Protecting the World's Exiles: The Human Rights of Non-Citizens

This article is a transcript of a video program. For that reason, its format is that of a dialogue. In order to preserve its character as an oral history, only minor changes have been made by the editors.

AH = Arthur C. Helton	LH = Lou Henkin
OS = Oscar Schachter	AB = Anne Bayefsky

Introduction

Fifty years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, attention to and scrutiny of human rights abuses plays an integral role in shaping governments' foreign policy, as well as the missions of many of the world's leading nongovernmental organizations. In spite of this scrutiny, however, more than 100 million people the world over--people whom this Declaration was intended to protect--are being ignored. They are the non-citizens of the world: aliens, stateless persons, and refugees, without the support of a government to protect them. Genocide and ethnic conflict are tearing families apart and forcing many victims to seek asylum in countries where they are arbitrarily detained or turned away. Seemingly well-meaning governments marred by bureaucratic indifference continue to deny sanctuary and legal protection to the one group of people who have nowhere else to turn.

Arthur Helton

My name is Arthur Helton. This discussion concerns the human rights of non-citizens. I am the Director of the Forced Migration Projects of the Open Society Institute. The Open Society Institute is a private foundation that promotes the development of open societies around the world through a variety of programs in the areas of educational, social, and liberal reforms. It is part of the Soros Foundation which now operates in more than thirty countries around the world.

The Forced Migration Projects, until 1 September 1999, was an operating program within the Open Society Institute, seeking to avert forced displacements, protect refugees and displaced persons, and find sustainable arrangements for those seeking to re-establish their lives. As of 1 September 1999, the Forced Migration Projects relocated to the Council on Foreign Relations, where I am now a Senior Fellow for Refugee Studies and Preventive Action.

The purpose of this discussion is to address the extent to which the rights of non-citizens are guaranteed by international human rights law and whether such rights are respected in practice. By "non-citizens" I mean aliens, stateless persons, and refugees in flight from persecution. Non-citizens often seem to fall through gaps in legal frameworks designed to protect universal human rights. These gaps in protection have caused untold hardships and require serious remedies by the international community.

I am joined by two eminent legal scholars who both have been instrumental in the evolution of the law of international human rights. I am honored to welcome Professor Louis Henkin of the Columbia University Law School, and Professor Oscar Schachter, also of the Columbia University Law School. Both are former Presidents of the American Society of International Law. Their individual accomplishments are simply too numerous to list. Suffice it to say that they embody much of the international human rights movement. At this time I would also like to introduce Professor Anne Bayefsky, Director of the Centre for Refugee Studies at York University, Toronto, Canada, who will be moderating this program with me. She has cooperated with the Forced Migration Projects in organizing this program.

Non-Citizens

Anne Bayefsky

Non-citizens, or aliens, are often understood as outside the realm of entitlements that most of us take for granted. At the same time, modern international human rights law presses beyond borders in both substance and result. The 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights encouraged us to consider the future, what we as international lawyers and human rights advocates have accomplished and where we need to go.

This conversation, therefore, focuses on the human rights of aliens, those who are so often bypassed or sidelined, and asks: What efforts, both...