Citizenship agendas for the abject: the production of distrust in Amsterdam's youth and security domain

Abstract

In this article I explore the seemingly contradictory notion of citizenship agendas for the abject. While abjection suggests a casting off or expulsion, citizenship implies inclusion. The youth and security policies that I argue can be read as citizenship agendas for the abject evidence this contradiction and the concomitant ambiguity. This article focuses on the workings of the ‘youth and security assemblage’ in the Amsterdam South District. This policy assemblage primarily targets ‘unruly’ young Moroccan-Dutch men from Amsterdam's notorious Diamantbuurt. In Amsterdam and elsewhere in the Netherlands, such young men have been portrayed as the ultimate troublemakers who have made urban lives unsafe and ‘terrorized’ entire neighborhoods. Through an ethnographic analysis of a public event that brought together various members of the youth and security assemblage, this article examines the tensions and organized distrust that these citizenship agendas for the abject carry within them.

Keywords::

• abject citizens
• citizenship
• race
• youth and security policies
• The Netherlands

Acknowledgements

This research would not have been possible without the help of the people who shared their experiences and views regarding the Diamantbuurt with me. I would particularly like to thank ‘our’ Streetcornerworkers, who did much to help me understand their work and the lives of their clients. I also owe much to the support and insights of Hakima Aouragh. This article has benefited much from the discussion of an early draft at the 2012 AAA-Meetings in San Francisco and at the workshop Understanding the New Europe in November 2012 in Amsterdam, as well as from the fruitful discussions and incisive feedback of friends and colleagues, especially Rivke Jaffe, Martijn Koster and insightful comments by the reviewers.

Notes

^1. Figures as of January 2013; Source: O+S. Allochtoon [used as a noun and an adjective, plural allochtonen] is originally a bureaucratic term used to distinguish those with at least one foreign-born parent from autochtonen, native Dutch. There is a further differentiation between non-western allochtonen and western allochtonen based on country of birth, whereby the west includes not only Europe but also Indonesia and Japan (see Yanow and Van der Haar 2013). The term soon found its way into popular usage. In everyday usage, allochtoon is almost always used to refer in an imprecise fashion to what used to be labeled foreigners, and is often associated with problems or deficits.

^2. Gemeente Amsterdam, Jeugdcriminaliteitsindex 2013-2.

^3.http://nos.nl/video/187258-cijfers-marokkanengemeenten.html. This specific allocation of funds was abandoned at the end of 2012.

^4.HP/De Tijd, 16 September 2011.

^5. The annual District Safety Action Plan gives a good impression of the range of actors and actions with in the youth and security domain, www.zuid.amsterdam.nl/…/actieplan_veiligheid_2013-2014_def.pdf

^6. I have used pseudonyms for most people discussed mentioned in this paper.

^7. See, for example, Memo Jeugdoverlast en criminaliteit in de Diamantbuurt, 6 December 2010, page 3, 1O002_Memo_Jeugdoverlast_en_criminaliteit_in_de_Diamantbuurt_Memo_Jeugdoverlast_en_criminaliteit_in_de_Diamantbuurt.doc_090835588005ea4b.pdf

Additional information

Funding

This article is based on the research project ‘Dutch Discontents’, which was financed by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) as part of the Conflict and Security Program (grant W 07.68.115.00).