scholarly journals Interrogating the efficiency paradigm : a study of language analysis as evidence in refugee status determination

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin Colleen Pease
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
News Media ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Pilot Project ◽  
Political Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Refugee Status ◽  
Language Analysis ◽  
The Subject

In 1993, Sweden commenced the unprecedented practice of using Language Analysis (LA) as evidence in refugee status determination. Since that time, Western governments trying to cope with the perceived refugee crisis have similarly adopted the tool to corroborate and undermine the nationality claims of asylum seekers crossing borders without identity documents. During this same period, language professionals, lawyers, various news media, and others across the globe have proceeded to fuel international controversy on the subject, largely challenging the linguistic integrity of the tool, while investing less energy addressing the political context of use, as well as the implications for violations of refugee rights. In 2007, Canada reflected prioritized concerns for efficiency when it made public a pilot project to address the value of this language tool in aiding status decision-making. This paper interrogates the Canadian efficiency paradigm through the Australian lens of LA in practice. In exposing the ethical and legal sites of likely disengagement should Canada proceed with implementation, this paper cautions against LA becoming the most recent assault on a Canadian protection regime already under siege.

scholarly journals Interrogating the efficiency paradigm : a study of language analysis as evidence in refugee status determination

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin Colleen Pease
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
News Media ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Pilot Project ◽  
Political Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Refugee Status ◽  
Language Analysis ◽  
The Subject

In 1993, Sweden commenced the unprecedented practice of using Language Analysis (LA) as evidence in refugee status determination. Since that time, Western governments trying to cope with the perceived refugee crisis have similarly adopted the tool to corroborate and undermine the nationality claims of asylum seekers crossing borders without identity documents. During this same period, language professionals, lawyers, various news media, and others across the globe have proceeded to fuel international controversy on the subject, largely challenging the linguistic integrity of the tool, while investing less energy addressing the political context of use, as well as the implications for violations of refugee rights. In 2007, Canada reflected prioritized concerns for efficiency when it made public a pilot project to address the value of this language tool in aiding status decision-making. This paper interrogates the Canadian efficiency paradigm through the Australian lens of LA in practice. In exposing the ethical and legal sites of likely disengagement should Canada proceed with implementation, this paper cautions against LA becoming the most recent assault on a Canadian protection regime already under siege.

scholarly journals Watchdogs, Advocates and Adversaries: Journalists’ Relational Role Conceptions in Asylum Reporting

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 168-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Ojala ◽  
Reeta Pöyhtäri
Keyword(s):  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Political Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Professional Roles ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Reference Groups ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Role Conceptions ◽  
Social Interactionist ◽  
Interactionist Approach

Journalistic role conceptions are usually understood as internalised professional conventions about the tasks reporters pursue in society. This study insists that more attention be put on the relational and context-dependent nature of journalistic role conceptions. Adopting a social-interactionist approach to journalistic roles, the study examines how Finnish journalists conceived of their professional roles when covering asylum issues during the so-called “refugee crisis” of 2015–2016. Based on an analysis of open-ended, semi-structured interviews with 24 journalists, we highlight how considerations of the political context and interactions with three key reference groups—officials, asylum seekers and anti-immigrant publics—shaped the journalists’ conceptions of their tasks and duties. The article contributes to the study of journalistic role conceptions by illustrating how the conceptualisation of journalistic roles in relation to reference groups takes place in practice. It also sheds light on the tensions involved in journalistic balancing and negotiation between various available role conceptions, especially in the shifting societal and political contexts of a Europe marked by multiculturalism and the simultaneous rise of anti-immigrant movements.

Political Agenda Setting

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marcus Maurer
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
News Media ◽  
Agenda Setting ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
Media Agenda ◽  
Political Decision Making

Political agenda setting is the part of agenda-setting research that refers to the influence of the media agenda on the agenda of political actors. More precisely, the central question of political agenda-setting research is whether political actors adopt the issue agenda of the news media in various aspects ranging from communicating about issues that are prominently discussed in the news media to prioritizing issues from the news media agenda in political decision making. Although such effects have been studied under different labels (agenda building, policy agenda setting) for several decades, research in this field has recently increased significantly based on a new theoretical model introducing the term political agenda setting. Studies based on that model usually find effects of media coverage on the attention political actors pay to various issues, but at the same time point to a number of contingent conditions. First, as found in research on public agenda setting, there is an influence of characteristics of news media (e.g., television news vs. print media) and issues (e.g., obtrusive vs. unobtrusive issues). Second, there is an influence of characteristics of the political context (e.g., government vs. oppositional parties) and characteristics of individual politicians (e.g., generalists vs. specialists). Third, the findings of studies on the political agenda-setting effect differ, depending on which aspects of the political agenda are under examination (e.g., social media messages vs. political decision making).

