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111. A Statistical and Demographic Profile of the US Temporary Protected Status Populations from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti

Author:
Robert Warren and Donald Kerwin
Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:
Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:
This report presents detailed statistical information on the US Temporary Protected Status (TPS) populations from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti. TPS can be granted to noncitizens from designated nations who are unable to return to their countries because of armed conflict, environmental disaster, or other extraordinary and temporary conditions. In January 2017, an estimated 325,000 migrants from 13 TPS-designated countries resided in the United States. This statistical portrait of TPS beneficiaries from El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti reveals hardworking populations with strong family and other ties to the United States. In addition, high percentages have lived in the United States for 20 years or more, arrived as children, and have US citizen children. The paper finds that: The labor force participation rate of the TPS population from the three nations ranges from 81 to 88 percent, which is well above the rate for the total US population (63 percent) and the foreign-born population (66 percent). The five leading industries in which TPS beneficiaries from these countries work are: construction (51,700), restaurants and other food services (32,400), landscaping services (15,800), child day care services (10,000), and grocery stores (9,200). TPS recipients from these countries live in 206,000 households: 61,100 of these households (roughly 30 percent) have mortgages. About 68,000, or 22 percent, of the TPS population from these nations arrived as children under the age of 16. TPS beneficiaries from these nations have an estimated 273,000 US citizen children (born in the United States). Ten percent of El Salvadoran, nine percent of the Haitian, and six percent of the Honduran TPS beneficiaries are married to a legal resident. More than one-half of El Salvadoran and Honduran, and 16 percent of the Haitian TPS beneficiaries have resided in the United States for 20 years or more. The six US states with the largest TPS populations from these countries are California (55,000), Texas (45,000), Florida (45,000), New York (26,000), Virginia (24,000), and Maryland (23,000). Eighty-seven percent of the TPS population from these countries speaks at least some English, and slightly over one-half speak English well, very well, or only English. About 27,000, or 11 percent, of those in the labor force are self-employed, having created jobs for themselves and likely for others as well. TPS status should be extended until beneficiaries can safely return home and can successfully reintegrate into their home communities. Most long-term TPS recipients should be afforded a path to lawful permanent resident (LPR) status and ultimately to US citizenship.
Topic:
Border Control, Refugees, and Immigrants
Political Geography:
United States, South America, Central America, and North America

112. Kidnapped, Trafficked, Detained? The Implications of Non-state Actor Involvement in Immigration Detention

Author:
Michael Flynn
Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:
Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:
Global migration challenges are reinforcing long-standing trends that involve shifting immigration control measures beyond national borders and incorporating new actors into detention systems. Proposals to shape migration management policies — including discussions on developing a Global Compact for Migration — recognize the need to involve a range of actors to implement humane and effective strategies. However, when observed through the lens of immigration detention, some policy trends raise challenging questions, particularly those that lead to increasing roles for non-state actors in migration control. This article critically assesses a range of new actors who have become involved in the deprivation of liberty of migrants and asylum seekers, describes the various forces that appear to be driving their engagement, and makes a series of recommendations concerning the role of non-state actors and detention in global efforts to manage international migration. These recommendations include: ending the use the detention in international migration management schemes; limiting the involvement of private companies in immigration control measures; insisting that the International Organization for Migration (IOM) actively endorse the centrality of human rights in the Global Compact for Migration and amend its constitution so that it makes a clear commitment to international human rights standards; and encouraging nongovernmental organizations to carefully assess the services they provide when operating in detention situations to ensure that their work contributes to harm reduction.
Topic:
Migration, Non State Actors, Border Control, and Refugees
Political Geography:
Global Focus

113. The “Right to Remain Here” as an Evolving Component of Global Refugee Protection: Current Initiatives and Critical Questions

