Deportation is the expulsion of a person or group of people by a state from its Sovereignty territory. The actual definition changes depending on the place and context, and it also changes over time.[Jean-Marie Henckaerts in his book Mass Expulsion in Modern International Law and Practice wrote: ]As far as deportation is concerned, there is no general feature that clearly sets it apart from expulsion. Both term basically indicate the same phenomenon. ... The only difference seems to be one of preferential use, expulsion being more an international term while deportation is more used in municipal law. ... One study discusses but immediately adds that in modern practice both terms have become interchangeable.
See A person who has been deported or is under sentence of deportation is called a deportee.
Definition
Definitions of deportation vary: some include "transfer beyond State borders" (distinguishing it from forcible transfer),
others consider it "the actual implementation of an order in cases where the person concerned does not follow it voluntarily".
Others differentiate removal of
legal immigrants (expulsion) from illegal immigrants (deportation).
Deportation in the most general sense, in accordance with International Organization for Migration,
"The terminology used at the domestic or international level on expulsion and deportation is not uniform but there is a clear tendency to use the term expulsion to refer to the legal order to leave the territory of a State, and removal or deportation to refer to the actual implementation of such order in cases where the person concerned does not follow it voluntarily."[W. Kälin, "Aliens, Expulsion and Deportation" in R. Wolfrum (ed) Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law (2014).]
According to the European Court of Human Rights, collective expulsion is any measure compelling Non-citizens, as a group, to leave a country, except where such a measure is taken on the basis of a reasonable and objective examination of the particular case of each individual non-national of the group. Mass expulsion may also occur when members of an ethnic group are sent out of a state regardless of nationality. Collective expulsion, or expulsion en masse, is prohibited by several instruments of international law.
History
Antiquity
Expulsions occurred in
ancient history. They were well-recorded particularly in ancient Mesopotamia.
The kingdoms of Israel and Judah faced several forced expulsions, including deportations by the Neo-Assyrian Empire following the fall of Israel and during Sennacherib's campaign in the 8th century BC. Later, the Neo-Babylonian Empire deported much of the Judean population upon conquering Judah in 597 BC and 587 BC.
Deportation in the Achaemenid Empire
Deportation was practiced as a policy toward rebellious people in Achaemenid Empire. The precise legal status of the deportees is unclear; but ill-treatment is not recorded. Instances include:
[A. Shapur Shahbazi, Erich Kettenhofen, John R. Perry, VII/3, pp. 297–312, available online at (accessed on 30 December 2012).
]
Deportation in the Parthian Empire
Unlike in the Achaemenid and Sassanian periods, records of deportation are rare during the
Parthian Empire period. One notable example was the deportation of the
Mards in
Charax Spasinu, near Ray by
Phraates I. The 10,000 Roman prisoners of war after the Battle of Carrhae appear to have been deported to
Merv near the eastern border in 53 BC, who are said to married to local people. It is hypothesized that some of them founded the Chinese city of
Liqian after becoming soldiers for the
Xiongnu tribe, but this is doubted.
Hyrcanus II, the Jewish king of Jerusalem, was settled among the Jews of Babylon in Parthian Empire after being taken as captive by the Parthian-Jewish forces in 40 BC.
Roman POWs in the Antony's Parthian War may have suffered deportation.
Deportation in the Sasanian empire
Deportation was widely used by the Sasanians, especially during the wars with the Romans.
During Shapur I's reign, the Romans (including Valerian) who were defeated at the Battle of Edessa were deported to Persis. Other destinations were Parthia, Khuzestan, and Asorestan. There were cities which were founded and were populated by Romans prisoners of war, including Shadh-Shapur (Dayr Mikhraq) in Meshan, Bishapur in Persis, Wuzurg-Shapur (Ukbara; Marw-Ḥābūr), and Gundeshapur. Agricultural land were also given to the deportees. These deportations initiated the spread Christianity in the Sassanian empire. In Rēw-Ardashīr (Rishahr; Yarānshahr), Persis, there was a church for the Romans and another one for Carmanians.
After the Arab incursion into Persia during Shapur II's reign, he scattered the defeated Arab tribes by deporting them to other regions. Some were deported to Bahrain and Kirman, possibly to both populate these unattractive regions (due to their climate) and bringing the tribes under control.
In 395 AD 18,000 Roman populations of Sophene, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Roman Syria, and Cappadocia were captured and deported by the "Huns". the prisoners were freed by the Persians as they reached Persia, and were settled in Slōk (Veh-Ardashir) and Kōkbā (Kōkhē). The author of the text Liber Calipharum has praised the king Yazdegerd I (399–420) for his treatment of the deportees, who also allowed some to return.
