Crossing Law’s Border

Book excerpt: The UN Refugee Agency considers resettlement – the selection and transfer of refugees from the state where they seek asylum to another state that volunteers to take them – a tool of refugee protection and an expression of international burden sharing. In this account of Canada’s resettlement program from the Indochinese crisis of the 1970s to the Syrian crisis of the 2010s, Shauna Labman explores how rights, responsibilities, and obligations intersect in the absence of a legal scheme for refugee resettlement. In particular, she examines the role of the law on the voluntary act of resettlement and the effect of resettlement on asylum policies. This pathbreaking book looks at the interplay between resettlement and asylum in one of the world’s most successful refugee protection programs and shows how resettlement can either complement or complicate in-country asylum claims at a time when refugee crises and fear of outsiders are causing countries to close their borders to asylum-seekers around the world.