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Governing refugees

University of British Columbia

Practices directed at refugees emerged in the inter-war period. Thousands of Europeans were maintained in camps, selected, and then resettled in the decades that followed. By the 1960s, what had been ad hoc, small scale, temporary international responses in Europe had become routine, distinctive practices directed at crises and millions of people around the world. In the Canadian context, practices of government directed at refugees have only recently arisen. The present thesis focuses on these Canadian practices as a governmental regime. By adopting Foucault's methods of discourse analysis and genealogy, the overarching research question, 'How is the Canadian refugee regime constituted and governed?', is pursued. Research procedures included forty-eight interviews with authorities active in the regime, attendance at a refugee conference, collection of documents, and examination of indices of the humanities and social sciences. The thesis begins by discussing conditions of possibility of the Canadian regime's emergence. It explores the development of the international refugee regime as one of these conditions, and in so doing, suggests the potential relevance of concepts and themes drawn from governmentality studies to understanding international regimes. The rise of an advanced liberal rationality in Canadian selection, determination, and resettlement practices since the 1970s is then discussed. In all three areas, refugees' conduct and fate can be seen gradually becoming governed less by state agents and more by agents at a distance from political authorities. In resettlement during this period, however, an advanced liberal rationality can be seen deferring to a pastoral rationality, thereby suggesting the Canadian regime has been constituted by more than one rationality. Developments consistent with the ascendancy of advanced liberalism or otherwise making the governance of refugees possible are then explored. These include: the 'partnership' as a form of association; refugee studies; psychological knowledge revealing the resettling refugee's soul; economic knowledge identifying the economically risky refugee; knowledge developing early warning systems: and technologies such as the documentation centre. Finally, the thesis argues that while resistance, understood as obstruction to (liberal) governance, is evident during this period, the presence of a pastoral rationality suggests a more complex view is required.

Thesis/Dissertation

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2009-07-06

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/10214

Sociology

University of British Columbia

UBCV

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