Asylum after Empire: Colonial Legacies in the Politics of Asylum Seeking

Lucy Mayblin

doi:10.5771/9781783486175

Summary

Asylum seekers are not welcome in Europe. But why is that the case? For many scholars, the policies have become more restrictive over recent decades because the asylum seekers have changed. This change is often said to be about numbers, methods of travel, and reasons for flight. In short: we are in an age of hypermobility and states cannot cope with such volumes of ‘others’.

This book presents an alternative view, drawing on theoretical insights from Third World Approaches to International Law, post- and decolonial studies, and presenting new research on the context of the British Empire. The text highlights the fact that since the early 1990s, for the first time, the majority of asylum seekers originate from countries outside of Europe, countries which until 30-60 years ago were under colonial rule. Policies which address asylum seekers must, the book argues, be understood not only as part of a global hypermobile present, but within the context of colonial histories.

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Bibliographic data

Edition: 1/2017
Copyright year: 2017
ISBN-Print: 978-1-78348-615-1
ISBN-Online: 978-1-78348-617-5
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham
Language: English
Pages: 202
Product type: Book Titles

1. Contents No access
2. Acknowledgements No access
1. ASYLUM IN BRITAIN No access
2. 1. The Right to Asylum No access
  2. Colonialism, Imperialism and the West No access
  3. ‘Race’ No access
3. Structure of the book No access
4. Note No access
1. Asylum policy in Britain: A short history No access
2. The Rise of the Asylum ‘Problem’: The Standard Narrative No access
3. 1. Silences around Non-European Refugees Before the 1990s No access
  2. Silences around Colonial Exclusions from the Refugee Conventions No access
  3. Silences around the Legacies of Colonialism for Mobility and Immobility No access
  4. Silences around the Legacies of Colonialism in Ideas of Asylum Seekers as Undesirable and Excludable No access
4. Moving Forward No access
1. 1. Asylum Seeker Hostility: Racism or Racialisation? No access
  2. Asylum Seekers and (un)Modernity No access
  3. Modernity and ‘Man’ No access
  4. Tracing Histories of Continuity No access
  5. Conclusion No access
1. 1. 1. The Transformative Order No access
    2. The Colonial Order No access
    3. Victory for the Transformative Order No access
  2. Enslaved People, ‘Blacks’ and the Legacy of Differential Humanity No access
2. Notes No access
1. 1. 1. Japan and the Transformative Order No access
    2. The Colonial Order No access
  2. ‘Race’ Hierarchies in Action No access
2. Notes No access
1. 1. 1. The Colonial Order and Human Rights No access
    2. The Transformative Order and Human Rights No access
  2. Human Rights, Refugee Rights and the Legacy of Differential Humanity No access
1. 1. 1. The Transformative Order No access
    2. The Coloniality of Power: The Anti-Asylum Institutional Order No access
  2. Human Rights, Asylum Seekers’ Rights and the Continued Legacies of Differential Humanity No access
2. Note No access
1. 1. Racism, Man and Human, Coloniality/.Modernity No access
References No access Pages 181 - 196
Index No access Pages 197 - 200
About the Author No access Pages 201 - 202