Who is doing asylum in Niger? State bureaucrats’ perspectives and strategies on the externalization of refugee protection
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In: Anthropologie et Développement, Vol. 2020, No. 51, 2020, p. 85-101.
Research output: Journal contributions › Journal articles › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Who is doing asylum in Niger? State bureaucrats’ perspectives and strategies on the externalization of refugee protection
AU - Lambert, Laura
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - In line with the policies fighting irregular migration to Europe, the asylum procedure in Niger was recently reinforced as a complementary mechanism of protection and fixation, with support from the European Union and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The article investigates from an ethnographic perspective what some of these reconfigurations meant to the affected bureaucrats in the National Eligibility Commission (CNE) and relevant asylum institutions and how they coped with these changes. Based on the Emergency Transit Mechanism (ETM) and the Sudanese in Agadez as two recent and politicized southbound refugee movements from Libya, I argue that the Nigerien bureaucrats experienced a reduced discretionary power in the asylum adjudication and in the question of who enters and remains in the country, due mostly to a power shift up to its government and the UNHCR, but also down to local interests and norms in Agadez. As a reaction to their reduced discretion or practical decision-making power, some voiced criticism or searched for creative solutions. Others slowed down the asylum procedures in order to reconcile the local anti-refugee stance and global refugee protection norms.
AB - In line with the policies fighting irregular migration to Europe, the asylum procedure in Niger was recently reinforced as a complementary mechanism of protection and fixation, with support from the European Union and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The article investigates from an ethnographic perspective what some of these reconfigurations meant to the affected bureaucrats in the National Eligibility Commission (CNE) and relevant asylum institutions and how they coped with these changes. Based on the Emergency Transit Mechanism (ETM) and the Sudanese in Agadez as two recent and politicized southbound refugee movements from Libya, I argue that the Nigerien bureaucrats experienced a reduced discretionary power in the asylum adjudication and in the question of who enters and remains in the country, due mostly to a power shift up to its government and the UNHCR, but also down to local interests and norms in Agadez. As a reaction to their reduced discretion or practical decision-making power, some voiced criticism or searched for creative solutions. Others slowed down the asylum procedures in order to reconcile the local anti-refugee stance and global refugee protection norms.
UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/a5c1e4db-6cda-3102-9027-db486354877b/
U2 - 10.4000/anthropodev.976
DO - 10.4000/anthropodev.976
M3 - Journal articles
VL - 2020
SP - 85
EP - 101
JO - Anthropologie et Développement
JF - Anthropologie et Développement
SN - 2553-1719
IS - 51
ER -