Selective Sovereignty and the Refugee Regime

Abstract

This introductory chapter lays out the book’s central question: why do states sometimes assert, and at other times cede, their sovereign prerogatives in the face of refugee flows? The overview of refugee rights around the world presented in the chapter reveals two puzzling trends: governments treat some refugees well and others poorly (the “discrimination puzzle”), and governments often hand over asylum policymaking to the UN (the “delegation puzzle”). These patterns complicate a conventional wisdom that pits state sovereignty against human rights. This chapter’s discussion sets the stage for subsequent chapters by establishing the present-day significance of state responses to refugees, the prevalence of discrimination and delegation, and the inadequacy of existing explanations for these phenomena.