本サイト 一橋大学機関リポジトリ(HERMES-IR)

第3号

 山岡 健次郎 Kenjiro Yamaoka
国民と難民の出会うところ
Nations and Refugees
2007年07月 発行

[ 要旨 ]

この論文には日本語要旨はありません


[ Abstract ]

  This paper will examine the political origin of refugees. If there were not the concept of nations, then there could be no concept of refugees. In order to examine and discuss this issue, this paper will look the following 3 relationships including “state and refugee”, “state and nation”, and “nation and refugee”.
  First, a state will produce refugees in the midst of the process of the formation of said state. This phenomenon was remarkably evident in developing countries after decolonization. People who try to escape from violent conflicts become refugees.
  However, the reason why such displaced persons can take on the role of refugees is because the stage for them to make an appearance has been already set up and prepared. What or who made the arrangements and preparations for the stage for refugees is strongly connected to the 2nd relationship, that of state and nation. In modern Europe, what used to be an estranged relationship between the state and its people has now become intimate and close through the usage of the expression people’s sovereignty. People are citizens as well as nations.
  At this point, those people who have been forced to cut ties with the state become refugees as they are exceptions to the rule. These people are not just displaced persons. People who have become nations treat displaced persons as refugees. The circumstances of refugees are juxtaposed to those of nations. As a result, the analogy applied to border regions where nations and refugees encounter each other is the contrast of light and darkness. However, in such places refugee camps and refugee concentration camps are established, which is almost evidence which calls into question the self-evident status of nations. Perhaps nations themselves are problematic and have taken on more than they can handle.
  As illustrated above, by discussing and examining the political origin of refugees, we may be able to detach the situation of the so-called refugee crisis from problem resolution or policy-oriented analysis and relativize the issue. In essence, the crisis of refugees is also a crisis of the 3 relationships, “state and refugee”, “state and nation”, and “nation and refugee”.