ABSTRACT
The founding theorists of international law laid out certain key principles in relation to asylum, which have remained at the heart of refugee law. In this chapter, the author explores how the refugee subject emerged through the prism of developments in three countries: France, United Kingdom and United States. A security paradigm has been evident since at least the end of the eighteenth century, and many of the concerns and prejudices about deserving and undeserving refugees were already present during the nineteenth century. The institution of a permanent and widespread regime of passports and immigration controls following the 'emergency' measures of World War, the author has contributed to the situation described by Egidio Reale, where refugees had become the 'excommunicated of the world. What follows is an attempt to sketch out how the regime of international refugee law has been framed within the biopolitical framework of management and security through a developing legal categorisation of the refugee.
