Scribd
Upload
41 views29 pages

Gender, Racist Gendered Violence, and Immigration Detention (L-W10)

Lecture Overview: - Feminist methodologies & intersectionality as an approach to immigration detention - Immigration detention - The Mexican Case

Uploaded by

Nadia Muhammad
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
41 views29 pages

Gender, Racist Gendered Violence, and Immigration Detention (L-W10)

Lecture Overview: - Feminist methodologies & intersectionality as an approach to immigration detention - Immigration detention - The Mexican Case

Uploaded by

Nadia Muhammad
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 29

Feminist Research, Female Migrant Journeys &

Detention in Mexico

Alethia Fernández de la Reguera


Visiting scholar at the University of
Warwick
Today´s presentation

1. Feminist methodologies & intersectionality as an approach to


immigration detention
2. Immigration detention
3. The Mexican Case
Feminist methodologies

 For more than fifty years, feminist methodologies have


created new ways of thinking, imagining, observing, and
interpreting phenomena of social life.
 We are currently at a boiling point in the field of feminist
methodologies that invites critical reflection on their
scope and challenges.
 In addition feminist movements demand more than ever
to rethink and strengthen how to do activism from the
academia.
"Mestiza must continually move
outside the usual patterns, that
is, move from convergent
thinking - the analytical
reasoning that usually uses the
rational to move towards a
single goal (a Western way) -
towards divergent thinking"
(Gloria Anzaldúa 2015:139).
Intersectionality

It has been a political strategy and a


theoretical approach of black,
Chicana and Latin American In the U.S. and Brazil since the 1960s
feminists throughout the 20th activists spoke of the triad of
century to name and denounce both oppressions "race-class-gender" to
colonial and patriarchal domination, expose the differences in feminist
as well as the hegemony of "white" discourses (Viveros 2016).
feminism in the struggle for women's
rights.
Intersectionality

Intersectionality as a political
Black and Chicana feminists posed
positioning and as an approach to
big questions: how to understand
knowledge brought to the center
the experience of discrimination
of the debate the enormous
as a Black or Chicana woman in
limitations of an essentialist
the United States, is it sexist
conception of the discrimination
discrimination or is it racial
that a woman experiences in
discrimination?
particular contexts.
Intersectionality

 Intersectionality is now recognized not only as a political position for


feminisms, but also as a particular form of sensitivity to the research
process that takes on greater meaning in practice (Hill Collins 2019).
 A research is intersectional when it critically thinks about sameness and
difference, and how these function in power relations.
 It allows not only the rethinking of existing knowledge about the social
problems that afflict women, but has also demonstrated the existence of
new systems of power (Hill Collins 2019).
Global governance of migration and asylum promotes
strategies to control human mobility, particularly by
criminalizing and detaining immigrants.
In the last two decades, and in particular
during the last five years, Mexico has
witnessed important transformations in
migration.

Mexico as a  Significant changes in the


country of directionality of flows, as well as in
the volumes, routes, strategies,
origin, transit nationalities, and profiles of people
in mobility.
and destination  The switch from economic to forced
migration
 Migrants emigrating + returning
 Asylum seekers accessing Mexican
territory in search of protection.
Context of immigration
detention in Mexico
 Mexico has the one of the largest
immigration detention systems in the world
(around 50 centres along the country).
 In 2022 Mexico detained 319,996
immigrants and received 118,478 asylum
requests.
 Between Jan. & Sept. 2023, 501,709
irregular migrants were detained of which
353,929 were taken to a detention centre.
 32% of detentions occur in Chiapas, and
16% in the city of Tapachula
Immigration detention

 Is the deprivation of liberty of a foreigner for not proving a legal stay in the country where he
or she is.
 It is an imigration control measure which, according to international law, is undesirable and
ultimately, exceptional, as there must always be a presumption against detention and in
favour of liberty.
 In most countries, it is an administrative detention, i.e. a legally established precautionary or
punitive measure, but does not correspond to a criminal offence, as crossing a border
irregularly is not a criminal offence.
 It must be temporary.
 Globally, immigration detention is often used as a deterrence policy and is therefore often
arbitrary, i.e. widespread and systematic.
 Unlike a criminal detention centre, immigration detention centres (however they are named)
have less accountability measures to ensure respect for migrant´s human rights.
Immigration detention

