Do asylum seekers and refugees choose destination countries? Evidence from large‐scale surveys in Australia, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka

Abstract

Some literature depicts refugees as more passive than active when selecting a destination country. We draw on surveys of over 35,000 people in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Australia, to show that most potential asylum seekers and refugees of Hazara, Rohingya, Muslim and Tamil backgrounds prefer some destination countries over others and that many refugees from these groups surveyed in Australia specifically had Australia in mind as a destination country. We show how Australia's asylum seeker policy was a key reason why many refugees chose Australia in 2011 and 2012 and that subsequent restrictive asylum seeker policy changes appear to be reflected in potential asylum seeker considerations in 2014. We find that despite the restrictive asylum seeker policy changes, perceptions of Australia as a highly functioning civil society, relative to other potential destination countries, may explain why Australia remains a country of choice for asylum seekers from west and south Asia.

Deciding Where to go: Policies, People and Perceptions Shaping Destination Preferences

“…With some exceptions (e.g. McAuliffe and Jayasuriya, ), most studies find that refugees and other migrants have, at best, patchy knowledge of asylum and migration policies in destination countries.…”

“…The literature has identified a country's “general reputation” as one of these factors. McAuliffe and Jayasuriya (), for example, find that despite an increasingly restrictive policy environment refugees still prefer Australia over other destinations because of its liberal reputation and livelihood opportunities. Our findings support this conclusion.…”

“…Drawing on in‐depth qualitative interviews with more than 250 individuals, we examine where our respondents wanted to go to and the extent to which they were aware of, and/or influenced by, policies put in place to control and manage their arrival. Given that “[m]igrants” thinking can change markedly and sometimes rapidly in the face of political, social, economic, environmental and other changes” (McAuliffe and Jayasuriya, , 57), our analysis provides new insights into the dynamic nature of migrant decision‐making in the context of rapidly moving policy responses and information sources (e.g. social media).…”

The Changing Spatiality of the “European Refugee/Migrant Crisis”

“…Existing research has detected a number of factors that greatly affect the attraction of certain asylum destinations (Havinga and Böcker, 1999;Lukić, 2016;McAuliffe and Jayasuriya, 2016;Robinson and Segrott, 2002). Böcker and Havinga (1998) differentiate between three groups of factors.…”

“…Aside from the border regimes, the role of asylum policy 8 A European Agenda on Migration, European Comission, 13.5.2015, https://ec.europa.eu/ home-affairs/sites/homeaffairs/files/what-we-do/policies/european-agenda-migration/ background-information/docs/communication_on_the_european_agenda_on_migra-tion_en.pdf. must also be stressed (Barthel and Neumayer, 2015;Hatton, 2005;McAuliffe and Jayasuriya, 2016) as well as smuggling networks (Brekke and Aarset, 2009). The selection of the asylum destination is therefore usually the result of a set of circumstances, rather than a pre-prepared plan based on the wishes and calculations of an individual.…”