Major deportations occurred during the Anastasian War, including Kavad I's deportation of the populations of Erzurum and Amida to Arrajan (Weh-az-Amid Kavad).
Major deportations occurred during the campaigns of Khosrau I from the Roman cities of Sura, Aleppo, Antioch, Apamea, Raqqa, and Batnai in Osrhoene, to Wēh-Antiyōk-Khosrow (also known as Rūmagān; in Arabic: al-Rūmiyya). The city was founded near Ctesiphon especially for them, and Khosrow reportedly "did everything in his power to make the residents want to stay".
Middle Ages
The Medieval European age was marked with several large religious deportations, including that of Christians, Jews and Muslims. For instance, the Almoravid deported Christians from Spain to Morocco, with mass deportations taking place in 1109, 1126, 1130 and 1138.
Modern deportation
With the beginning of the Age of Discovery, deporting individuals to an overseas colony also became common practice. As early as the 16th century,
formed a substantial portion of early colonists in Portuguese empire.
[Russell-Wood (1998: p. 106–107)] From 1717 onward Britain deported around 40,000
British religious objectors and "criminals" to America before the practice ceased in 1776.
[Daniels, Coming to America: A History of Immigration and Ethnicity in American Life, 2002] Jailers sold the "criminals" to shipping contractors, who then sold them to
. The "criminals" worked for the plantation owner for the duration of their sentence.
[ After Britain lost control of the area which became the United States, Australia became the destination for "criminals" deported to British colonies. Britain transported more than 160,000][ British "criminals" to the Australian colonies between 1787 and 1855.][McCaffray and Melancon, p. 171.]
Meanwhile, in Japan during Sakoku, all Portuguese and Spanish people were expelled from the country.
In the 18th century the Tipu Sultan, of Mysore, deported tens of thousands of civilians, from lands he had annexed, to serve as slave labour in other parts of his empire, for example the: Captivity of Mangalorean Catholics at Seringapatam.
In the late 19th century the United States of America began designating "desired" and "undesired" immigrants, leading to the birth of illegal immigration and subsequent deportation of immigrants when found in irregular situations.
At the beginning of the 20th century the control of immigration began becoming common practice, with the Immigration Restriction Act 1901 in Australia,[David Rosenberg, ' Immigration' on the Channel 4 website] and the Continuous journey regulation of 1908 in Canada,
In the meantime, deportation of "regular residents" also increased.
United States
In the 1930s, during the Great Depression, more stringent enforcement of immigration laws were ordered by the executive branch of the U.S. government, which led to increased deportation and repatriation to Mexico. In the 1930s, during the Great Depression, between 355,000 and 2 million Mexicans and Mexican Americans were deported or repatriated to Mexico, an estimated 40 to 60% of whom were U.S. citizens – overwhelmingly children. At least 82,000 Mexicans were formally deported between 1929 and 1935 by the government. Voluntary repatriations were more common than deportations.[McKay, "The Federal Deportation Campaign in Texas: Mexican Deportation from the Lower Rio Grande Valley During the Great Depression", Borderlands Journal, Fall 1981; Balderrama and Rodriguez, Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s, 1995; Valenciana, "Unconstitutional Deportation of Mexican Americans During the 1930s: A Family History and Oral History", Multicultural Education, Spring 2006.]
