In the 3rd episode of PUAN podcast, co-host Saumya Pandey interviews Anthropologist Angela Garcia on the endless dispossession, inequality, and heroin use etched in the history and memory of northern New Mexico. Professor Garcia’s avant-garde scholarship combines apparently isolated moments of intimacy, addiction, care and abuse to shed light on the impacts of a colonial past that is eating up the landscape inside.
Book review: John-Andrew McNeish (2021) Sovereign Forces: Everyday Challenges to Environmental Governance in Latin America. Berghahn Books.
In Sovereign Forces John-Andrew McNeish, an anthropologist based in Norway, offers a fresh perspective on “resource sovereignty,” identifying sovereignty, at various scales and in different spaces, as a vital analytic concept for understanding land, territory and energy development in Latin America and beyond. Reflecting on more than twenty years of ethnographic engagement and research projects in and on Latin America, McNeish constructs a rich, historically grounded, account of the region’s economic and political development and how it is inextricably bound with sovereign claims to territory and resources.
The author begins his new book by figuratively plunging us into the cold waters of everyday violence against indigenous environmental defenders in present-day Latin America. He recounts the case of Hector Jaime, an indigenous community leader, from the Chocó region of Colombia, who receives a telephone message that an assassin has been hired by a criminal organization to kill him and his family. Jaime, who has been working with other community members to block mining and other extractive activities from entering their legal territory, reaches out for assistance to McNeish and others via a signature campaign, urging that national authorities protect him and investigate the threat to his and his families’ lives and livelihoods. No direct police protection results, although Jaime is given a bulletproof vest and an investigation is begun.
McNeish’s opening narrative device, recounting this personalized account, powerfully reminds us that the themes he deals with are not merely scholarly preoccupations. These are urgent practical challenges daily confronting citizens, families, activists and authorities. Indeed, this sense of urgency is sustained throughout the volume, as it expertly unpacks contestations around resource landscapes, mainly in Bolivia, Guatemala, and Colombia.
A particular strength of the book is its situating of Latin American experiences of resource contestation within the global political economy, drawing on historical sources and analysis to explain the multiple forces and actors, both within and outside the region, at play in shaping its developmental trajectories. McNeish’s basic thesis, which extends from his earlier published works, is that sovereignty practically matters at multiple scales: it is crucial in explaining national, regional and local decisions on the ownership, use, protection and management of natural resources. From his perspective, Latin American conflicts over land and resources are “conjoined economic and ontological conflicts regarding the equivalence of knowledge and value” (p. 22).
Taking aim at the top-down readings of state-building and resource contestation often found in the resource curse literature, McNeish draws on debates in the cognate fields of social anthropology, political economy and political ecology to further develop the concept of “resource sovereignty.” What are found in the Latin American cases examined are not straightforward manifestations of the classic idea of supreme authority in a defined geographic territory. Rather, multiple attitudes to territory, identity, capital and resources co-exist, compete and conflict – ultimately helping explain empirical outcomes. In this story, indigenous and peasant peoples have been victims of colonization and, frequently, of annihilation, but also agents whose everyday encounters with the state, the market, and politics have left distinctive marks on the geographies and institutions of Latin American states.
The author builds his argument using a series of “ethnographic fragments” drawn from his years of engagement with Latin America. In Chapter 1, two major events in Bolivian politics (the gasolinazo fuel subsidy backlash and TIPNIS roadbuilding protests) are used to explore the broader relationships in Latin America between the politics of natural resources, territory and sovereign claims within and beyond the state. The second chapter uses the example of fuel and resource smuggling along the Bolivian and Guatemalan borders to discuss contrasting visions and definitions of sovereignty, but also to demonstrate how classic accounts of resource politics pay insufficient attention to sovereign claims beyond and beneath the state.
