Legal Pathways to International Protection
The options through which international protection can be legally pursued may change based on reforms to global agreements, national level legislation, in conjunction with technologies that enable new processes and operations.
A (Optimist)
Global migration and asylum reform with sponsorship, protected transit and resettlement agreements
- There is a new global agreement on migration and asylum management and flows become more orderly
- The Geneva Convention is modernised, policies more adapted (e.g. climate refugees included), and protected transit universalised
- Global quotas for resettlement are increased to match associated resettlement needs. Criteria for humanitarian visa become more generous, and asylum seeker sponsorship schemes become more widespread
- Resettlement gains more and more prominence and the majority of applicants arrive in a safe and orderly manner
B (Pessimist)
Restrictive interpretations of international protection slow processing, worsen conditions in transit countries
- Externalisation increases - embassies become dominant application and processing venues, the duration of the asylum process increases leaving people in limbo, increased human rights abuses, and more violations of the principle of non-refoulement
- Legal pathways for migration are greatly reduced (lower resettlement quotas, fewer humanitarian visas etc.)
- Stricter policies make legal pathways narrower and end up in the further increase of illegal ones
- International refugee law, international/regional reception standards, etc. are not complied with, badly implemented and/or loosely enforced leading to de facto lack of international regulatory framework in the field and countries taking more and more individualistic approach towards regulating asylum-related migration
C1 (Mediator)
Expansion of humanitarian visa programs, but unprotected transit
- International refugee law develops and a new successful way is found for destination countries to share costs more equitably
- Humanitarian visas begin to be issued in embassies and consulates around the world, but asylum seekers encounter great delays in their journey due to travel restrictions, leaving many of them vulnerable
C2 (Mediator)
Fractured global migration reform and hardened territorialisation
- Increased use of remote application and processing technologies creates are used to limit asylum seeking flows and prevent access to territory
- International refugee law further develops, but there are more and more countries opting out and refusing to host or allow entrance to refugees
D (Innovator)
Externalised screening and remote interviewing expedites asylum procedures
- Embassies and consulates start pre-screening potential asylum seekers’ applications, whose applications are then sent to the central services of the national asylum authorities, who then issue a decision based on the application and interview done online