The Sociology of Health and Medicine in Poland

2012 ◽  
pp. 73-88
Author(s):  
Zofia Slonska ◽  
Wlodzimierz Piatkowski
Keyword(s):  
Medical Sociology ◽  
Scientific Discipline ◽  
Political Context ◽  
European Countries ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
International Context ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Sociology Of Health

There is no doubt that the specificity of the country political context of the early 1950s contributed to the delay of the Polish medical sociology development. In 1951 as a result of the political decision, practicing sociology as an official scientific discipline, was prohibited. Its resurgence came after 1956. The growing domestic and international position of the Polish sociology enabled to initiate not only the activity of the general sociology but also the activity of its subdisciplines, including the medical sociology. The process of institutionalization of medical sociology in Poland has started since the beginning of 1960s. Its founder was a prominent medical sociologist Magdalena Sokolowska. Taking into account the existence of the strong connections of the Polish medical sociology both with medicine and the general sociology we can speak about its double identity. That feature of it decided about its specificity in European countries. Magdalena Sokolowska named it "intellectual hybrid". The subject of the article is the process of institutionalization and transformation of the Polish medical sociology since the beginning in the early 1960s until nowadays, in the international context.

Congressional Constitutional Interpretation and the Courts: A Preliminary Inquiry into Legislative Attitudes, 1959–2001

2004 ◽  
Vol 29 (01) ◽  
pp. 127-175
Author(s):  
Bruce G. Peabody
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Survey Research ◽  
Political Context ◽  
The Political ◽  
Constitutional Interpretation ◽  
Survey Responses

Through theoretically informed inquiry into congressional attitudes toward the Constitution and the courts as well as survey research of two modem Congresses, this study considers the prospects and implications of a more salient legislative role in constitutional affairs. By analyzing survey responses from the 86th (1959–61) and 106th (1999–2001) Congresses, and the political context in which these views were formed, this essay explores the legislature's evolving conception of its role and capacities as a constitutional interpreter. Among other findings, Congress demonstrates a persistent and somewhat surprising interest in asserting an independent, distinctive constitutional voice, although it has somewhat conflicted and underdeveloped views about how to achieve this objective. While this essay points to significant barriers to fostering a coherent and forceful congressional presence in constitutional decision making, it also suggests institutional organizations and strategies that may be promising bases for promoting this goal.

scholarly journals “Disturbing Practices”: Dehumanizing Asylum Seekers in the Refugee “Crisis” in Australia, 2001–2002

Refuge ◽  
2003 ◽  
pp. 25-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Leach
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Difference ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Parental Responsibility ◽  
Australian Government ◽  
Refugee Status ◽  
Boat People ◽  
Post September 11 ◽  
The Way

Throughout late 2001 and 2002, the Australian Government, seeking re-election, campaigned on a tough line against so-called “illegal” immigrants. Represented as “queue jumpers,” “boat people,” and “illegals,” most of these asylum seekers came from Middle Eastern countries, and, in the main, from Afghanistan and Iraq. This paper explores the way particular representations of cultural difference were entwined in media and government attacks upon asylum seekers. In particular, it analyzes the way key government figures articulated a negative understanding of asylum seekers’ family units – representing these as “foreign” or “other” to contemporary Australian standards of decency and parental responsibility. This representational regime also drew upon post-September 11 representations of Middle Eastern people, and was employed to call into question the validity of asylum-seekers’ claims for refugee status. Manufactured primarily through the now notorious “children overboard” incident, these images became a central motif of the 2001 election campaign. This paper concludes by examining the way these representations of refugees as “undeserving” were paralleled by new Temporary Protection Visa regulations in Australia.

scholarly journals Knowledge as Practice: Producing Decisional Certainty

2020 ◽  
pp. 75-115
Author(s):  
Laura Affolter
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Practical Knowledge ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Refugee Status ◽  
Know How

AbstractMuch uncertainty inheres in refugee status determination and particularly credibility assessments. This chapter deals with how asylum caseworkers attempt to overcome such uncertainties in order to reach enough decisional certainty for categorising asylum seekers into one of four legal categories: refugee with asylum, refugee with temporary admission, non-refugee with temporary admission and non-refugee without temporary admission. I argue that decision-makers’ explicit “country knowledge” as well as their implicit know-how of how to carry out their tasks and their “gut feeling”—which building on Reckwitz (Zeitschrift für Soziologie 32:4: 282–301, 2003) I conceptualise as professional-practical knowledge—plays a crucial role thereby. Furthermore, this chapter shows how basing negative asylum decisions on non-credibility rather than non-eligibility to refugee status serves as a means for overcoming uncertainties inherent in asylum decision-making, leading to the (re-)production of the so-called “culture of disbelief” in asylum administration.