Author:
Daniel Kanstroom
Publication Date:
01-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal on Migration and Human Security
Institution:
Center for Migration Studies of New York
Abstract:
This article considers the relationship between two human rights discourses (and two specific legal regimes): refugee and asylum protection and the evolving body of international law that regulates expulsions and deportations. Legal protections for refugees and asylum seekers are, of course, venerable, well-known, and in many respects still cherished, if challenged and perhaps a bit frail. Anti-deportation discourse is much newer, multifaceted, and evolving. It is in many respects a young work in progress. It has arisen in response to a rising tide of deportations, and the worrisome development of massive, harsh deportation machinery in the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Mexico, Australia, and South Africa, among others. This article’s main goal is to consider how these two discourses do and might relate to each other. More specifically, it suggests that the development of procedural and substantive rights against removal — as well as rights during and after removal — aids our understanding of the current state and possible future of the refugee protection regime. The article’s basic thesis is this: The global refugee regime, though challenged both theoretically and in practice, must be maintained and strengthened. Its historical focus on developing criteria for admission into safe states, on protections against expulsion (i.e., non-refoulement), and on regimes of temporary protection all remain critically important. However, a focus on other protections for all noncitizens facing deportation is equally important. Deportation has become a major international system that transcends the power of any single nation-state. Its methods have migrated from one regime to another; its size and scope are substantial and expanding; its costs are enormous; and its effects frequently constitute major human rights violations against millions who do not qualify as refugees. In recent years there has been increasing reliance by states on generally applicable deportation systems, led in large measure by the United States’ radical 25 year-plus experiment with large-scale deportation. Europe has also witnessed a rising tide of deportation, some of which has developed in reaction to European asylum practices. Deportation has been facilitated globally (e.g., in Australia) by well-funded, efficient (but relatively little known) intergovernmental idea sharing, training, and cooperation. This global expansion, standardization, and increasing intergovernmental cooperation on deportation has been met by powerful — if in some respects still nascent — human rights responses by activists, courts, some political actors, and scholars. It might seem counterintuitive to think that emerging ideas about deportation protections could help refugees and asylum seekers, as those people by definition often have greater rights protections both in admission and expulsion. However, the emerging anti-deportation discourses should be systematically studied by those interested in the global refugee regime for three basic reasons. First, what Matthew Gibney has described as “the deportation turn” has historically been deeply connected to anxiety about asylum seekers. Although we lack exact figures of the number of asylum seekers who have been subsequently expelled worldwide, there seems little doubt that it has been a significant phenomenon and will be an increasingly important challenge in the future. The two phenomena of refugee/asylum protections and deportation, in short, are now and have long been linked. What has sometimes been gained through the front door, so to speak, may be lost through the back door. Second, current deportation human rights discourses embody creative framing models that might aid constructive critique and reform of the existing refugee protection regime. They tend to be more functionally oriented, less definitional in terms of who warrants protection, and more fluid and transnational. Third, these discourses offer important specific rights protections that could strengthen the refugee and asylum regime, even as we continue to see weakening state support for the basic 1951/1967 protection regime. This is especially true in regard to the extraterritorial scope of the (deporting) state’s obligations post-deportation. This article particularly examines two initiatives in this emerging field: The International Law Commission’s Draft Articles on the Expulsion of Aliens and the draft Declaration on the Rights of Expelled and Deported Persons developed through the Boston College Post-Deportation Human Rights Project (of which the author is a co-director). It compares their provisions to the existing corpus of substantive and procedural protections for refugees relating to expulsion and removal. It concludes with consideration of how these discourses may strengthen protections for refugees while also helping to develop more capacious and protective systems in the future.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Cooperation, Border Control, Refugees, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, Europe, France, South Africa, Germany, Australia, Mexico, and Global Focus

114. Refugees Flee into Yunnan After Renewed Violence Along Myanmar Border

Author:
Peter Wood
Publication Date:
03-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
China Brief
Institution:
The Jamestown Foundation
Abstract:
Violence along China’s border with Myanmar is threatening yet again to spill across into Yunnan Province. According to the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, more than 20,000 refugees have fled into Yunnan after renewed fighting between the Kachin Independence Army and Myanmar’s Armed Forces (Tatmadaw). These refugees are the second wave after more than 3,000 fled into China in late November 2016. In response, the prefectural government has begun setting up temporary shelters (Guanchazhe, November 22, 2016). It is unclear how it will cope with the much larger, second wave.
Topic:
Refugee Issues, Military Affairs, Border Control, and Conflict
Political Geography:
China, Asia, and Myanmar

115. Brexit -- What Does It Mean for Ireland?

Author:
John Bruton
Publication Date:
05-2017
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Center for Transatlantic Relations
Abstract:
Testimony by CTR Distinguished Fellow and former Irish Prime Minister John Bruton at the Seanad Special Select Committee on the UK’s Withdrawal from the European Union on Thursday, April 27 2017.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Treaties and Agreements, Border Control, European Union, and Brexit
Political Geography:
United Kingdom, Europe, Ireland, and European Union

116. The Idolatry of Force: How Israel Embraced Targeted Killing

Author:
Paul Aaron Gaston
Publication Date:
06-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Not until the Second Intifada did assassination emerge as an explicit, legally codified, and publicly announced doctrine of so-called targeted killing in Israel. This study, the first of a two-part series, explores the doctrine’s historical roots and ideological lineage and tracks its rise under the premiership of Ariel Sharon. Targeted killing became institutionalized not just to reduce direct and imminent threats against Israelis but also to mobilize electoral support, field- test weapons and tactics, and eliminate key figures in order to sow chaos and stunt the development of an effective Palestinian national movement. The study frames the analysis within a wider meditation on Israel’s idolatry of force. As much symbolic performance as military technique, targeted killing reenacts and ritualizes Palestinian humiliation and helplessness in the face of the Zionist state’s irresistible power, making this dynamic appear a fact of life, ordained and immutable.
Topic:
International Organization, International Affairs, Armed Forces, and Border Control
Political Geography:
Israel

