The Critical-Analytical Approach to Immigration: Foucault on Security and Freedom of Movement

Anuja Bose

UCLA Department of Political Science

Abstract: At a time of greater possibilities of mobility, border control has become paramount for many industrialized nations as they cope with the influx of migrants from around the world. The normative debate on immigration understands two contending values of security and freedom of movement to be in need of balance in this political issue. However, the search for a morally sound balance between security and freedom of movement has remained detached from the modern state’s responses to cross-border mobility. In this paper, I turn to Foucault’s lectures on governmentality to articulate a critical-analytical approach to immigration that is attentive to the rationalities governing state action. By developing a governmental conception of security and freedom of movement, I argue that freedom of movement is integral for pursuing the goals of security. The history of immigration in Australia that culminated in the MV Tampa crisis of 2001 serves as example that demonstrates this point. At different junctures in Australia’s immigration history, free movement has been instrumental for facilitating and augmenting the pursuit of security.

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The debate on immigration emerges as a response to popular fears of being culturally and

economically submerged by foreigners who bring different cultural practices, belief-

systems and demands upon the welfare state.1 More broadly, this fear of submergence can

be understood as a threat to the security of a nation-state insofar as immigration is

deemed to compromise the institutional, economic and cultural stability of a nation-state.2

This situation sparked the debate in liberalism over the conflicting

demands of security and freedom of movement on issues of

immigration. The most promising case for freedom of movement has

been made from a liberal egalitarian perspective, where restrictions to

mobility are only marshaled when there is a direct threat to security in

terms of the numbers of migrants seeking to re-locate. A range of

thinkers have criticized this position as idealistic and removed from the

realities of sovereign state power. In response, they have developed a

response to immigration from within the structural constraints of state

sovereignty, privileging security concerns that states face in their

attempt to embrace an open borders policy. This debate on open 1 Michael Dummett understands the fear of submergence to arise from a scenario in which high levels of immigration make the languages, cultural identity, economic welfare and patterns of association in a nation-state unsustainable. Thus, Dummett argues that discussions of justice on matters of immigration should acknowledge the right of indigenous populations to not be submerged by an influx of people with different cultures. He does however underscore the importance of rejecting the use of this right to deny the legitimate desires of migrants and refugees to resettle in more developed nations. See, Michael Dummett, On Immigration and Refugees, (London, New York: Routledge, 2001), 20-21.2 See Myron Weiner, “Security, Stability and International Migration,” International Security 17, no. 3 (1992-1993): 91-126 for an elaboration of the security problems that results from international migration, including demands on the welfare state, threats to the ethnic composition of the state and the breakdown of public order. Importantly, Weiner is the one of the early proponents who argued for the need to shift from a purely economic analysis, which focused on global economic conditions as key determinants of population movement to a security/stability framework that considers the social and political reasons why governments may promote or restrict immigration.

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borders provokes the question at the heart of this paper: how should

we understand the relationship between freedom of movement and the

demands of security on issues of immigration?

The normative approach to immigration conceptualizes the

relationship between freedom of movement and security as a balance,

where we must circumscribe our right to free movement in our desire

for security and limit our pursuit of security to affirm the value of free

movement. Such an approach, while useful for adjudicating the morally difficult

issues at stake in immigration, creates a blind spot on the rationalities that animate and

give coherence to the modern state’s reactions to immigration. An alternative

conceptualization of freedom of movement and security, and therefore

a better engagement with the modern state’s responses to

immigration, is made available in Foucault’s lectures on

governmentality at the Collège de France entitled Security, Territory,

Population and The Birth of Biopolitics. I argue that Foucault offers us a

critical-analytical approach to immigration where freedom of

movement is understood to be integral to the security apparatus. In

other words, rather than being in conflict with security, free movement

brings about an equilibrium and growth in social relations that facilitates and augments

the pursuit of security. This alternative relationship between free

movement and security suggests that we consider how free movement

has intensified security concerns to the point of pushing contemporary

immigration policies towards increasingly authoritarian measures. I

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exemplify this point by drawing on a contemporary example of border

transgression from Australia to demonstrate how the historical

anxieties produced by free movement elicit a politics committed to

security that ultimately culminated in authoritarian measures to

defend national borders. In order to focus our attention on these

authoritarian tendencies in immigration policy, it is necessary to set

aside the normative task of balancing the conflicting values of free

movement and security to develop the critical-analytical perspective

that is attentive to the prioritization of security in state actions towards

immigration.

In developing this argument, the paper is divided into four parts:

1) I will first reconstruct the liberal debate on immigration to lay bare

the conflict between freedom of movement and the juridico-legal

conception of security in liberalism. Namely, freedom of movement

and the juridico-legal understanding of security are understood to be

competing values in need of a balance in the normative approach to

immigration. 2) In order to begin articulating an alternative relationship

between these terms, I explicate the Foucauldian understanding of free

movement and governmental security to demonstrate how they differ

and converge with liberal notions of juridico-legal security and freedom

of movement. To that end, this section translates the terms of the

immigration debate in order to shift from the normative approach of

liberalism to the critical-analytical approach offered by Foucault. 3) By

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drawing on Foucault’s lectures on governmentality at the Collège de

France, I argue that freedom of movement is integral to the deployment of

governmental security. I do this by underscoring the elements of complementarity,

interdependency and augmentation between governmental security and free movement.

This alternative relationship between freedom of movement and

governmental security forms the basis for a critical-analytical approach

to immigration, which proposes that freedom of movement establishes

the conditions of equilibrium and growth that facilitate and augment

governmental security. 4) In the final part of paper, I exemplify the critical-

analytical approach by turning to a contemporary example of border

transgression from Australia, the MV Tampa incident of 2001. The

historical context of immigration policies, which culminated in the MV

Tampa incident demonstrate how freedom of movement intensified

security concerns in Australia to the point of pushing contemporary

immigration policies towards increasingly authoritarian measures.

I. Security and Freedom of Movement: Demands for a Balance in the Normative Debate

A central thematic in liberal political theory is the clash between

security and liberty. Social contract theorists such as Hobbes and

Locke highlight how the search for security begins with the dangers

and unpredictability of the state of nature, which culminates in the

creation of sovereign power: an exchange of absolute liberty in the

state of nature for security under the sovereign. This basic thematic

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has continued to animate debates in liberalism: How much individual

liberty should be curtailed to procure security?3 A key assumption in

these debates is that an appropriate balance must be struck between

the demands of security and liberty. In other words, the relationship

between liberty and security is understood to be a matter of more or

less, and each situation requires a careful calibration between these

competing considerations.4

The debate on international migration over open borders can be

understood as a subset of this larger thematic in liberalism between

balancing the demands of liberty and security.5 Although there is much

trepidation about framing the normative debate on immigration in

terms of security for fear of legitimating popular articulations of

migration as a security problem akin to terrorism or crime,6 this section

will demonstrate that a juridico-legal conception of security remains a

persistent theme in the normative debate on immigration. “Security’ in

liberalism is best understood from a juridico-legal perspective as the

3 For a recent adaptation of the security/freedom nexus in liberalism for the post 9/11 context through careful attention to balancing competing considerations, see Jeremy Waldron, “Security and Liberty: The Image of Balance,” Journal of Political Philosophy 11, no. 2 (2003): 191-210. 4 For a discussion of quantitative computations of liberty and security see Hillel Steiner, “How free? Computing Personal Liberty,” in Of Liberty, ed. A Philips Griffiths (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). 5 In fact, the debate is more popularly understood to be a contention between those who emphasize the universality of global justice, and those who underscore the bounded nature of democratic communities. In other words, the opposition is typically conceptualized to be between liberal universalism and democratic particularism. For a helpful framing of the immigration debate in these terms, see Arash Abizadeh, “Democratic Theory and Border Coercion: No Right to Unilaterally Control Your Own Borders,” Political Theory 36, no.1 (2008): p.38. And more recently, Sarah Song, “The Boundary Problem in Democratic Theory: Why the Demos Should be Bounded by the State”, International Theory 4, no.1 (2012): 39-68. 6 Lucis Zedner, “Too Much Security?” International Journal of the Sociology of Law 31, no.3 (2003): 155-184.

