{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.024688279301745636, 'fraction_numerical': 0.012718204488778055, 'mean_word_length': 4.46457765667575, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Commentary on Current Refugee Issues

On 3 November 1994, Aristide Zolberg spoke with members of the Journal of International Affairs editorial board about the current developments in the international refugee regime and its attempts to address unfolding refugee crises. Reprinted here are Professor Zolberg's responses to particular issues including immigration tension in host countries, liberalism and multiculturalism, the move of global humanitarian and peacekeeping functions to the regional level and the need for revitalized and innovative thinking on refugees. For a long time, many refugees were people in the third world, who were for the most part in camps next door to their countries of origin. The camps were managed in one way or another by the international community, where in some cases, relocation has been the end of the tunnel. The Vietnamese, for example. The second category was people originating in communist countries. There were not too many, because communist countries never let them out for the most part. But East Germans were welcomed in West Germany, and the Hungarians in 1956 and the Czechs in 1968 were able to get haven in various Western countries without much difficulty. Now one of the things that happened, not really after the end of the Cold War, but before the end of the Cold War was a kind of broadening of this pool and so, a difficulty in sorting them out. Cubans, for example. Cubans came to the U.S., were welcomed as victims of communism by several successive presidents, and so on. As late as 1965 there were "freedom flights" which went on until about 1972. By the mid-1970s, it turned out that some of these victims of communism weren't quite as "white" as the other victims of communism who had come earlier. This began to be a less of an "easy" thing. Also, during the Solidarity crisis in 1981, it was made very clear that Poles wouldn't get massive havens the way Hungarians had gotten havens in 1956 or the Czechs in 1968. It's interesting. Austria dosed its borders to Poles. "No we're not going to let these Poles in." "Why not?" Because it was made clear that Western countries weren't about to take in hundreds and thousands of Poles that way they had taken in the hundreds and thousands of Hungarians earlier. There is a kind of immigration tension in the West, which started rising with the end of the Bretton Woods boom. Economic conditions and the end of the "go-go" years, the end of the growth, the energy crisis of 1973 where in Europe you got all sorts of efforts to stop immigration flows. This began to lead to a reconsideration of asylum procedures, as well. Now, it's gotten much more that way. I've been involved in this for about 15 years, and I could already see it around 1978 or thereabouts. As I said, not to the same acute and shrill degree as we do now, but there were elements already in the 1970s. And that was already leading to some kind of reconsideration of the wisdom of having a generous asylum policy. The end of the Cold War clearly changed the situation. We welcomed these people because they were victims of communism. But the fact that we welcomed them, the fact that they wanted to get out was constant evidence that communism was undesirable and that our way of life was desirable. Germany received all Germans from any communist country. Obviously, it was a constant demonstration that postwar Germany was a legitimate and desirable state. And that they were under constraints to have such a policy because of their past and everytime they did receive somebody, it was a demonstration that they weren't a "bad" Germany that had produced refugees. So, in that sense, it was part of foreign policy. States are not by nature, generous. Nothing happens if you wait for generosity or for the state to exercise moral obligation. But I think liberal states do have an obligation of asylum and a very important one. And I think this is the only ground we can have to have a really strong and generous refugee regime. …