The aim of this article is to outline some of the key issues and themes discussed at the Institute of Policy Studies symposium in July 2009 on ‘Climate Change and Migration in the South Pacific Region: policy perspectives’. The linkages between climate change, environmental degradation and migration are manifold and not always clearly perceived.
This chapter describes refugee status determination (RSD), which is the post-Second World War-era term to describe a process by which the asylum norm, now expressed primarily through the Refugee Convention, is operationalized. While the concept of offering sanctuary from harm—‘asylum’—is old, little has been written about the surrounding decision-making processes in the Convention’s historical antecedents or precursors. The chapter begins by examining the origins of RSD. It charts how contemporary RSD reflects its historical antecedents and questions the robustness of a dichotomy between group and individual determination as a marker of development. The chapter then outlines the increased systemization of RSD through dedicated status determination structures comprising both State and mandate RSD, and juridification via an ever-denser body of law and guidance. It also considers inherent and contextual challenges faced by RSD before detailing various proposals for reform to ensure that RSD is a ‘fit-for purpose’ protection mechanism in the twenty-first century.
This article considers how justice relates to and informs the structure of international climate change mitigation2 architectures under which burdens are assumed by individual states. The argument can be made that the structure of the current global architecture has, to a substantial extent, been determined in the domain of realpolitik, not justice. In the domain of realpolitik, states seek to maximise their national self-interest based on practical rather than ethical considerations. The more powerful the state, the more able it is to stay outside global regulatory systems if its perception of its national self-interest deems this appropriate. But if this is so, are considerations of justice relevant to the shape of future global climate change mitigation regimes? This article argues that they are.
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