The battle of numbers: Refugee protection, race, and Neoliberal politics of bureaucratic efficiency

Azar Masoumi

doi:10.35295/osls.iisl/0000-0000-0000-1047

Authors

Azar Masoumi York University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.35295/osls.iisl/0000-0000-0000-1047

Keywords:

Law and bureaucracies, race and racialization, Neoliberal governance

Abstract

This paper examines the early years of systematic refugee claim processing in Canada to explore the ways neoliberal bureaucratic practices rely on and (re)produce racialization in their day to day operations. I argue that due to the rise of neoliberalism, systematic refugee protection in Canada has come to exclude claimants who have borne the label of economic migrant. Furthermore, I argue that the exclusion of economic migrants from refugee protection has been a racialized and racializing project. The institutional procedures that worked to exclude these migrants inherited, drew upon, and reproduced racialized knowledges about certain national groupings. Racialization of economic migrants provided the claim processing bureaucracy with quick and efficient means of screening large numbers of claimants out of their workload. Thus, I argue that neoliberal governance of refugee claims in Canada has been a racialized and racializing bureaucratic practice.

Downloads

Metrics

Global Statistics

536 Views	481 Downloads
1017 Total

References

Andreas, P., 1996. US-Mexico: Open Markets, Closed Border. Foreign Policy, 103, 51–69. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/1149202

Aucoin, P., 1995. The New Public Management: Canada in Comparative Perspective. Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy.

Brown, W., 2015. Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution. Brooklyn, NY: Zone Books. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt17kk9p8

Connell, R., Fawcett, B., and Meagher, G., 2009. Neoliberalism, new public management and the human service professions: Introduction to the special issue. Journal of Sociology [online], 45(4), 331–338. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177/1440783309346472 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1440783309346472

Davis, D.A., 2007. Narrating the mute: Racializing and racism in a neoliberal moment. Souls [online], 9(4), 346–360. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/10999940701703810 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/10999940701703810

Dirks, G.E., 1995. Controversy and Complexity: Canadian Immigration Policy During the 1980s. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9780773565074

Enck-Wanzer, D., 2011. Barack Obama, the Tea Party, and the Threat of Race: On racial neoliberalism and born-again racism. Communication, Culture & Critique [online], 4(1), 23–30. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1753-9137.2010.01090.x [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1753-9137.2010.01090.x

Ferlie, E., et al.,1996. The New Public Management in Action. Oxford University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198289029.001.0001

Fitzpatrick, J., 1996. Revitalizing the 1951 Refugee Convention. Harvard Human Rights Journal, 9, 229–254.

Giroux, H., 2008. Against the Terror of Neoliberalism: Politics Beyond the Age of Greed. London: Paradigm.

Goldberg, D.T., 2009. The Threat of Race: Reflections on Racial Neoliberalism. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/9781444304695

Hathaway, J.C., 1993. Rebuilding trust: Report of the review of fundamental justice in information gathering and dissemination at the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. Ottawa: Immigration and Refugee Board.

Henry, F., 1994. The Caribbean Diaspora in Toronto: Learning to Live with Racism. University of Toronto Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3138/9781442680630

Immigration and Refugee Board, 1990. Annual Report for the year ending December 31, 1989. Ottawa: Immigration and Refugee Board.

Immigration and Refugee Board, 1991. Annual Report for the year ending December 31, 1990. Ottawa: Immigration and Refugee Board.

Immigration and Refugee Board, 1992. Annual Report for the year ending December 31, 1991. Ottawa: Immigration and Refugee Board.

Immigration and Refugee Board, 1993. Annual Report for the year ending December 31, 1992. Ottawa: Immigration and Refugee Board.

Jackson, I.C., 1991. The 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees: A Universal Basis for Protection. International Journal of Refugee Law [online], 3(3), 403–413. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1093/ijrl/3.3.403 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/ijrl/3.3.403

Keely, C.B., 2001. The International Refugee Regime(s): The End of the Cold War Matters. International Migration Review [online], 35(1), 303–314. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111%2Fj.1747-7379.2001.tb00016.x [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-7379.2001.tb00016.x

Lane, J.E., 2000. New Public Management: An Introduction. London / New York: Routledge.

Mehta, U., 1990. Liberal Strategies of Exclusion. Politics and Society [online], 18 (4), 427–454. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177/003232929001800402 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/003232929001800402

Melamed, J., 2006. The spirit of neoliberalism: From racial liberalism to neoliberal multiculturalism. Social Text [online], 24(4(89)), 1–24. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1215/01642472-2006-009 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1215/01642472-2006-009

Mongia, R.V., 2007. Historicizing state sovereignty: Inequality and the form of equivalence. Comparative Studies in Society and History [online], 49(2), 384–411. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417507000539 [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0010417507000539

Morton, J., 1974. In the Sea of Sterile Mountains: The Chinese in British Columbia. Vancouver: J.J. Douglas.

Omi, M., and Winant, H., 1994. Racial Formation in the United States: From the 1960s to the 1990s. New York: Routledge.

Ong, A., 2003. Buddha is Hiding: Refugees, Citizenship, the New America. Berkeley: University of California Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/california/9780520229983.001.0001

Pineo, P.C, 1977. The Social Standing of Ethnic and Racial Groupings. Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology [online], 14(2), 147–57. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-618X.1977.tb00338.x [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-618X.1977.tb00338.x

Plaut, W.G., 1985. Refugee determination in Canada: Proposals for a new system: A report to the Honourable Flora MacDonald, Minister of Employment and Immigration. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services Canada.

Roberts, D.J., and Mahtani, M., 2010. Neoliberalizing Race, Racing Neoliberalism: Placing “Race” in Neoliberal Disocurses. Antipode [online], 42(2), 248–257. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2009.00747.x [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2009.00747.x

Satzewich, V., 1989. Racism and Canadian immigration policy: The government's view of Caribbean migration, 1962–1966. Canadian Ethnic Studies, 21(1), 77–97.

Sharma, N., 2001. On being not Canadian: The social organization of “migrant workers” in Canada. Canadian Review of Sociology [online], 38(4), 415–439. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-618X.2001.tb00980.x [Accessed 5 March 2019]. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-618X.2001.tb00980.x

Soss, J., Fording, R.C., and Schram, S.F., 2011. Disciplining the Poor: Neoliberal Paternalism and the Persistent Power of Race. University of Chicago Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226768786.001.0001

Stanley, T.J., 2011. Contesting White Supremacy: School Segregation, Anti-Racism, and the Making of Chinese Canadians. Vancouver: UBC Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.59962/9780774819336

The Globe and Mail, 1978. New immigration act tightens entry rules. The Globe and Mail, 11 April, 8.

Wynne, R.E., 1978. Reaction to the Chinese in the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia, 1850–1910. New York: Arno Press.