The Global Spread of Safe Country Policies: Introducing the SACOP Dataset

Safe Country Policies have been a central tool used by states to restrict access to asylum. Despite the salience of such policies for both host states and people seeking protection, we lack a coherent conceptualization of the different types of Safe Country Policies and systematic information on their adoption in all world regions. Aiming to fill these conceptual and empirical gaps, I introduce the Safe Country Policies Dataset (SACOP), which provides original information on the adoption and characteristics of Safe Country Policies in 195 states from 1951 until 2021. Drawing from this dataset, we learn that Safe Country Policies are not only widespread in the Global North but are increasingly being adopted by states in the Global South. The global spread of these policies does not only challenge the principle of responsibility-sharing in asylum governance, but it may also create new patterns of injustice between states in regions that host the bulk of displaced people.