Lecture by Maartje van der Woude on 'Unravelling crimmigration control in EU border areas'
On 2 February Maartje van der Woude will deliver a lecture in Montreal entitled: Noble Cause at the Border? Unravelling crimmigration control in EU border areas
Ever since the implementation of the Schengen agreement in 1985, driven by concerns about mass migration and transnational crime, Member states have sought ways to monitor internal migration mobility without breaching the Schengen Border Code. In the Netherlands the vital role of monitoring the internal border areas is fulfilled by the Military and Border Police (MBP). Their official task is to prevent irregular migration, yet, as a result of increased concerns over the EU’s external borders and the global war on terror, this official focus of immigration control seems to have been extended to unofficially also include crime control.
Whereas this development of "crimmigration control" in border areas can partially be explained by developments on the EU and national policy level, it is also necessary to look at the role of human agency and the often highly discretionary decisions made by individual border patrol officers. To what extent do their actions (further) fuel this process of crimmigration control? Can their behaviour be explained by what in the literature on police ethics has been coined as "noble cause" decision-making - decision-making that favours utilitarian ends in law enforcement activity - or are there other less noble underlying rationales?
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