Description
In 1938, the League of Nations established a special committee to oversee the repatriation of foreign combatants from the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). The process required that foreign combatants—who are now broadly referred to as foreign fighters—be returned to their countries of origins unless 1) that state no longer exists or 2) the individual could not safely return. The approach during the Spanish Civil War and the narratives around the status of foreign fighter returnees differs vastly from those towards other generations. This paper compares how narratives around returnees have been constructed by states, international organisations and media across an initial three cases: the Spanish Civil War, the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, and Ukraine.
