Shutting Down the Borders
The Fortress Europe is expanding and the EU is increasingly working together
with its neighboring countries, so that the latter are more and more taking
over the defense against migrants who by EU definition are not authorized to
enter. Nevertheless people are trying to get to Europe. They come from countries
where dissenters have to fear for their lives and from countries with disastrous
living conditions and a lack of possibilities of survival. In fact, if one considers
how many hundreds of millions of people live in extreme poverty in the countries
of the south, one is astonished that there are not more people who set out to
affluent Europe and storm the fortress. The situation at the external Community
borders is dramatic. Every year thousands of people die when trying to enter
the Fortress Europe. They die on overcrowded boats that capsize on the passage
to Italy, Spain or the Canary Islands; they suffocate jammed into freight containers,
they die from injuries incurred at the metre-high fences of the Spanish exclaves
in North Africa or they do not even make it there and perish when crossing the
Sahara.
In its defense against the migration streams the EU has entered close collaboration
with Maghreb countries where the democratic and human rights situation is often
more than disputable. These countries get financial support and high-tech equipment
in order to better achieve the objective: To stop the people who have set out
to Europe already before they reach the external Community borders.
Expulsion
Of course, many people make it to Europe. No matter how high the walls are that
the EU erects, in the long run they will never be high enough to stop those
people who are really determined to escape the political or economic plight
in their home countries or their personal misery. Once in Europe the migrants
are checked by the authorities and put into refugee camps, asylum requests are
examined and very often the people are taken in pre-deportation detention straight
away. Apart from the more and more rigid interpretation of the human right of
asylum, which guarantees protection from persecution, it is an unacceptable
fact that people are arrested without having committed a crime – their
“offence” is fleeing from persecution and poverty and their desire
for personal happiness. Yet, in line with the rigid interpretation of the right
of asylum, the vast majority of asylum requests are rejected. The people’s
residence rights are withdrawn and they get deported. How people are dealt with
who do not have the right of residence in Europe is in many cases devoid of
all humanity and recalls totalitarian systems. People are torn out of their
beds and find themselves on board of an airplane “home” shortly
afterwards, families are torn apart, children are “detained” right
in the schoolyard, people suddenly don’t show up at their workplaces.
Countless cases are documented. “Dead or alive” – unfortunately
this saying is not as absurd as it sounds in this context; too many have been
killed in the process of deportation. How is this possible in Europe in the
21st century? Does the notion of a European humanistic spirit still exist at
all?
Exclusion within Europe
Thus the EU is very busy shutting down its borders and instantly shipping back
those who have nevertheless managed to get in. As a parallel development the
phenomenon of inner exclusion has emerged. The idea that we must shut down and
are able to shut down Europe in its entirety has also infected the inner structures.
Certain segments of the population are increasingly being denied access to public
areas. Presumably unwelcome people, people whose attitude does not correspond
to the norm, the fewer (also known as minorities) are to be kept away from certain
territories. They are not to meet each other in public, they are not to make
music or make noise in whichever way, and they are not to demonstrate against
anything and stand in for their own rights or the rights of others. They are
not to create a “public mischief”. They shall remain invisible for
the majority, excluded, pushed to the margin, ghettoized. Civil rights, who
cares? What is important is that the public space remains clean, safe, easy
to survey and control.
The security frenzy is escalating. There is hardly a corner that does without
a camera. And there are more and more types of people wearing a uniform who
do not represent any law enforcement agency yet act as if they did and abuse
the authority that the uniform suggests.
Little Fortresses
The idea that we must create and are able to create zones of total security
also within Europe leads to the construction of fortresses. Demand for this
is increasing, e.g. when political and economic rulers want to remain undisturbed
and among themselves – at the World Economic Forum or summits such as
the G8 in Heiligendamm 2007.Then temporary fortresses are erected and made “untouchable”
with amazing expenses and a massive Robocop and military contingent.
Gated communities are another amazing phenomenon. They are created for people
who are willing to pay for 24-7 surveillance and a life behind walls and fences,
controlled entrances for pedestrians and vehicles alike and totally disconnected
from the surrounding social life of a society. Only its residents and people
who are welcome have access to the community. All the others get caught in the
fences and the controls. These places are to communicate to their residents
the feeling of a life in security. They needn’t care what is going on
in the world around their aseptic little fortresses.
Margarethe Makovec & Anton Lederer