The Michigan Guidelines on Nexus to a Convention Ground

Efforts to promote the contemporary vitality of the Convention refugee definition have usually focussed on refining our understanding of the circumstances in which an individual may be said to be at risk of "being persecuted," or on giving contemporary relevance to the content of the five grounds upon which risk must be based-race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion. Comparatively little thought has been given to how best to conceive the causal linkage or nexus between the Convention ground and the risk of being persecuted. In what circumstances may the risk be said to be "for reasons of' one of the five Convention grounds?