Privatization of Migration Control by Austin Sarat

Author:Austin Sarat [Sarat, Austin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781801172455
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited
Published: 2021-07-29T00:00:00+00:00

5.4. Psychological Exclusion

Systematic exclusion psychologically impacts irregular migrants, particularly regarding self-worth: the dehumanisation becomes internalised. Valentine (2010) particularly links the regime with ‘[t]he shame of no longer being able to support the family at home, [which] can contribute to depression and anxiety’ (p. 44). Similarly, Khosravi (2007) interestingly advances the point in his reflective article: ‘the illegal migrant, subjected to a gaze and treatment that divests him or her of humanity, internalises the shame’ equating irregular status with ‘personal deficiencies and inadequacies’ (p. 331).

An intriguing parallel can be drawn to Agamben’s camp dehumanisation theory, where inhabitants are ‘stripped of every political status and wholly reduced to bare life’ which results in individuals ‘from whom humiliation, horror, and fear had so taken away all consciousness and all personality’ (Agamben, 1998, p. 171 & 185). Similarities exist between Agamben’s camp inhabitants, who are degraded and dehumanised to breaking point, and irregular migrants who are likewise dehumanised, stripped of rights, and subsequently excluded. Even when not held in camps, dehumanisation psychologically damages irregular migrants in a way that distorts self-perception. One of Bawdon’s (2014) interviewees encapsulates such self-depreciation: ‘[i]f the state says you have no status … [y]ou are absolutely nobody. You can’t stand up and speak’ (p. 30). Irregular migrants can become so degraded and distraught that they do not value themselves properly, which leads to issues of modern slavery including forced labour.22

This unsavoury phenomenon is illustrated by the Vietnamese women enslaved in nail bars across the UK. For instance, one newspaper reported two undocumented Vietnamese girls working ‘60 hours a week’ in a nail bar, in which ‘[o]ne was being paid about £30 a month while the second was not paid’ (Morris, 2018). Dwyer et al. (2011) correctly highlight the link between irregular status and forced labour, explaining that ‘[w]ith few legal rights to residence, work or welfare, irregular migrants are likely to be the group most vulnerable to forced labour’ (p. 16). But it is not just the legal exclusion of irregular migrants that makes them especially vulnerable. As Caroline Haughey QC rightly notes in response to questioning a forced labour victim, ‘[the victim’s] view of herself is that she doesn’t matter’ (as included in BBC, 2018, at 46:59). The ethnocentric dehumanisation the employer sanctions contribute to is internalised by the irregular migrant, leading to feelings of inferiority and irrelevancy. Unsurprisingly the Modern Slavery Helpline identified modern slavery ‘is normally more prevalent among the more vulnerable or within … socially excluded groups’ (Modern Slavery Helpline, publication date unavailable, p. 18), indicating the exacerbated exclusion caused by employer sanctions facilitates exploitation.

Ironically, modern slavery victims often become trapped in the UK in an excluded underclass. The hostile environment means many victims feel so invisible and isolated they cannot reach out for help, and thus have no alternative but to stay with their captors, encapsulated by Caroline Haughey QC as ‘incarceration by lack of choice, because there is no alternative’ (as included in BBC, 2018, at 25:45). Ultimately therefore, the hostile environment traps the most vulnerable in the UK, subverting its purpose of encouraging voluntary deportation.

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