Rich countries are paying poorer ones to manage their refugee crises: 3 reasons this is dangerous

In recent years, western nations have been sending asylum seekers who arrive at their borders to other countries. This is a practice known as offshoring. The UK has become the recent poster country of this practice.

The UK, whose plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda was later scrapped after domestic and international opposition, has continually manufactured a perceived asylum threat. This led to slogans by the UK government such as “send the boats back” and “stop the boats”.

Australia pioneered offshoring by sending asylum seekers to Nauru, a small island nation in the Pacific Ocean. This began in 2012.

The Rwanda plan was emblematic of the emerging border governance strategy. First proposed by then-prime minister Boris Johnson in April 2022, the plan intended to send upwards of 50,000 asylum seekers to Rwanda from the UK.

The plan essentially approached governing and managing asylum seekers and refugees as commodities who can be shipped like goods from country to country.

We are scholars of refugee rights and public policy, as well as global supply chain governance and human rights.

We have been following how western governments have created a new form of refugee governance. Just as they once outsourced production, the dumping of e-waste and plastics recycling, they have been seeking to hand over to developing countries the problem of refugee processing and governance. This approach is flawed, too. It opens the door to human rights abuses and the propping up of authoritarian regimes in developing countries, and is expensive for western countries under the guise of humanitarianism and “solving” so-called migration crises.

Bad policy

The numbers of refugees and forcibly displaced people are surging. This has been brought on by climate change-related disasters, political repression, socioeconomic insecurity and group-based persecution. All these factors are intertwining with mounting anti-immigrant sentiment.

As a result, refugee offshoring remains on the radar of policymakers tackling so-called problematic immigration in Europe. For instance, 15 European Union (EU) countries are calling for migration and asylum processes to be outsourced.

It’s also no surprise that the Rwanda plan gained so much traction with right-wing politicians in Europe given that the populations being excluded are often migrants from Africa and the Middle East.

In our view, offshoring asylum seekers is cruel, inefficient and overall bad migration policy.

Understanding the risks

Human rights abuses: Offshoring is premised on denying asylum seekers a right to claim refuge. It encourages the enactment of restrictive and inhumane migration policies, and treats asylum seekers as commodities. This subjects them to further hardships during transportation, detention, and an unsafe return home or outright denial of entry. With offshoring, there are virtually no safeguards against human rights abuses. This was evidenced in the EU’s deal with Libya. Since 2017, the EU has spent 59 million euros (US$64 million) supplying and training the Libyan Coast Guard to stop arrivals in Europe. This has resulted in physical and sexual violence, forced labour and extortion.

Empowering authoritarian regimes: The west’s efforts to offshore migrants seeking refugee status by trading them like commodities in exchange for money is, by default, empowering authoritarian or backsliding democratic regimes. The west supplies these regimes with cash inflows that line the pockets of corrupt governments and the private companies that assist in managing migration through brute force. In March 2024, the EU struck an offshoring deal with Mauritania in north-west Africa. This agreement has seen politicians and activists, including Human Rights Watch, raise the alarm. Under the terms of the deal, the EU would pay Mauritania 210 million euros (US$227.5 million) to curb the flow of migrants into Europe through the country. However, Human Rights Watch warns that these funds would bolster the regime of Mauritanian president Mohamed Oul Ghazouani, who heads an autocratic government that still tolerates certain forms of slavery. This deal with Mauritania also threatens to destabilise domestic politics in the country on the grounds of racism.

Afro-Mauritanians have recently faced societal violence under perceptions of their illegality. Mauritanians perceive the EU as settling illegal criminals in their country, creating an even more dangerous situation for resettled asylum seekers.

Offshoring is expensive and destined to fail: In addition to being dangerous, refugee offshoring deals are immensely costly. The UK’s plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda would have cost taxpayers £1.8 million (US$2.3 million) per person deported to Kigali. The Australian taxpayer paid AUD$485 million (US$320 million) to process only 22 asylum seekers in Nauru in 2023. Not only are these strategies cruel, but they are also financially highly ineffective. Offshoring deals are intended to solve migration crises. However, they continually fail in stopping asylum seekers from entering western territories. Offshoring placates the far-right but is in fact a terrible use of government resources.

What next?

What the world is witnessing is a new western model of refugee governance. Rich countries are paying poorer ones to manage their refugee crises, while at best ignoring severe human rights violations and at worst contributing to these intentionally as a deterrent to future asylum seekers.

Despite the dangers and fiscal irresponsibility, the future of refugee governance centres increasingly on offshoring and border externalisation. This is evident in the new EU Pact on Migration and Asylum. It aims to pay countries in the global south to solve migration under the premise of good development.

More than 50 non-profit organisations have warned that this pact would be a catastrophe for migrant rights as asylum seekers could face human rights abuses, detention, unfair legal systems and poor shelter quality. This warning comes as the EU tilts its policy away from safe reception to externalised detention, fences, borders and deportations to unsafe third countries under the veneer of humanitarianism.

This new offshoring industry needs to be stopped in its tracks. Refugee claimants are people in distress, not a commodity to be bought and sold around the world through new trade deals between nations.

Ali Bhagat, Assistant Professor, Simon Fraser University and Genevieve LeBaron, Professor, School of Public Policy, Simon Fraser University

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