Is there some useful distinction between entering a country and deciding to stay and “defecting”? It strikes me that the only time one hears about a “defection” is if the defector is high profile and/or the country of origin is hostile to the country of destination.
I would imagine for it truely to be a defection, one would have to go to a properly placed official of the local government and request asylum. Before you do that, it’s just avoiding local immigration laws.
I think the distinction stems in the fact that you made no effort to settle your affairs in your home country, i.e. you’re abandoning/deserting your native land with no notice.
I believe you are correct, Otto. I’ve known immigrants and people who sought asylum, here in the US and in Switzerland, and sometimes their (lack of) preparations and actions seem to be indistinguishable from the defectors I’ve read about. I suspect that ‘defector’ is simply a pejorative, like ‘traitor’ (‘betrayal’ isn’t a crime; ‘treason’ is, but it is defined far more narrowly than ‘being a traitor’)
A quick search didn’t turn up any actual international law regarding defection. Some countries may have their own definitions. It may even be illegal by their rules.
The word “defection” is widely used, with the same generic sense (to withdraw) in game theory, politics (“The US defected from the Climate Control Treaty”) and many other areas. I can’t think of any reason that its use by the State Department couldn’t be ordinary English instead of a technical “term of art”.
According to Merriam-Webster:
So the idea is that there has to be some ideological basis. An illegal Mexican immigrant to the U.S. of course would not be a defector.
This generally carries the implication that the person is of some political importance. However, it is not necessarily so. Lee Harvey Oswald defected to the Soviet Union for a while, although he was not considered to be of any particular importance by either side at the time.
I’ve also heard of people defecting who were of some ‘importance’ but not really political - a well-known athlete, chess player, or scientist. Can’t come up with any obvious examples though.
Of course, the argument could be made that during the cold war, such people were considered to be political assets to both sides.
Bela Karolyi (gymnastics coach) defected, as did his most famous student, Nadia Comeneche (unsure of the spellings of all four names), although their defections were separated by a couple of decades. Baryshnikov (don’t know about the spelling of that one either) also defected IIRC.
The cynical answer is that Russian ballerinas “defect” from the Evil Empire, which is all romantic and chic, while Mexican laborers are “illegal aliens”, which, er, isn’t. They’re all people who come here (or I suppose to other countries) seeking things unavailable to them at home, economically or poltically. Some legally and some not. But I’ve never heard of a Russian ballerina or gymnastics star or ice skater or whatever being called an “illegal alien”, whether they are technically or not.
To me, the distinction seems to be that it’s defection, when the two sides are opposing each other in some way, countries at war, rival sports teams etc, and the defector takes something of value from one side to the other, e.g. knowledge or skills.
To me, the distinction seems to be that it’s defection, when the two sides are opposing each other in some way, countries at war, rival sports teams etc, and the defector takes something of value from one side to the other, e.g. knowledge or skills.