States’ Responsibilities to Refugees and Refugee Selection

Abstract

There is a general consensus amongst political theorists that there are conceivable limits to the number of refugees that a state can be expected to admit. Once this limit nears, states are faced with the issue of having to select some refugees for admittance over others. States have evolved different refugee selection practices to suit their particular circumstances. This thesis draws on the contrasting theories of Michael Walzer, Joseph Carens and David Miller to evaluate which grounds for selection that states may use are theoretically permissible, and which are not. With respect to the theory and the author’s own reflection, it concludes that the vulnerability of the refugee should be the main ground for selection, while selection on the grounds of a refugee’s race is impermissible. Other grounds for selection require additional considerations to be made when deciding on their permissibility. This thesis makes use of two case studies, involving recent refugee crises, to test whether the responses of EU states to these crises can be considered permissible when measured against the theories presented in this thesis.