Trained to Disbelieve: The Normalisation of Suspicion in a Swiss Asylum Administration Office

Affolter, Laura

doi:10.1080/14650045.2021.1897577

Cited by 20 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…It was presumed that perceived threats were strong mediators of suspicion towards refugees because of the ‘fake refugees’ rhetoric that was widespread among anti‐refugee protesters during the period of the Yemeni refugee arrivals. Indeed, in many refugee‐accepting countries, a ‘culture of disbelief’ is embedded in the asylum administrations and public political discourse on refugees (Affolter, 2021; Every & Augoustinos, 2008). This ‘default mode’ of suspicion is justified by the rationale that ‘bogus’ and therefore ‘undeserving’ refugees with economic motivations should be distinguished from ‘genuine’ refugees and screened out through the refugee status determination process (Borrelli, 2020).…”

Section: The Refugee‐related Discourse and The Anti‐refugee Movement ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Refugees as perceived threat: College students' attitudes towards refugees in South Korea

Yuk,

Shin

2024

International Migration

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In 2018, the influx of Yemeni asylum seekers generated the unprecedented politicization of the refugee issue in South Korea. This paper explored South Korean attitudes towards refugees by collecting data from Korean college students. In doing so, we looked into what led to negative attitudes towards refugees and the role perceived threats play as a mediator. Following previous studies on intergroup threat theory, we noted that threat perception was a useful tool in understanding intergroup prejudice and anxiety as perceived threats and their antecedents were found to explain a significant amount of the attitudes towards refugees. We also found strong interconnections between prejudices towards different minority groups, including Islamophobia, homophobia and anti‐refugee attitudes. This finding supported the idea that such prejudices are part of a larger intolerant belief system towards minority groups in general.

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Section: The Refugee‐related Discourse and The Anti‐refugee Movement ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Refugees as perceived threat: College students' attitudes towards refugees in South Korea

Yuk,

Shin

2024

International Migration

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“…Moreover, numerous authors have shown that migration administrations – and in particular asylum procedures – are pervaded by a ‘culture of disbelief’ (Bohmer and Shuman 2018 ; Borrelli 2022 ; Griffiths 2012 ; Jubany 2017 ). Accordingly, a suspicion by-default approach is considered as a sign of professionalism by many caseworkers, efficiently resulting in an inversion of the burden of proof (Affolter 2022 ). It is the asylum seeker who has to convince caseworkers of the credibility of their ‘protection story’ and the existence of verifiable ‘well-founded fear’ through a narrative that is considered as ‘consistent’ and ‘plausible’ by caseworkers as its core features resonate with available ‘country of origin information’ (COI) (Thomas 2006 ; van der Kist 2024 , this issue).…”

Section: A Material-semiotic Reading Of Asylum Procedures: Human-mach...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Epistemic domination by data extraction: questioning the use of biometrics and mobile phone data analysis in asylum procedures

Scheel

2024

Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

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In a growing number of destination countries state authorities have started to use various digital devices such as analysis of data captured from mobile phones to verify asylum seekers’ claimed country of origin. This move has prompted some critics to claim that asylum decision-making is increasingly delegated to machines. Based on fieldwork at a reception centre in Germany, this paper mobilises insights from science and technology studies (STS) to develop a framework that allows for more nuanced analyses and modes of critiques of the digitisation of asylum procedures. Rather than thinking human and non-human forms of agency as external to one another in order to juxtapose them in a zero-sum game, I comprehend the introduction of digital technologies as a reconfiguration of existing human-machine configurations. This conception highlights how the use digital technologies enables caseworkers to retain their position as an epistemic authority in asylum decision-making by assembling clues about asylum seekers’ country of origin generated by digital technologies into hard juridical evidence. Subsequently, I develop an alternative critique that focuses on epistemic implications of the digitisation of asylum procedures. I identify a particular version of data colonialism that enables epistemic domination by means of data extraction.

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“…A special section in Geopolitics examines institutionalized suspicion of migrants as an entry point for identifying how disbelief shapes administrative frameworks (Borrelli et al, 2022). For example, Affolter (2022) shows how doubt and distrust are built into the institutional socialization of asylum case workers within the Swiss Secretariat for Migration.…”

Section: Institutionalized Suspicion Of Migrantsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Political geography III: International migration and geopolitics

Fluri

2023

Progress in Human Geography

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This report provides an overview of contemporary scholarship on the geopolitics and political geographies of migration. There has also been an extensive amount of scholarship, including several special issues focused on migration, borders, and displacement from state and non-state institutional management to the everyday experiences of individual migrants. The political geographies and geopolitics of human displacement in this report are organized into the following thematic categories: state and institutional management, institutionalized suspicion of migrant populations, border management techniques and technologies, and re-centering migrant experiences.

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Trained to Disbelieve: The Normalisation of Suspicion in a Swiss Asylum Administration Office

Cited by 20 publications

References 39 publications

Refugees as perceived threat: College students' attitudes towards refugees in South Korea

Refugees as perceived threat: College students' attitudes towards refugees in South Korea

Epistemic domination by data extraction: questioning the use of biometrics and mobile phone data analysis in asylum procedures

Political geography III: International migration and geopolitics

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