The intertwining of the politics of sovereignty and natural resources is further explored in Chapter 3, with cases from Colombia and Guatemala of new political and legal spaces actively created, despite risks of violence, through community engagement with state entities. The fourth chapter focuses on the politics of establishing lithium production in the Bolivian Highlands. This Salar de Uyuni case shows that contests around resource sovereignty are not limited to fossil fuels but are also manifest in what are conventionally thought-of as “green” resources. Chapter 5, the final case-based chapter, returns to McNeish’s normative claim, with which the book begins, that resource sovereignty matters for peace and governance goals. Reflecting on the land rights case of the Embra Chamí community of the Cañamomo Lomaprieta in western Colombia, he shows how the state can sometimes directly enable the illegal circumvention and abuse of rights. Technocratic avoidance of certain features of contested resource sovereignty thus requires attention if environmental governance is to deliver on its aims.
Finally, the concluding chapter succeeds in pulling together in one place the various concepts and cases expounded upon in the earlier, empirical sections of the book. This is a helpful addition since the volume can sometimes feel a little bewildering in the breadth and depth of its scope and examples, especially to non-Latin America experts. McNeish views contestations around resource sovereignty as arising from the efforts of citizens and communities to secure a future without constant fear of violence or the actual experience of insecurity. He further suggests that a significant match can be made between the concept of contested resource sovereignty and critical institutionalism. The latter’s recognition that institutions are the outcome not just of acts of design, but of long-term acts of “bricolage” whereby indigenous and peasant communities write themselves back into the history of state-formation, shows that the engagement of these communities has, put bluntly, a direct impact on the success and failure of environmental governance.
In conclusion, Sovereign Forces is a fascinating, multi-disciplinary and historically grounded account of the contested resource politics of Latin America. It makes an impassioned plea for critical engagement with resource sovereignty as a crucial aspect of environmental peacebuilding, that resonates far beyond the country contexts examined here. The book is a must-read for anyone wishing to engage with the complexities of everyday environmental governance in Latin America and elsewhere.
Podcast Episode 2: History and geography of a city soaked in water
In the 2nd episode of PUAN podcast, co-host Saumya Pandey interviews Anthropologist Nikhil Anand on the concept of wet cities. Professor Anand focuses on Mumbai, a city built in and out of the Arabian Sea. He encourages us to think about the long history of engineering cities as dry lands devoid of wetness, and how that is contributing to the current climate events.
Transcending identities: Narrative reflection on the ritual of coming out
The term ‘coming out’ is still unfamiliar to many Indians. It is safe to say that it is a new term known mostly to the urban, English-speaking world of India who are familiar with gender and sexual minorities. Coming out of the closet can mean different things to different people; it can be an emancipatory act for some, forced upon for others. The timing of coming out and to whom is a matter of careful evaluation of consequences and trust. It is a self-learnt process born out of an inevitable need and a survival tool to overcome mental health issues. With this background in mind, this blog revolves centrally around my own coming out experience, which I have analysed as a ritual. I attempt to explain the coming out process that I have developed over the years through reflexive learning. I use autoethnography to narrate how my identity transcends contextual spaces while navigating in and out of the closet.
I hail from a fast-growing metropolitan city in South India where there are safe spaces such as support groups and NGOs, which my rural friends do not have. As is the case in most countries in the world, criminalising laws on homosexuality have colonial origins. Despite having a rich history and queer tradition in India, homosexuality is heavily frowned upon in Indian society. Awareness about sexual health, let alone homosexuality, is still a far dream. For example, men who identify as gay are thought by society at large to become transgender in the future. Although the supreme court of India decriminalised homosexuality in 2018, it will be a long time before there is complete societal acceptance, and there are no explicit anti-discriminatory laws in India that will legally protect an individual based on their sexual orientation. However, post-2018, some multi-national companies in India have initiated diversity and inclusion policies.
From the outset, it appears that I have a dichotomous life, taking up different identities as and how the situation demands. Privately, I am chiefly a gay man (of late, I am questioning this identity, too). Yet for the outer world, I am a middle-class, polyglot, backward caste, urban-raised, English-educated clinician and public health professional, with little exposure to world travel due to work, and with varied interests including philately, Indian philosophy, pottery, among others. I use the word ‘transcend’ instead of ‘transform’. In my understanding, transforming is a superficial change physically visible to others. In contrast, transcendence involves an enormous shift in personality, which is susceptible to quick changes, involving a distinct private and public self (p 57) where the two are related.
