1995-10-01a- CIA Conference Report: THE CHALLENGE OF ETHNIC CONFLICT TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL ORDER IN THE 1990S GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVES 01-Oct-95

C00123268
Summary of discussion DR. KENZER: You can sum it up in one word, poli-
tics. How can you say that Cubans are refugees and
Haitians are not? It's a political issue. People do not
General Discussion want to hear that underlying our definitions for entry
are issues of race and other things.
DR. WIXMAN: While we often hear about high birth-
rates being major causes of nationalism, the reverse- DR. SCHWARTZ: There is still the distinction
that is, where low fertility is one of the primary rea- between economic migrants and political refugees.
sons for rises in nationalism-is also important. In the The United States does not have a category of an eco-
former Soviet Union, for example, the rapid rise in nomic refugee.
Russian nationalism was very much tied to a sense of
rapidly declining fertility. In Germany, the lowering of DR. DE BLIJ: We do not. It's irrelevant. The defini-
the birthrate is also one of the primary factors in the tion of a refugee is someone from a Communist coun-
rise of the German national consciousness. Are there try.
people doing work on the corelation between declin-
ing fertilities and the rise of ethnic national conscious- DR. KENZER: The distinction is becoming an impor-
ness? tant issue. We are going to see refugees being cast in a
different light; all emphasis is going to be on Central
DR. FULLER: Yes, exactly along the lines you say Americans and people beyond.
and for exactly the reasons that you say. In fact, I can
say that the people that are sponsoring this conference DR. SCHWARTZ: A good test case would be Nicara-
have published a paper along exactly those lines. gua, from where we once accepted political refugees
but after the government changed, the departees
QUESTION: Why does the Upited States distinguish became economic migrants.
between ethnic and political refugees in the way they
are treated? DR. DE BLIJ: We also do not accept people from
Communist China, but we do take people from Com-
DR. SCHWARTZ: Frankly, in part to keep out people munist Cuba.
from coming in who are seen as potentially draining to
the economy. This is a complicated issue, however. QUESTION: We do accept Chinese refugees; they are
the ones who are allowed to have only one child.
DR. DE BLU: The distinction between refugees is a
holdover from the Communist period. The current DR. DE BLU: You are right.
definition of refugees is related to the political system
they leave when they come here.
DR. SCHWARTZ: The definitions come from the
1951 UN convention and the 1967 protocol. The 1951
convention was based on the post-World War II refu-
gee regime, while the 1967 protocol was attached onto
that in order to deal with peoples from other areas of
the world. Dr Kenzer, do you want to elaborate on
that?
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