Law and Critique
Volume 25, Issue 3, 2014, Pages 249-270

Accidents, Agency and Asylum: Constructing the Refugee Subject (Article)

Behrman S.*
  • a Law School, University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich, Norfolk NR4 7TJ, United Kingdom

Abstract

Refugee law demands that the asylum seeker demonstrate an extremely limited and distorted form of agency that is encapsulated within the legal definition of the refugee. Such a framework also denies the role of the accidental in the refugee experience. I argue that the problem lies at the heart of the legal form, as constructed under capitalism. The sans-papiers show us the potential for refugees themselves to reconstruct a subjectivity that transcends the distorted form of agency and the false dichotomy between the accidental and agency found in law, through their rejection of legal definitions and the re-emergence of themselves as political subjects. © 2014, Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.

Author Keywords

Refugees Marxism Agency Sans-papiers

Index Keywords

[No Keywords available]

Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84912017280&doi=10.1007%2fs10978-014-9140-x&partnerID=40&md5=2feb48bdd6cc4a2c2b6b4a95cb868a9a

DOI: 10.1007/s10978-014-9140-x
ISSN: 09578536
Cited by: 6
Original Language: English