12. Causes and Consequences of Human Smuggling

SUMMARY

Organizers:

Jeroen Doomernik
University of Amsterdam
NETHERLANDS
J.Doomernik@frw.uva.nl

Joanne van Selm
University of Amsterdam
NETHERLANDS
vanselm@pscw.uva.nl

Description:

Increasingly the activities of human smugglers undermine the privilege of governments to determine whom they allow access to, and residence within their jurisdiction. The smuggler’s market is the result of the conjunction of growing migration pressure from the non-industrialized world and increasingly restrictive immigration policies at the receiving end. At the same time smugglers may also pose a serious threat to fundamental human rights (including the right to asylum) of migrants in that frequently their only concern lies in financial gain. Government policy makers tend to focus on the first problem, whereas NGO’s as a rule focus on the latter. In this workshop both perspectives will be integrated, with researchers as intermediaries.

This will be done around three sets of topics:

(1) the use of human smugglers as a necessary means for refugees to find protection/the fact that smuggling constitutes (international crime)

(2) the right of individuals to be protected against human rights violations, during the migration process/the need for states to maintain their sovereignty and maintain immigration restrictions

(3) the question of whether present day migration flows are basically made up of individuals who need to be viewed as refugees or as economic migrants, and the resulting perspective on the human smuggling phenomenon.

Presenters

Joanne van Selm, University of Amsterdam, NETHERLANDS (chair)
Nora V. Demleitner, St Mary’s University, UNITED STATES
Jeroen Doomernik, University of Amsterdam, NETHERLANDS
Mark J. Goodman, York University, CANADA
Khalid Koser, University College London, UNITED KINGDOM
Zool Suleman, Suleman & Co., CANADA
Philip L. Martin, University of California at Davis, UNITED STATES (discussant)