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This paper argues that the nation's immigration laws are being misused to craft a system of preventive administrative detention of immigrant men, predominantly of Middle Eastern background. These detentions give rise to imprisonment without charge for weeks and months, denial of access to lawyers, physical and psychological abuse and ultimately deportations without a fair initial hearing or the exhaustion of available appellate recourse. I argue that this expanded use of civil immigration detention is designed to weaken constitutional due process protections, bringing into the U.S. detention tactics adopted abroad under the rubric of the war on terror. This paper also highlights similarities between the evolving administrative detention system in the United States and longer-standing practices in Israel.

Liberal democratic states have involved the use of private companies for purposes of detention and the debate is whether such involvement is only for immigration control or whether they are primarily for macro-economic benefits. This paper aims to present the argument that a State wishing to detain migrants must do so within the purview of immigration control and in conformity to international human rights standards rather than other latent reasons such as macro-economic benefits. The exponential growths of immigration detention over the years, this paper argues, smack of latent reasons with unarguably macro-economic benefits accruing to these States.

The methodology is doctrinal research focusing on immigration detention and privatization. Doctrinal research is library-based and reliance will be placed on primary and secondary materials such as legislations, case laws, soft laws on the one hand and textbooks, journals, articles, legal encyclopedia, databases and many valuable websites on the other hand.

Findings have been made of similarities in State practice between the UK, the USA and Australia and conclude that the trend is worrying given that privatization of the detention estate lends credence to the fact that growing international prison industry influences prison and detention policies.

These have portent implications for the violations of the rights of detainees and weaken the protection of rights under international human rights law.

The originality of this paper lies in its ability to unravel the legitimacy of immigration detention in the face of privatization and macro-economic benefits accruing to States, thereby querying the availability of the rights of migrants within the remit of State practice.

Indefinite immigration detention causes well-documented harms to mental health, and international condemnation and resistance leave it undisrupted. Health care is non-independent from immigration control, compromising clinical ethics. Attempts to establish protected, independent clinical review and subvert the system via advocacy and political engagement have had limited success.

The purpose of this study is to examine the following: how indefinite detention for deterrence (exemplified by Australia) injures asylum-seekers; how international legal authorities confirm Australia’s cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment; how detention compromises health-care ethics and hurts health professionals; to weigh arguments for and against boycotting immigration detention; and to discover how health professionals might address these harms, achieving significant change.

Secondary data analyses and ethical argumentation were employed.

Australian Governments fully understand and accept policy-based injuries. They purposefully dispense cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and intend suffering that causes measurable harms for arriving asylum-seekers exercising their right under Australian law. Health professionals are ethically conflicted, not wanting to abandon patients yet constrained. Indefinite detention prevents them from alleviating sufferings and invites collusion, potentially strengthening harms; thwarts scientific inquiry and evidence-based interventions; and endangers their health whether they resist, leave or remain. Governments have primary responsibility for detained asylum-seekers’ health care. Health professional organisations should negotiate the minimum requirements for their members’ participation to ensure independence, and prevent conflicts of interest and inadvertent collaboration with and enabling systemic harms.

Australia’s aggressive approach may become normalised, without its illegality being determined. Health professional colleges uniting over conditions of participation would foreground ethics and pressure governments internationally over this contagious and inexcusable policy.

Many migrants are detained in Europe not because they have committed a crime but because of lack of certainty over their immigration status. Although generally in good physical health on entry to Europe, migrant detainees have complex health needs, often related to mental health. Very little is known about the current health situation and health care needs of migrants when detained in European immigration detention settings. The review aims to synthesize the qualitative literature available on this issue from the perspectives of staff and migrants.

The authors undertook a synthesis of extant qualitative literature on migrant health experience and health situation when detained in European immigration detention settings; retrieved as part of a large-scale scoping review. Included records (n = 4) from Sweden and the UK representing both detainee and staff experiences were charted, synthesised and thematically analysed.