 Virtually every country in the world has implemented


immigration detention as a central practice of border control (S.
Silverman & Nethery, 2015).
 Despite the absolute prohibition of arbitrary detention under
international law, the detention of migrants is: mandatory,
automatic, systematic or generalised.
 Contrary to the obligations of States to grant international
protection to persons who are forcibly displaced, in many
countries vulnerable persons such as asylum seekers, pregnant
women, children and adolescents, stateless persons and the
elderly are detained.
Immigration
 Being an administrative detention does not
detention
require a formal charge or legal justification
beyond the legitimacy of the state for
immigration regularisation or deportation (S.
J. Silverman & Massa, 2012).
 Detention is initiated during border controls
carried out at points of entry into the national
territory (airports, ports, etc.) or during
immigration checks inside the country
(roadblocks or public places).
 Euphemisms: rescue operations, immigration
station, hosting of immigrants, etc
Immigration detention

 Contrary to popular belief, the conditions of "administrative


detention for migration reasons" can be more precarious and
cruel than "criminal detention" or "detention for security
reasons”.
 Authorities do not need to request detention orders, there are
usually no readings of one's rights, there is no automatic right
to legal representation or a phone call, and people are usually
not informed about the time limits, their rights or how to leave
detention, or whether they are being subjected to an
administrative procedure.
Main causes of migration of women from Honduras, El Salvador
and Guatemala: insecurity and violence (46%) and economic
reasons (32%) (CNDH- UNAM, 2017).
Causes and 8 out of 10 women interviewed reported having left their country

strategies of accompanied(CNDH- UNAM, 2017).

They hire services from a trafficker, obtain false documentation,


women's travel by road, avoid the train, and stay in hotels instead of
shelters.

mobility The percentage of women users of shelters for 2011 ranged


between 10 and 15%, a figure that decreases in the central and
northern regions of the country(Díaz Prieto & Kuhner, 2015).
Research
Question
 What is the impact of
subjectivities of
immigration agents in
the implementation of
immigration policy?
Institutional ethnography

Research conducted between 2017 & 2019 at Estación Migratoria Siglo XXI with
Research active and former immigration agents, migrants, staff from IOs and NGOs.

Understand tensions and contradictions observed in social interactions in


Understand everydayness of institutional practices.

Analyse emotions regarding the norms, discourse, and institutional practices of


Analyse securitization and criminalization of migrants.
The public discourse and stigma on
immigrants
 Symbols of immigrants related to unhealthy conditions
 Places of origin with higher rates of disease
 Risky working and living conditions
 Cultural superiority of destination communities
Women migrants & Institutional violence

Invisibility,
Racial profiling of
State violence discrimination
migrants
and stereotyping

Absence of Absence of
Detention of
gender- gender –
women and their
responsive perspective
children
budgeting migration policies
Is disgust a mechanism of power in
detention centers?

What is the functionality of disgust?


Disgust

 A cultural construct
 A social and moral emotion that
condemns an object or a person for
being considered pollutant mainly
related to body fluids and secretions
“Most societies teach the
avoidance of certain groups of
people as phisically disgusting,
bearers of a contamination that
the healthy element of society
must keep at bay” (Nussbaum,
2004:72)
The function & effects of disgust

From the institutional perspective From the migrant´s perspective


 Social distancing between inmates  Makes them feel uncomfortable
and guardians  Makes them even more vulnerable
 Practices of indifference &  Increase the risk of illness
dehumanization
 Effects on mental health
 Mechanism of punishment
 Makes them feel punished
 Reinforces stigmas, discrimination
and racism  It is related to practices of torture
 It is part if a daily practice
The functions & effects of disgust

 Disgust prevents feelings of concern, care, compassion and love


(Miller, 1998)
 Disgust instrumentalizes racism, abandonment and neglect towards
immigrants
 It is a powerful mechanism to despise and humilliate others
Sexual difference does represent risks and
Does the culture that stigmatizes gender-based human rights violations during
transit and immigration detention.
migrant women outweigh the
culture and institutionalization of
The sexual difference of menstruating, gestation,
human rights? childbirth and breastfeeding does make a
difference in how women experience
institutional violence because they are migrants,
poor, racialized, mothers, and pregnant or
menstruating women.

Their status as women exposes them to greater


risks and additional stigma because they are
considered irresponsible for migrating with their
children, pregnant or for having left their
children in their countries.
 The demand must be for the total eradication of immigration detention, the
elimination of any exceptional measures and the expansion of alternatives to
detention so that people can carry out their migration regulation and refugee
status application processes in freedom.
THANK YOU

[email protected]

You might also like