Access to Asylum: International Refugee Law and the Globalisation of Migration Control

Is there still a right to seek asylum in a globalised world? Migration control has increasingly moved to the high seas or the territory of transit and origin countries, and is now commonly outsourced to private actors. Under threat of financial penalties airlines today reject any passenger not in possession of a valid visa, and private contractors are used to run detention centres and man border crossings.

In this volume Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen examines the impact of these new practices for refugees' access to asylum. A systematic analysis is provided of the reach and limits of international refugee law when migration control is carried out extraterritorially or by non-state actors. State practice from around the globe and case law from all the major human rights institutions is discussed. The arguments are further linked to wider debates in human rights, general international law and political science.

Published as part of the prestigious Cambridge Studies in International and Comparative Law, Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen's new volume has been described as “path-breaking”, “important” and addressing “what may well be the most pressing challenges in international refugee law today” by James Hathaway, University of Michigan Law School.