In 1954, the executive branch of the U.S. government implemented Operation Wetback, a program created in response to public hysteria about immigration and immigrants from Mexico.[See Albert G. Mata, "Operation Wetback: The Mass Deportation of Mexican Undocumented Workers in 1954 by Juan Ramon García", Contemporary Sociology, 1:5 (September 1983), p. 574 ("the widespread concern and hysteria about 'wetback inundation'..."); Bill Hing, Defining America Through Immigration Policy, Temple University Press, 2004, p. 130. ("While Operation Wetback temporarily relieved national hysteria, criticism of the Bracero program mounted."); David G. Gutiérrez, Walls and Mirrors: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the Politics of Ethnicity, University of California Press, 1995, p. 168. ("The situation was further complicated by the government's active collusion in perpetuating the political powerlessness of ethnic Mexicans by condoning the use of Mexican labor while simultaneously whipping up anti-Mexican hysteria against wetbacks."); Ian F. Haney López, Racism on Trial: The Chicano Fight for Justice, new ed., Belknap Press, 2004, p. 83. ("... Operation Wetback revived Depression-era mass deportations. Responding to public hysteria about the 'invasion' of the United States by 'illegal aliens', this campaign targeted large Mexican communities such as East Los Angeles."); Jaime R. Aguila, "Book Reviews: Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s. By Francisco E. Balderrama and Raymond Rodríguez", Journal of San Diego History, 52:3–4 (Summer–Fall 2006), p. 197. ("Anti-immigrant hysteria contributed to the implementation of Operation Wetback in the mid 1950s....")] Operation Wetback led to the deportation of nearly 1.3 million Mexicans from the United States.[García, Juan Ramon. Operation Wetback: The Mass Deportation of Mexican Undocumented Workers in 1954. Westport, Ct.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 1980. ][Hing, Bill Ong. Defining America Through Immigration Policy. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2004. ]
Nazi Germany
Nazi policies deported homosexuals, Jews,[ Deportation to the Death Camps, Yad Vashem][ Database of deportations during the Holocaust – The International Institute for Holocaust Research, Yad Vashem] Polish people, and Romani people from their established places of residence to Nazi concentration camps or extermination camps set up at a considerable distance from their original residences. During the Holocaust, the Nazis made heavy use of , where "deportation" frequently meant the victims were subsequently killed, as opposed to simply being relocated.
Russia and the Soviet Union
The Grand Principality of Moscow developed policies of internal exile - the transfer of undesirable individuals or groups to remote territories. An early example of population exchange occurred following Moscow's conquest of the Novgorod Republic in the 15th century.[
]
The Tsardom of Russia, the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation continued similar practices as a more humane alternative to execution, deporting undesirables with or without sentences of penal labor - instituting katorga, the Gulag system and corrective labor colonies. In the 19th century, for example, rebellious Vistula Land and Decembrists found themselves in Siberia, and Dostoevsky experienced katorga in Siberia and exile in Central Asia. Prior to 1917 several early Bolsheviks served time in remote cities and governorates.
The Soviet Union, especially under Joseph Stalin during the 1930s and 1940s, carried out forced mass-transfers of some 6 million people, resulting in millions of deaths. As many as 110 separate deportations have been catalogued, included the targeting of at least 13 distinct ethnicities and 8 entire nations. Many historians have described Soviet deportations as ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity, and/or genocide.[
]
Besides the imprisonment of (such as Vladimir Kara-Murza and Alexei Navalny) in remote outposts, the Russian Federation has deported Ukrainians in the course of the Russo-Ukrainian War (2014 onwards).
Independent State of Croatia
An estimated 120,000 Serbs were deported from the Independent State of Croatia to German-occupied Serbia, and 300,000 fled by 1943.
Contemporary
All countries reserve the right to deport persons without right of abode, even those who are longtime residents or possess permanent residency. In general, foreigners who have committed serious crimes, entered the country illegally, overstayed or broken the conditions of their visa, or otherwise lost their legal status to remain in the country may be administratively removed or deported.[Henckaerts, Mass Expulsion in Modern International Law and Practice, 1995, p. 5; Forsythe and Lawson, Encyclopedia of Human Rights, 1996, pp. 53–54.]
Since the 1980s, the world also saw the development of practices of externalization/"offshoring immigrants", currently being used by Australia, Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom,
The period after the fall of the Iron Curtain showed increased deportation and repatriation in parts of Europe.[ Zetter, Roger, et al. "An assessment of the impact of asylum policies in Europe, 1990–2000." Home Office Online Report 17.03 (2003).]
During its invasion of Ukraine, the Russia has perpetrated mass deportations of Ukrainian citizens to Russia and occupied territories. While independent numbers are difficult to come by, and depending on the degree of Russian coercion or force required to meet the definition of "deported", reported numbers range from tens of thousands to 4.5 million deportees.
Dominican Republic deported more than 250,000 Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian Ancestor to Haiti in 2023.
Deportation of undocumented Afghans from Pakistan since 2023. By January 2025, over 813,300 individuals had been repatriated to Afghanistan.
Deportation in the second presidency of Donald Trump since 2025. The Trump administration has claimed that around 140,000 people had been deported as of April 2025, though some estimates put the number at roughly half that amount.
In May 2025, the government ordered the mass deportation of an estimated 4 million Afghan migrants and refugees to Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
Noteworthy deportees
Alexander Berkman, Emma Goldman, C.L.R. James, Claudia Jones, Fritz Julius Kuhn, Lucky Luciano, and Anna Sage were all deported from the United States by being arrested and brought to the federal immigration control station on Ellis Island in New York Harbor and, from there, forcibly removed from the United States on ships.
