Eighteenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Abstract

This paper employs middle-range theory, situating North Korean refugees sur place presented in various “space” including borders, camps, and courts. Firstly, this paper analyses legal status of North Korean border crossers in five states (South Korea, China, Russia, the UK, and the US) vis-à-vis North Koreans’ predicaments as refugees sur place. The legal status is then compared to this paper’s survey on self-identification of border crossers. Through this triangulation of identity analysis, this paper describes endogenous and exogenous variables of (de)refugeeisation. Notably, this paper focuses on the “agency” of (non)border crossers drawn on Foucauldian resistance and Bakhtinian answerability. In this view, border crossing is rephrased as self-emancipation practice in response to the body management of the states. This is further articulated upon this paper’s theoretical foundation, Ethics of Coexistence (EoC). EoC addresses the power to restore the politics of migration against scapegoating mechanisms; the fitness of deviance for constructive social changes; and the resilience of human agents to risks in border crossing. This paper concludes with ethical, legal and methodological reflections on primarily but not limited to North Korean refugees sur place.