Faculty Bibliography
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Deborah Anker, Law of Asylum in the United States (forthcoming 2024).
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Published with Thomson Reuters since 2010.
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Abstract Over the past three decades, the US has developed a robust body of gender asylum law, including claims of women subject to sexual violence or other serious harm for reasons of gender. This body of law both reflects and has been a catalyst for larger shifts in US jurisprudence recognising the international treaty law basis of domestic asylum law. For years such progress was stymied by a dominant Cold War ideological decision-making paradigm and a woefully inadequate and politicised administrative bureaucracy. The growth of a domestic and international women’s rights movement, and more meaningful engagement by the US judiciary, have resulted in substantial changes. Although progress remains incomplete, today there is a significant body of administrative and federal judicial case law incorporating gender into the interpretation of key categories in refugee law, including gender-defined particular social groups (PSG) and gender-based claims under the political, race and religion grounds in the definition of refugee. These more principled developments have proven vulnerable to politics, particularly under the administration of President Donald J. Trump. However, a new approach, based in part on a clearer, regulatory articulation of doctrine, holds promise for the development of a more coherent and principled body of jurisprudence. This article places US gender asylum in the context of the larger political landscape (i.e., the Cold War, and post-Cold War politics). The article also attempts to draw the links between the development of gender asylum law and larger social and legal change movements, including a domestic and international women’s rights movements focused on issues of sexual violence and violence in the home or “domestic violence.”
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How has feminism shaped US asylum law? Why and how is the Trump administration trying to undo feminist gains? In this episode of Ask a Feminist, asylum- and refugee-law expert Deborah Anker discusses the history and present of gender in the US asylum system. Anker is the founder and director of the Harvard Law School Immigration and Refugee Law Clinical Program and is one of the most widely known asylum scholars and practitioners in the United States. She speaks to Aziza Ahmed, professor of law at Northeastern University School of Law, and takes us through the key cases and arguments that have led to the current moment, the transformations the system is currently undergoing, and why she is less pessimistic than might be expected.
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Deborah Anker, Law of Asylum in the United States (2021 ed.).
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Law of Asylum in the United States is an authoritative presentation of U.S. asylum law, long considered a must-have publication for practitioners, students, researchers, and teachers. It is frequently relied upon and cited by practitioners and decision makers. Law of Asylum describes and interprets U.S. statutes, regulations, and cases, as well as numerous international sources, providing an up-to-date analysis of all aspects of asylum law. This edition has been thoroughly updated to capture recent developments in asylum law and policy, including the Trump Administration's policy changes, children's credibility, formulation of particular social groups, the material support bar to asylum eligibility, the one-year filing deadline, ongoing Safe Third Country Act litigation, and reinstatement of removal. The extensive Procedures Appendix has been expanded and thoroughly updated to provide an invaluable resource for practitioners and researchers interested in U.S. asylum processes. In addition, this edition includes numerous unpublished Board of Immigration Appeals and immigration judge decisions In addition, this edition includes numerous unpublished Board of Immigration Appeals and immigration judge decisions and asylum officer training materials in accessible perma.cc format to guide practitioners and researchers. Law of Asylum also addresses fundamental issues such as: The meaning of "well-founded fear" and "persecution" The five grounds for asylum (race, religion, nationality, social group membership, and political opinion) Withholding of removal protection and protection under the Convention Against Torture Claims based on childhood status and gender-based persecution When nonstate actors can be considered agents of persecution Extensive coverage of gang membership/opposition to gangs Elements of proof Credibility determinations Recent changes in statutory language enacted with the REAL ID Act BIA cases on social distinction and particularity
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Deborah E. Anker, Law of Asylum in the United States (Thomson West 2018).
