In her article, Alexandra Keller examines whether migrants and refugees can, in certain circumstances, be regarded as a collective civilian population for the purposes of crimes against humanity under international criminal law. The article reviews case law and scholarship and identifies two main approaches to defining a “population”: a quantitative approach focused on the number of people targeted, and a distinguishable-group approach focused on shared characteristics that make a group of people the target of an attack. She argues that both approaches can be useful in establishing the collective nature of a crime against humanity and, using a combination of the two approaches, concludes that migrants and refugees can in some contexts constitute a population in the sense of crimes against humanity.
The article resulted from her Master's thesis in International Law, which was the laureate of the Mariano Garcia Rubio Prize in 2022. After submitting her thesis, she was encouraged to develop it into an article so that the research could reach a broader audience.
Revisiting the topic a few years later gave me the opportunity to refine and broaden the original analysis and engage with more recent jurisprudential developments. I am very grateful to the Geneva Graduate Institute for making the article’s open-access publication possible, and I hope it can contribute, even in a small way, to ongoing discussions on accountability for grave human rights violations against migrants and refugees.
– Alexandra Keller
Since graduating from the Geneva Graduate Institute, Alexandra Keller has held positions with governmental institutions and international organisations in Switzerland and the Americas, focusing on international humanitarian and human rights law, peacebuilding, and international cooperation. The article was written in her personal capacity, and the views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of her current or former employers.