State of Control: Unknown Migrant Children
| Published date | 01 December 2020 |
| Author | Andreas Lundstedt |
| Date | 01 December 2020 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12670 |
State of Control: Unknown Migrant Children
Andreas Lundstedt*
ABSTRACT
Recently, crises seem to predominate migration policymaking. They are commonly seen as
critical junctures which precipitate major policy change. However, rather than creation of
something new, crises can instead be vehicles for restoring the order of the past. This article
examines the case of asylum-seeking unaccompanied minors in Sweden, where drastic changes
have been made in the aftermath of the perceived “migration crisis”of 2015. Employing his-
torical institutionalist theory, it examines decades of Swedish migration policymaking through
analysis of state inquiries, law proposals and court rulings. It argues that the changes intro-
duced 2015 were not qualitatively new, but rather a result of long-simmering tensions. These
tensions lie between state attempts to control migration, particularly of “unidentifiable”indi-
viduals, and the rights accorded to migrants. The article shows that Sweden’s migration frame-
work of bounded universalism has gradually been altered by tools that categorize migrants,
with implications for migration policy as a whole.
THE HISTORICAL THREADS OF A CRISIS
In 2015, Zubaid was one of 35,000 unaccompanied minors who sought asylum in Sweden. Being a
child,hewasplacedingovernment-runhousingwithotherminors.Hefounda home, started
school and remained under supervision by a social worker, a legal guardian, as well as the family
he was living with –all normal services for unaccompanied minors. Things changed quickly, how-
ever. A year later, the Swedish government had enacted a series of restrictive law changes in wake
of what was deemed the “crisis”situation of 2015. Zubaid’s claim of being a child was questioned,
the Migration Agency decided he had not provided sufficient proof of his identity and he was
denied asylum. His access to state-funded welfare services was withdrawn (Dagens Nyheter 2017).
Zubaid’s story is similar to that of thousands other “unknown children”, mostly adolescent boys,
which form perhaps the most controversial flashpoint of current migration policymaking in Sweden.
Following 2015, Swedish migration policy is broadly seen to have undergone a rapid shift. Severe
restrictions in asylum policy and border control procedures have been enacted, and public discourse
on migration has shifted in a country internationally seen as open to refugees (Geddes & Scholten,
2016). A brief glance at the state of affairs would seem to validate a common line of thinking on
the dynamics of crises: external events present opportunities for critical junctures, where successful
framing of something as a crisis has the potential to alter the future direction of a policy field
(Capoccia, 2016).
* University of Gothenburg
The peer review history for this article is available at https://publons.com/publon/10.1111/imig.12670
doi: 10.1111/imig.12670
©2019 The Author
International Migration ©2019 IOM
International Migration Vol. 58 (6) 2020
ISSN 0020-7985Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
However, rather than aiming to alter the direction of the future, the “crisis button”can be pushed
by policymakers to restore the order of the past. A crisis, rather than being something qualitatively
new, is often perceived in terms of the “normalcy”it deviates from (Jeandesboz & Pallister-Wilk-
ins, 2016). Assembled interpretations of the past, together with existing policy instruments, form
the context with which policymakers interact in a crisis situation. This interaction, rather than the
external events themselves, is what leads to policy change. (Mahoney & Thelen, 2010). Policy-
maker beliefs, furthermore, often derive from country-specific historical particularities, such as for-
mal institutional structures and political ideas (B
eland, 2009; Cox, 2001). What’s seen as
threatened by a “migration crisis”–be it welfare expenditures, cultural values or state capacity –
comes out of an understanding of history.
Certainly, the importance of identification had been paramount in Swedish migration policy long
before Zubaid and other “unknown children”came to Sweden. Major changes took place in 2015,
when age claims were questioned in large numbers and biological age tests scaled up amid great
controversy (Noll, 2016). However, these changes derived from a perceived necessity of being able
to identify individuals according to state standards, extnt long before 2015. People who don’t con-
form to bureaucratic requirements, such as by being ‘unknown’, challenge the infrastructure upon
which migration management rests (Zetter, 2007). Passports, visas and permits are all individual-
ized, and they require state agencies to be able to delineate between individuals by imbuing them
with identity information such as date of birth (Torpey, 2000). The rights accorded to children
make the stakes high, as reception conditions and chances of asylum are considerably reduced for
adults –giving rise to state suspicions of adults fooling the system by posing as children. This pre-
sents a state control dilemma, since the rights accorded to children often exempt them from control
procedures such as bodily inspections and fingerprinting.
The flurry of government activity surrounding this highly contested issue, then, has long explana-
tory roots outside the crisis frame. Swedish government conceptions of normalcy arise from the
vast importance of its population registry, an administrative infrastructure which is extensively inte-
grated into most bureaucratic operations and presupposes valid identification practices, as well the
bounded universalism of its migration policy (Brochmann, 2014). Extensive welfare programmes
are seen by many policymakers to require boundaries, but within these particularized boundaries
egalitarian norms often apply, even if often weakly implemented (Eastmond, 2011). This bounding
is not stable but has continuously developed over decades, a process in which the idea of child
rights has been prominent. With the arrival of immigrant communities, Swedish conceptions were
defined as “universal”child rights, part in a pattern whereby child rights have played a role in
defining the Swedish state’s view on itself through its understanding of others (Sandin, 2018).
The presence of such ideas can help in explaining the specific outputs of institutional factors
(B
eland, 2009). In Sweden, migration policy has been structured by an influential bureaucracy and
incremental changes in policy instrumentation often precipitate overall policy changes. An examina-
tion of past Swedish migration policy can enhance our understanding of crisis policymaking
through an exploration of the normalcy it is attempting to restore, and widen our knowledge of the
importance of bureaucratic procedures in migration control by focusing on the crucial but under-
studied phenomenon of refugee identification.
CONTROL FRONTIERS: IDENTIFICATION AND CHILDREN
State bureaucracy, in migration as in other issues, asserts control by requiring individuals to con-
form to its categories –disaggregating information into standardized labels that serve administrative
needs (Lipsky, 1980; Zetter, 1991). In asylum identification proceedings, this means answering the
question “Who are you?”by providing what is deemed sufficient proof. This question builds on a
124 Lundstedt
©2019 The Author. International Migration ©2019 IOM
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