Three themes emerged from the analysis, namely, conditions in immigration detention settings, uncertainties and communication barriers and considerations of migrant detainee health. Conditions were described as inhumane, resembling prison and underpinned by communication difficulties, lack of adequate nutrition and responsive health care.

It is crucial that the experiences underpinning migration are understood to respond to the health needs of migrants, uphold their health rights and to ensure equitable access to health care in immigration detention settings.

There is a dearth of qualitative research in this area because of the difficulty of access to immigration detention settings for migrants. The authors highlight the critical need for further investigation of migrant health needs, so as to inform appropriate staff support and health service responses.

The immigration conundrum to craft policy that ensures border security and safeguards human rights is grave and complex. Individuals fleeing religious persecution made finding refuge part of our heritage since colonial times. This American tradition has enshrined our values to the world. This essay is limited to summarizing the asylum process and recent events through the summer of 2018 which affect it. Policy changes are ongoing. The asylum process is complicated by illegal immigration. The surge in migrants arriving at and/or crossing the border has led to controversial policies over the years. Unlike those who illegally cross the border and remain unknown to law enforcement, everyone who makes an affirmative asylum claim to a United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) officer, or a defensive asylum claim in immigration court, has been thoroughly vetted through identity, criminality, and terrorism background checks. Granting refuge to those fleeing persecution reaffirms the values of a country that is, as Lincoln richly stated, the last best hope of Earth. Comprehensive immigration reform is needed on many immigration issues, two of which are to ensure border security and safeguard the asylum-seeking process.

This paper studies the experiences of asylum seekers in Australia. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between mental wellbeing, living conditions, and Australia’s detention policies in light of human rights.

Using grounded theory, data were collected via observations, semi-structured interviews, key-informant interviews, and document analysis. Participants included seven asylum seekers and three professionals working with them.

In light of a human rights framework, this paper reports on the mental distress suffered by asylum seekers in detention, the environments of constraint in which they live, and aspects of detention centre policy that contribute to these environments. The findings highlight a discrepancy between asylum seekers’ experiences under immigration detention policy and Australia’s human rights obligations.

This research indicates human rights violations for asylum seekers in detention in Australia. This research project involved a small number of participants and recommends systemic review of the policy and practices that affect asylum seekers’ mental health including larger numbers of participants. Consideration is made of alternatives to detention as well as improving detention centre conditions. The World Health Organization’s Quality Rights Tool Kit might provide the basis for a framework to review Australia’s immigration detention system with particular focus on the poor mental wellbeing of asylum seekers in detention.

This study links international human rights law and Australian immigration detention policies and practices with daily life experiences of suffering mental distress within environments of constraint and isolation. It identifies asylum seekers as a vulnerable population with respect to human rights and mental wellbeing. Of particular value is the inclusion of asylum seekers themselves in interviews.

This paper aims to explore the impact of stressors and the strategies staff use to cope with these at a detention facility. It documents through case studies some of the triggers of trauma, possible coping mechanisms that might assist in navigating the associated stressors in a workplace and recommendations as to what might assist staff.

A naturalist approach was used in this research, using an ethnographic qualitative methodology. Grounded theory assisted in the analysis of the data to capture naturalistically the subjective experience of the participants of the study. Conversations occurred with staff who had worked in a detention facility using face to face semi-structured interviews. The structure was open-ended to allow the staff to discuss and share their experiences freely.

Stressors that impacted staff working in a detention facility resulted from areas such as heightened reactions from detainees because of the length of their detainment, detainee self-harm, dealing with the effects of an increase of substance abuse through detainees obtaining contraband and the associated violent reactions that can occur as a result. Adverse symptoms noted within the lives of staff included acute anxiety, sleeplessness, depression and tension within impersonal relationships, including family. What compounded the issue was staffs’ reluctance to talk about work stressors.

