Papers by Huub Dijstelbloem
Geopolitics, 2019
This paper seeks to expand recent interest in the material practices, policy techniques and techn... more This paper seeks to expand recent interest in the material practices, policy techniques and technopolitics of borders, migration and solidarity initiatives in Europe by connecting this debate to Sloterdijk’s spherological philosophy. With his thematization of enclosures, atmospheres, foams and life sup- port Sloterdijk helps us to give a more morphological account of borders. We illustrate the benefits of this move by reflecting on the recent questions of hostile environment and the crim- inalization of migrant solidarity practices and movements. The paper also highlights certain limitations in Sloterdijk’s thoughts, which appear when it is brought into migration research. Arguing that Sloterdijk remains somewhat sedantarist in his approach to atmosphere we introduce a concept of the envelope as a way to foster a more dynamic, agonistic and mobilityfocused conception of enclosure.
The Multiple Movements of the Humanitarian Border The Portable Provision of Care and Control at the Aegean Islands, 2019
The “humanitarian border” that emerged at the Aegean Islands of Chios and Lesbos during the so ca... more The “humanitarian border” that emerged at the Aegean Islands of Chios and Lesbos during the so called “refugee crisis” arose out of various engagements with care and control. A humanitarian border can be said to consist of the entanglements between humanitarianism and securitization. But how do care and control materialize in practice and how can they move from one place to another? By combining the notion of the “humanitarian border” with the concept of “viapolitics” and an actor-network lens, and based on interviews with state authorities, volunteers and NGOs, this article brings in three claims. First, by studying the “missing masses”, the humanitarian border can be said to arise out of “conjoint actions” that concern engagement with peoples and objects of all sorts. Second, the humanitarian border is not only of a composite nature but of a mobile nature as well. Third, the interstructure of the humanitarian border is generated by a productive relationship between the fluidity of network configurations on the one hand and emerging frictions on the other. By studying the situated tensions between humanitarianism and securitization and focusing on the circulation of materialities of all sorts the movements that make up a humanitarian border can be displayed.
The relation between vision and action is a key element of both practices and conceptualizations ... more The relation between vision and action is a key element of both practices and conceptualizations of border surveillance in Europe. This paper engages with what we call the ‘operative vision’ of surveillance at sea, specifically as performed by the border control apparatus in the Aegean. Elaborating on three examples of fieldwork conducted at the Aegean and the islands of Chios and Lesbos, this paper analyzes the consequences of this operative vision in a political way. One of the main aims is too bring the figure of the migrant back in to the study of border technologies. By combining insights from Science and Technology Studies with Border, Mobility and Security Studies, the article distinguishes between processes of intervention, mobilization and realization and to emphasize the role of migrants in their encounter with surveillance operations. Two claims are brought forward. Firstly, engaging with recent scholarly work on the visual politics of border surveillance we circumscribe an ongoing ‘transactional politics’. Secondly, the dynamic interplay between vision and action brings about a situation of ‘recalcitrance’ in which mobile objects and subjects of various kinds are drawn into securitized relations, for instance in encounters between coast guard boats and migrant boats at sea. Without reducing migrants to epiphenomena of those relations, this recalcitrance typifies the objects of surveillance as both relatable as well as resistant particularly in the tensions between border control and Search and Rescue.
Every single week, Amsterdam Airport Schiphol is visited not only by one million passengers, but ... more Every single week, Amsterdam Airport Schiphol is visited not only by one million passengers, but by 500 'mystery guests' as well. These invited guests work for the airport, directly or indirectly, and their task is to test security measures. Schiphol also receives uninvited guests trying to test their level of security. One of the best known of these is SBS reporter Alberto Stegeman, who regularly tries to prove that security measures at Schiphol are inadequate; by successfully forging a KLM ID-card for instance. Less well known perhaps is the case of the American artist Rozalinda Borcila. As part of her project Geography lessons, she aimed 'to intervene in apparently controlled spaces that are policed through technologies of visualization and information management' (Amoore 2009, 26). Unfortunately, she was deported after being caught making videos of Schiphol's airport security.
