Description
Book SynopsisState-controlled refugee protection in Canada has gone through paradoxical developments in recent decades. While refugee rights have expanded, access to these rights has tightened. Previously unrecognized groups such as women experiencing gender-based violence and LGBT populations are now considered legitimate refugees. Yet, the implementation of stringent administrative measures has made it harder for refugees to secure protection. Refugees Are (Not) Welcome Here draws on archival and media sources, interviews, and organizational data to examine how refugee claims are administered within a complex and contradictory regime that maintains significant legal and bureaucratic silos. Azar Masoumi explains why state-controlled refugee protection persists despite its many failures, not only in Canada but globally. This rigorous study deftly argues that the paradoxical interplay between refugee law and claim-processing bureaucracies is symptomatic of a larger illogic: reliance on
Table of Contents
Introduction: States of Paradox, the Paradox of States
Part 1: The Early Years, 1946–92
1 Forty Years of Beginnings: The Origins of Systematic Refugee Protection in Canada
2 With Rights Came the Rightless: Bureaucracy and Restrictionism
Part 2: The Middle Trenches, 1993–2006
3 A Nice Symbolic Gesture: The Making of the Gender Guidelines
4 The Losing Game of Protection: Administrative Failure and Restrictionist Salvage
Part 3: Recent Times, 2007–17
5 Pivoting on Gay: Sexual Rights and Migration Restriction
6 Protection on Life Support: Bureaucracy, Intersectionality, and SOGIE Protection
Conclusion: For Whose Protection?
Appendixes; Notes; List of References; Index
