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Continued and intensified hostility: The problematisation of immigration in the UK government’s 2021 New Plan for Immigration

GRIFFITHS, CLARE

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Abstract

Drawing on Bacchi’s (2009) ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’ framework, this article provides a critical analysis of HM Government’s (2021a) New Plan for Immigration. We explore how immigration is problematised, the assumptions that underlie these problematisations, alternative ways of representing the ‘problem’ of immigration, and the possible effects of the proposed reforms. Our article demonstrates how the New Plan is increasingly hostile towards, not only ‘illegal’ migrants, but an ever-widening group of people and organisations who may be viewed as facilitating illegal entry (organised criminals, hauliers) and/or those held responsible for preventing/delaying their removal (lawyers). The government’s proposals risk creating a two-tiered system, increasing the exclusion experienced by those seeking asylum, and widening the net of those held responsible for immigration control. Ultimately, we conclude that while the sentiments behind the government’s New Plan may not be all that ‘new’, they are nevertheless significant for their continuation and intensification of existing hostile policies and practices relating to immigration in the UK. This is especially so, given a number of recent global events that could have provided an opportunity to disrupt the government’s problematisation of, and hostility towards, people seeking refuge.

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date May 13, 2022
Online Publication Date Jun 30, 2022
Publication Date Jun 30, 2022
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Critical Social Policy
Print ISSN 0261-0183
Publisher SAGE Publications
Volume 43
Issue 3
Pages 401-422
DOI https://doi.org/10.1177/02610183221109133
Keywords Bacchi, hostile environment, asylum, immigration, problem representation
Publisher URL https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/02610183221109133
Additional Information The final version of this article and all relevant information related to it, including copyrights, can be found on the publisher website upon publication.

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https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Copyright Statement
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).




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