Pros And Cons Of Refugees And Asylum Seekers

Refugees and asylum seekers are “feared” because they directly question ideas such as territory, the border, and sovereignty. The political strength of a state has historically been equated with control of territory (Painter, 2008). When a group of people exist who are “stateless”, they necessitate a reaction from the state whose job it is to reinforce control over territory and people. The state responds with dominating power and violence to reassert their control by increasing border security, demolishing camps and leaving refugees and asylum seekers to their own devices. Taking into account that power is an entanglement of domination and resistance, refugees and asylum seekers are empowered in their resistance (Sharp, Routledge, Philo, & Paddison, 2000). The mere act of existing and creating
The term “campzenship” has emerged to recognize “the specific and situated form of political membership produced in and by the camp” (Sigona, 2015, p.1). Although refugees and asylum seekers are able to foster solidarity and add life into camps, they are nonetheless abandoned by the state and exist in a state of exception. Refugees and asylum seekers are included in politics as bare life; their lives have no meaning, they are not grievable. Refugees and asylum seekers exist in spaces of exception, whether in detention centres, en-route to “safety”, or even when they think they’ve reached their safe haven only to be rejected and left to wait in makeshift camps. France and the UK both recognize the human right of seeking asylum and are both signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention, but their actions as a state directly contradict that. Refugees are included in the law as having the right to seek asylum, but they are also excluded and abandoned when the state is directly asked to deal with them. The state of exception is