117. A Newer Hamas? The Revised Charter

Author:
Khaled Hroub
Publication Date:
06-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
On 1 May 2017, Hamas released its “Document of General Principles and Policies” following years of periodic speculation that the movement was working on a new political platform. Heralded by some as a significant milestone in Hamas’s political thought and practice, the document reiterates longstanding positions but also lays out some new ones. Given the timing of its release, as well as its contents and possible implications, the document could be considered Hamas’s new charter: it details the organization’s views on the struggle against “the Zionist project” and Israel and outlines its strategies to counter that project. This essay aims to provide a fine-grained analysis of the substance, context, and ramifications of the recently released document. The discussion starts with an overview highlighting aspects of the document that could be considered departures from Hamas’s original 1988 charter, and pointing to changes in the movement’s discourse, both in form and substance. A contextual analysis then probes the regional, international, and internal impetuses behind the issuance of the document. Finally, the discussion concludes with a look at the possible implications for the movement itself, as well as for the Palestinians and for Israel.
Topic:
International Security, International Affairs, Border Control, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:
Palestine

118. Europe Facing its Migration and Refugee Challenges: EU, Nation States and Civic Society

Author:
Vaclav Havel Library
Publication Date:
05-2016
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Vaclav Havel Library
Abstract:
The Václav Havel European Dialogues is an internation- al project that aims to initiate and stimulate a discussion about issues determining the direction of contemporary Europe while referring to the European spiritual legacy of Václav Havel. This idea takes its main inspiration from Václav Havel’s essay “Power of the Powerless”. More than other similarly focused projects, the Václav Havel Euro- pean Dialogues aims to offer the “powerless” a platform to express themselves and in so doing to boost their posi- tion within Europe. The Václav Havel European Dialogues is planned as a long-term project and involves cooperation with other organisations in various European cities. Indi- vidual meetings, which take the form of a conference, are targeted primarily at secondary and third-level students, as well as specialists and members of the public interested in European issues.
Topic:
Migration, Regional Cooperation, Immigration, Border Control, European Union, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:
Europe

119. A Medium- and Long-Term Plan to Address the Central American Refugee Situation

Author:
Dan Restrepo and Silva Mathema
Publication Date:
05-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for American Progress - CAP
Abstract:
It is impossible to understand the flow of refugees emanating from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador—collectively, known as the Northern Triangle of Central America—without understanding the security and economic conditions in each of the three countries. Despite important differences, the three Northern Triangle countries are among the poorest in the Americas and the most violent in the world. Based on statistics from the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, or UNODC, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador were three of the five most dangerous countries in the world in 2013—the last year for which U.N. statistics are available. That year, Honduras had the world’s highest per capita homicide rate, at 90.4 homicides per 100,000 people; El Salvador ranked fourth, with a rate of 41.2 homicides per 100,000 people; and Guatemala was fifth, with a rate of 39.9 homicides per 100,000 people. Since then, the situation in El Salvador has dramatically worsened following the 2014 breakdown of a 2012 truce between two of its largest and most powerful street gangs: MS-13 and Barrio 18. In 2015, El Salvador became the most dangerous country in the Western Hemisphere, with a homicide rate of 108.5 per 100,000. This made it 24 times more dangerous than the United States, which had a homicide rate of 4.5 per 100,000 in 2014. The violence in some of these countries’ cities is even worse. For example, San Salvador, the capital city of El Salvador, averaged one murder every hour in August 2015—the highest number of murders since the end of the country’s horrific civil war in 1992.5 The 2015 homicide rates in both Honduras and Guatemala improved to 62.5 and 29.2 homicides per 100,000 people, respectively.
Topic:
Migration, Border Control, Refugee Crisis, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:
Central America, North America, Honduras, El Salvador, and United States of America

120. A Short-Term Plan to Address the Central American Refugee Situation

Author:
Philip E. Wolgin
Publication Date:
05-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for American Progress - CAP
Abstract:
Over the past half-decade, rising violence and structural poverty in the Northern Triangle region of Central America—which encompasses El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala—have pushed thousands of children and families to flee for safety. These three countries are some of the most dangerous on the planet, with high rates of homicide and specifically femicide—the killing of women and girls. Violence, corruption, and extortion play a big part in everyday life. Since 2014, more than 120,000 children and another 120,000 people in family units from this region have arrived in the United States seeking protection. The flow of these asylum seekers peaked in fiscal year 2014 before dipping, perhaps temporarily, in FY 2015. This drop occurred not because conditions improved in the region but because of a sustained effort by the U.S. government—with the help of Mexico and the Northern Triangle countries—to stop people from making the dangerous journey or to intercept them on the way to the United States. This year, in FY 2016, the numbers of children and families arriving in the United States have begun to rise again as conditions in the region continue to deteriorate. This report lays out short-term recommendations for ensuring that all asylum seekers who reach the United States receive a full and fair shot at protection. The recommendations are structured to follow the process that children and families go through when seeking protection: arrival in the United States, custody determinations and detention, and proceedings in the immigration courts.
Topic:
Migration, Border Control, Refugee Crisis, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:
Central America, North America, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, and United States of America