State Lockdown: The Concept of "Risky Immigrants" in Danish Policy Discourse

People who arrive at the borders of the United States and European countries without a visa or the right to entrance are variously termed “illegal immigrants,” “irregular immigrants,” or even “unwanted immigrants.” Those immigrants who are granted residency based on family reunification or their status as refugees are sometimes described as “risky,” signaling that they carry various potential hazards for the receiving country. Corresponding to this notion of risk are recent metaphors that express the need to protect ourselves from immigrants: the “war” or “fight” against immigration; the building of “Fortress” Europe; the interception of “immigration routes”; “flanking measures”; “frontline states”; and the idea of prioritizing assistance to distant “buffer zones”. To be sure, risky immigrants are the subject of intense public discussion across the affluent parts of the world. This chapter takes inspiration from Foucault's lectures on governmentally, analyzing Danish migration policies during the last four decades as straddling between the rationalities of law, discipline, and security.