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maintenance of law and order, and the protection of life, liberty and property.7 Given

this, the juridico-legal conception of security encompasses the institutional,

economic and political stability of the nation, and free movement is

understood to be a right that threatens these three aspects of juridico-

legal security.

The case for freedom of movement is articulated first and foremost as an

argument for global justice. In his 1987 article “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open

Borders”, Joseph Carens utilizes the original position from John Rawls’s A Theory of

Justice to think through questions of immigration and global justice. The purpose of the

original position is to do away with the specific contingencies that result from social and

natural circumstances at a national level. Applying the principle at a global level would

entail nullifying the effects of being born in a rich nation as opposed to a poor one. The

upshot of expanding the scope of the original position to a global level is that the right to

free movement would be included in the system of basic liberties, along with the right to

religious freedom or free speech. Free movement would be considered essential for

pursuing one’s plan in life, and thus those in the original position could not permit

restrictions to this right.8

There are two contending values at play in the argument put forth by Carens. On

the one hand, free movement is a remedial right that can address the uneven distribution

7 This definition of liberal ‘security’ is given in the first lecture of Security, Territory, Population. See Michel Foucault, Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the Collège de France 1977-1978, ed. Michel Senellart, François Ewald & Alessandro Fontana, trans. Graham Burchell (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 4-6.8 Joseph Carens, “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders,” Review of Politics 49, 1989: 258. For other discussions where open borders are proposed as a remedy for global inequality, see Thomas Pogge, “Migration and Poverty,” in Citizenship and Exclusion, ed. Bader Veit Michael (Basingstroke : Macmillian, 1997) and Jonathan Seglow, “Immigration, Justice and Borders: Towards a Global Agreement”, Contemporary Politics 12, no 3-4 (2006): 233-246.

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of wealth, resources and opportunity across the world. It is therefore an argument for

global justice. However, it is also evident from the liberal egalitarian position that

freedom of movement across national borders is fundamental for exercising individual

autonomy and therefore an indispensable part of a system of basic liberties. Carens has

later argued that being able to move and settle in other places is crucial for enabling

individuals, as far as possible, to determine for themselves the circumstances of their

lives.9 Thus, for Carens free movement is not simply instrumental for greater social and

economic justice. Free movement is something that is intrinsically valuable because it

encapsulates a core aspect of what it means to live as free and autonomous individuals.

The larger point is that freedom is just as central to the liberal egalitarian position as

global justice. There has been a tendency to overlook or under emphasize this fact since

adding free international mobility to the stock of protected human rights has been a

controversial step in the liberal egalitarian argument.10

For Carens, the main caveat to the argument for free movement is the ‘public

order restriction’, which stipulates that if open borders lead to the breakdown of law and

order, restrictions may be imposed in order to assure the liberty of the national population

as a whole. In fact, the ‘public order restriction’ is axiomatic to the Rawlsian framework

of justice: “liberty may be restricted for the sake of liberty even in ideal theory since all

9 Joseph Carens, “Migration and Morality: A Liberal Egalitarian Perspective” in Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the Transnational Migration of People and of Money, ed. Brian Barry and Robert E. Goodin, (New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992), p. 2610 See for instance, David Miller, “Immigration: The Case for Limits” in Contemporary Debates in Applied Ethics, ed. Andrew Cohen and Christopher Heath Wellman, (Oxford: Blackwell, 2005), 191-206. Miller’s contention is that Carens overstates the importance of free international mobility as a human right. Miller distinguishes between bare and basic interests to argue that international mobility while a genuine interest is not important enough to deserve protection as a human right. He goes on to argue that the right to mobility can at best be a remedial right for those persons whose basic rights cannot be secured in their home country.

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liberties depend on the existence of public order….”11 In that sense, the ‘public order

restriction’ can be broadly understood as a defense of the juridico-legal conception of

security since the maintenance of law and order are of primary importance. Juridico-

legal security provides the conditions of institutional stability within a nation, necessary

to facilitate cross-border mobility without detrimental consequences. The parameters of

what constitutes a breakdown of public order, forms the criterion by which the balance

between juridico-legal security and freedom of movement oscillates. Importantly, the

‘public order restriction’ introduces security concerns to the immigration debate as a

competing consideration against which the right to free movement needs to be weighed,

and the search for a balance between security and freedom emerges as a central theme of

the immigration debate.

Since Carens expounds a fairly minimalist standard for juridico-legal security as

institutional stability (the maintenance of law and order), he tips the balance more

towards freedom of movement.12 However, those who have responded to him have

provided a more expansive criterion for restricting free movement by emphasizing other

aspects that threaten juridico-legal security, such as the economic and political instability

of a nation. John Isbister provides a liberal argument for privileging the demands of

economic stability within a nation over those of free movement across borders. He

criticizes the liberal egalitarian position on open borders for assuming general economic

equality within developed nations. Instead, he argues that immigration could worsen the

condition of the least well off in affluent nations by depressing wages, and consequently

11 John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), p.213.12 Joseph Carens, “Aliens and Citizens: The Case for Open Borders,” p.259.

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undermine the cause of equality and justice within a nation.13 Thus, by emphasizing the

need to safeguard the economic stability of a nation, Isbister provides a more expansive

criterion for restricting free movement. Free movement must now be curtailed to ensure

the institutional and economic stability of a nation, making the juridico-legal conception

of security a more prominent concern than freedom of movement in the normative

debate.

The second sense in which juridico-legal security has been valorized over

freedom of movement is for the sake of political stability. Will Kymlicka makes the

argument that freedom of movement could threaten the social cohesiveness of a nation

since large numbers of immigrants with different cultural and political values could make

the process of socio-political integration challenging. This line of argument understands

freedom of movement as a civil liberty that could undermine other freedoms such as free

speech or religious freedom if open borders were to admit large numbers of immigrants

whose anti-liberal attitudes threatened the survival of domestic liberal democratic

institutions.14 Kymlicka is balancing the relative importance of different types of

freedoms here to privilege the class of civil liberties traditionally protected by national

governments. This argument can also be interpreted as a desire to balance the competing

demands of security and freedom of movement since the class of liberties protected are

13 John Isbister, “A Liberal Argument for Border Controls: Reply to Carens,” International Migration Review 34, no.2 (2000): p. 633. See also the response by Carens to the argument for favoring needy compatriots over foreigners. Carens contends that Isbister takes the notion preferential treatment too far without any critical engagement with existing arrangements of inequality and privilege, see Joseph Carens, “Open Borders and Liberal Limits: A Response to Isbister,” International Migration Review 34, no. 2 (2000):636-643. 14 Will Kymlicka, “Territorial Boundaries: A Liberal Egalitarian Perspective” in Boundaries and Justice: Diverse Ethical Perspectives, ed. David Miller and Sohail H. Hashmi, (Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001) 249-275. For an expansion of how institutional stability is compromised without an immigration ceiling see John A. Scanlan and O.T Kent, “The Force of Moral Arguments for a Just Immigration Policy” in Open Borders? Closed Societies?: The Ethical and Political Issues, ed. Mark Gibney (New York: Greenwood Press, 1988) 61-107.

