Asylum seekers, human rights and social work

Although no region of the world is immune to asylum seeker flows, those arriving in the Asia Pacific face specific hurdles. Australia, although a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention, exercises its sovereign power to exclude and banish asylum seekers. There are attempts to develop a Regional Cooperation Framework, but this is lagging, and in the meantime asylum seekers languish in detention camps or restrictive community settings in Australia, Indonesia and Malaysia. Australia has introduced bi-lateral arrangements with Nauru and Manus Island to establish detention centres in those countries, seen by some as a reinvention of colonialism. Within this policy mix, this chapter argues that social workers, as moral agents, have a mandate to challenge the existing policy arrangements and to work with established social movements that strive for the human rights of asylum seekers and refugees. Examples of social work engagement are presented.