Abstract Refugee camps within non-signatory states are differentially distinguishable with respect to the degree of the social and administrative integration of their residents with the wider “host” community. Nonetheless, in each case, the spatio-temporal and administrative segregation lends to the creation of localised time-spaces where divergent and parallel structures of law develop. This research looks at the perpetuation of legal pluralism within the confines of the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh, one of the more repressive camp settings across the world. Through in-depth ethnomethodological accounts, I trace the ways in which refugees (dis)engage with state legal systems and the divergent, multiple legal orders within the camps, a number of which are administered by armed groups. The research argues that through the establishment of such pluralities, the process of justice production itself becomes a site of contestation between competing actors seeking to establish temporal and effective control in refugee camps and over refugee bodies. The findings of this study add to the literature on law and order in refugee camps and to the debates on how plural legal spaces emerge.
Abstract The psychological impacts of disasters can be profound and enduring, especially when people are displaced from their homes. Fear may arise in anticipation of future physical dangers, or derive from traumatic memories which are relived in the present. International protection decision-makers have been slow to grapple with psychological harm and its temporal dimensions – even though international refugee and human rights law clearly recognise that such harm may constitute persecution, torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. By foregrounding evacuations as a common form of disaster-related displacement, this article presents three interconnected propositions. First, psychological harm arising from displacement in the disaster context may be ongoing and cumulative, rather than confined to a discrete past event. Secondly, the temporal and spatial lenses commonly applied by decision-makers risk undervaluing or mischaracterising the psychological dimensions of harm by treating them as temporary, subjective or resolved upon return. Thirdly, properly integrating evidence related to the mental health impacts of displacement into protection decision-making does not require doctrinal expansion. Rather, it demands a trauma-informed application of existing legal standards and systematic consideration of the psychological literature, in the same way that country-of-origin information is used to contextualise individual protection claims.
Abstract There is a long-standing tension in humanitarian work between care and control. This is reflected in current debates which juxtapose humanitarian ideologies to relieve suffering, with the biopolitical administration of refugees. Numbers play a central role, and they are widely recognised as a technology of control within refugee settings. This article shifts the focus from the numbers produced to the practice of counting. Drawing on 14 months of multi-sited ethnographic research, it analyses why COVID-19 cases were counted among refugees in some contexts, but not others. Irrespective of the numbers produced, the practice of counting (and not counting) COVID-19 cases was shaped by social and political logics and served important purposes. Whilst mobilising humanitarian ideologies and rhetorics of care, counting was actually more about the control of dangerous “others.” Simultaneously, practices of counting on the front-line, which visibly control the movement of people, were in-fact important relational moments of care.
Abstract This article rethinks the European Court of Human Rights’ role in refugee protection by reading its asylum-related case law as acts of judicial diplomacy. Diplomacy here is not institutional outreach; it is the Court’s reasoning practice: how it frames facts, allocates responsibility, and signals the practical limits of discretion under crisis pressure. This article develops a two-axis framework: (i) anticipatory and crisis-responsive diplomacy, capturing how Strasbourg calibrates tone, scope and evidentiary demands in high-stakes cases and (ii) vertical and horizontal diplomacy, tracking how judgments speak “downwards” into domestic asylum systems and “sideways” across overlapping legal regimes. A close reading of leading decisions on non-refoulement, jurisdiction, and vulnerability shows that the Court’s protective and restrictive strands often follow recurring diplomatic logics rather than mere inconsistency. This article concludes with a rights-centred benchmark for judicial diplomacy: legitimacy in refugee protection turns on making non-refoulement and individualised assessment practically reachable through clear jurisdictional reasoning and effective remedies.
Abstract This Special Issue examines the growing interaction and friction between international criminal law (ICL) and international refugee law (IRL). Central to this interaction is Article 1F of the Refugee Convention, which excludes individuals suspected of serious international crimes from refugee protection. This introduction highlights how IRL increasingly draws on ICL concepts to determine exclusion, despite significant differences in evidentiary standards, procedural safeguards, and underlying objectives. These differences risk producing legal misalignment, lowering thresholds of proof, and encouraging States to rely on immigration law as an alternative to criminal prosecution. Introducing the contributions to the Special Issue, the article identifies four broader trends: the expansion of exclusion and immigration control mechanisms, the shift of accountability efforts from criminal trials to immigration procedures, the creation of prolonged legal limbo for excluded individuals, and the problematic transfer of criminal law language into refugee decision-making without equivalent safeguards. The article calls for critical scrutiny of these developments and advocates for better coordination between ICL and IRL to ensure accountability while safeguarding fundamental rights.
