Akin, ‘Queer Challenges to the Norwegian Policies and Practices of Immigration’, 2017

Akin D, ‘Queer Challenges to the Norwegian Policies and Practices of Immigration: Asylum Seeking in Norway on the Grounds of Sexual Orientation-Based Persecution’, Doctoral Thesis, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 2017

Abstract

Over the past decades, thousands of people have fled their country because of their sexual orientation and sought a safe haven in another country (Spijkerboer and Jansen 2011, Berg and Millbank 2009). However, neither the plight of sexual minorities nor their search for safer and better spaces is a recent phenomenon. Sexual minorities have been travelling across borders – either within their countries (from rural to urban areas) or outside their countries – to avoid discriminatory practices and harassment, or simply to improve their lives, for quite some time. What is relatively new is the formation of sexual orientation-based persecution as a legitimate ground for asylum claims, as established by the United Nations Refugee Convention.

The inclusion of sexual minorities in the Convention poses particular challenges centered on the interpretation and application of asylum law to sexual orientation-based claims. It also prompts the question of how sexual identities and meanings are constructed in the nexus of global sexual politics and discourse around refugees.

Focusing on the Norwegian context, this dissertation attempts to shed light on the way in which these issues – or what I call “queer challenges” – inform Norway’s policies and practices of immigration concerning sexual orientation-based asylum claims.