The research used nine participants for case studies of staff who had formerly experienced various adverse impacts of stressors. This is not a comprehensive study, however, of the broader experiences of staff at an Australian detention facility. It does provide, however, a snapshot of the experiences of a small group who had significantly been impacted by the stressors of the workplace.

This paper provides fresh perspectives or initiatives that are needed to assist staff to navigate the changing environment of working in a detention facility. In particular, some support mechanisms and protective factors that could be put in place to curb the negative impact of stressors in the workplace and to mitigate against long term stress disorders developing in the personal lives of staff.

Many staff are not getting the help they need to cope with the emotional distress they experience in their workplace. However, there are practical interventions to support staff in managing the stressors they face. These will be outlined in this article.

This study was carried out with the goal of giving staff a voice and to capture their former experiences in their vocational responsibilities in a venue that has had very limited research attention. This study has presented the challenges staff faced in a unique venue of working in a detention facility. It has documented some of the common stressors staff faced, the impact of such and some coping mechanisms used to handle them.

When it comes to deterring and incarcerating people seeking asylum, there is a fusion between racialisation and politicisation. The bedrock is the colonisation of the nation now called Australia, where the dispossession of Indigenous peoples was a national project that later merged into the building of a state that lauded British heritage and the exclusion of migrants through the White Australia policy. This foundation of nationhood continues in a manner that challenges the myth of harmonious multiculturalism by determining who is deemed worthy and who is excluded. The centrepiece of racialised bordering is the immigration detention regime which is increasingly characterised by transporting people to offshore sites. This chapter argues through examples, how people seeking asylum have been racialised, dehumanised and criminalised, particularly through a national security lens.

Recent reports raise suicidality among asylum seekers as a pertinent issue in current Australian offshore detention centres. However, knowledge on the nature of the suicidality in these centres is very limited. The purpose of this paper is to explore in depth how suicidality arises and develops in offshore detention centres.

A single case study approach was used.

This case study presents the findings on the suicidal process of an asylum seeker who attempted suicide three times while in Nauru Regional Processing Centre, the last of which being a near-lethal one. The prolonged mandatory detention, together with lack of clarity about the timeframes of detention and constant postponing of the legal processes were identified as the main factors driving the suicidal intent. The suicidal behaviour escalated from an interrupted attempt to a near lethal one within two years, which signals lack of adequate suicide prevention within detention.

The resources for mental health being limited in Nauru, it is likely overall changes in refugee status processing may be a more effective suicide prevention strategy rather than implementation of other additional measures.

Studies in offshore processing facilities have been scarce due to barriers for researchers to access the detention centres. This study offers a unique insight into suicidality in this hard to reach population.

The purpose of this paper is to offer practical researcher self-care strategies to prepare for and manage the emotions involved in doing organizational ethnographic research. Institutional ethics policies or research training programs may not provide guidance, yet emotions are an integral part of research, particularly for ethnographers immersed in the field or those working with sensitive topics or vulnerable or marginalized people.

The paper draws on ethnographic fieldwork over nine months with a voluntary organization in the UK, Yarl’s Wood Befrienders, to explore the experiences and activities of volunteer visitors who offer emotional support to women detained indefinitely in an immigration removal center. The author is a “complete member researcher,” or “at-home ethnographer,” a volunteer visitor and a former detainee.

The author describes the emotional impact the research personally had on her and shares learning from overcoming “compassion fatigue.” Self-care strategies based on the literature are recommended, such as a researcher self-assessment, identification of the emotional risks of the research, and self-care plan formulated during project planning. Suggested resources and activities to support the well-being of researchers are explored.

This paper provides practical resources for researchers to prepare for and cope with emotional and mental health risks throughout the research process. It builds awareness of safeguarding researchers and supporting them with handling emotional disruptions. Without adequate support, they may be psychologically harmed and lose the potential to critically engage with emotions as data.

The literature on emotions in doing research rarely discusses self-care strategies. This paper offers an actionable plan for researchers to instil emotional and mental well-being into the research design to navigate emotional challenges in the field and build resilience.