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ABSTRACT
This article interprets sanctuary cities as mobilising metaphors, which are given significance at particular moments to ameliorate frictions in urban governance. Drawing on long-term ethnographic fieldwork, the article presents the first UK city to self-designate as a ‘City of Sanctuary’, Sheffield, to shed new light on the meaning and effects of contemporary sanctuary cities. Inspired by the anthropology of policy, I shift attention from definitions of ‘sanctuary’ to trace how and why the ‘City of Sanctuary’ term emerged, who labelled the city in this way, for what purpose and with what effects. An ethnographically informed reading of sanctuary cities is crucial to tease out sanctuary’s possibilities but also the complex processes through which governing systems use the term ‘City of Sanctuary’ to extinguish practices animated by radical potential. The article contributes to sanctuary scholarship by demonstrating that sanctuary cities are not necessarily antagonistic to national exclusionary policies. The article also builds on urban migration governance literature by exploring the challenges of shifting the meaning of local migration policy from ‘welcome’ to ‘non-cooperation’.
Acknowledgements
The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and approved by the Ethics Committee of University of Birmingham (protocol code ERN_17-0871 April 30th 2018). Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study. I am hugely grateful to Julia Mourao Permoser, Rainer Baubock and the two anonymous reviewers who provided invaluable comments on previous drafts of this article. All inaccuracies remain my own.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 Trump, D. 2016. Donald Trump’s Contract with the American Voter. [https://perma.cc/E384-B85W]. See also Trump, D. 2017. Enhancing Public Safety in the Interior of the United States. Federal Register 82 (18): 8799–8803.
2 The wide definition of ‘sanctuary cities’ has been codified through the National Conference of State Legislatures, which has compiled this list of state sanctuary bills that include a wide range of different pro-migrant state legislation https://www.ncsl.org/Portals/1/Documents/immig/StateSanctuaryBills_050817.pdf.
3 The USA Office of the Inspector General, however, has used it to reference ‘jurisdictions that may have state laws, local ordinances, or departmental policies limiting the role of local law enforcement agencies and officers in the enforcement of immigration laws’. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, Audit Division, Cooperation of SCAAP recipients in the removal of criminal aliens from the United States 7 n.44 (Jan. 2007) https://oig.justice.gov/reports/OJP/a0707/final.pdf.
4 Tami Luhby, Trump Condemns Sanctuary Cities, but What Are They?, CNN (Sept. 1, 2016), https://www.cnn.com/2016/09/01/politics/sanctuary-citiesdonald-trump/index.html [https://perma.cc/3S8F-47H4]; Democrats ‘Complicit’ in All Murders by Illegal Immigrants, DONALDJTRUMP.COM (Jan. 20, 2018), https://www.donaldjtrump.com/media/ democrats-complicit-in-all-murders-by-illegal-immigrants [https://perma.cc/9J3A-J6NJ].
5 The Freedom of Information Act 2000 provides public access to information held by public authorities.
6 Including: Benefits; Parking; Schools and Childcare; Housing; Social Care; Disability and Mental Health; Parks, Sport and Recreation; Libraries and Archives; Pollution and Nuisance; Births, Deaths, Marriages and Citizenship; Public Health; Travel and Transport; South Yorkshire Police; Fire Department.
7 Two activists, two faith-based organisations, thirteen Council employees, twenty-eight NGO employees.
8 Unison (2019) Shocking picture of austerity cuts to local services is revealed by UNISON 6th December 2019 available at: https://www.unison.org.uk/news/article/2019/12/shocking-picture-austerity-cuts-local-services-revealed-unison/.
9 Crawford, Rowena, George Stoye, and Ben Zaranko (2018). The impact of cuts to social care spending on the use of Accident and Emergency departments in England. No. W18/15. IFS Working Papers, 2018. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/14577.
10 Hastings, Annette, et al. (2015) The cost of the cuts: The impact on local government and poorer communities. York: Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 2015. Available at: https://www.jrf.org.uk/sites/default/files/jrf/migrated/files/Summary-Final.pdf.
11 Centre for Cities (2019) Cities Outlook: A decade of austerity London: Centre for Cities 2019. Available at: hthttps://www.centreforcities.org/reader/cities-outlook-2019/a-decade-of-austerity/.
12 Thomas, Chris 2019 Hitting the poorest worst? How public health cuts have been experienced in England’s most deprived communities 5th November 2019 London: IPPR. Available at: https://www.ippr.org/blog/public-health-cuts.
13 Names are pseudonyms.
14 For the development of the City as a municipal corporation see Isin 1992: 16–55.
15 SYMAAG (2019) Sheffield: Hostile Environment or City of Sanctuary? 28th August 2019 available at: https://www.symaag.org.uk/2019/08/28/sheffield-hostile-environment-or-city-of-sanctuary/.
16 Grayson (2019) Arrests of suspected undocumented migrants soar in Sheffield, the UK’s first City of Sanctuary OpenDemocracy 13th September 2019 available at: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/shine-a-light/arrests-of-suspected-undocumented-migrants-soar-in-sheffield-the-uks-first-city-of-sanctuary/.