International Institutions and Individualized Decision-Making: An Example of UNHCR's Refugee Status Determination

2008 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 1779-1804 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maja Smrkolj
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
International Institutions ◽  
Health Conditions ◽  
Refugee Status ◽  
Security Forces ◽  
High Commissioner ◽  
Sudanese Refugees ◽  
Individualized Decision ◽  
Asylum Seekers And Refugees

In autumn 2005 a group of Sudanese asylum seekers and refugees discontented with the unbearable conditions in the United Nations High Commissioner for Refuges (UNHCR) office in Cairo started a sit-in protest near the office. The protesters were, besides venting their anger at the suspension of Refugee Status Determination procedures for Sudanese refugees due to the ceasefire between the Sudanese government and Sudan's People Liberation Army, also making their frustrations heard regarding UNHCR's lengthy procedures, its failure to provide them with proper assistance, the high numbers of rejected applications, improper interviews and their general treatment by UNHCR's personnel as well as their difficult social and health conditions which had been aggravated by the lack of proper assistance. They were demanding that this situation be remedied and calling for transparent and fair procedures. Shortly thereafter they were joined by many more protesters so that in the following three months a group of between 1,800 and 2,500 people stayed around UNHCR's premises. However, meetings and negotiations with UNCHR eventually failed. The crisis ended in a tragedy. On December 30, 2005 the Egyptian security forces proceeded with the forcible removal of the protesters from the venue in an action in which 28 refugees were killed, more than half of which were children and women, with several protesters missing after the events. The Cairo incident illustrates what the cited report on the events has rightly called “a tragedy of failures and false expectations” regarding international humanitarian and human rights institutions.

The Political Analysis of Negotiation: How Who Gets What and When

1974 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 385-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. William Zartman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Collective Bargaining ◽  
Political Process ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Analysis ◽  
Underdeveloped Area ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Complex Models ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Number Of Parties

Negotiation is one of the basic political or decision-making processes, but if processes in general have been sorely neglected in political analysis, negotiation has been neglected more than most. Legislation as an institutional function has a respectable literature; as a process wherein goal values are constant and decisions are made by aggregating a sufficient number of parties to constitute a numerically superior side, it has become the subject of coalition theory. Adjudication has also given rise to a large quantity of institutional literature, although a theory explaining the process wherein a single party combines events and values to produce a decision is less well established. Similarly, diplomacy—and more recently, collective bargaining—has been thoroughly described, and economists and mathematicians using game and utility theories have developed some complex models of bargaining. But negotiation as a political process, specifically explained in terms of power, is an underdeveloped area of theory.

Poliheuristic Theory and Crisis Decision Making: A Comparative Analysis of Turkey with China

2011 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-57 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nukhet A. Sandal ◽  
Enyu Zhang ◽  
Carolyn C. James ◽  
Patrick James
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
The Political ◽  
Common Pattern ◽  
Prise De Décision ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Common ◽  
Cross National

Abstract.Poliheuristic theory (PH) is an innovative attempt to conceptualize decision making in a way that recognizes patterns deriving from both cognitive and rational schools of thought about how foreign policy is made. Crisis decision making, a setting in which the political aspects emphasized by PH can be expected to operate, is the subject of this article. The study focuses on Turkey and China, two important states that frequently are characterized as sui generis and possibly unsuited to comparative analysis in the context of any overarching theory. As will become apparent, PH is capable of explaining crisis decision making for China and Turkey and the common pattern we explore is perhaps only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to cross-national application of the theory within the crisis domain.Résumé.La théorie poliheuristique (PH) est une tentative novatrice de concevoir la prise de décision en reconnaissant l'apport des modes de comportement issus des écoles de pensée cognitive et rationnelle. Cet article porte sur la politique étrangère en temps de crise et offre un cadre politique au sein duquel les modes de comportement identifiés par la théorie poliheuristique devraient normalement opérer. Plus particulièrement, l'étude se concentre sur le cas de la Chine et de la Turquie, deux États souvent considérés comme singuliers et possiblement inadaptés à l'analyse théorique de la politique étrangère comparée. Toutefois, comme cet article le démontre, la PH est en mesure d'expliquer de manière comparée la prise de décision de la Chine et de la Turquie en temps de crise. Les conclusions de recherche laissent penser que cette étude pourrait bien être le prélude de nombreuses recherches employant la PH dans le domaine de la politique étrangère comparée en temps de crise.

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