Audie Klotz

South Africa as an Immigration State

A dramatic outburst of xenophobic violence in May 2008 spotlighted South Africas place among countries of immigration. While a plethora of policy studies have examined many micro-level dynamics in these attacks, surprisingly little attention has been paid to underlying political causes. By applying the comparative ‘immigration state’ literature, I offer a counter-intuitive, two-part explanation for the complex and often contradictory mix of South African migration policies. First, the historical absence of a ‘rights-markets’ coalition allows for the persistence of exclusionary and protectionist legislation. Second, post-apartheid international commitments to ‘rights-markets’ norms have contributed to significant reforms, especially regarding refugees, but these pressures have not fully counter-balanced the predominant exclusionary and protectionist coalition. Democratization in the absence of a liberal ‘rights-markets’ coalition, I conclude, has reinforced xenophobia and will continue to produce only incremental policy reforms.

Norms and sanctions: lessons from the socialization of South Africa

In response to South Africas increasingly institutionalized racial discrimination during the postwar years, transnational anti-apartheid activists advocated a vast array of global sanctions. With the formal abolition of apartheid in 1991, sanctions advocates celebrated the apparent success of the international communitys efforts in promoting a global norm of racial equality in South Africa. Since similar sanctions are an increasingly popular policy in the post-Cold War world, the South African case offers a useful starting-point for re-evaluating the utility of sanctions as a non-military policy. However, despite the prominent role of a norm of racial equality in anti-apartheid sanctions, both advocates and critics of international sanctions still generally ignore norms analytically.1 Expanding our conceptual frame work beyond the realist assumptions implicit in most sanctions analyses enables us to understand better why international actors adopt sanctions and how these measures affect target states.2 One consequence of this realist foundation of sanctions analysis is the assumption that co-ordinated, multilateral sanctions are extremely difficult to implement due to conflicting national interests. Some states, most analysts argue, will circumvent sanctions in pursuit of economic gain, providing inevitable gaps in enforcement. Yet

How far does ‘societal security’ travel? Securitization in South African immigration policies

Responding to political developments in Europe during the 1990s, the Copenhagen School drew on speech act theory to argue that state leaders represent certain issues, including immigration, as existential threats to society. Two decades of friendly amendments and vociferous critiques have raised questions about how well the Copenhagen School’s core concept of ‘societal security’ travels outside Europe. To assess the scope of this ‘securitization’ framework more systematically, we examine South Africa, a democracy that recently liberalized its immigration policies despite ethno-nationalist and racist traditions. Specifically, we test four claims: (1) that official discourses will target certain foreigners as an existential threat to collective identity; (2) that bureaucracies will consistently institutionalize these discourses; (3) that identity-oriented groups will be crucial to any societal contestation over these discourses; and (4) that successful securitization produces regionalization. These securitization claims hold up well, even though the nature of threats to societal security shift over time. Keeping in mind that no theory is without weaknesses, we recommend wider integration of the societal security concept into comparative studies of immigration policy, especially in democracies outside Europe.

Borders and the Roots of Xenophobia in South Africa

Abstract Responses to migration are intricately linked to the demarcation of borders and hence separate citizenships. In South Africa, the racist roots of the connection between nationality and territory is especially significant for understanding anti-foreigner violence. Ameliorating xenophobia, in turn, requires destabilising this foundation, from the abstract world of social theory, through assumptions embedded within policymaking processes, down to public education. As a crucial step in that agenda, I bring the regions national narratives into sharper focus by concentrating on three constitutional transitions, each of which fundamentally altered territorial boundaries. (1) The establishment of the Union of South Africa in 1910 defined the core of its current borders, but those negotiations also left unresolved the liminal status of the neighbouring British protectorates. (2) A cascade of decolonisation into the early 1960s inscribed formal borders within the region, a process that also created new citizenships. (3) The dismantling of white-minority rule in South Africa transformed key features of this regional order, notably by granting full rights of citizenship for non-white nationals, but democratisation also reinforced an exclusionary definition of nationality that fuels xenophobia.

Refugee rights or refugees as threats? Germany’s new Asylum policy

On-going Mediterranean migration highlights serious tensions over asylum policy in Germany, among European Union members, and with neighbouring states. Yet commentaries thus far lack a clear understanding of these complex dynamics and their policy implications, because each typically relies on only one of two analytically distinct frameworks: either refugee rights or refugees as threats. Instead, we integrate these frameworks. Specifically, we juxtapose securitisation theory with the coalition literature from migration studies in order to analyse societal contestation in Germany’s responses to the Syrian refugee crisis. We conclude that, despite tactical political shifts, Germany’s commitment to rights remains fundamental because of a resilient coalition of political parties, economic actors, and rights advocates. Insights about Germany, the country arguably most responsible for pushing a common European Union approach to refugees, also help us understand better regional dynamics.