The idea of coming out is an exhaustingprocess, often with both negative and positive consequences. I have come across friends who have been ostracised by their highly conservative religious families and friends in India, causing severe mental health issues ranging from depression to suicidal ideations. The thought of coming out makes me highly anxious. Growing up, I didn’t have any resources to help myself deal with bullying and the self-awareness that I am different from others. The socio-cultural conditioning of my personhood in the heteronormative society led to the othering of myself to the extent that I believed something was wrong with me and my behaviour. Personhood (p 57) is ‘acquired gradually from birth onwards as the child becomes increasingly familiar with the shared customs and knowledge of society’. The fear of rejection and ridicule has led to lower academic and work performance, and I also developed psycho-somatic conditions such as fibromyalgia. The social fears I have developed are linked to clinical health conditions. General prejudice in society, minority stress, lack of accessible help and stigma related to rejection and discrimination all lead to excessive stress resulting in a range of mental and systemic health and behavioural issues among the queer community that are largely unnoticed.
On the other hand, coming out to a few friends strengthened our relationships, and there was mutual growth and understanding of differences in sexuality and sexual orientation. It also helped me to overcome my internalised homophobia. So far, I have come out only to friends and to two cousins in my family. I come from a joint family which is holding onto traditional Indian family values and customs. Since my family is unaware of my sexual orientation, the pressure to marry a girl is always there. I have learned to dodge the topic by giving excuses such as studying further, sometimes telling my family that I don’t find marriage interesting, pointing to the failed marriages in family and friend circles, or sometimes quoting the Hindu monkhood as an ideal way of living. Despite changes in contemporary Indian society with rapid urbanisation and Western lifestyle influences, the family institution plays an important role in India. Though there is an intergenerational change in the marriage system in India where inter-religious and inter-caste marriages are on the rise, one survey revealed that middle-class Indian youth favoured the legalisation of same-sex marriage, but were still not attracted to homosexual marriages. Every time I manage to dodge the marriage topic, I am aware of the pricking lies that I tell. Deep within, I crave a boyfriend, possibly moving where there is no discrimination against homosexuality and gay marriage is legalised. Therefore, sometimes, coming out is an answer to those close and trusting friends concerned about my well-being and showing genuine interest in my personal life.
The ritual of coming out is a step-by-step process, complex and not always linear. It is like working out the maths to find an answer based entirely on assumptions. Every coming out ritual is a rite of passage to that person. Gennep’s description of rites of passage finds familiarity here. Rites of passage (p 148) is an event in a person’s life such as divorce, retirement, and so on, where an individual goes through separation, trial, and reintegration, marking progress through life stages. Eichler has used an autoethnography tool to illustrate his coming out using vignettes ranging from materials to places. Garrick has analysed the coming out act of self-disclosure using the ritual theory and the rites of passage and offers a generalisation that ritual can be protective and act as a guide for self-disclosure.
My coming out ritual involves three stages: a preparatory phase that happens in my mind, the actual coming-out event, and the post-coming-out engagement. The first stage is the most challenging part for me. It involves answering an algorithmic pattern of questions in my mind. I deal with many uncertainties of ifs and buts. A slight doubt could cancel the ritual. It begins with a person in mind to whom I could come out and then follows a barrage of mind-numbing questions. Why should I come out to this person? What is the necessity? Is there a threat to my life, work, or future that necessitates an outing? What is it that I am getting back in exchange? Will I face any threats from this person later? If yes, what is my safety net? Are there any secrets of this person I know which would prevent them from putting me in a fix?
Once I have convincing answers that fulfil the criteria of the first stage, the ritual preparation begins. How do I come out? Should I do it in person, write an email, or send a text? The first time I came out to my closest friend, I took more than four hours of talking to speak the three words that have defined my life – ‘I am gay!’. Nowadays, it has downgraded to a simple text message. The timing of coming out is another essential aspect of the ritual. It involves a lot of homework about the chosen person’s daily routine that leads to other questions about the selected person. For example, is this person going through any stressful situations at the moment? Will this person be able to handle this information that they might not have known? Do I have to inform anyone else and be prepared for any untoward outcome as a safety measure?
