The Right to Leave the Territory of a State

• In Event: International Organization, Human Rights, and Migration Policy

Abstract

Most scholarship on migration considers immigration, entry to state territory. Much less discussed is emigration, let alone (particularly since the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War) the idea that states might attempt to block or regulate exit from their territory. Though Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights enshrines a human right to leave any country – specifying that “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own” – many states do in fact restrict or regulate the right to exit. This paper considers various types of regulation of exit, including by democratic countries. It is a largely conceptual and policy-oriented piece, drawing inspiration from articles appearing in a special issue of the journal International Migration on the topic of regulation of exit, and advancing some normative arguments about how to better protect the human right to leave any country, illustrated by empirical examples mostly from developed democracies.

Author

• Willem Maas, York University