A Month, a Year, a Decade? The Temporal Capacity of Protection for Refugees and Other Forced Migrants.

La Chaire Oppenheimer en droit international public et le Centre sur les droits de la personne et le pluralisme juridique, avec l'appui du McGill Refugee Research Group, accueillent la professeure Jane McAdam, University of New South Wales Law, Sydney, Australie; directrice du Andrew & Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law; et rédactrice en chef de la revue International Journal of Refugee Law.

Résumé

[En anglais seulement] In refugee law, the meaning of ‘well-founded fear of being persecuted’ has been extensively examined by courts and scholars alike. Yet, there has been very little consideration of how far into the future a risk of persecution may extend for protection to be warranted.

This lack of guidance on the question of timing has allowed an inappropriate notion of ‘imminence’ to infiltrate refugee decision-making across a range of jurisdictions – at times resulting in people being denied protection. It is especially pertinent to human rights-based claims involving harms that may manifest more gradually over time, such as those relating to the slow-onset impacts of climate change.

Professor McAdam's paper examines how certain courts have grappled with ‘time’ in a relatively nuanced way, highlighting principles that may be instructive for other contexts.

Cette activité est admissible pour 1,5 heures de formation continue obligatoire tel que déclaré par les membres du Barreau du Québec.

Un léger déjeuner sera servi.