Can’t be held responsible: Weak norms and refugee protection evasion
| Date | 01 June 2021 |
| Author | Alise Coen |
| DOI | 10.1177/0047117819884613 |
| Published date | 01 June 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0047117819884613
International Relations
2021, Vol. 35(2) 341 –362
© The Author(s) 2019
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DOI: 10.1177/0047117819884613
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Can’t be held responsible:
Weak norms and refugee
protection evasion
Alise Coen
University of Wisconsin-Green Bay
Abstract
States have increasingly moved away from refugee protection, intensifying the vulnerability of
refugees and asylum-seekers. Drawing on theories of norm dynamics within International Relations
(IR), this article argues that departures from refugee protection can be partly explained by the
weakness of the normative principles governing the treatment of individuals fleeing persecution.
Ambiguities, diverging interpretations, and varying levels of codification complicate efforts to
hold states accountable to a complex bundle of human rights standards surrounding refugee
and asylum protection. These weaknesses in the international refugee regime bolster norm-
evading behavior wherein governments deliberately minimize their obligations while claiming
technical compliance. Drawing on an analysis of US refugee and asylum policies under the Trump
administration, the article reveals how norm evasion and accountability challenges emerge in the
context of ambiguous standards vis-à-vis non-refoulement, non-detention, non-penalization, non-
discrimination, and refugee responsibility-sharing.
Keywords
asylum, human rights, norm evasion, norms, refugees, United States
In response to global forced displacement – including an estimated 25 million refugees –
governments have increasingly closed borders, detained and repatriated asylum-seekers
against their will, developed ‘deterrence’ and ‘repulsion’ techniques to prevent asylum-
seekers from reaching their territories, and engaged in other practices undermining human
rights principles regarding the treatment of individuals fleeing persecution and conflict.1
The denial of entry by European ports to asylum-seekers – including sick children –
stranded for weeks in the Mediterranean, the deaths of children detained along the US
Corresponding author:
Alise Coen, Department of Political Science, University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, Sheboygan Campus, One
University Drive, Sheboygan, WI 53081, USA.
Email: coena@uwgb.edu
884613IRE0010.1177/0047117819884613International RelationsCoen
research-article2019
Article
342 International Relations 35(2)
southern border, and drastic cuts to third-country refugee resettlement prompt challenging
questions about the status of the international refugee and asylum regime.2 Given the bar-
rage of state practices contravening human rights principles governing the treatment of
refugees and asylum-seekers, it is reasonable to question whether refugee protection
norms are in crisis.
A breakdown in adherence to the human rights standards at the core of refugee protec-
tion intensifies vulnerability, suffering, and potential loss of life. Yet, other human rights
norms have received substantially more attention within International Relations (IR)
than refugee protection norms. Much work, for example, has probed the status of anti-
torture norms in the wake of the counterterrorism era.3 Despite robust literatures on
human rights, norms, and international order, the status of refugee and asylum protection
principles remains unclear. This article assesses the complex bundle of normative princi-
ples surrounding the treatment of refugees and asylum-seekers,4 exploring how ambigui-
ties, diverging interpretations, and in some cases lack of codification facilitate refugee
protection norm evasion. Weaknesses underpinning the refugee and asylum regime com-
plicate determinations of which behaviors constitute outright breaches and undermine
efforts to hold states accountable. The article draws on an analysis of US refugee and
asylum policies during the Trump administration, illustrating how accountability prob-
lems manifest in the arenas of non-refoulement (i.e. prohibitions on the return of asylum-
seekers to territories where they might face harm), non-detention, non-penalization,
non-discrimination, and refugee responsibility-sharing.
The article proceeds as follows: to begin, theoretical frameworks from the study of
norm dynamics in International Relations are bridged with the refugee studies literature
to contextualize the task of investigating how weak normative principles at the interna-
tional level contribute to the erosion of human rights standards in domestic refugee and
asylum policies.5 Next, the article outlines the normative ambiguities and varying levels
of codification characterizing non-refoulement, non-detention, non-penalization, non-
discrimination, and refugee responsibility-sharing. The third section explores accounta-
bility problems associated with these principles through an analysis of their evasion
under the Trump administration. The article concludes with a reflection on how this lack
of refugee protection and responsibility-sharing fits into broader questions surrounding
international human rights norms and IR.
Bridging norm dynamics and refugee studies
The study of norms, commonly defined as standards of appropriate behavior based on
collective understandings and moral assessments,6 is central in IR. Constructivist
approaches have been instrumental in foregrounding the power of norms in shaping
interests, identities, and behaviors, envisioning important roles for normative discourses
in regulating and constituting governance.7 At the international level, norms shape col-
lective expectations for rightful action among states and other actors, providing a ‘logic
of appropriateness’ that governs membership and status while legitimizing patterns of
authority.8 The intersubjective recognition of what is proper and acceptable emerges in a
global social hierarchy in which behavior is bound by communities with given identities,
such that norms generate comparative judgments wherein states are ranked and assessed
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