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Drawing on research undertaken with separated children seeking asylum in the UK, this paper explores the ways in which children's political identities and experiences have been conceptualised in procedures for determining who is – and is not – in need of protection under international refugee law. The paper focuses in particular on the experiences of separated children during the asylum interview. It is suggested that the conduct of the interview not only indicates a basic lack of humanity and care in engaging with the experiences of separated asylum-seeking children, but also a particular conceptualisation of ‘childhood’ that undermines the ability of children to fully articulate their experiences and to secure access to the protection to which they are entitled. The consequence of this approach is not only that separated asylum-seeking children are significantly less likely than adults to be granted refugee status, but that children who express political views and agency may not be considered to be children at all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In June 2007, the city of Sheffield officially declared itself to be the UK’s first ‘City of Sanctuary’, a gesture that sought to instil a spirit of ‘welcome and hospitality towards asylum seekers and refugees’. Drawing on a series of interviews and ethnographic work, this paper critically examines this gesture by considering how City of Sanctuary sought to enact a relational account of place through which the responsibilities of Sheffield towards both proximate and distant strangers were highlighted. The paper argues that while the City of Sanctuary movement integrates both relational and territorial political practices, it also actively pursues a relational imaginary through presenting the city as a space of political connections and responsibilities. This is achieved through a twin focus upon the role asylum seekers and refugees play in constituting the city and the role that Sheffield might come to play in national discussions of asylum. Following this discussion, the paper looks to the implications of City of Sanctuary’s work for a relational account of spatial politics, arguing that a dual orientation of spatial responsibilities ‘within’ and ‘beyond’ place may be more easily articulated in reference to some networks and flows than others. The experiences of City of Sanctuary therefore suggest that relational accounts must present a space of negotiation between territorial practices, political networks, spatial responsibilities and geographical imaginations. The development of City of Sanctuary into a national network of towns and cities promoting hospitality indicates the importance of such negotiations for developing a culture of refuge across British cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the role of place in the positioning and survival of the contemporary private asylum. While community care is now the dominant mental health care modality in most Western health economies, some asylum care has survived, often in the private sector, catering for a clientele able and willing to pay for a non-standard approach to care. We consider how landscapes, buildings and services provide a basis for marketing and selling asylum care. Drawing on fieldwork, documentary analysis and visual evidence, we analyse the representational strategies of the Homewood Health Centre Inc. (Ontario, Canada), the Ashburn Private Psychiatric Clinic (Dunedin, New Zealand) and the acute psychiatric hospitals within the Priory Group (UK). The paper draws conclusions about the role of therapeutic landscapes in the contemporary asylum, place marketing and the (re)valorization of historical ideas of asylum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous analyses of forced migration have drawn attention to the increasing discretion held by asylum sector decisionmakers. According to these accounts, as the state reacts to the political risks associated with asylum migration control, responsibility for forced migration management is increasingly transferred onto a range of intermediate actors, between state and society, including local government employees, asylum interviewers, immigration judges and security staff. Yet little research has directly addressed these intermediaries’ collective experiences and the influences to which they are subject. The article therefore focuses attention explicitly upon the nominal conduct of this increasingly authorised, discretionary and highly heterogeneous population. Drawing upon 37 interviews across four sites at which asylum sector intermediaries have significant and increasing discretion over asylum seekers’ experiences, the findings demonstrate the importance of institutionalised timing and spacing for the determination of their volitional conduct. The timing and spacing of government institutions are important, not only through their influence over asylum seekers directly, but also because they present asylum seekers to those with discretionary authority in ways that are conducive to exclusionary uses of this authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the bombings in London of July 2005, the Prime Minister, Tony Blair warned that ‘the rules of the game are changing’. The proposed changes have primarily related to foreign suspects of terrorism and engage rules relating to asylum, deportation and nationality. The Terrorism Act 2006 and the Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Act 2006, which give effect to the proposals, are examined and analysed with reference to the policy choices in regard to counter-terrorism strategy, to the weighting of rights against policy, and to choices between rights, including the treatment of absolute rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the aspects of the immigration and asylum act in Great Britain. Context of the law; Provisions of the act; Priorities of the legislation; Appeals process.