“Nothing about us, without us”: Solidarity with refugees

David Owen (University of Southampton)

Abstract: Reflecting on the international response to the Syrian Refugee Crisis recently led UN Deputy Secretary General Armina Mohammed to declare: ‘The world is undergoing a crisis of solidarity’ [1]. From a more philosophical perspective, Bannerjee has argued that ‘the position of the refugee is itself one of exclusion and in a sense constitutes a form of identity which seemingly eludes solidarity’ [2]. These remarks point to an ambiguity with the phrase ‘solidarity with refugees’ and this essay begins by considering recent work on the concept of solidarity before exploring its implications for conceptualizing solidarity with refugees. It introduces the idea of proleptic political solidarity and argues that in the case of refugees this has both epistemic and political dimensions. It then focuses on the specific requirements of such solidarity and some examples of the forms that it can take.

[1] ‘Amid Crisis of Solidarity, Deputy Secretary-General Urges Faith-Based Groups to Use ‘Your Moral Voice’ in Support of Dignity for Refugees, Migrants’, https://www.un.org/press/en/2018/dsgsm1123.doc.htm, accessed 23/07/2018.

[2] Kiran Bannerjee ‘Re-theorizing Human Rights through the Refugee: On the Interrelation between Democracy and Global Justice’, Refuge 27/1 (2010): 24-35.