‘Transit’ and ‘Suspension’: Migration Management or the Metamorphosis of Asylum-Seekers into ‘Illegal’ Immigrants

Abstract

This article explores the historical construction of the ‘transit country’ as one answer to the perceived loss of control over migration that governments of the developed North have increasingly felt. A frenzy of re-conceptualisations has taken place over the past 20 years, leading to a discourse—unquestioned and accepted by policy-makers and many academics—of Migration Management. A consequence of the evolution of Migration Management is captured by the notion of ‘suspension’, which often refers to either the physical or the metaphorical death of a certain minority of illegal migrants. However, I argue that such ‘suspended’ illegal migrants have the capacity to reinvent themselves precisely because they are outside the realm of juridico-political categorisation and enumeration.

Keywords:

• Migration Management
• Asylum-Seekers
• Illegal Migrants
• Transit Country
• European Union
• ‘Suspension’

Acknowledgements

This article evolved out of a BISA Special Workshop on Global Justice, Borders and Migration (12–14 May 2008), hosted by Christien van den Anker at the University of the West of England, Bristol. My special thanks for comments go to Christien, Fran Meissner, an anonymous JEMS referee and all those colleagues who have been supporting me in writing this article.

Notes

1. Although the term ‘illegal migrant’ is often considered derogatory, I use it explicitly to denote persons with no status within the law.

2. In this paper I discuss neither trafficking nor smuggling, as the focus is on those not (yet) labelled as either. For a discussion see Gallagher (2001); Salt (2002).

3. All documents reviewed here are archived and held by the author.

4. IGC, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/1, page 4.

5. IGC, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/2, ‘Note by the High Commissioner’, page IV A.

6. UNHCR, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/2, page 4 (11).

7. UNHCR, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/2, page 4/5 (12).

8. UNHCR, 04 April 1985, Irregular Movements of Asylum-Seekers and Refugees: Meeting of Working Group of Executive Committee, 11–12 April 1985.

9. More recently this list expanded to include people moving into Europe from Bangladesh, Ghana, Nigeria, Pakistan, Algeria, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, India, Palestine and Azerbaijan (İçduygu 2005).

10. IGC, Gerzensee, 29 January1987, Working Paper Agenda Item 4 C.

11. IGC, Gerzensee, 29 January 1987, Working Paper Agenda Item 4 D.

12. IGC, 21 May 1987, HC TX EA, 391.84 100.GEN.IRN.

13. This is already mirrored in the 1951 Convention (Art. 31), which provides that asylum-seekers should not be criminalised due to not being able to show legal documentation.

14. A collection of memoranda, faxes, notes and letters concerning the pilot project in Turkey in the context of the IGC from the year 1987 is held by the author and can be consulted on request.

15. Jonas Widgren, Fax, EA 89 391.84, 9 May 1988, Confidential, Provisional Agenda for the informal consultations in Oslo, 18–20 May, Agenda Item 5, Annex 6.

16. IGC, EA 89 391.84, 9 May 1988, Agenda Item 5, Annex 6, emphasis added.

17. UNHCR, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/1, page 6/7.

18. UNHCR, 29 April 1985, HCR/CAE/85/1, page 11.

19. The document is undated and anonymous. It was sent from the BMAA-Sektion IV on 19 March 1991. The EU has formalised these deliberations with their Conclusions adopted on 30 November 1992 concerning countries in which there is generally no serious risk of persecution, WGI 1281; Circulation and Confidentiality of joint reports on the situation in certain third countries, 20 June 1994, and Council of the European Union, OJ (1996) 274/43, and institutionalised these activities formally with the Conclusion of 30 November 1994 on the organisation and development of the Centre for Information, Discussion and Exchange on the Crossing of Frontiers and Immigration (CIREFI), Council of the European Union, OJ (1996) C274.

20. Interview with Jeff Crisp, November 2005.