This article argues that authorisation and moral evaluation are the dominant legitimation strategies used in asylum decisions by the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri). After the migration events of 2015, the percentage of accepted asylum claims dropped dramatically in Finland, causing concern about the legal rights of asylum seekers. Drawing on theoretical literature concerning asylum decisions, borders and language, this article is based on a systematic analysis of 77 asylum decisions. It aims to answer the following questions: What strategies of legitimation does Migri use to support their negative asylum decisions? How are these strategies used? The study reports that the reasons behind negative asylum decisions are often not openly provided. Instead, the decisions largely rely on authorisation and implicit moral evaluation; the decision is so ‘because Migri says so’. This lack of transparency has adverse consequences for the due process of asylum seekers, and these consequences can be life-changing.
This article argues that authorisation and moral evaluation are the dominant legitimation strategies used in asylum decisions by the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri). After the migration events of 2015, the percentage of accepted asylum claims dropped dramatically in Finland, causing concern about the legal rights of asylum seekers. Drawing on theoretical literature concerning asylum decisions, borders and language, this article is based on a systematic analysis of 77 asylum decisions. It aims to answer the following questions: What strategies of legitimation does Migri use to support their negative asylum decisions? How are these strategies used? The study reports that the reasons behind negative asylum decisions are often not openly provided. Instead, the decisions largely rely on authorisation and implicit moral evaluation; the decision is so 'because Migri says so'. This lack of transparency has adverse consequences for the due process of asylum seekers, and these consequences can be life changing.
This article shows how the Finnish Immigration Service approaches internal credibility assessment in asylum decisions. The internal credibility assessment is one of the most important parts of the asylum process, since it aims to assess the truthfulness of the asylum applicant’s account, customarily through evaluation of the level of detail, coherence, and sense of personal telling. If the account is not accepted as truthful, the applicant may not be granted asylum. In general, the internal credibility assessment is based on the asylum interview documented in the asylum record. The current study analyses 44 asylum decisions and the corresponding interview records to see how the internal credibility assessment is intertextually constructed in the decisions. The article shows that referring to detail seems to be used as a shorthand in the decisions to reject the applicant’s account, since it is used both in cases where the questions of the interviewer have been general, and in cases where the issue seems rather to be one of consistency in either the interview or the decision. The article further shows how the decisions portray the assumptions of the decision maker as more neutral, objective, and credible than those of the asylum applicant. Overall, the article argues that the asylum decisions become performances in which the form and internal argumentation may become more important than the intertextual coherence of the asylum case.
Artikkeli tarkastelee kilpailevia argumentteja vuosina 2015–16 Suomeen saapuneiden afganistanilaisten turvapaikkapäätöksissä. Artikkelissa päätökset ymmärretään argumentatiivisena viranomaisviestintänä, ja niitä tarkastellaan väittelynä, jossa esitetään kilpailevia argumentteja sekä turvapaikan myöntämisen puolesta että sitä vastaan. Kilpailevat argumentit viittaavat väitteiden vastakkaisuuteen ja poissulkevuuteen – turvapaikka voidaan joko myöntää tai jättää myöntämättä. Tutkimus kysyy, millaisia turvapaikanhakijan ja Maahanmuuttoviraston kilpailevia argumentteja päätöksissä esiintyy sekä miten ne rakentuvat. Tutkimuksen aineistona on 29 Afganistanin kansalaisille vuosina 2016–17 tehtyä kielteistä turvapaikkapäätöstä, joita analysoidaan Toulminin argumentaatiomallin avulla. Turvapaikanhakijat eivät päätöksissä esitä argumentteja suoraan, vaan ne on suodatettu monen vaiheen kautta. Analyysi näyttää, miten turvapaikanhakijoiden suodatetut sekä Maahanmuuttoviraston argumentit eroavat lähtökohdiltaan toisistaan siinä määrin, että niitä on vaikea vertailla, kuten kuitenkin esimerkiksi valitusprosessissa tehdään. Molemmat argumentit näyttäytyvät analyysin valossa myös puutteellisilta. Turvapaikanhakijoiden suodatetuissa argumenteissa puutteellisuus näkyy oikeutusten ja Maahanmuuttoviraston argumenteissa taustatukien kohdalla. Kilpailevan argumentin käsite kiinnittää huomion siihen, miten viranomaisten valta toimii argumentaation, sen oikeutusten ja taustatukien kautta.
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