Once these questions are all resolved, then comes the second stage: the actual coming-out ritual. I have always preferred doing it in person. It gives me more confidence. It leaves me with a comfort that I have confronted my projected fear. It is also about providing a chance for them to clarify any questions about homosexuality in general and specific questions about myself, setting a stage to enter the third phase. While I come out, I take a deep breath, directly look into the other person’s eyes, smile and say the three golden words. In the beginning, I would prepare a speech describing how good a person I am (and so should not be discriminated against based on my homosexual inclination), and how this relationship is so significant to me that I cannot hide it.
The third phase is a continuation of the second with a self-imposed obligation to engage. I take the responsibility of helping the person understand my coming out. I have deduced that coming out is not a mono act since I involve the other person. I have realised that everyone, whether queer or straight, has to metaphorically come out of the closet.
Who better than me to answer questions on who else have I come out to, how sex works between two men, and so on? They only knew me as a façade. I also have to patiently listen to anyone’s unsolicited advice. All of this subsequently reduces any future awkward encounters.
After the ritual, I might not be reintegrated back into the person’s life. There is a risk of exposing one’s vulnerability to exploitation and to losing loved ones. The ritual is similar to the exchange of a gift except that there are no materials exchanged, only emotions. Coming out is sharing important information about one’s sexual orientation to gain support and solidarity, seeking a stronger allyship, overcoming deep layers of inhibition, shame, and guilt. For this is necessary to build a kinship network, a ‘chosen family’ of those who are accepting my sexuality, yet also open those who disagree.
I will illustrate this process using two examples. I confessed my sexual orientation to one of my closest friends, Shaantha, in 2016. I planned to meet her at a restaurant over lunch. We sat down over the table, ordered food, and were catching up about our work and other things. I had planned my conversation in detail. At one point, I mentioned my new project at work where my team were involved in developing a community health programme for queer folks. I mentioned it nonchalantly to observe her reaction. Knowing her personally for many years, I knew she would not judge me. Yet I wanted to be assured. The conversation moved to relationships and marriage. I brought up the issue of marriage not being an option to many individuals and she responded that it was unfortunate. I asked a follow-up question about what her feelings were about homosexual people. She said, without taking any time to think, that she would accept them for what they are. Taking advantage of the moment, I asked her how would she feel if anyone came out to her, to which she replied she would feel very happy that someone thought of her as trusting enough to share such personal information. At this moment, I revealed it to her. There was an instant shock on her face, but she got up from her chair and came towards me to give a tight hug. This was very assuring. She had many questions afterwards about my dating scene, personal journey, and so on. Throughout this conversation, I was on my guard and testing the waters slowly. I had to check every move, reassure myself that I was doing well, and be ready to abort the procedure if I sensed any red flag.
Almost three years later, I was visiting on one of my cousins who was going through a rough time and quit his job abruptly. He was visibly uncomfortable with my arrival. Sensing this, I prepared to leave, but he asked me to stay for a little longer. I obliged; yet the awkward silence continued. He suddenly popped the question and confronted me, asking if I was gay. He caught me off guard and I froze. I was speechless. I took a deep breath and just answered ‘yes’. By this time, I had performed many coming out rituals and I started to realise that it was a tiring process. A simple yes was easier than to carry out the laborious procedure. My cousin appeared flabbergasted. He told me to see a doctor to get rid of my homosexuality (he wouldn’t utter the word gay later in the conversation). I mustered up enough courage to tell him that I was fine and needed no treatment and then left immediately to prevent any further embarrassment. He cut off all communications with me. It did not bother me much but occasionally hurt me that a family member could stop talking to me because of my sexual orientation. I came face to face with one of my worst fears. This incident opened my eyes to the fact that people will choose to be homophobic because of the conditioning of society and I could do very little to change it.
