Shauna Labman -- Book Launch
Thursday Jan 16 2020 7:00 pm, Winnipeg, Grant Park in the Atrium
Launch of Crossing Law’s Border: Canada’s Refugee Resettlement Program (UBC Press), co-presented by the University of Winnipeg Global College.
In this account of Canada’s resettlement program from the Indochinese crisis of the 1970s to the ongoing Syrian crisis, Shauna Labman explores the role that law plays in resettlement and the impact of resettlement on asylum policies. Her pathbreaking work shows that resettlement can either complement or complicate asylum claims at a time when refugee crises and fear of outsiders are causing countries to close their borders to asylum-seekers.
Crossing Law's Borders was recently featured on The Hill Times’ List of 100 Best Non-Fiction Canadian Books in 2019.
Shauna Labmanis a lawyer and associate professor of human rights in the Global College, University of Winnipeg. She started her legal career with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in New Delhi, India which led her to research the interplay between resettlement and asylum. She sits on the Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization of Manitoba’s Board of Directors and, in 2016, she was recognized as one of CBC Manitoba’s Future 40 for her advocacy work with refugees.
See:
Crossing Law's Border
- Shauna Labman 
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The UN Refugee Agency considers resettlement – the selection and transfer of refugees from the state where they seek asylum to another state – to be a tool of refugee protection and an expression of international burden sharing. Resettlement is voluntary and ad hoc, and Canada is one of three leading resettlement countries in the world. In this account of Canada’s resettlement program from the Indochinese crisis of the 1970s to the Syrian crisis of the 2010s, Shauna Labman explores how rights, responsibilities, and obligations intersect in the absence of a legal scheme for refugee resettlement. She asks: How does law influence the voluntary act of resettlement, and how does resettlement affect asylum policy? She reveals that the core concept of refugee protection, non-refoulement, which prevents countries from turning away asylum-seekers, can be compromised by resettlement, both by the resettlement selection process and the influence of resettlement practices on in-country asylum. This pathbreaking look at the interplay between resettlement and asylum in one of the world’s most successful refugee protection programs shows that resettlement can either complement or complicate in-country asylum claims at a time when refugee crises and fear of outsiders are causing countries to close their borders to asylum-seekers around the world. This book will appeal not only to scholars in law, sociology, and refugee and migration studies but also to general readers and policy makers interested in refugees and resettlement programs. Shauna Labman is an associate professor of human rights in the Global College at the University of Winnipeg. She co-founded the Migration Law Research Cluster at the University of Manitoba and was a consultant for the Law Commission of Canada, the Canadian Embassy in Beijing, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in New Delhi. In 2016, she was recognized as one of CBC Manitoba’s Future 40 for her advocacy work with refugees.