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Law of Asylum in the United States is an authoritative presentation of U.S. asylum law, long considered a must-have publication for practitioners, students, researchers, and teachers. It is frequently relied upon and cited by practitioners and decision makers. Law of Asylum describes and interprets U.S. statutes, regulations, and cases, as well as numerous international sources, providing an up-to-date analysis of all aspects of asylum law. This edition has been thoroughly updated to capture recent developments in asylum law and policy, including the Trump Administration's policy changes, children's credibility, formulation of particular social groups, the material support bar to asylum eligibility, the one-year filing deadline, ongoing Safe Third Country Act litigation, and reinstatement of removal. The extensive Procedures Appendix has been expanded and thoroughly updated to provide an invaluable resource for practitioners and researchers interested in U.S. asylum processes. In addition, this edition includes numerous unpublished Board of Immigration Appeals and immigration judge decisions In addition, this edition includes numerous unpublished Board of Immigration Appeals and immigration judge decisions and asylum officer training materials in accessible perma.cc format to guide practitioners and researchers.
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"Law of Asylum in the United States is an authoritative presentation of U.S. asylum law, long considered a must-have publication for practitioners, students, and teachers. It is frequently relied upon and cited by decision makers. Law of Asylum describes and interprets applicable U.S. laws, as well as numerous international sources, providing an up-to-date analysis of all aspects of asylum law. This edition addresses current hot topics such as the recent decision in Matter of A-R-C-G-, finding a Guatemalan woman subject to severe spousal abuse eligible for asylum as a member of a particular social group, as domestic violence may form a basis of an asylum claim and gender may define a particular social group, and the rethinking of social distinction and particularity in social group claims. In addition, the extensive Procedures Appendix, added last year, has been expanded and thoroughly updated to provide an invaluable resource for practitioners and researchers interested in the U.S. asylum and related processes." --Publisher
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Questions of gender have strongly influenced the development of international refugee law over the last few decades. This volume assesses the progress toward appropriate recognition of gender-related persecution in refugee law.
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This briefing highlights the importance of a child-centered approach in children’s asylum cases by focusing on Mejilla-Romero v. Holder, a recent First Circuit Court of Appeals case presented by the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic at Greater Boston Legal Services.
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Deborah E. Anker, Corroboration, Credibility and Nexus in Asylum Law, in Immigration Practice Pointers (2012-2013) 466 (Gregory P. Adams, et al. eds., American Immigration Lawyers Association 2012).
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The authors discuss the escalation of persecution regarding the protection of gays and refugees with respect to the article written by Josan Pobjoy and James C. Hathaway. They are critical of the ideas of Hathaway and Pobjoy on the false analyzing by the courts of Great Britain, New Zealand and Australia on the refugee status of the LGBT people. Information on the jurisprudence by the courts of the U.S. on the issue of sexual orientation is also presented.
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Deborah E. Anker, Gender-based Particular Social Group Claims, in Immigration Practice Pointers (2011-2012) 553 (Gregory P. Adams, et al. eds., American Immigration Lawyers Association 2011).
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Over the past two decades, international human rights law has provided an increasingly useful framework for interpreting key criteria of the definition of a refugee. A human rights-based approach to analyzing refugee status helps to increase consistency and uniformity in decision making by state parties regarding who qualifies for international protection. Michelle Foster's book, International Refugee Law and Socio-economic Rights: Refuge from Deprivation (Cambridge U. Press 2007), comes at a critical time, not only because of increasing acceptance of the connection between refugee law and human rights law and significant developments in the current understanding of economic and social rights, but also because more asylum applicants are articulating the aspects of their claims involving socioeconomic deprivation. All jurisdictions, including the United States, now recognize that socioeconomic harm can rise to the level of persecution, but inconsistencies and insecurities still obstruct attempts at coherent analysis. Foster's meticulous research, sober reasoning, and original analysis may encourage additional scholarship on these pressing issues and lead to a more sophisticated understanding of both the refugee definition and the substantive content of economic and social rights. The proper adjudication of socioeconomic claims will likely play a vital role in challenging the lingering, dominant orthodoxy of civil and political rights, help coalesce the relationship between human rights and refugee law, and promote the development of refugee law, with some coherency, as a body of law.
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Written three years after the enactment of the REAL ID Act, this piece analyzes the implications of the act on assessments of credibility and corroboration requirements in asylum and related protection cases.