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those which safeguard the cohesiveness and stability of national political institutions.

Thus, insofar as Kymlicka’s arguments for hierarchizing freedoms are rooted in the

desire for political and institutional stability, I would argue that he tips the balance more

towards security than freedom.15

The range of positions on the normative debate over open borders can therefore

be understood as an attempt to strike a balance between the competing demands of

juridico-legal security and freedom of movement. The initial argument laid out by Carens

favors freedom of movement by considering basic institutional stability as a prerequisite

for the juridico-legal security. Subsequent responses to his position have attempted to

temper his open borders position by introducing a number of security concerns relating to

the economic, political and institutional stability of a nation. In their search for a morally

ideal balance, liberal egalitarians and their interlocutors treat the relationship between

juridico-legal security and freedom of movement as bifurcated, where two separate but

equally important considerations are in normative conflict and in need of balance.

While this approach can be useful for adjudicating the morally difficult issues at

stake in immigration, it creates a significant blind spot on state actions towards

immigration. In other words, the search for a balance in the normative debate occurs at a

fairly detached level from the rationalities that animate and give coherence to state

actions on immigration. As the Australian state’s response to unauthorized immigration

demonstrates at the end of this paper, the modern state exhibits deep-seated anxieties

about freedom of movement, which propel it towards pursuing security interests at the

15 For liberal egalitarian critiques of closed border arguments, see Phillip Cole, Philosophies of Exclusion: Liberal Political Theory and Immigration (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2000); andHoward F. Chang, “Liberalized Immigration as Free Trade: Economic Welfare and the Optimal Immigration Policy,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 145, no. 5 (1997): 1147-1244.

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expense of affirming the value and legitimacy of free movement. In other words, when

we examine the responses of a liberal democratic state to immigration, free movement is

not an opposing value that can temper the unrestrained pursuit of security, as the

normative formulation of the problem suggests. In fact, the Australian example

demonstrates how free movement intensified security concerns on the

continent to the point of pushing immigration policies towards

increasingly authoritarian measures. Therefore a better engagement

with the rationalities governing the modern state is necessary to

understand the prioritization of security in state responses to immigration. In next

sections, I turn to Foucault to develop a critical-analytical approach to immigration that is

grounded in an account of the security apparatuses and mechanisms that animate the

governmental state. The critical-analytical approach reveals how freedom of

movement is integral to the security apparatus. Rather than being in

conflict with security, free movement brings about an equilibrium and growth in

social relations that facilitates and augments the pursuit of security. I begin to make this

argument by first articulating a governmental conception of security and freedom of

movement.

II. Security and Freedom of Movement: Translating Terms

In the lecture series entitled Security, Territory and Population, Foucault develops an

understanding of security as a set of political rationalities and technologies, which

operate on the plane of circulation to manage contingency. In the follow up lecture series,

The Birth of Biopolitics, Foucault expands on the dynamic relationship between security

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and circulation through a study of liberal and neoliberal forms of government. Although a

number of works have fruitfully traced the complementary relationship between security

and freedom in Foucault’s writings,16 little attention has been paid to the relationship

between security and circulation in Foucault’s lectures at the Collège de France. In this

section, I demonstrate that Foucault’s explication of security and circulation offers us an

alternative to the juridico-legal conception of security and freedom of movement in the

normative debate on immigration. In fact, the governmental conception of security and

circulation offered by Foucault underlies the liberal egalitarian argument for freedom of

movement. Foucault’s descriptively rich analysis of liberalism allows us to exhume

elements of the liberal egalitarian argument that reveal an affinity to governmental modes

of power. As a result, this section serves as the switch point for transitioning from a

normative to a critical-analytical approach on immigration.

In Security, Territory, Population, Foucault distances himself from the tradition

of liberal political theory, which understands security in juridico-legal terms as the

maintenance of law and order, and the protection of life, liberty and property through the

rule of law. Instead, he conceptualizes security as an apparatus that deploys statistical

knowledge on the population, economy, climate and social routines to preserve the

strength of the state.17 This governmental conception of security is non-juridical and 16 The argument that security and ‘freedom’ are not opposing principles but complementary aspects of liberal governmentality has been taken up in great detail and clarity in the literature on governmentality; See, Colin Gordon, “Governmental Rationality: An Introduction” in The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, ed. Graham Burchell, Colin Gordon and Peter Miller (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 1-51. Mitchell Dean, Governmentality: Power and Rule in Modern Society, (London: Sage Publications, 2010), 175-204. Nikolas Rose, Powers of Freedom: Reframing Political Thought, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 61-97.17 Interestingly, Foucault distinguishes between the different types of knowledges required for governmental rule (the security apparatus) and sovereign rule. The former is concerned with the complex of men and things, that is, men in their relationship to a number of variables such as the economy, social habits, epidemics and territory. Statistics therefore becomes vital for governmental rule. Where as, according to Foucault, knowledge of the law and territory are the sole elements necessary for sovereign rule. For more on this distinction see, Michel Foucault, Security, Territory, Population, 96-97.

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therefore unconcerned with the prevention of crime and other social dangers through the

penal system. Rather, the aim is to reduce the frequency of crime and social dangers by

using statistical knowledge on the relevant variables at play, such as education, poverty

and employment levels. In other words, the security apparatus works within the reality of

a problem, for example scarcity or crime, to get the different elements of the problem to

function in such a way that the phenomenon itself is minimized.18 This shift to

governmental security occurs when the problem of the cost enters juridico-legal practices

of security. In other words, the relevant question becomes “how much does it cost a

country, or at any rate a town, to have thieves running free?”19 Therefore, the efficacy of

security mechanisms is no longer determined by the prevention of a social crime or

danger, but by the cost effectiveness of prevention.

The juridico-legal and governmental understandings of security exist

simultaneously in the normative debate on immigration. The liberal egalitarian argument

to impose restrictions on immigration is initially an argument for security from a juridico-

legal perspective, where the institutional stability of a nation-state is of primary

importance. Carens for instance specifies that institutional stability could be undermined

by the overwhelming numbers of people seeking to migrate from poorer nations which

developed nations may not be able to fully accommodate. Others such as John Isbister

and Will Kymlicka have criticized Carens for neglecting to consider the economic and

political costs of resettling immigrants and refugees in a new context. Given this, they

argue that the costs of integrating outsiders might be too much for a state to bear without

18 Security, Territory, Population, p. 45-47, 5919 Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolics: Lectures at the Collège de France 1978-1979, ed. Michel Senellart, François Ewald & Alessandro Fontana, trans. Graham Burchell (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), p. 248.

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threatening its economic and political stability. Thus, insofar as liberal egalitarians and

their interlocutors understand immigration as a threat to institutional, political and

economic stability within a nation-state, they embrace a juridico-legal conception of

security.

