The Neoliberal Understanding of Human Rights and the Failure to Protect Refugees

The connection between neoliberalism and human rights, which both took flight in the 1970s and 1980s, has garnered significant scholarly attention. Interestingly, from the 1970s onward, there have also been important turning points in the history of refugee protection that have fostered a minimalist approach to refugee protection. Given neoliberalism’s significant influence on the contemporary understanding of human rights, the question arises whether this neoliberal understanding of human rights also extends to refugee rights and refugee protection. This article argues that the minimalist approach to refugee protection presupposes a specific understanding of the rights of refugees that combines with a neoliberal understanding of human rights in general. Refugees are no longer perceived to have rights, but to have needs. Like human rights in general, refugee rights were reshaped according to the idea that saving bare lives and provision of basic needs is deemed sufficient.