Opposition
Many criticize deportations as inhumane, as well as questioning their effectiveness. Some are completely opposed towards any deportations, while others state it is inhumane to take somebody to a foreign land without their consent.
In popular culture
In literature, deportation appears as an overriding theme in the 1935 novel, Strange Passage by Theodore D. Irwin.
Films depicting or dealing with fictional cases of deportation are many and varied. Among them are Ellis Island (1936), Exile Express (1939), Five Came Back (1939), Deported (1950), and Gambling House (1951). More recently, Shottas (2002) treated the issue of U.S. deportation to the Caribbean post-1997.
See also
Notes
Bibliography
-
Aguila, Jaime R. "Book Reviews: Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s. By Francisco E. Balderrama and Raymond Rodríguez". Journal of San Diego History. 52:3–4 (Summer–Fall 2006).
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Balderrama, Francisco and Rodriguez, Raymond. Decade of Betrayal: Mexican Repatriation in the 1930s. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995. .
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Campana, Aurélie. "Case Study: The Massive Deportation of the Chechen People: How and why Chechens were Deported". Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence. November 2007. Accessed 11 August 2008.
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Daniels, Roger. Coming to America: A History of Immigration and Ethnicity in American Life. New York: HarperCollins, 2002.
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Fragomen, Austin T. and Bell, Steven C. Immigration Fundamentals: A Guide to Law and Practice. New York: Practising Law Institute, 1996.
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García, Juan Ramon. Operation Wetback: The Mass Deportation of Mexican Undocumented Workers in 1954. Westport, Ct.: Greenwood Publishing Group, 1980. .
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Gibney, Matthew J. and Hansen, Randall. "Deportation and the Liberal State: The Involuntary Return of Asylum Seekers and Unlawful Migrants in Canada, the UK, and Germany". New Issues in Refugee Research: Working Paper Series No. 77. Geneva, Switzerland: United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2003.
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Gutiérrez, David G. Walls and Mirrors: Mexican Americans, Mexican Immigrants, and the Politics of Ethnicity. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
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Hing, Bill Ong. Defining America Through Immigration Policy. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2004.
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"The Law of Necessity As Applied in the Bisbee Deportation Case". Arizona Law Review. 3:2 (1961).
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"Lewis Attacks Deportation of Leaders by West Virginia Authorities". The New York Times. 17 July 1921.
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Lindquist, John H. and Fraser, James. "A Sociological Interpretation of the Bisbee Deportation". Pacific Historical Review. 37:4 (November 1968).
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López, Ian F. Haney. Racism on Trial: The Chicano Fight for Justice. New ed. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2004.
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Martin, MaryJoy. The Corpse On Boomerang Road: Telluride's War on Labor, 1899–1908. Lake City, Colo.: Western Reflections Publishing Co., 2004.
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Mata, Albert G. "Operation Wetback: The Mass Deportation of Mexican Undocumented Workers in 1954 by Juan Ramon García". Contemporary Sociology. 1:5 (September 1983)
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Mawdsley, Evan. The Stalin Years: The Soviet Union 1929–1953. Manchester, England: Manchester University Press, 2003.
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McCaffray, Susan Purves and Melancon, Michael S. Russia in the European Context, 1789–1914: A Member of the Family. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
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McKay, Robert R. "The Federal Deportation Campaign in Texas: Mexican Deportation from the Lower Rio Grande Valley during the Great Depression". Borderlands Journal. (Fall 1981).
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Naimark, Norman M. Fires of Hatred: Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth-Century Europe. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.
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Nurbiyev, Aslan. "Relocation of Chechen 'Genocide' Memorial Opens Wounds". Agence France Press. June 4, 2008.
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President's Mediation Commission. Report on the Bisbee Deportations Made by the President's Mediation Commission to the President of the United States. Washington, D.C.: President's Mediation Commission, 6 November 1917.
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Silverberg, Louis G. "Citizens' Committees: Their Role in Industrial Conflict". Public Opinion Quarterly. 5:1 (March 1941).
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Suggs, Jr., George G. Colorado's War on Militant Unionism: James H. Peabody and the Western Federation of Miners. 2nd ed. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991.
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Valenciana, Christine. "Unconstitutional Deportation of Mexican Americans During the 1930s: A Family History and Oral History". Multicultural Education. Spring 2006.
Further reading
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Garrity, Meghan (2022). "". Journal of Peace Research.
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Grams, Grant W.(2025). The Nazi ‘Heim ins Reich’ program from Lands of Oversea Migration and German deportees from Canada and the United States, in Thomas Geisen (ed.) Journal of International Migration and Integration.
External links