This juridico-legal understanding of security co-exists with the governmental

notion of security in the normative debate immigration debate. In other words, the

objective is not solely the preservation of institutional, political and economic stability

through restrictions on cross-border mobility, but also the augmentation of state forces

through the effective management of population flows. For instance, a number of thinkers

have bolstered Carens’ liberal egalitarian position on minimal restrictions to immigration

by defending a governmental notion of security. Howard F. Chang contends that the free

movement of workers across borders promotes economic welfare by increasing

production, creating wealth and reducing poverty.20 In a similar vein, Kevin R. Johnson

has argued that immigration barriers are just as costly as trade barriers and should be

liberalized for the sake of economic growth.21 Here, we can detect governmental

conceptions of security at work in the normative debate insofar as the goal is an optimal

equilibrium between labor mobility, resources and employment opportunities to order to

bring about the growth of commerce, production and resources of the state. Security is

not the outcome of repressing or preventing the manifold forms of cross-border mobility,

but rather the result of achieving an appropriate equilibrium and growth in the various

20 Howard F. Chang, “Liberalized Immigration as Free Trade: Economic Welfare and the OptimalImmigration Policy,” University of Pennsylvania Law Review 145, no.5 (1997): p.1150. 21 See Kevin R. Johnson, “Free Trade and Closed Borders: NAFTA and Mexican Immigration in the United States,” University of California Davis Law Review 937, no.27 (1994).

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social relations at play in immigration.22

Pivotal to the governmental conception of security is the notion of circulation,

which is central to Foucault’s conceptualization of freedom of movement. Circulation is a

persistent theme in Security, Territory, Population that refers to the constant movement

of a broad range of phenomena such as merchandise, ideas, air, water and most

importantly people.23 Although Foucault is reticent on positive definitions of freedom, we

can deduce that circulation is closely connected to freedom of movement in the

governmentality lectures insofar as Foucault understands freedom to be the possibility of

movement, of both people and things. As he says succinctly at the conclusion of lecture

two in Security, Territory, Population: “…it is in terms of this option of circulation, that

we should understand the word freedom, and understand it as one of the facets, aspects,

or dimensions of the apparatuses of security.”24 Foucault’s understanding of freedom of

movement is therefore markedly different from the liberal egalitarian conception of

freedom of movement as a right that can be created and then protected by the rule of law.

Freedom of movement is rather a condition that is actively produced by the security

apparatus through the unblocking of circulatory processes. Namely, it is the absence of an

over-regulatory regime that establishes limits, frontiers and restrictions to curb the

circulation of people, merchandise and natural phenomena.

22 Security, Territory, Population, 353-354. In fact, Foucault proposes that there is a double system of rule operating after the 18th century where the regulatory control of the territory and subjects coincides with a whole series of mechanisms that fall within the province of the economy and the management of the population. Thus, we could say that he anticipates the co-existence of juridico-legal and governmental mechanisms of security, which we see in contemporary immigration debates. 23 An idea that is closely related to Foucault’s conception of circulation is the notion of the milieu. In part, circulation receives such a broad understanding in the lectures because it is understood to operate on the plane of the milieu (p.21), which is a set of natural and artificial givens. As a result, circulation cannot be restricted to commerce or people alone, but must include the movement of more unconventional elements such as flows of water, air and diseases. See, Security, Territory, Population, 20-23.24 Security, Territory, Population, p. 49.

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In fact, the notion that a deregulation of circulation is instrumental for producing

greater freedom lays buried in the normative debate on immigration. For Carens, the free

movement of people between rich and poor nations can produce greater conditions of

freedom by opening up access to wealth, resources and opportunities.25 Moreover, in

response to cultural arguments for restricting immigration, some liberal egalitarians have

argued that free movement could under certain conditions produce a more liberal polity

by accommodating a culturally diverse population. For instance, Rainer Bauböck argues

that national cultures that are internally homogenous are likely to become more liberal

through culturally diverse immigration.26 In other words, liberal egalitarians hope to

expand and reinforce existing freedoms by inducing conditions of greater cross-border

mobility. Importantly, these arguments resonate with Foucault’s description of liberal

freedom as that which is actively produced through a deregulation of the circulatory

processes of life.

This section sought to differentiate Foucault’s understanding of security and

freedom of movement from the juridico-legal conception of these terms in the normative

debate. In the process, it was also demonstrated that elements of the liberal egalitarian

argument for open borders find an affinity with Foucault’s explication of security and

freedom of movement under governmental modes of power. This is perhaps unsurprising

since scholars of governmentality have argued that immigration is a form of population

25 See Joseph Carens, “Migration and Morality: A Liberal Egalitarian Perspective” in Free Movement: Ethical Issues in the Transnational Migration of People and of Money, ed. Brian Barry and Robert E. Goodin, (New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1992), p. 2626 Rainer Bauböck, “Global Justice, Freedom of Movement and Democratic Justice,” European Journal of Sociology 50, no.1 (2009): p. 7. Also see, Mark Tushnet, “Immigration Policy in Liberal Political Theory” in Justice in Immigration, ed. Warren F. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 147-157. Tushnet underscores the benefits of rethinking liberalism’s basic precepts as the members of its polity change. Thus, the limitations on entry that attempt to preserve the existing distribution of values in a society are in consistent with the liberalism’s commitment to revising its own values as the values of its members change.

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management subject to various governmental techniques of power.27 A governmental

conception of security and freedom of movement is therefore immanent to the liberal

egalitarian debate on immigration. In that sense, a critical-analytical perspective that is

informed by Foucault’s analysis of state power, can germinate from the normative debate

on immigration. In the next section, I elaborate on this critical analytical perspective by

re-conceptualizing the relationship between the juridico-legal conception of security and

free movement so that they are no longer understood to be competing considerations in

need of a balance.

III. Security and Freedom of Movement: The Critical Analytical Approach

The juridico-legal conception of security considers the protection of life, liberty and

property through the rule of law as integral to establishing institutional, political and

economic stability in a polity. This conception of security, at the heart of the normative

debate on immigration, understands freedom of movement as a right that compromises

the stability of a polity. As a result, liberals understand the relationship between security

and free movement to be in need of a balance, where the demands of security impose

restrictions on free movement and vice versa. There exists a significant blind spot

in this normative approach towards immigration given its inattention to the

rationalities governing the modern state. In this section, I draw on Foucault’s

conception of governmental security and freedom of movement to articulate a critical-

analytical approach to immigration, grounded in an account of the security apparatuses

27 See Barry Hindess, “Citizenship in the International Managements of Populations,” American Behavioral Scientist 43, no.9 (2000), p.1493-1494; and Didier Bigo, “Security and Immigration: Toward a Critique of the Governmentality of Unease,” Alternatives 27, (2002), 63-92.

18

and mechanisms that animate the governmental state. 28 I argue that freedom of

movement is integral to the operation of the security apparatus in the

critical-analytical approach. I make the argument by underscoring the

elements of complementarity, interdependency and augmentation that characterize the

relationship between free movement and governmental security. This alternative

relationship between freedom of movement and governmental security

establishes the conditions of equilibrium and growth that facilitate and

augment governmental security.

As mentioned in the previous section, Foucault argues that governmental security

works within reality, by accepting and supporting its various aspects to achieve

equilibrium in social relations. An aspect of reality that governmental security integrates

and works with is that of the constant movement of people, capital, goods, and natural

phenomena. Foucault describes circulation as a necessary, inevitable and natural process

in life.29 Here, governmental security works by “not interfering, allowing free movement,

letting things follow their course; laisser faire, passer et aller.”30 Thus, unlike sovereign

or disciplinary rule, governmental security does not attempt to curb or prevent the

circulatory processes of reality. Rather new elements are constantly integrated and

organized by the security apparatus into ever-wider circuits that are self-regulating,

28 In the recent years, a number of writings on international migration have been influenced by Foucault’s lectures on governmentality. Thus far, there has been no attempt to elaborate on the general approach in these works. The critical-analytical approach to immigration put forth in this paper is one way of describing and grouping these various writings in political theory and sociology. See, for instance: William Walters, “Deportation, Expulsion and the International Police of Aliens,” Citizenship Studies 6, no. 3 (2002): 265-290; Jeff Huysmans, Andrew Dobson and Raia Prokhovnik, ed. The Politics of Protection: Sites of Insecurity and Political Agency, (New York: Routledge, 2006); Didier Bigo, “Security and Immigration: Toward a Critique of the Governmentality of Unease,” Alternatives 27, (2002), 63-92; and most recently Nicholas De Genova and Nathalie Peutz, The Deportation Regime: Sovereignty, Space and the Freedom of Movement,” (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2010). 29 Security, Territory, Population, p. 45.30 Security, Territory, Population, p. 48.

