Sanctuary And Asylum

The practice of sanctuary�giving refuge to the threatened, vulnerable stranger�may be universal among humans. From primate populations to ancient religious traditions to the modern legal institution of asylum, anthropologist Linda Rabben explores the long history of sanctuary and analyzes modern asylum policies in North America, Europe, and elsewhere, contrasting them with the role that courageous individuals and organizations have played in offering refuge to survivors of torture, persecution, and discrimination. Rabben gives close attention to the mid-2010s refugee crisis in Europe and to Central Americans seeking asylum in the United States. This wide-ranging, timely, and carefully documented account draws on Rabben�s experiences as a human rights advocate as well as her training as an anthropologist. Sanctuary and Asylum will help citizens, professionals, and policy makers take informed and compassionate action.

The death of twenty-one Salvadoran refugees in the Arizona desert in 1980 made many Americans aware for the first time that people were strugglingÑand dyingÑto find political asylum in the United States. Tucsonan Jim Corbett first encountered the problem while attempting to help a hitchhiking refugee. What came of that act of altruism was a movement that spread across the country, challenged the federal government, and brought the refugee problem to national awareness. Corbett first worked within the law to help refugees process applications for asylum, but the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service soon began a program of arrests; then he began to smuggle refugees from the Mexican border to the homes of citizens willing to provide shelter, making hundreds of trips over the next two years; finally he enlisted the support of the Tucson Ecumenical Council and persuaded John Fife, pastor of the Southside Presbyterian Church, to open that building as a refuge. When legal action against Corbett and the others seemed imminent, Southside became, on March 24, 1982, the first of two hundred churches in the country to declare itself a sanctuary. Convictions of the Heart takes readers inside the santuary movement to reveal its founders' motives and underlying beliefs, and inside the courtroom to describe the government's efforts to stop it. Although the book addresses many points of view, its primary focus is on the philosophy of Jim Corbett. Rooted in the nonviolence of Gandhi, the Society of Friends, and Martin Luther King, Corbett's beliefs challenged individuals and communities of faith across the country to examine the strength of their commitment to the needs and rights of others.

This collection contains a rich and up-to-date mix of specific substantive empirical case studies and theoretically-driven analyses from multiple disciplinary perspectives and is international in scope. This is the first time studies and discussion of sanctuary practices outside the US context (e.g., in the UK, Germany, the Nordic countries and Canada) and of recent developments within the US context (e.g., the New Sanctuary Movement), along with accounts of sanctuary as a mutating set of practices and spaces (e.g., pre-modern and terrorist sanctuary), have been brought together in one collection.

This book traces the ancient concept of sanctuary. It examines how the contemporary sanctuary city movement contributes to a hostile asylum regime by holding asylum seekers in a suspended state where rights are indefinitely deferred. At the same time, it explores myriad subversive practices challenging this waiting state.

This book explores the history and evolution of sanctuary and asylum as a legal concept including treaties, laws, and court rulings by major geographic areas around the world, influences of Hebrew [Old Testament], classical sanctuary theory and practices, the Koran, and other Islamic-Arab regional accords and conventions. The authors' approach is well cited and suitable for those who want a good starting point for further study. Included in the book are chapters on the following topics: Sanctuary and Asylum, Jewish View of Asylum, Asylum History, Asylum in France, Asylum: History, Asylum in France, Asylum in Great Britain, Asylum in Germany, Asylum: Islamic Law, Asylum in International Treaties, Asylum in International Relations, Asylum in the United States, Asylum in the European Community, Asylum in Latin America, Asylum in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Seeking Sanctuary brings together life stories from LGBT migrants living in Johannesburg and their battle to reconcile faith with their sexual identity. The narratives reveal the complex interplay between homophobia and xenophobia; the fight for sexual and gender rights; and how faith-based organisations can direct social change.

The author recounts the development in the United States of the 'sanctuary movement', a loose association of churches which accord refuge and legal and social services to central American refugees. United States immigration and refugee law is succinctly described, with due emphasis given to the 1951 Convention the principle of non-refoulement and the protection required by the 1949 Geneva Red Cross Conventions. The low refugee recognition rate for central Americans is identified as one reason giving rise to the need for extra-statutory refuge. The resulting confrontation between church and state is discribed, with reference to the prosecution and trials of various sanctuary workers. The author also assesses the legal implications for those helping 'illegal' refugees, who may be indicted for harbouring, concealing, shielding from detection or transportation; possible defences are suggested. Three chapters examine the history of sanctuary, as an ancient, biblical tradition; as a privileged refuge established in England in early years in reaction to the practice of blood revenge, and as reflected in elements of United States history, for example, in regard to the 'underground railroad' for fugitive slaves and in various responses to war resisters during the Vietnam period. The author concludes with the suggestion that the authority of the sanctuary novement today is moral, rather than legal; he notes the grassroots origins of the movement and the fact that the beneficiaries today are refugees rather than criminals.

Deprived of political rights yet caught up in the law's vested interest in portraying them as “other” to its citizens, individuals seeking asylum often experience a relationship of “inclusive exclusion” with their host nation. Concentrating on legislation, ethics, and political identity in Britain, Australasia, and the European Union, David Farrier engages in this book with asylum as an emerging postcolonial field through readings of postcolonial authors and filmmakers—including J. M. Coetzee, Leila Aboulela, and Stephen Frears—framed by the work of theorists, including Gayatri Spivak and Jacques Derrida. Postcolonial studies has typically understood displacement in terms of hybridity, and this accessible introduction represents a new direction for understanding belonging in a globalized world.