Semi-legality and belonging in the Obama era: the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals memorandum as an instrument of governance

ABSTRACT

While the effects of the Deferred Actions for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) executive order have been analysed by a number of scholars, little attention has been paid to the ways in which this program has functioned as a technology of governance. Drawing from content analysis of political discourse regarding the 2012 DACA executive memorandum, this paper offers new directions for thinking about one of the key legacies of the Obama administration. It contextualizes DACA within a global proliferation of variegated legal statuses and argues that DACA discourses allowed state actors to re-invigorate notions of US exceptionalism and humanitarianism, while deeming ‘illegality’ an objective fact existing outside of the state’s control. In doing so, notwithstanding the DACA memorandum’s limitations in alleviating conditions of ‘illegality’ even for eligible subjects, dominant discourses surrounding the program functioned to legitimise state practices and normalise the bounds of national belonging and ‘good citizenship’ in the face of contradicting global realities.

KEYWORDS:

• Immigration policy
• youth
• DACA
• illegality
• state
• semi-legality

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to DACA recipients and advocates who have shared their experiences with me. I am also grateful to Percy Hintzen, Patricia Price, Juliet Erazo, Melissa Bernardo as well as anonymous readers who have provided insightful comments and suggestions for improving previous versions of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. The full criteria can be found at: https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/08/15/deferred-action-childhood-arrivals-who-can-be-considered.

2. This is the official number of initial granted applications provided by United States Citizenship and Immigration Services as of June, 2017. See: https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/USCIS/Resources/Reports%20and%20Studies/Immigration%20Forms%20Data/All%20Form%20Types/DACA/daca_performancedata_fy2017_qtr3.pdf.

3. Importantly, many persons eligible for DACA may not consider themselves ‘youth’. This is a situated category and its meaning varies across time and space. However, of interest here is how this category becomes deployed politically to set particular limits and possibilities.

4. Temporary Protected Status (TPS) provided to Haitians after the 2010 Earthquake has suffered a similar fate under the Trump administration. On November 20^st, 2017 the Department of Homeland Security announced the termination of this program.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Maria V. Barbero

Maria V. Barbero is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Global and Sociocultural Studies at Florida International University. Her research is concerned with issues of immigration as they relate to youth mobility and constructions of national identity.