Internal surveillance

Illegal immigrants try to find their way into Dutch society despite the restrictions that are in part explicitly designed to stop them from doing so. In the preceding chapters, it became clear that the strategies and practices of illegal immigrants directly and indirectly interact with the official policies and regulations. After having focused on the immigrants, our attention now shifts to actors in the receiving society. In chapter 1, the decision was made to focus on implementation practices at the lower level. In this respect, our attention goes to ‘street-level bureaucrats’ in several crucial sectors (see also chapter 5). The present chapter looks into the role of the police. The responsibility of the police in detecting and expelling illegal immigrants comprises an integral part of internal migration control.

In most European countries a central role of internal surveillance is assigned to the police and immigration services (Garson 1999). So far, enforcement practices in this field have attracted little systematic attention (see chapter 1). In the migration policy literature, the attention is confined to alarming statements about the increasing role of the police and warnings against harassment and discrimination (Den Boer 1995a, Bigo 1996). Moreover, the involvement of the police is often said to contribute to the link between crime and illegal residence. These risks have to be taken seriously, considering the already strained relationship between the police and immigrants. But the lack of insight into how police officers conduct their tasks, how they use these powers of discretion, what judgements they make and why and to what extent their actions are subject to controls, all make it problematic to draw conclusions regarding the role and influence of the police.

A second body of literature where information can be gathered, is the sociology of the police. In this literature, discretionary freedom with respect to handling crimes and misdemeanours, and to a lesser the serviceoriented role of the police, have attracted most of the attention (see for example Brown 1981a, Holdaway 1983, Wilson 1989, Punch 1979). Tasks of police officers with regard to the surveillance of illegal immigrants are not commonly dealt with, suggesting that they are not viewed as central tasks.