19

integrative and centrifugal.31 In fact, the equilibrium in social relations sought by

governmental security is achieved through this self-regulating, integrative and centrifugal

character of free movement. In lecture one and two, Foucault emphasizes how the

security apparatus32 often allows a social problem to develop to a point where a process

of self-regulation and self-correction can be activated. In the case of scarcity for instance,

prices are allowed to fluctuate so that they reach a natural equilibrium; goods are

encouraged to circulate in a whole series of markets to meet demands; and without any

artificial measures to prevent and suppress the problem, scarcity becomes a chimerical

problem whose origin, development and solution are obfuscated, resulting in the

suppression of popular dissent.33 In effect, Foucault’s analysis of scarcity demonstrates

that the free movement of goods and capital cancels out the problem to restore a harmony

in social relations.

In this sense, free movement is complementary to governmental security. Free

movement understood in the broad sense of exchange, contact, dispersion and

distribution, is what allows the security apparatus to achieve an equilibrium in social

relations. In fact, it would not be possible for governmental security to function well

without embracing the circulatory processes of life. Free movement is therefore integral

for the security apparatus to govern optimally. As Foucault declares towards the end of

31 Security, Territory, Population, p. 45; Foucault makes an interesting comparison between the disciplinary and security mechanisms in this lecture, noticing that discipline is essentially centripetal because it concentrates, focuses and encloses, while security is centrifugal because it has a constant tendency to expand and allow the development of ever-wider circuits. 32 I use the term ‘security apparatus’ as a synonym for governmental security. Foucault never refers to the term governmental security, although his discussions on security are for the most part circumscribed to governmental modes of power. I use the term ‘governmental security’ to distinguish it from ‘juridico-legal’ security. 33 Security, Territory, Population, 31-44. On the issue of how scarcity becomes a chimera that eludes the population through de-regulatory strategies, see p. 41 and 43.

20

Security, Territory, Population: “Failing to respect freedom is not only an abuse of rights

with regard to law, it is above all ignorance of how to govern properly.”34

If free movement of people and things is an aspect of reality that governmental

security must embrace in order to achieve equilibrium, the security apparatus must also

actively regulate the nature of free movement to encourage the positive elements and

hinder the negative. A pertinent example is given in lecture one where Foucault talks

about the transformation of the town from a tight, enclosed space of legal and

administrative activity into an organ akin to the heart that acts as an agent perfect for

circulation. The impetus for restructuring the town into a space for circulation was the

growth of economic and commercial activity in eighteenth century Europe. As a result,

new streets were built and connected into a network to allow for the flow of goods;

overcrowding was dealt with by creating wider roads and open spaces; housing was

provided to attract labor from the countryside; and new forms of surveillance were

installed to reduce dangerous flows like theft and disease.35 These interventions can be

understood as deployments of governmental security designed to maximize the

movement of positive elements that facilitated commerce, and minimize the risky

elements that undermined the free flow of people and goods. In this instance, free

movement in eighteenth century Europe was the liberation of commercial activity, so the

security apparatus actively worked to manufacture this freedom through a range of

measures, which privileged the flows of commerce over others.

Thus, we can now delineate two facets of the relationship between governmental

security and free movement. On the one hand, free movement is an aspect of reality that 34 Security, Territory, Population, p.353.35 Security, Territory, Population, 14-20.

21

is complementary to the security apparatus because of its capacity to achieve equilibrium

in social relations. Unlike sovereign or disciplinary modes of power, which resist the

circulatory processes of reality by erecting borders and establishing enclosures,

governmental security operates through circulation to achieve its objectives.36 On the

other hand, the security apparatus must also actively shape and cultivate freedom of

movement to fully liberate its potential from sovereign and disciplinary rule, while

managing the dangers that may arise from this liberation. Foucault’s example of how

towns were restructured in the eighteenth century to promote flows of commerce

exemplifies this point. In that sense, governmental security and freedom of movement

can be understood to have an interdependent relationship, where free movement allows

security to flourish, while at the same time the security apparatus must contain free

movement within acceptable limits in order to achieve its objectives of equilibrium and

growth.37 The interdependent relationship between free movement and security

demonstrates that free movement is integral to the security apparatus, since security

mechanisms must govern through free movement even when circumscribing the scope of

circulatory processes.

A third characteristic defining the relationship between governmental security and

freedom of movement is augmentation of state forces. This third characteristic is most

clearly elucidated at the nexus of police and circulation. Police can be understood as one

36 Security, Territory, Population, 13-18. 37 Foucault articulates the interdependent relationship between security and freedom with great clarity in the lecture given on January 24, 1979 in The Birth of Biopolitics, 63-68. Here, he contends that the liberal art of government must breath life into and actively produce freedom. Any additional increase to freedom under liberalism is introduced through additional control and intervention. In that sense, security/control is no longer just a counterweight to freedom, as in the case of panopticism, but its mainspring. See The Birth of Biopolitics, p.67

22

of the two main elements that make up the anatomy of governmental security.38 Primarily

concerned with the growth and strength of the state’s forces while maintaining internal

order,39 police is concerned with two main fields of intervention: the population and the

space of circulation.40 As Foucault attests, the space of circulation is a privileged object

for police because it is by putting people and things in circulation that the state is able to

draw its strength from the population. Moreover, circulation allows humans to live

together, to reproduce, to subsist, to communicate and to associate. It is this collective co-

existence of humans in large numbers that enhances the strength of the state, which

police enables by facilitating circulation. Therefore, the relationship between police and

circulation is characterized by augmentation. Notably, the relationship between police

and circulation coincides with that between governmental security and freedom of

movement. Since police encapsulates aspects of the security apparatus concerned with the

growth and strength of the state’s forces, we can conclude that a relationship of

augmentation characterizes the relationship between governmental security and freedom

of movement. In other words, the police/circulation nexus amplifies how the security

apparatus and freedom of movement are engaged in a mutually reinforcing relationship to

increase the state’s strength and internal order.

Taking stock, this section highlighted the elements of complementarity,

38 The other element is the military-diplomatic apparatus. See Security, Territory, Population, p. 296 for Foucault’s elaboration of the structure of the security mechanism.39 The alternative name given to police is ‘splendor’. Foucault refers to a number of texts in the eighteenth century, which refer to the object of police as the state’s splendor. The definition of splendor captures the double goals of police as the growth of state forces and order: ‘splendor is the visible beauty of the order and the brilliant radiating manifestation of a force’, see Security, Territory, Population, p.31440 There are five fields of intervention specified for the police apparatus (the number of people in a state, the necessities of life, the problem of health, the activity of the population and the circulation of men and things), which I have summarized into two: the population and the space of circulation, see, Security, Territory, Population, 323-326.

