Breaking Down Anonymity: Digital Surveillance of Irregular Migrants in Germany and the Netherlands

231 Pages·2009·1.22 MB·English

by  Dennis Broeders

imiscoe
Because borders alone cannot stop irregular migration, the European Union is b DissertAtions
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turning more and more to internal control measures. Through surveillance, member o
e
states aim to exclude irregular migrants from societal institutions, thereby discouraging d
e
their stay or deporting those who are apprehended. And yet, states cannot expel r
s
immigrants who remain anonymous. Identification has thus become key. Breaking Breaking Down Anonymity
B
Down Anonymity shows how digital surveillance is becoming a prime instrument of r
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identification and exclusion policies towards irregular migrants. To support this a
k
claim, the study charts policy developments in Germany and the Netherlands. It
i
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analyses both countries’ labour market controls as well as their detention and
g Digital Surveillance of Irregular
expulsion practices. Also examined is the development of several new EU migration
D
databases. Spanning the Continent, these information systems create a new European
o Migrants in Germany and
Union frontier – one that is digital, biometric and ever-strengthening. w
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the Netherlands

Dennis Broeders is a researcher in the Department of Sociology at Erasmus University A
n
Rotterdam and a senior research fellow at the Dutch Scientific Council for Government
o
Policy in The Hague. n
DENNIS BROEDERS
y
m
“Using the tools developed in the burgeoning field of migration surveillance, this book insightfully explores the problem
i
of the ‘internal’ control of irregular migration in Europe. A strong contribution to the discussions in this area.” t
y
John Torpey, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York
“This provoking and well-researched study of migration controls through digital surveillance documents the
irrationality and helplessness of organising exclusion mechanisms in Fortress Europe. An uneasy must-read for all
immigration and control authorities.”
Frank Bovenkerk, Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies, University of Amsterdam
“This book opens a fresh and theory-oriented perspective on the study of irregular migration. It will certainly have
some impact on future research in this field.”
Michael Bommes, Institute for Migration Research and Intercultural Studies, University of Osnabrück

sb 978 90 8964 159 5
serd ers ress · .. Amsterdam Universit y Press
Breaking Down Anonymity
IMISCOE
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The IMISCOE Network of Excellence unites over 500 researchers from
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Breaking Down Anonymity
Digital Surveillance of Irregular Migrants
in Germany and the Netherlands
Dennis Broeders
IMISCOE Dissertations
Cover design:Studio Jan de Boer,Amsterdam
Layout: The DocWorkers, Almere
ISBN 978 90 8964 159 5
e-ISBN 978 90 4851 103 7
NUR 741 /763
©DennisBroeders /Amsterdam University Press,
Amsterdam 2009
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright re-
served above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or in-
troduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any
means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise)
without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the
authorof the book.
Who are you?
Who, who, who, who?
The Who, 1978
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements 9
List ofabbreviations 11
1 Introduction and researchquestions 13
1.1 The irregular migrant as a policy problem 13
1.2 Turning inwards: internal migration control 14
1.3 Researchquestions: internal migration control
at crossroads? 16
1.4 Caseselection: Germany andthe Netherlandsas
‘most likely’cases 17
1.5 Outlineof the study 22
2 The state,surveillanceand irregular migrants: theoretical
perspectives 27
2.1 Introduction 27
2.2 The changingnature ofEuropean borders: a story in
metaphors 28
2.3 The surveillance state and internal migration control 38
2.4 The limits of state surveillance 49
2.5 A new regimeof internal migration control? 57
3 Guarding the access to the labour market 61
3.1 Setting the scene: political mindsetsand
policy frameworks 61
3.2 Political economies ofirregular migrant workers 66
3.3 Labour marketsurveillance in Germany andthe
Netherlands:a typology 74
3.4 Exclusion fromdocumentation 78
3.5 Exclusion through documentation 97
3.6 Conclusions 105
CONTENTS 7
4 Policesurveillance,detention and expulsion 111
4.1 Introduction 111
4.2 Internalsurveillance:the state in control and/or
the penal state in action? 113
4.3 Policesurveillance 124
4.4 Detention as an instrument ofmigration control 130
4.5 Expulsion 137
4.6 Conclusion: factories ofidentification? 149
5 European tools for domestic problems 153
5.1 Introduction 153
5.2 EU policymaking: transfer of competence or
a Europeantoolshed? 154
5.3 Schengen,Amsterdamand Prüm: abird’s-eye viewof
European cooperation in Justice and Home Affairs 159
5.4 Matters of scale and weight: EU return and
readmission policies 164
5.5 Creating digital borders:a network ofEU migration
databases 167
5.6 Conclusions 180
6 Conclusion: breakingdownanonymity 185
6.1 A new regimeof internal migration control 187
6.2 Policygaps: ‘white spots’ and ‘black holes’ 193
6.3 Follow the leader? 197
6.4 Breaking down anonymity,marginalising citizenship? 197
Dutch summary/Nederlandsesamenvatting 201
Bibliography 209
Discography 224
Notes 225

Acknowledgements
This book is, among other things, a tale of three cities. Its foundation
was laid in The Hague, my beautiful hometown. It was in the offices
of the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR) that the Coun-
cil’s deputy director of the time, Anton Hemerijck, and I first spoke
about my writing a PhD thesis. Godfried Engbersen, who enthusiasti-
cally agreed to be my supervisor, landed my project in the city of Rot-
terdam, where he took me up in the Department of Sociology at Eras-
mus University Rotterdam. The first full draft of this book was written
in Berlin, where I enjoyed a stay at the Social Science Research Centre
Berlin (WZB) as a visiting research fellow during the summer of
2008.
The WRR has been my professional and intellectual home base for
ten years now. It is a stimulating environment where new ways are al-
ways found to make personal and professional development possible. I
thank all my colleagues – past and present – at the council for continu-
ally reinventing the spirit of the WRR. More specifically, I thank Anton
Hemerijck, Rob Mulder and Wim van de Donk for showing the perso-
nal and institutional flexibility that cleared the path for this
dissertation.
Erasmus University Rotterdam became my second home over the
last years. Godfried Engbersen provided enthusiasm, intellectual chal-
lenge, academic and organisational savvy, friendship and a great confi-
dence in my abilities as a researcher. What more can any researcher
ask for? In addition to that, he grounded both me and my research in
the Department of Sociology, a place where research is considered hard
work and great fun at the same time. I am very glad to be able to con-
tinue my researchin Rotterdam in the coming years.
Thomas Spijkerboer of the Free University of Amsterdam, my other
supervisor, doesn’t fit in the tale of three cities. I always like people
who do not neatly fit into categories. I thank him very much for his
support and keen eye for spotting rights and wrongs in the central line
of my argument.
In Berlin I spent a few wonderful and productive months at Ruud
Koopmans’ blossoming WZB research department, Migration, Integra-
tion and Transnationalization. I am very grateful for the warm