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Deborah E. Anker, Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law, & Justice: Symposium on Gender Migration (2007).
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Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law, & Justice: Symposium on Gender Migration
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Deborah E. Anker, Grounds for Asylum, Withholding, and CAT Protection: Current Issues and Recent Developments, in 40th Annual Immigration & Naturalization Institute (Practising Law Institute 2007).
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Deborah E. Anker, Lena Ayoub, H. Glenn Fogle Jr. & Matthew Muller, Stepping Up to the Bar: Exclusions from Asylum and Withholding of Removal Protection, in Immigration & Nationality Law Handbook 348 (American Immigration Lawyers Association 2007).
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Deborah E. Anker, Membership in a Particular Social Group: Recent Developments in U.S. Law, in Proceedings of 2005 Annual Immigration Law Conference (Austin Fragomen ed., Practising Law Institute 2005).
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The book looks at the complexities, inconsistencies, and paradoxes of immigration from the point of view of both academics and practitioners in the field.
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Deborah E. Anker, James L. Cavallaro & Avantika Shastri, Towards the Lowest Common Denominator: Canada Guts Post-9/11 Refugee Protection, 9 Bender's Immigr. Bull. 1028 (2004).
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Deborah E. Anker, Refugee Law, Gender and Human Rights Paradigm,15 Harv. Hum. Rts. J. 133 (2002).
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Deborah E. Anker, Refugee Status and Violence Against Women in the 'Domestic Sphere', 15 Geo. Immigr. L.J. 391 (2001).
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Deborah E. Anker, Joan Fitzpatrick & Andrew Shaknove, Crisis and Cure: A Reply to Hathaway, Neve and Schuck, 11 Harv. Hum. Rts. J. 295 (1998).
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Deborah E. Anker, Rape in the Community as a Basis for Asylum; The Treatment of Women Refugees: Claims to Protection in Canada and the United States, Part I & II; Mental Harm and Suffering as Persecution, Bender's Immigr. L. Bull. (1997)(Bi-weekly column from 1997-1998).
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Since the issuance of the United States Gender Guidelines in 1995, the immigration agencies have faced special challenges in applying them in particular cases, and in institutionalizing their commitments and principles. Since adoption of the guidelines, many asylum officers, immigration judges and Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) trial attorneys have shown greater sensitivity in addressing gender-related asylum claims. Nonetheless, in some cases lawyers for the INS have suggested that a heightened test of extraordinary persecution is appropriate or that the applicant must show persecution on account of gender plus something else in order to prevail. Claims involving domestic violence have raised particular concerns. Although the guidelines state that domestic violence can be the basis for an asylum claim, some INS attorneys have suggested that domestic violence is a private family matter not subject to protection under United States asylum law. As a result, this article originally was submitted as a position paper by the Refugee Law Center, Inc. and the Women and International Law Program of American University's Washington College of Law, in collaboration with other nongovernmental organizations, to the INS. Its purpose was to provide a framework of analysis of domestic violence as a human rights violation and as a basis for asylum protection.
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Deborah E. Anker, The Legal Position of Foreigners in the United States, in 11 Comp. L. Y.B. 129 (Dennis Campbell ed., 1992).
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Deborah E. Anker, Determining Asylum Claims in the United States: A Case Study on the Implementation of Legal Norms in an Unstructured Adjudicatory Environment, 19 N.Y.U. Rev. L. & Soc. Change 433 (1992).
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Haitian Political Asylum: A manual for Pro Bono Representation of Guantanamo Haitians (Cheryl A.E. Little, Deborah E. Anker & Gail Pendleton eds., 1992).
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This manual is intended to provide a general overview of asylum law and procedure to the volunterr practitioner who has little or no immigration law experience. It provides a detailed description of the procedures for applying for asylum (preparing and filing an asylum application for Haitians, including interviewing techniques, and applying for work authorization; framing the claim; theories of the case; preparing for the asylum interview and responding to a denial; a description of the legal asylum; and hearings before the immigration courts. It includes also extended appendises.