23

interdependency and augmentation between governmental security and freedom of

movement. Given this close association, I argue that freedom of movement

establishes the conditions of equilibrium and growth that facilitate and

augment governmental security. Freedom of movement is therefore not simply

an independent and competing value to be balanced against security, but rather integral to

the deployment of security mechanisms. In order to arrive at this argument, it was

necessary to rethink the definitions of security and freedom of movement prevalent in the

normative debate. The juridico-legal conception of security in liberalism understands

freedom of movement as a threat to the institutional, political and economic stability of a

polity. As a result, liberals have expended much energy attempting to achieve a morally

ideal balance between the conflicting demands of security and freedom of movement and

consequently paid little attention to the rationalities that animate the modern state. A

relationship of complementarity, interdependency and augmentation between security

and freedom of movement provides new conceptual coordinates to understand state

responses to immigration. In the next section, I exemplify the critical-analytical

approach by turning to a contemporary example of border

transgression from Australia. The historical context of immigration

policies, which culminated in the MV Tampa incident demonstrate how

freedom of movement intensified security concerns on the continent to

the point of pushing contemporary immigration policies towards

increasingly authoritarian measures.

IV. Security and Freedom of Movement: Immigration in Australia and the MV Tampa Incident of 2001

24

Since the early 1980s, there has been a sharp rise in asylum claims across Western

countries. Whereas the total number of applications across Western Europe averaged no

more than 13,000 annually in the 1970s, the annual totals had grown to 170,000 by 1985

and to 690,000 in 1992. By the beginning of 2000, the number of claims had dropped to

412,700, a figure still far in excess of the levels in 1970s and 1980s. Outside of Europe,

only three out of twenty-one countries received fewer asylum applications in the three-

year period between 1998 and 2000 than they received between 1995 and 1997.41 Thus,

in the vast majority of Western countries, there has been a growth in asylum

applications.42 The response of Western countries to this rising trend in asylum applicants

has been paradoxical. While many have recognized the moral importance of the principle

of asylum, and publicly acknowledged the legal responsibilities to refugees and others in

need of protection, a remarkable array of restrictive measures to prevent and deter asylum

seekers have also been implemented.43 This contradictory response of Western states to

the claims of asylum seekers has been attributed to the challenges faced by governments

when trying to balance the demands of national security with commitments to 41 UNHCR, State of the World’s Refugees 2006 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p.325.42 Matthew Gibney and Randall Hansen attribute the growth in asylum seekers since the 1980s to four main causes: 1) In 1967, a Protocol was added to the UN Convention on Refugees expanding the application of the Convention to refugees who emerged as a result of events occurring after 1951 and came from countries outside Europe 2) By the early 1970s, France, Germany, Switzerland, Scandinavia and the UK had all ended policies that encouraged or tolerated labor migration from Southern Europe and former colonies/the third world. Around the same time, even countries of permanent settlement, such as Australia, found themselves cutting back on immigration, in part due to rising unemployment. 3) From the 1970s, refugee-producing events in the South, and, after 1989, in the Balkans escalated. 4) A global industry in the smuggling and, in some cases, trafficking of people has enabled asylum seekers to evade immigration control measures imposed by western nation-states. See, Matthew J. Gibney and Randall Hansen Asylum Policy in the West: Past Trends, Future Possibilities, Un/University/Wider Discussion Paper, 2003/68, September.43 For an account of the changing modalities of regulation in international immigration in Europe and North America see, James F. Hollifield, "Migration and the New International Order: The Missing Regime," in Bimal Ghosh, ed. Managing Migration: Time for a New International Regime (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 75-109. Hollifield distinguishes between external measures of immigration control such as visa regimes, carrier sanctions and airport liaison officers, and internal measures such as detention, dispersal regimes and restrictions to access to welfare and housing.

25

international human rights instruments like the 1951 UN convention Relating to the

Status of Refugees. In other words, the response of Western governments to asylum

seekers is considered to be an institutional manifestation of the ethical challenge faced by

liberal egalitarians when trying to balance the demands of security and freedom of

movement. The incongruence in state responses is critiqued by liberal egalitarians as a

failure to strike the appropriate balance between security and free movement by

capitulating to the dynamics of electoral politics, economic interests and foreign policy

concerns.44

In this section, I draw on the history of immigration in Australia to argue that the

contradictory response of liberal democratic states to asylum is better understood from a

critical-analytical perspective where freedom of movement establishes the

conditions that facilitate and augment the pursuit of security. The

Australian state’s response to unauthorized immigration exhibits deep-seated anxieties

about freedom of movement, which propelled it towards pursuing security interests at the

expense of affirming the value and legitimacy of free movement. In other words,

rather than being a competing consideration that can temper the

demands of security, free movement has intensified security concerns

to the point of pushing immigration policies in Australia towards

increasingly authoritarian measures. Thus, although great emphasis is attached

to the principle of asylum, even greater efforts are made to ensure that refugees never

44 Matthew Gibney makes the argument there is gap between the realm of ethical theory and the actual behavior of states because states face real world constraints such as elections, economic interests and foreign policy concerns. He argues that normative theory on immigration must to some extent mesh with real world possibilities of choice and action by acknowledging that the capabilities of governments to enact ethical principles are for the most part politically constructed within the sovereign structure of the state. See, Matthew Gibney, The Ethics and Politics of Asylum: Liberal Democracy and the Response to Refugees, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 194-228.

26

reach the territory of the state where they could receive protection. I demonstrate the

prioritization of security in state approaches to asylum by taking up the MV Tampa

incident of 2001 in Australia. I elaborate on the incident and the context that led to it in

order to illustrate how freer cross-border movement consolidated the security apparatus

through a process of complementarity, interdependency and augmentation.

Australia constitutes an important example for understanding the practices of

liberal democratic states to asylum because of the way it has pioneered new forms of

restrictive policies towards asylum seekers over the last decade, all the while continuing

to support and implement relatively inclusive immigration policies towards regular

migrants. In 2001, the Australian government embroiled itself in a heated international

controversy when a crisis relating to border security erupted on the shores of Australia. A

wooden fishing boat carrying 433 asylum seekers, mostly Afghan nationals, began to sink

in the Indian Ocean approximately 140 kilometers north of Australia’s Christmas Island

territory. The fishing boat was soon in distress and after responding to an alert by

Australia coastal officials, a Norwegian freighter, the MV Tampa, rescued the 438

asylum seekers on board. The freighter, now carrying a human cargo, charted a course for

Christmas Island at the request of its passengers, where they would be able to make a

demand for asylum from Australia. Wishing to prevent such a scenario, Australian

government officials telephoned the captain and warned him not to enter Australia’s

territorial waters. The captain ignored the warning, giving rise to a stand off between

troops from the Australia Defense Force and an overloaded and under-resourced ship.45

45 Ernst Willheim, “MV Tampa: The Australian Response”, International Journal of Refugee Law, 15(2), 2003: 160-163.

27

After several days, a resolution was achieved whereby the asylum seekers were

forcefully transferred to another ship that took them to Papua New Guinea and the Pacific

Island of Nauru. The Australian government reached a financial deal with these countries

to hold the asylum seekers until other states could be convinced to give them asylum. The

government’s efforts to resolve the crisis by drawing upon resettlement options in other

states became known as the ‘Pacific Solution’. In addition, new legislation excised a

number of Australian island territories (Christmas Island, Ashmore Reef and Cocos

Island) from the country’s ‘migration zone’. Asylum seekers landing on these territories

would no longer be deemed to have landed in Australia for the purposes of immigration

law, effectively denying them access to the protection of the Australian courts.

