Transnational Affective Circuitry: Public Information Campaigns, Affective Governmentality, and Border Enforcement

Abstract

Geographers have been central to identifying and exploring the shifting spatialities of border enforcement and how different enforcement strategies alter the geography of state sovereignty. Migration-related public information campaigns (PICs) are one strategy that has received increasing attention from geographers and social scientists more broadly in recent years. Although existing research examines the sites and spaces where PICs are distributed, as well as the affective content of their messaging, little research has examined the development of campaigns and the transnational connections that enable their deployment. This article draws on work in the fields of carceral circuitry and transnational enforcement networks to expand our understanding of affective governmentality as a transnational strategy of border governance. Based on data collected as part of a large-scale comparative study of the use of PICs by the U.S. and Australian governments, we argue that this form of affective governmentality relies on transnational circuits through which people, money, and knowledge move to enable the development and circulation of affective messaging. In doing so, we develop the concept of transnational affective circuitry to refer to the often contingent, temporary relations and connections that enable PICs to operate as a form of transnational affective governmentality aimed at hindering unauthorized migration. Our analysis illustrates the transnational connections that enable increasingly expansive and creative forms of border enforcement to emerge while also expanding the scope of examinations of affective governmentality to attend to the relations that undergird and enable this form of transnational governance.

地理学家一直致力于识别和探索边境执法的空间变化、不同执法策略如何改变国家主权地理。近年来, 移民公共信息运动（PIC）越来越受到地理学家和社会科学家的关注。现有研究探讨了PIC的分布地点和空间及其传递的情感内容, 但很少研究PIC的发展及其所依赖的跨国联系。本文借鉴监狱回路和跨国执法网络研究, 拓展了我们对作为跨国边境治理策略的情感治理的理解。基于美国和澳大利亚政府采用PIC的大规模比较研究中收集到的数据, 我们认为, 这种形式的情感治理依赖于跨国回路, 从而实现了人、资金和知识的流动, 促进了情感信息的制作和传播。由此, 我们提出“跨国情感回路”的概念：这些偶然性和暂时性的关系和联系, 使得PIC成为旨在阻止非法移民的跨国情感治理形式。我们阐释了越来越广泛的、创造性的边境执法形式所依赖的跨国联系, 拓展了情感治理的研究范畴, 关注了支撑和实现这种跨国治理形式的关系。

Los geógrafos han jugado un papel crucial para identificar y explorar las espacialidades cambiantes de la aplicación de la normatividad fronteriza y el modo como diferentes estrategias de aplicación alteran la geografía de la soberanía estatal. Las campañas públicas de información relacionada con migración (PIC) son una de las estrategias que ha recibido creciente atención de geógrafos y científicos sociales, en años recientes. Aunque las investigaciones existentes examinan los sitios y espacios donde se distribuyen las PIC, así como el contenido afectivo de sus mensajes, escasa ha sido la investigación que ha examinado el desarrollo de las campañas y conexiones transnacionales que facilitan su despliegue. Este artículo se apoya en trabajos realizados en el campo de los circuitos carcelarios y las redes transnacionales de aplicación, para ampliar nuestro entendimiento de la gobernabilidad afectiva como estrategia transnacional de la gobernanza fronteriza. Con base en datos recogidos como parte de un estudio comparativo a gran escala sobre el uso de las PIC por los gobiernos americano y australiano, sostenemos que esta forma de gobernabilidad afectiva descansa en los circuitos transnacionales a través delos cuales se mueve gente, dinero y conocimiento para facilitar el desarrollo y circulación de los mensajes afectivos. Al hacerlo, desarrollamos el concepto del circuito afectivo transnacional con el cual referir las relaciones y conexiones, con frecuencia contingentes y temporales, que permiten a las PIC operar como una forma de gobernabilidad afectiva transnacional destinada a parar la migración no autorizada. Nuestro análisis ilustra las conexiones transnacionales que permiten la aparición de formas cada vez más expansivas y creativas del control de fronteras, al tiempo que extienden el ámbito de los exámenes de la gobernabilidad afectiva para atender las relaciones que sustentan y permiten este tipo de gobernanza transnacional.

Key Words:

• affect
• affective governmentality
• border enforcement
• circuits
• networks

关键词:

• 情感
• 情感治理
• 边境执法
• 回路
• 网络

Palabras clave:

• afecto
• circuitos
• control fronterizo
• gobernabilidad afectiva
• redes

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the assistance provided by research assistants Elisa Sperandio, Natasha Rapp, Masen Webster, Richard Johnson, Gaby Ramos, and Georgia Weiss-Elliot. Special thanks to the reviewers and editor whose careful readings and thoughtful feedback greatly improved the article. Finally, thank you as well to our families and child-care providers who provided us with the time and space to think and write amid a global pandemic and its aftermath. We contributed equally to this article and are collectively responsible for any errors or omissions.

Additional information

Funding

This work was made possible by the financial support provided by the U.S. National Science Foundation under Award 1853652.

Notes on contributors

Jill M. Williams

JILL M. WILLIAMS is an Associate Research Professor in the Southwest Institute for Research on Women, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research uses a feminist geopolitical approach to explore the way states navigate shifting national and transnational responsibilities within the context of border and immigration enforcement.

Kate Coddington

KATE CODDINGTON is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography & Planning, University at Albany, State University of New York, Albany, NY 12222. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research interests include the shifting geographies of border enforcement and their implications for the everyday experiences of asylum seekers.