Governing Through Migration Control: Security and Citizenship in Britain
35 Pages Posted: 27 Oct 2008 Last revised: 17 Jun 2014
Date Written: 2008
Abstract
Expanding mechanisms of border control increasingly depend on the criminalisation of non-citizens. While some criminology scholarship might suggest such measures announce an increasing governance of migration 'through crime', we argue that it is not simply a case of punitive crime control strategies leaching into migration policies. Not only are foreigners in a far more vulnerable position to the British citizen, but the restrictions they face play important constitutive roles in newly invigorated discourses of citizenship and nationalism. In this article we suggest that criminologists must move on from studies that emphasise control and criminalisation to consider more broadly the implications of basing a politics of national identity that aspires to 'solidarity' and shared values on the forcible exclusion of growing numbers of people.
Keywords: immigration, asylum, citizenship, security, governing through crime
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