From my experiences, coming out is a repetitive process and not a one-time event. It is an elaborate ritual involving lots of preparation and anticipating repercussions. I have found out that this technique resonates more or less with other queer individuals’ styles with whom I interacted through support group networks and random strangers on the internet. Using the language of queer people, ‘it gets better’ after every coming-out ceremony. I have become better with my choice of words, gained more confidence in uttering the word ‘gay’, and learnt from mistakes. Through this autoethnography, I have elucidated the nuances of navigating the in and out of my closet space. As I conduct this ritual often, I am at ease and perform it effortlessly, shedding the shame and guilt little by little, thus transcending to the true self. I have, over the years, broken the false sense of two lives and slowly accepted the fluid nature of life in general and, specifically, the spectrum of gender and sexual identity.
The construction of an internal humanitarian border: the case of Puebla, Mexico
Introduction
The October 2018 migrant caravans prompted migration to be reconfigured as a political issue in the Central America–Mexico–United States region. Described as a forgotten crisis by the European Commission (European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations, 2021), transit and settlement migration from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador to Mexico had until then been invisible to regional and international institutions (Coutin, 2005) and migrants were primarily assisted by networks of shelters and associations overseen by the Catholic Church. However, in October 2018, the situation changed radically when thousands of people mobilised in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, to migrate collectively to the United States in migrant caravans, defying the region’s securitarian apparatus. Within a regional geopolitical context dominated by the United States, these mobilisations were framed as a national security concern and, in January 2019, the US government launched the “Remain in Mexico” programme. This restrictive migration policy remains in place and forces people seeking asylum in the United States to wait for a decision on their application on Mexican territory (Homeland Security, 2019; WOLA, 2019). As a result of this measure, Mexico was obliged to take responsibility for supplying humanitarian aid to the waiting migrants, while militarisation spread across the national territory in an attempt to limit the number of people reaching the northern border. The consequences of these changes are highly concerning: today, thousands of people are trapped at Mexico’s northern border in poor conditions and their human rights and rights to asylum are being violated.
As well as mobilising the security apparatus, the hypervisibility of the migrant caravans prompted the declaration of a regional humanitarian crisis and led many local and international humanitarian organisations to take action to meet the needs of people in transit or waiting at the borders. Media and humanitarian attention has focused particularly on Mexico’s northern and southern borders, which have become geographic and symbolic spaces of violent dispute over the right to mobility. However, Mexico’s interior states have been frequently overlooked as areas structurally traversed by migrants and shaped by tensions between securitarian and humanitarian concerns. What is happening in the states located far from the country’s borders? How is the migration issue constructed and what is the response to it? This post reflects on these questions in the context of the state of Puebla in Central Mexico, which has been identified as a key transit area for migrants where securitarian and humanitarian dynamics are reproduced and extended. It is based on ethnographic research conducted in Puebla between July and September 2019 with three non-governmental organisations (two international and one Mexican) and an international humanitarian organisation involved in providing migrants with humanitarian assistance. This fieldwork was carried out as part of the research project ‘Reinforcing the Permanent Seminar on Gender and Migration’ (2019) coordinated by the Institute of Feminist Studies at the Complutense University of Madrid in Spain (INSTIFEM-UCM) and the Centre of Gender Studies at the Autonomous University of Puebla in Mexico (CEG-BUAP).
These reflections are framed within the existing debate on humanitarian borders, which are defined by Walters (2011) as a complex, contradictory assemblage comprising humanitarianism and the securitarian dimension of migration control and management. Humanitarianism is a cultural model of assistance involving intervention at borders as spaces of migration management, with the aim and mandate of alleviating human suffering through a coordinated network of different stakeholders. According to De Lauri (2019), the expansion of humanitarianism in these spaces is redefining borders not only as basic components of migration control and containment, but also as areas affected by humanitarian crises, giving rise to new approaches to migration governance grounded in an acknowledgement of suffering, compassion and aid. Against this backdrop, it is important to conceptualise borders not only in terms of their securitarian dimension but also as cultural products, “invisible or ostentatious boundaries used to create ‘different’ groups of human beings” (Juliano, 1998). The borders shaping Mexico’s migration scene are culturally constructed and reproduced in multiple ways. The hypervisible process whereby migration is constructed as a humanitarian issue in a context of ongoing crisis (Benincasa & Cortés, 2021) is culturally redefining the migrant population in terms of otherness and foreignness. Migration is pinpointed as a regional issue requiring legitimate intervention and presented simultaneously as a depoliticised humanitarian object and a threat to national security. The dynamics and tensions inherent in the humanitarian border extend and are reproduced beyond territorial borders in the overlooked migration transit area of the state of Puebla.