Furthermore, in 2006 an Immigration Detention Centre, containing approximately 800

beds, was constructed on Christmas Island for the Department of Immigration in

Australia.46

The Australian government’s response to the Tampa affair demonstrates the fear

of submergence by foreigners that I opened this paper with. The government’s response

remains distinctive for a number of reasons. Compared with other developed nations that

have faced unauthorized immigration, Australia’s severe response was provoked by so

few asylum seekers. Whereas the US, Germany and the UK have faced tens and

thousands of applicants on an annual basis, Australia has at most faced a few thousand.47

Second, although other Western nations have also implemented increasing punitive

policies towards unauthorized immigrants, the Australian government was the first to not

46 The State of the World's Refugees, Safeguarding Asylum, The Tampa Affair: Interception and Rescue at Sea, 19 April 2006. Accessed online at: http://www.unhcr.org/4444d3c320.html 47 United States Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, Sea Change: Australia’s New Approach to Asylum Seekers, 19 February 2002. Accessed online at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/country,,USCRI,,AUS,,3c99bc884,0.html

28

only enforce mandatory detention, but also accomplish territorial re-definition to prevent

unauthorized immigration.48 Moreover, there was unprecedented public support for the

government’s policy on refusing entry to asylum seekers. It has been argued that no

Western government in recent decades can claim a direct link to their re-election and the

issue of restricting asylum seekers as the Howard government of 2001.49 The fear of

submergence by foreigners is clearly apparent in Australia’s response to the Tampa

affair, for the asylum seekers were treated like an invasion force even though the actual

numbers of migrants seeking entry into Australia was quite small. The extremity of

Australia’s response to unauthorized immigration suggests that unique historical anxieties

are propelling Australia’s intractable defense of national borders.

The root of Australia’s anxieties towards asylum seekers can be explained by the

history of cross-border mobility on the continent. Between 1945 and 1976, the link

between immigration and the nation’s security was considered to be crucial. Australia’s

leaders embraced mass migration from Europe in order to expand the labor pool and

maximize economic growth. Furthermore, fears of invasion from the more populous

Asian nations to the North convinced political leaders that a population of 7 million in

1945 was too small to deter or repel any hostile nation. As a result, Australia’s first

Ministry of Immigration was set up in 1945 with Arthur Calwell as its first minister. By,

1978, the implementation of the Calwell program resulted in over 3.5 million immigrants

from Europe settling in Australia.50

48 James Jupp, From White Australia to Woomera: The Story of Australian Immigration, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002) p.18749 Anthony Burke, In Fear of Security: Australia’s Invasion Anxiety, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 150-151.50 James Jupp, From White Australia to Woomera: The Story of Australian Immigration, 130-137.

29

Therefore, the first post-war wave of European immigration to Australia was

crucial for the economic and demographic security of the nation. Here, we can draw on

the critical-analytical approach to illuminate aspects of governmental security in

Australia’s immigration policy. Australia’s openness to freer movement across its borders

allowed the nation to achieve the governmental security objectives of equilibrium and

growth. In the immediate post-war period, Australia’s economy was

exceedingly vulnerable to fluctuations in international commodity

prices because of its overdependence upon the production of primary

goods derived from farming and mining. Thus, a larger supply of labor

was necessary if the nation was to construct a strong manufacturing

base. Migrant labor from Europe led to an expansion in the country’s

manufacturing base, which according to Arthur Calwell, the

immigration minister in 1951, “greatly assisted in breaking bottle-

necks in the production of iron and steel, bricks, tiles, cement and

other building materials.”51 In other words, freer cross-border movement brought

about the equilibrium and growth in the economy that facilitated the Australian

government’s pursuit of economic security. Similarly, Australia’s desire to

expand its migrant intake from Europe stemmed from the belief that

the country was under-populated and therefore unable to draw on a

population large enough to ensure the nation’s military security. In that

sense, freer cross-border movement resulted in population growth that

struck an equilibrium between Australia’s military needs and the nation

51 Arthur Calwell, quoted in Francis Keble Crowley, Modern Australia Documents: Volume II 1939-1970, (Melbourne: Wren, 1973), p.14.

30

demographic deficit. Given this, we can identify a complementary relationship

between free movement and security in Australia’s post-war intake of European

immigrants. Freer cross-border movement on the continent established the

conditions of equilibrium and growth that facilitated the nation’s

pursuit of governmental security.

While European refugees after 1945 had benefited from the fortunate coincidence

that their need for protection served Australia’s security interests, Vietnamese refugees

that arrived in Australia after 1975 could not rely on such good fortune. The arrival of

Vietnamese refugees in Australia after US forces pulled out of Saigon rekindled long-

established public concerns over the nation’s ability to insulate itself from the ‘poor and

over-crowded’ nations of Asia.52 In the face of a highly anxious public, the Labor

government of 1978 spearheaded international discussions with the UNHCR and the US

to share the responsibility of refugees from Vietnam. These discussions, which led

eventually to the establishment of an orderly departure program for Vietnamese refugees,

attempted to prevent future arrivals by boat by giving potential unauthorized immigrants

an official route to enter Australia, along with other Western countries, notably the US.

By 1981, around 50,000 Indo-Chinese had been allowed to enter Australia as refugees.

The government had also committed itself to accepting approximate 15,000 more

annually.53

Thus, the second wave of refugees entering Australia between 1975 and 1981 was

accepted with great trepidation. In fact, if it had not been for Australia’s involvement in 52 For instance, the White Australia Policy that survived until 1973, was motivated by concerns that the importation of Asian and Pacific Islander migrants would jeopardize the ‘Britishness’ of Australian society. See James Jupp, From White Australia to Woomera: The Story of Australian Immigration, 1-13.53 Nancy Viviani, “Refugees – The End of Splendid Isolation?” in P.J Boyce and J.R Angel, ed. Independence and Alliance: Australia in World Affairs 1976-80, (Sydney: Allen and Unwin and the Australian Institute of International Affairs, 1983), pp. 56-78.

31

the Vietnam war and the need to strengthen Australia’s geopolitical connections to Asia

as the region rose to global economic prominence, there may have been no compelling

reason for Australia to dismantle its restrictive immigration policies.54 In this instance,

free movement was necessary for Australia to obtain its security objectives, but the racial

make-up of the migrants conditioned Australia’s response to the refugees. Australia

sought to constrict freedom of movement through a process of ‘burden-sharing’ with

other liberal democratic states, and the establishment of quotas to regulate the flow of

refugees.

These interventions should be understood in the context of a highly racialized

discourse on immigration in Australia where maintaining the European-ness of Australian

society was a pressing concern. Vietnamese refugees were considered to be a cultural and

economic threat to Australia since it was argued that they would shift the European

demographic makeup of Australian society and create difficult and competitive

conditions for Australian workers by providing cheap and flexible labor to employers.55

In this context, restrictions on free movement were designed to manage the substantive

identity of the Australian population, while safeguarding the rights and privileges of

Australian citizenship. In that sense, the second wave of immigration to Australia

exemplifies the interdependent relationship between governmental security and free

movement. Although free movement fulfilled security needs during the first wave of

immigration, the security apparatus soon has to contain it within acceptable limits in

54 James Jupp argues that the viability of White Australia Policy depended upon Australia’s key economic and security interests being tied to Europe and North America. By the beginning of the 1970’s however, Australia’s connections to the North Hemisphere weakened and it became necessary to forge new alliances with Asia. See James Jupp, From White Australia to Woomera: The Story of Australian Immigration,41-56.55 Nancy Viviani, The Long Journey: Vietnamese Migration and Settlement in Australia, (Beaverton: Melbourne University Press, 1984), p. 89.

32

order to achieve its objectives equilibrium and growth in a racially homogenous society.

The character of free movement is therefore something that is constantly produced by the

liberal state in accordance with the changing exigencies of governmental security.

