Seeking protection at the gates of europe: Refugees, labeling and dissuasion practices at the southern Spanish borders

Abstract

Based on an analysis on the practices that have become generalized over the past few decades to limit refugees from entering the territory through what has been dominated the dissuasion paradigm, this article uses the literature on labeling to research how asylum has been managed at Spain’s southern border over the past three decades. The analysis is based in 34 in-depth interviews conducted between 2016 and 2019 in Madrid, Cádiz, Ceuta and Melilla to members of different public institutions and social organizations involved in the implementation of refugee policies at the Southern Spanish border. The “labeling” of African immigrants as labor migrants (or as “bogus” asylum seekers) has shaped the refugee policies at this border resulting in practices of contention and dissuasion of the flows and restrictions in the access to the Spanish protection system under the priority of the logic of control.