ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the European refugee crisis because that is what drove the impetus for the 19 September 2016 UN Summit on Refugees and Migrants, resulting in the New York Declaration and the some global compacts. The number of asylum-seekers arriving in Australia increased from 161 in 2008 to 2,800 in 2009, leading the government to implement the “Indonesian solution” in which Australia provided bilateral aid in exchange for the Indonesian government’s agreement to crack down on people smugglers. Without US leadership and in a changed international environment, it is difficult to determine whether the promises made at the Leaders’ Summit have been kept. According to S. Nazario, “beginning in July 2014, Mexico redirected 300 to 600 immigration agents to its southernmost states, and conducted over 20,000 raids in 2014” on migrant freight trains, and in bus stations, hotels and on highways.
