From Ad Hoc to Universal: The International Refugee Regime from Fragmentation to Unity 1922-1954

This article examines the scope of international instruments providing refugee protection, from the League of Nations, through the 1951 Refugee Convention, up to the 1954 Convention Relating to Stateless Persons. While the nature of the early instruments was ad hoc and tailored for specific refugee groups in geographically limited areas, the creation of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees marked a shift towards a global refugee regime, applicable the world over. The fundamental caveat in the Refugee Convention being the exclusion of Stateless Persons from its scope, was rejected by France in its 1952 creation of the Office franc¸ais de protection des re´fugie´s et apatrides as she opted to include stateless persons under her purview. Using hitherto unpublished sources from Belgian, British, Israeli, and French archives, the author argues that the Eurocentric vision of the delegates at the League of Nations corresponded to the ad hoc nature of the refugee instruments they designed. The United Nations’ notion of Universalism corresponded to the lifting of the geographical and ethnic boundaries of refugee protections. France, wishing to shift the debate to the Council of Europe, opted for her own Universalist vision, voluntarily extending the scope of refugee protections so as to include stateless persons.