The history of the Habsburg Empire in the post-Napoleonic era is frequently approached from the perspective of its various component nationalities. These were traditionally portrayed in the historiography as engaged in more-or-less open struggle with control from Vienna. This article argues that the over-privileging of such national categories can distort the picture. By looking at a number of case studies – the naming of Lombardy-Venetia, the Biblioteca italiana, the Panteon veneto – the relationship between Venice (and its Terraferma) and Habsburg rule during the second Austrian domination is examined. It will be argued that it is more profitable to see Venetian identities (municipal, local, Italian, and as part of a wider transnational European culture) as capable of working for as well as against the empire, and that Habsburg policy was as often concerned with managing potential local rivalries (notably between Lombards and Venetians) as with controlling a perceived Italian threat. It is also suggested that, while cultivation of local identity was often used to reinforce the national, the Austrian authorities were also happy to annex both to further imperial interests.

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The cessation clause epitomises the 1951 Refugee Convention’s internal barriers to the full achievement of refugees’ rights. By examining the controversial application of this provision in the case of Rwandan refugees, this paper demonstrates the resultant infringements on refugees’ human rights, and signals a key obstacle in understanding refugee experiences: institutional insistence on subjugating refugee perspectives and knowledge. This top-heavy ‘knowing what’s best’ for refugees must cede to alternative conceptualisations of refugee rights, especially in the well-worn durable solutions debate. A rights-based approach would see transnational mobility as a solution to challenges endured by camp-based refugees in particular. The Rwandan case study is grounded in theories of today’s membership-based nation-state paradigm, and questions whether re-inscribing refugees as primary agents of their own repatriation (with or without return) can bridge the divide inherent in the exclusionary citizenship-centric logic which ultimately structures the refugee rights system, and can adequately address problems rooted in complex identity politics

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