Degree Type
Honors Capstone Project
Date of Submission
Spring 5-1-2007
Capstone Advisor
Alison Mountz
Honors Reader
Jennifer Hyndman
Capstone Major
International Relations
Capstone College
Citizenship and Public Affairs
Audio/Visual Component
no
Capstone Prize Winner
no
Won Capstone Funding
no
Honors Categories
Social Sciences
Subject Categories
International and Area Studies | Other International and Area Studies
Abstract
The U.S./Canadian border is in the process of being renegotiated as a result of larger processes of redefining and reimagining sovereign territories inNorth America. New understandings ofU.S.and Canadian state sovereignty are creating a conflated “other” of cross-border flows: an illegitimate migrant figure who is securitized, criminalized and disembodied. The contemporary “othering” of the migrant has serious human rights implications such as the restriction of access to refugee protection. U.S.and Canadian states share an agenda of migration control executed through the manipulation of geography and the figure of the migrant.
On paper, the Safe Third Country Agreement (STCA) aims to enhance refugee protection and increase border security. In practice, STCA makes the U.S./Canadian border a battleground for obtaining access to asylum, thus eroding refugee protection inNorth Americaand threatening the security of asylum seekers, theU.S.and Canadian states.
In order to evaluate STCA, I conducted field interviews during 2006 and 2007 with persons working in theU.S.and Canadian governments as well as outside the governments in both countries on STCA. Through my analysis of these discussions, official policy documents and relevant literature, I offer three different readings of STCA. This provides a context for STCA and uncovers the motivations for the signing of the policy.
The U.S./Canadian STCA functions as an exclusionary measure in a broader field of exclusions: reconfigurations of the border, state sovereignty, territorial limits of the state and the figure of the migrant which aim to reduce the access to and the quality of asylum.
Recommended Citation
Ryman, Sarah Anne, "The U.S./Canada Safe Third Country Agreement: A Geographical Evaluation" (2007). Honors Capstone Projects - All. 584.
https://surface.syr.edu/honors_capstone/584
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