The ethnographic context
The state of Puebla is located in the southern part of Central Mexico, approximately 130 km to the south-east of Mexico City. It has traditionally been a migrant-sending region, with migrants travelling to the United States in particular (Cortés, Forina & Manjarrez, 2017). Internal migration remains a priority on the local political agenda, which is currently focused on responding to return migration in the state. However, Puebla is also a destination for international migrants, especially those from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. According to the Migration Statistical Bulletin, Puebla received 2,804 migrants in 2019 and returned 1,883, most of whom came from Central America (Unidad de Política Migratoria, 2019). Meanwhile, in 2021, 3,521 people arrived in the state and 2,266 were returned (Unidad de Política Migratoria, 2021). In their study of Central American migration in Puebla, Cortés, Forina and Manjarrez (2017) show that the state is a key stage in Mexico’s main migration routes. Firstly, it lies on the route taken by the Beast: the train used by many migrants to cross Mexico. Secondly, the implementation of the Comprehensive Plan for the Southern Border in 2014 and the increasing militarisation of the cargo train have transformed Puebla into a transit region, with migrants taking alternative, unnoticed routes on foot, accompanied by people smugglers or using motorised transport when their financial resources allow. Puebla is also a stage on the route to Mexico City, which is the departure point for the main routes leading to the northern border.
International migration in Puebla has been identified as transit migration, so it has not been labelled a political issue on the local public agenda. Although their institutional invisibility can facilitate their transit towards the north of the country, it also leaves migrants more vulnerable to dangers such as kidnapping, mugging, abuse, detention and deportation as they move (Cortés, Forina & Manjarrez, 2017). Indeed, migrants are only invisible on the local public agenda to the extent that their status as individuals with rights goes unacknowledged. Puebla has drawn increasing attention from the security apparatus as a stage on the migration route: the state is home to one of the 29 permanent holding centres used to detain irregular migrants that have opened in Mexico (Global Detention Project, 2021) and are coordinated by the National Institute of Migration (INM). In the words of Sánchez Gavi (2016), this institutional invisibility also contrasts with the visibility afforded to migrants as “delinquents” and their construction as objects of suspicion and peculiarity among some political groups and the local population. Amid these tensions, the Catholic Church has traditionally been responsible for providing migrants with humanitarian assistance in Puebla through the Human Mobility Pastoral Program and a network of five shelters. These are supplemented by impromptu aid initiatives (Sánchez-Gavi, 2016): a mobile Red Cross surgery on the Beast train route at Ciudad Serdán and groups of women known as Las Patronas led by Doña Luisa (Moncó, 2021).
Reconfiguring migration in Puebla
An analysis of the ethnographic data collected in 2019 shows how the arrival of the first migrant caravans in 2018 brought about major changes in humanitarian assistance for migrants in Puebla (Benincasa & Cortés, 2021). Firstly, one of the most significant impacts of the emergence of the caravans as a new form of regional mobility was a dramatic increase in scrutiny of the routes used by migrants to cross the country. In this context, Puebla has been publicly recognised as a stage on the migration route to Mexico City, where migrants continue towards the northern border (Benincasa & Cortés, 2021). Secondly, the emergency situation in October 2018 prompted a number of public and private stakeholders to mobilise to respond to the needs of the migrants in transit. The public authorities, coordinated by Claudia Rivera Vivanco from the left-wing National Regeneration Movement as municipal president (2018–2021), introduced measures to accommodate the migrants on a temporary basis, providing shelter, medical care and basic necessities. Civil society associations, local and international non-governmental organisations, and international organisations also played a part in managing the reception of the migrants.
