.

2. See also Betts and Collier (2015, 2016). The creation of SEZs also raises important moral questions about the possibility of protecting refugees against labour exploitation, which I do not pursue here.

3. I thank an anonymous reviewer for pushing me to clarify the status of the critique of domination.

4. Important contributions here include Dahl (1957), Barry (1980), Dowding (1991), Lukes (2005) and Forst (2015).

5. For the former view, see Pettit (1997, p. 55). For the latter, see Lovett (2010, pp. 113–117).

6. For the notion of ‘background justice’ in the international order, see Ronzoni (2009).

7. According to Nicholas Vrousalis’ (2013, p. 132) account of exploitation, which he restricts to the economic sphere, ‘A exploits B if and only if A and B are embedded in a systematic relationship in which (a) A instrumentalizes (b) B’s vulnerability (c) to extract a net benefit from B.’ In the case at hand, (a) richer states instrumentalise (b) poorer states’ economic vulnerability (c) in order to extract the benefit of achieving their narrowly self-interested goal of refugees being located elsewhere. If this is best understood as a case of exploitation, then this appears to lend support to Vrousalis’ claim that exploitation is a form of domination. However, other plausible accounts of exploitation are available, and nothing in my argument hangs on this being a form of exploitation. Important contributions on exploitation include Roemer (1982), Steiner (1984), Werthermeier (1996). For an overview, see Vrousalis (2018).

8. For accounts which defend the relevance of persecution, see Cherem (2016), Lister (2013) and Price (2009).

9. For a good overview of the dynamics of climate-induced displacement, see Kälin (2010).

10. On the feasibility of reforming the refugee regime, see Ferracioli (2014).

11. If a market system allows states to buy and sell asylum for particular refugees, rather than merely asylum ‘spots’, then refugees’ choices would not even be able to operate as a secondary determinant of where they are to be hosted. Schuck’s proposal would allow for states to make decisions based on information such as ‘refugees’ social class, level of education, ethnicity, age, religion, family status’ and so on (Schuck, 1997, p. 286).

12. Population size is one of the indicators of a state’s ‘integrative capacity’ on Gibney’s view, alongside its gross national product (GNP). See, Gibney (2015). In earlier work, Gibney included other factors, such as a state’s immigration history (Gibney, 2004). For a good discussion of these factors as reasons for determining the differential responsibilities of states, see Owen (2016b).

13. Betts and Collier argue that there is no general ‘right to migrate’ but do not engage directly with this argument (Betts & Collier, 2017, pp. 110–117).

14. I thank an anonymous reviewer for raising this point.

15. Both the manifest historic injustices that have shaped the formation of the contemporary international order and developments of globalisation identified in the previous section may give us reason to think that the contemporary international order systematically frustrates individuals’ claims of justice which reach across borders.

16. For a discussion of the ‘global public good’ model of the refugee regime, see Suhrke (1998).

17. The idea that states bear special responsibility for those who they have caused to become refugees appears to have widespread appeal. See, for example, Walzer (1983, p. 49), Carens (2013, p. 195), Miller (2016, p. 90). It is rarely made clear, however, whether that responsibility is best understood in terms of an obligation to bear costs, or an obligation to host.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Leverhulme Doctoral Programme in Climate Justice: Ethics, Policy, Law under grant number DS-2014-002.

Notes on contributors

Jamie Draper

Jamie Draper is a Leverhulme Doctoral Scholar in Climate Justice in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Reading and a Teaching Fellow in Political Theory at the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. His research focuses on justice in migration and climate justice.