Australia’s experience with Vietnamese refugees has defined the nation’s

relationship to freedom of movement. The landing of Vietnamese refugees in 1976

transformed public attitudes in Australia such that immigration matters became one of the

most divisive issues facing the nation,56 paving the way for the MV Tampa controversy of

2001. Although the policies of the Howard government to MV Tampa incident has been

widely characterized as constituting a radical departure, a ‘sea change’57 in Australia’s

response to refugees, previous governments have consistently refused the mantle of

Australia as a country of first asylum since the mid 1970s. For instance, the previous

government of Paul Keating had attempted to deter asylum seekers by making detention

mandatory and reducing prospects for judicial review.58 The Howard government, finding

policies of deterrence inadequate, shifted its response to the direct prevention of arrivals

through interdictions. This movement from deterrence to direct prevention should be

understood as consistent with the trajectory of policy-making on asylum seekers since the

late 1970s where security, economic and demographic justifications reduced refugee

intake.

In that sense, the nation’s reaction to the Tampa incident arises in this context

where free movement since the 1970s has posed a threat to the security of the nation. In

56 Freda Hawkins, Critical Years in Immigration: Australia and Canada Compared, (Kingston, Ontario: McGill and Queen’s University Press, 1991), 35-39.57 United States Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, Sea Change: Australia’s New Approach to Asylum Seekers, 19 February 2002. Accessed online at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/country,,USCRI,,AUS,,3c99bc884,0.html58 Freda Hawkins, Critical Years in Immigration: Australia and Canada Compared, 67-69

33

response, freedom of movement was carefully managed to promote the needs of security.

The severity of Australia’s response to the Tampa incident is an extension of this

management of free movement. The nexus between police/circulation best captures the

violence involved in the management of free movement because it amplifies how security

and freedom of movement are engaged in a mutually reinforcing relationship of

augmentation to increase the state’s strength and internal order.

To elaborate on this dimension of augmentation, I consider the detention and

deportation of the asylum seekers on board the MV Tampa. In the aftermath of the

Tampa incident and the ‘Pacific Solution’, the Australian government constructed

Immigration Detention Centers on Christmas Island to prevent irregular entry. While the

Australia courts process the claims of the detainees for asylum, they are detained,

monitored and subject to isolation and punishment.59 A report by the Australia Human

Rights Commission expressed concern over the high security, prison-like conditions of

the detention center. The report also states that the detention facilities on the remote

island are not appropriate for asylum seekers since under international standards,

authorities should seek to minimize differences between life in detention and life at

liberty in the design and delivery of detention services and facilities.60 After months of

detention in these facilities, 181 asylum seekers were deported from Christmas Island.61

The detention and deportation of the asylum seekers on board MV Tampa can be

productively illuminated through the nexus of police/circulation. The circulation of non-

59 Michael Leech, "'Disturbing Practices: Dehumanizing Asylum Seekers in the Refugee 'Crisis' in Australia, 2000-2002," Refuge 21, no. 3 (2003): 25-33.60 Australian Human Rights Commission, Immigration Detention on Christmas Island 2010, Accessed online at: http://www.hreoc.gov.au/human_rights/immigration/idc2010_christmas_island.html#Heading59561 William Kirtley, “The Tampa Incident: The Legality of Ruddock v. Vadarlis Under International Law and the Implications of Australia’s New Asylum Policy”, Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 41, no.2 (2002), p. 254.

34

European migrants into Australian territory is a feature of modern life that Australia

reluctantly accepted from the 1970s onwards. It attempted to curb these waves of

migrations by displacing the burden to other liberal democratic states, and instituting

annual quotas that regulated circulation. At the nexus of police and circulation, we are

able to identify the repressive techniques of detention and deportation used to control

circulation. Police is concerned with maintaining internal order while putting men in

circulation so the state can draw its strength from the population. In that sense, the

detention and deportation of asylum seekers is a method of regulating circulation with the

aim of maintaining internal order. Internal order should be understood in relation to the

population, so that the aim of police is to control the ethnic and class make-up of the

population through exclusion (detention) and removal (deportation).62 Since, control over

the character of the population is aimed towards the growth and strength of state forces,

there is a dimension of augmentation that characterizes the Australian state’s response to

the MV Tampa incident.

In order to understand Australia’s response to the MV Tampa

incident, it was necessary to delve into the history of immigration on

the continent. Australia’s encounter with immigration from Europe and

Asia demonstrated how freedom of movement was integral for the

consolidation of governmental security concerns on the continent. I

drew on the critical-analytical approach developed in this paper to 62 For a discussion on the deportation of aliens as a practice within the international police of population see, William Walters, “Deportation, Expulsion and the International Police of Aliens”, Citizenship Studies, 6, no. 3 (2002): 280-284.

35

make this point. The elements of complementarity, interdependency

and augmentation that characterize the relationship between

governmental security and freedom of movement could be traced in

the Australian state’s responses to immigration. This suggests that free

movement across borders furthers the goals of governmental security and ceases to be a

competing consideration that can temper the demands of security. The valorization of

security is best exemplified in the “Pacific Solution”, in which the

Australian government argued that such drastic measures as detention

and deportation were necessary to curb the unending flows of asylum

seekers would make their way to Australia’s northern shores.

V. Conclusion

If the specific policies employed by Australia appear harsher than those of European

countries, the difference is mostly one of degree. The trajectory of Australia’s asylum

policies since the 1970s is one of increasing radicalization in the measures used to deter

and prevent arrivals, particularly those arriving by boat. Yet, this kind of radicalization is

evident in other liberal democratic nations as well. Germany moved from the mild

reforms in its asylum procedures in the 1980s to whole-scale constitutional change in the

1990s; in the 1960s, the US tried to manage Cuban arrivals with organized resettlement

schemes but, by the 1980s was employed interdiction as well. The UK, faced with

unprecedented numbers of asylum seekers after 1999, stated that, in addition to

continuing its policies on detaining and restricting welfare to asylum seekers, it was now

36

considering ‘Australian style’ turning back of ‘illegal’ migrants in the Mediterranean

sea.63

This paper sought to develop an approach that could understand why

contemporary immigration policies are increasingly moving towards

such authoritarian measures. In other words, why is there a radicalization in the

measures used by governments to prevent and deter unauthorized entry? The normative

approach to the problem understands the drastic state responses to asylum seekers as

emerging from the failure to strike an appropriate balance between security and free

movement. In other words, the right to free movement is not appropriately weighed

against security concerns when states capitulate to the dynamics of electoral politics,

economic interests and foreign policy concerns. The attempt to strike a balance between

security and freedom of movement can be a useful philosophical exercise for adjudicating

the morally difficult issues at stake in immigration. However, it creates a significant blind

spot on state actions towards immigration because the search for a balance in the

normative debate occurs at a fairly detached level from the rationalities that animate and

give coherence to state actions on immigration. By re-conceptualizing the relationship

between security and freedom of movement in the normative debate, a critical-analytical

approach was developed to understand the prioritization of security in immigration

policies of liberal-democratic states. Freer cross-border movement consolidates the

security apparatus through a process of complementarity, interdependency and

augmentation. In other words, rather than being a competing

63 Matthew Gibney, “The State of Asylum: Democratization, Judicialization and the Evolution of Refugee Policy” in Susan Kneebone ed. The Refugee Convention 50 Years On: Globalization and International Law (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2004), p.20

37

consideration that can temper the demands of security, free

movement has intensified security concerns to the point of pushing

immigration policies in liberal-democratic nations towards increasingly

authoritarian measures.

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