Whose Safety Matters? Exaltation, Risky Refugees, and Canadian Safe Country Practices

• Main Author: Field, Emily
• Other Authors: Magnet, Shoshana
• Language: en
• Published: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa 2013
• Subjects: Canada; Designated Country of Origin; Exaltation; Safe Country; Safe Third Country Agreement; United States
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10393/30228; http://dx.doi.org/10.20381/ruor-3408

This thesis seeks to examine what cultural work is done on behalf of the state by the Safe Third Country Agreement and Bill C-31’s designated country of origin policy? I will be drawing on the work of Critical Race feminists and Critical Security Studies theorists to examine the concept of safety, systems of domination, and the parameters of national belonging. I will be performing a discourses analysis of the government’s and the Canadian Council for Refugee’s year one report of the Safe Third Country Agreement. I will also be performing a discourse analysis of the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website’s discussion of designated countries of origin. I will argue that state exaltation constructs the state, refugees, and safety in a way that reifies systems of domination.