To be published as: Broeders, D. and H. Dijstelbloem (2016) 'The Datafication of Mobility and Mig... more To be published as: Broeders, D. and H. Dijstelbloem (2016) 'The Datafication of Mobility and Migration Management: the Mediating State and its Consequences', pp. 242-260 in: I. Van der Ploeg and J. Pridmore (eds.) Digitizing Identities: Doing Identity in a Networked World. London: Routledge 12 The datafication of mobility and migration management: the mediating state and its consequences Dennis Broeders and Huub Dijstelbloem MONITORING AND DATAFYING HUMAN MOBILITY Modern technologies have increased the possibilities of governments to gather and process data and this has increased the variety and the depth of governmental observation and monitoring. This variety includes the data from new technologies such as radar, infrared and satellite technology ('the eye in the sky') that allow for different forms of observation and detection, while depth can be added through technologies such as ICT, biometrics, GIS technology and statistical risk calculation. The more recent development of big data analysis is now also finding its way into public policy making. The state's perception of reality thus becomes more technologically and statistically mediated and 'datafied'. Data of various types and sources are processed, combined and connected though networked databases. Even though policymakers often claim that technology merely does the same job faster and better, technology also changes both the substance and the nature of policy. For one thing, it brings new actors to the scene. Baker (2008) described the work of what he calls a new class of 'Numerati' that data mine vast databases for correlations and use these to plan for the future. He primarily emphasized the commercial brand of this class, but there are public counterparts in ever larger numbers in, for example, counterterrorism (Balzacq 2008; Monahan and Palmer 2009) and youth care (Schinkel 2011; Keymolen and Broeders 2013), international development (Taylor 2015; Taylor and Broeders 2015) and crisis management (see Adey in this volume) . For another, the use of ever bigger datasets necessitates policy thinking in terms of risks and increasingly favours correlations over causalities (Mayer-Schönberger and Cukier 2013).
Book chapter published in Gevers, I. et al. (Eds) Hacking Habitat. Art of Control (2016) Rotterda... more Book chapter published in Gevers, I. et al. (Eds) Hacking Habitat. Art of Control (2016) Rotterdam: Nai010. Hacking the Border Ricardo Dominguez is probably the world's only person to have hacked a border. Besides being Professor of New Media, Performance Art, and a Principal Investigator for CALIT2 at the University of California in San Diego, he specializes in electronic disturbance as an art form. In the early 1990s, Dominguez and his companions considered the rise of the Internet and the coming--into--being of virtual information systems as a new space for protest. Traditional loci for contestation such as the streets rapidly became 'dead capital.' As he explained in an interview, the concept of electronic civil disobedience 'emerged in our dialogue as a way to imagine a new space of contestation and reimagine new forms of civil disobedience.' 1 One of the actions he deployed was a Denial--of--Service (DoS) attack on the Pentagon in 1998. In 2001 Lufthansa was paid a digital visit for supporting deportations by the German state. Another action was a digital sit--in in 2005 on the website of The Minutemen, the U.S.
Social sorting of migrants and travellers based on data stored in information systems is at the c... more Social sorting of migrants and travellers based on data stored in information systems is at the centre of border controls and mobility management in Europe. Recent literature finds that the inclusion-exclusion distinction is insufficiently equipped to do justice to the variety of classifications that is applied. Instead, a proliferation of refined categorisations determines the outcome of visa and permit applications. This article explores the 'administrative ecology' in between the two extremes of inclusion and exclusion. It claims information technologies encourage the emergence of an intermediary category of 'non-publics' situated between the level of groups and the level of individuals. The ontological and normative status of these 'non-publics' will be analysed by using some key notions of Actor-Network Theory.
B en M - Beleid en Maatschappij, 2003
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Papers by Huub Dijstelbloem