Becoming stateless

JC Helary helary at eskimo.com
Sat Mar 25 07:05:56 PST 2000


Le Sat, Mar 25, 2000 a 06:42:34PM +1100, rc-am a ecrit:


> But specifically, what do you mean by "less hassled"? What criteria are
> applied to determining whether someone is 'stateless' in Japan, say?
>
> Angela

Well, I wish I could be specific. My idea is that stateless have a status that is recognized by the un and so by the countries that signed the related un conventions. I'm confused because I often mix up what happens in France and here. If I remember well, people who enter japanese territory without travelling document and are taken by the police go to detention centers where they are asked their nationality until they say it, when it is confirmed they are sent back to their country [considering the way japanese treat their own nationals in jail I do not suppose this is done in humane conditions, there are some amnesty reports on the subject]

I suppose that people who have proper statuses are handled 'properly' according to the status Japan allows them to have. Regarding this I checked the immigration law this afternoon and found only 2 articles on refugees but nothing on stateless. I was surprised since the un document I read today mentioned both and clearly defined their respective statuses and the way signatory countries were supposed to handle their case and what right they were entitled to.

I asked my local immigration specialist and he confirmed that their is no law covering the status of stateless. Their case is handled by a departement of the Ministry of Justice that acts discretionarily. It seems that there are different kind of statelessness recognized in Japan (though the person seemed to mean it was more a case by case process) that depend on the travelling papers of the person and/or his/her relation to Japan (japanese relatives or not etc...) Plus the documents that direct the choices are not made public, they are internal documents to the MoJ. Mr Aoyama (that's his name) promised me he would check further. He was a high level official at Tokyo Immigration Office for years, before becomming attendant in the local international association here...

Besides the technical points, that are probably not mirroring much on the 'reality' level, I am still wondering why statelessness has not been subjet of more attention from critics of immigration policies and immigrant status in general (incl. illegal or cheap labor). There is another text on the un site that reflects what was mentioned in the australian thread (the commitment of international institutions to reduce to the minimum movements of population) it is the commitment to reduce by all means the number of stateless. Which actually means giving them a nationality... The not so progressive un texts mostly show that nation states have full control on who can/can not be a national. Even the declaration of human rights does not guarantee the right to cross a border. There are thousands of ways I can stay here, or go somewhere besides France if I leave Japan, but it never depends 100% on my will, I need to be allowed, by a state to enter it. And it is the same for nationals of a country, first they need to apply for a passport, which means they have to receive the permission to leave their territory, before being allowed then to enter another one. In the case of Japan, the number of passports released every year before the 80's (I think) was ridiculous, I could get the figures, but I got this info from an official in the passport delivery office. They were delivered only for people who had 'valid' reasons to go abroad (the excuse the guy gave me is that they could not allow too much people out of the country in case they misbehaved and gave an bad image of Japan abroad, he was dead serious when he said that...) The tourist boom of the 80's 90's made it something very easy to get though.

Even the attempts in Europe at making a visa-free environment are daily contradicted by national policies even within the Schengen area (ex Belgium closing her borders a few months ago when the gvt decided to start a regularization of illegal migrants, or Schengen 'citizens' in detention centers in the Schengen area because they fail to produce valid ids...) so the claim that you barely need to wave you passeport in EU in not really founded (that was Deborah in the australian thread).

Choosing to be stateless is probably an extreme way to experience one's relationship to state borders, but I've got the feeling it's one possible way out of the nationalist contradiction that tends to affect any 'progressive' critic of the world system, by cancelling any possible attachement to an 'origin' which values tend to be more 'universal' than other places' universal values. I don't see other ways to pretend being a 'citizen of the world' without being cynical (or naive).

I have a few off -stateless- topic related to the australia thread. I am not as documented as Angela, but everything I hear about France immigration policy now sounds pretty similar to what I could read about australia. It is scary when you know that the gvt in supposed to be progressive (socialists, communists, greens...). There is an email list to share info on the immigrants situation (illegal workers, detention centers, foreigners put in planes by force etc etc), I read horror stories _every_ day. The list is french speaking, but anybody interested can join (look for zpajol on the web, list info is on the page). About the way people enter 'illegally' a country, I am not sure whether Deborah was suggesting that only rich people could afford it or if it is what australian think, but there is ample documentation on the way even poor people are cheated and smuggled into other countries to serve as slave labor.

Should be in bed...

JC Helary



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