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Conference Theme: The Refugee Convention at 50
The 50th anniversary of the 1951 Geneva Convention will be celebrated in 2001. The Convention has
become the tool of refugee protection. Its position in relation to wider human rights has raised, in the
course of its 50 years of use, a wide range of questions and issues, in the areas of healthcare,
anthropology, demography, geography, sociology, economics, and international relations, as well as law
and politics. The rights related issues raised by the Convention exist both in its use in practice, and
from its position at the heart of academic and political debate concerning status provisions, refugee
rights and the image of those deemed included or excluded by those applying its terminology. In some
areas of the world it is only one of several tools, as other Conventions, Declarations and agreements
build on or supplement the Convention directly or indirectly; in other areas its interpretation is the
subject of developing collective approaches; in still other states the Convention remains unsigned and
unused. Some see its 50 years of existence as the ?universal' basis to protection as a success, an
unprecedented longevity record in this area. Others question its continuing validity as a basis or
standard, and argue, for example, that it is only a standard from which states, and the real lives of
refugees and displaced persons, deviate in various areas and to various degrees.
It is appropriate that in this anniversary year, practitioners and scholars join within their association
to discuss the state of play - the record of the past 50 years, the current situation(s) and where the
Convention, on paper or in practice, should or could go from here.
Date received: November 30, 2000
© 2008 Atlas Conferences Inc.