Attachment required: The affective governmentality of marriage migration in the danish aliens act 2000-2018

TY - JOUR

T1 - Attachment required

T2 - The affective governmentality of marriage migration in the danish aliens act 2000-2018

AU - Bissenbakker, Mons

PY - 2019/6/1

Y1 - 2019/6/1

N2 - Taking as its case the Danish "attachment requirement" (2000-2018), this article examines the way in which the biopolitical management of marriage migration has come to take the form of asserting national belonging. Although introduced as a tool for combatting "forced marriages," the Danish attachment requirement did not purport to determinate the genuine character of love relationships but instead aimed at monitoring and predicting the national attachment of migrating spouses. Through an indepth analysis of Danish Alien Acts from 2000 to 2018, I demonstrate how the attachment requirement placed an obligation on the applicants to orient themselves toward the Danish nation and society as opposed to other nations, symbolically and legally represented by the applicants' next of kin and/or their relation to the so-called "ghetto." Relying on the affectivephenomenological concept of orientation, I suggest that national attachment according to the Danish Aliens Act can be understood as a method for turning belonging into a juridical tool. This secures maximum flexibility for the state in bestowing and reworking rights to family reunification.

AB - Taking as its case the Danish "attachment requirement" (2000-2018), this article examines the way in which the biopolitical management of marriage migration has come to take the form of asserting national belonging. Although introduced as a tool for combatting "forced marriages," the Danish attachment requirement did not purport to determinate the genuine character of love relationships but instead aimed at monitoring and predicting the national attachment of migrating spouses. Through an indepth analysis of Danish Alien Acts from 2000 to 2018, I demonstrate how the attachment requirement placed an obligation on the applicants to orient themselves toward the Danish nation and society as opposed to other nations, symbolically and legally represented by the applicants' next of kin and/or their relation to the so-called "ghetto." Relying on the affectivephenomenological concept of orientation, I suggest that national attachment according to the Danish Aliens Act can be understood as a method for turning belonging into a juridical tool. This secures maximum flexibility for the state in bestowing and reworking rights to family reunification.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85071609320&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1093/ips/olz001

DO - 10.1093/ips/olz001

M3 - Journal article

AN - SCOPUS:85071609320

SN - 1749-5679

VL - 13

SP - 181

EP - 197

JO - International Political Sociology

JF - International Political Sociology

IS - 2

ER -