Security, Law, Borders: Spaces of Exclusion

Abstract

Politics of borders and the distinction between inside/outside have become an important security practice of liberal states. Borders are strategically used to change the balance between security and liberties. This article analyzes the legal constitution of border zones and argues that security is not exceptional in its constitution but results from ordinary law and practices. Illiberal practices at border zones are embedded in ordinary politics of the liberal state.

The UK Justice and Security Bill 2012–2013: Using secrecy to legitimize the securitization of the law

“…More broadly, the findings in this paper support Basaran's (2008) thesis that identity and borders are constituted in law by liberal governance. The research in this paper highlight how compromise of legal principles are challenged and do need to be justified, but it suggests that information -even evidence related to grave human rights abuse -may be successfully argued to be beyond legal borders where it is intelligence that concerns a threat from a perceived potential enemy.…”

“…It will add contribute to scholarship on the intersection between law and security. Basaran (2008) 1998: 30) proposed that the way that threats are presented discursively, rather than the threat itself, should be central to any assessment of security. They make clear that securitization impacts on politics, suggesting that it 'takes politics beyond the established rules of the game and frames the issue either as a special kind of politics or as above politics' (Buzan et al 1998: 144 (Salter, 2008;Balsacq, 2011: 7;Hansen, 2000).…”

The Jewish State of Anxiety: Between Moral Obligation and Fearism in the Treatment of African Asylum Seekers in Israel

“…Indeed, in the post 9/11 era, in the USA, Australia and countries across Europe, there is a detectable effort to discredit asylum seekers: at best, as economic migrants who are associated with criminality, abuses of the welfare system and the undermining of the national social fabric; at worst, as posing potential terror threats to the national security (Andreas and Snyder 2003;Baldaccini, Guild, and Toner 2007;Basaran 2008;Pace 2010). Notwithstanding the move towards the securitisation of migration (Bigo 2002), and the evocations of national security to fence off foreigners, it is only remote voices, mostly located at the extreme far-right and/or openly racist end of the political spectrum, that refer to the presence of undocumented migrants and asylum seekers as constituting an existential threat to the receiving state.…”

Differential inclusion of non-citizens in a universalistic welfare state

“…Immigration law establishes legal statuses and respective legal identities (see Basaran 2008) through which states can regulate non-citizens' rights and access to various institutions and public resources. In migration research, the relevance of legal status has been addressed mainly with regard to legal presence and access to labour markets.…”