<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:'courier new',monospace;font-size:small">
<p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-US">Hi Ricardo,</span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Times"></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span style="font-size:9.5pt;line-height:150%;font-family:Arial;background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial">“I was wondering how your work traces out the
question of how virtual fences function in creating targeted visibility (as
expanded forms</span><span style="font-size:9.5pt;line-height:150%;font-family:Arial"> <span style="background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial">surveillance) of immigration, how does migration
hotspot* management function shutdown invisibility and escape routes?” </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span style="font-size:9.5pt;line-height:150%;font-family:Arial;background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US">Thanks for bringing in that
question, it goes right at the center of some things I have recently been
working on. As I mentioned in my first post, border surveillance policies in
Europe in general and this new strategy of hotspotting in particular mistakenly
assume you can define a region as a border just by taking in a North-West
perspective. Defining the Aegean as a border is a denial of history and a
denial of transactions and exchanges that have been going on culturally,
socially, economically and religiously between different regions for centuries.
So by defining a region as a hotspot the
first thing that happens is that all kinds of existing relationships between a
state and civil society on the one hand and between different social
organizations on the other are put under pressure. Some of the consequences we
see already. Following the questionable (to say the least) Greek example,
several European member states are studying on jurisdiction to arrest people
who support migrants (“irregular migrants” as they are officially referred to)
on the accusation of smuggling. Another example that has been going on for a
couple of years now on islands like Chios and Lesbos is that the state closes
down refugee camps that have been created with the help of local people and
grassroots organizations. So what first was welcomed as an initiative from
civil society to support the state in housing migrants and providing them with food
and health care because the state lacked all kinds of resources (the result of
a combination of years of austerity with a lack of migration policy) is now
condemned as a criminal act, as illegally supporting illegal people. To come
down to my point, this strategy of hotspotting by defining an area as a high
voltage border and putting it under permanent control demolishes the visual
manifestations of solidarity and voluntary support and turns the long existing
relationships between state and society invisible. In doing so it takes away
one of the most important democratic tools of a group of people namely the
possibility of imaging itself as a community in relationship with others by visualizing
its deeds and performing public acts. So I think the paradigmatic interplay
between the visible and the invisible is not just performed on an instrumental level
by covering things up and exposing others but on a political level as it
interferes with a society’s possibilities to be visible to itself as a society.
</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US">I can share some examples of
activist’s attempts to re-visualize the society’s concern for migrants on the
Aegean islands in a next post,</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US">Best,</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US">Huub</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:150%"><span style="font-size:9.5pt;line-height:150%;font-family:Arial;background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial">*According to the E.U. Commission: "A
Hotspot is characterized by specific and disproportionate migratory
pressure, </span><span style="font-size:9.5pt;line-height:150%;font-family:Arial"><br>
<span style="background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial">consisting of mixed migratory flows, which are
largely linked to the smuggling of migrants, and where the Member</span><br>
<span style="background-image:initial;background-repeat:initial">State concerned might request support of better
cope with the migratory pressure."</span></span></p>
</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><font face="courier new, monospace" color="#444444" style="background-color:rgb(204,204,204)">Prof. dr. Huub Dijstelbloem<br>WRR - <a href="http://www.wrr.nl" target="_blank">www.wrr.nl</a><br>UvA - <a href="http://www.uva.nl/over-de-uva/organisatie/medewerkers/content/d/i/h.o.dijstelbloem/h.o.dijstelbloem.html" target="_blank">http://www.uva.nl/over-de-uva/organisatie/medewerkers/content/d/i/h.o.dijstelbloem/h.o.dijstelbloem.html</a><br>Academia - <a href="https://amsterdam.academia.edu/HuubDijstelbloem" target="_blank">https://amsterdam.academia.edu/HuubDijstelbloem</a></font><br></div></div></div>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">2016-02-08 13:55 GMT+01:00 Ricardo Dominguez <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:rrdominguez@ucsd.edu" target="_blank">rrdominguez@ucsd.edu</a>></span>:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------<br>
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
<br>
Hola Huub y Tod@s,<br>
<br>
I was wondering how your work traces out the question of how virtual
fences function in creating targeted visibility (as expanded forms<br>
surveillance) of immigration, how does migration hotspot* management
function shutdown invisibility and <br>
escape routes? <br>
<br>
*According to the E.U. Commission: "A Hotspot is characterized by
specific and disproportionate migratory pressure, <br>
consisting of mixed migratory flows, which are largely linked to the
smuggling of migrants, and where the Member<br>
State concerned might request support of better cope with the
migratory pressure."<br>
<br>
Very best,<br>
Ricardo<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
</div>
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