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1. Introduction
This paper addresses two research questions:
RQ1. What formal contracts, instruments and accounting activities constitute Australia’s offshore asylum seeker processing policy in practice?
RQ2. How are different notions of legitimacy and accountability mediated through the network constituted by this policy?
We raise these issues in the context of the evolution of Australia’s asylum seeker policy during the period from 3 December 2007 when Kevin Rudd first became Prime Minister to 17 February 2014 when violence at the offshore processing facility in Papua New Guinea (PNG) resulted in the death of asylum seeker Reza Barati and injury to 70 others. We find that while the various contracts that constitute the policy seem designed to create accountability gaps, the requirement within the network to remain financially accountable undermines the government’s claims not to be responsible for the conditions in the detention camps. This particular policy network therefore provides an example of how the notion of efficiency and effectiveness that lies at the core of new public sector accountability establishes the state’s effective control over the conditions of irregular migrants and by doing so, establishes the Australian Government’s responsibility for the extent to which their human rights have been violated.
The issue of asylum seekers has become an emotive issue in Australia with significant political implications. In response the state has assembled an array of complex mechanisms to confront the issue. These mechanisms, which include offshoring the processing of asylum seekers who are unauthorized maritime arrivals (UMAs)[1] to Nauru and PNG and outsourcing service provision for these facilities to private companies, has attracted considerable criticism from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR, 2013c), among others, for its failure to adhere to international human rights obligations[2] (para. 90).
These mechanisms bring into tension two imperatives: domestic politics and international human rights obligations. Domestically the Australian Government is under pressure to be efficient and effective in its use of public money while appearing tough and uncompromising on (UMAs) in order to secure and retain political power (Davids and Thampapillai, 2013). However, Australia is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966, ICCPR), a global governance mechanism designed to regulate the behaviour of nation states. Article 7 of the ICCPR...