Puebla’s increasing visibility as a transit region for international migrants has resulted in the emergence of a new political issue for the organisations covered by our 2019 ethnographic fieldwork. Despite traditionally being involved in preventing internal migration, they were obliged to reorder their priorities in response to the emerging migration problem. In the narrative they present, the political context of crisis and its tensions made it difficult to establish a clear stance and structured working agenda. Their humanitarian work was shaped by two tensions in particular. Firstly, the highly mobile nature of the population impeded longer-term planning. The extent to which migration is temporary varies across Mexico, ranging from high levels of mobility to long waits at the northern border or in detention centres (a consequence of policies intended to contain migration). In 2019, Puebla continued to receive large numbers of migrants travelling northwards, which led to prolonged uncertainty for humanitarian stakeholders.
Secondly, a clear tension emerged between the political stance held by humanitarian stakeholders and the contextual need to negotiate the security-focused law governing migration management in Mexico. Broadly speaking, the humanitarians’ political approach to migration revolved around the right to asylum and human rights (Benincasa & Cortés, 2021). However, this stance and the search for political responses were undermined by Mexico’s inconsistent official discourse, which wavered between concern for protecting migrants’ rights and restrictive measures used to detain, imprison and deport them, violating these rights and creating an ambiguity that has yet to be resolved (París Pombo, 2019). Moreover, the construction of a prolonged humanitarian crisis fuelled the notion of instability in relation to Mexico’s migration and political situation, legitimising and reinforcing humanitarianism as the only possible response to migration.
These tensions illuminate how Puebla has become a focus of attention for humanitarian intervention in migration in Mexico. Changes in the migration situation in Puebla, which have been driven and highlighted by the migrant caravans, are transforming the state into a clear space of tension between mobility, humanitarianism and securitarianism. This ethnographic case study shows how the intersection between border dynamics and humanitarian action transcends national borders to affect Mexico’s interior states. The humanitarian border that is being constructed in Mexico is expanding and being reproduced in the state of Puebla, which is emerging as an internal humanitarian border. This process highlights the urgent need to understand these specific local manifestations of the border with the aim of demonstrating and comparing the ways in which migrants are stripped of their political and human rights (Moncó, 2021) and the influence of the humanitarian border on their mobility and immobility as they cross the state of Puebla.
Bibliography
Benincasa, V. & Cortés, A. (2021). Humanitarizando la movilidad en México: la migración centroamericana como problema humanitario.Oñati Socio-Legal Series, 11(3), 809–832. Available at: https://opo.iisj.net/index.php/osls/article/view/1270
Cortés, A., Forina, A. & Manjarrez, J. (2017). El caso de Puebla. Trayectorias y rutas migrantes. Experiencias de violencia y necesidades especificas. In Cortés, A. & Manjarrez, J., eds. Mujeres, migración centroamericana y violencia: un diagnóstico para el caso de Puebla. Puebla, Mexico: BUAP. Available at: https://eprints.ucm.es/id/eprint/46054/1/Mujeres,%20migraci%C3%B3n%20centroamericana%20y%20violencia.pdf
Coutin, S. B. (2005). Being en Route. American Anthropologist, 107(2), 195–206.
De Lauri, A. (2019). A Critique of the Humanitarian (B)order of Things. Journal of Identity and Migration Studies, 13(2), 148–166. Available at: http://www.e-migration.ro/jims/Vol13_No2_2019/JIMS_Vol13_No2_2019_pp_148_166_LAURI.pdf
European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (2021). Forgotten Crisis Factsheet. European Commission. https://ec.europa.eu/echo/what/humanitarian-aid/needs-assessment/forgotten-crises_en
Homeland Security (2019). Migrant Protection Protocol. Available at: https://www.dhs.gov/news/2019/01/24/migrant-protection-protocols
Juliano, D. (1998). Las que Saben: Subculturas de mujeres (Cuadernos inacabados). Madrid: horas y HORAS.
Moncó, B. (2021). Cuidados y solidaridad femenina en contextos migratorios: el caso de la migración centroamericana en su paso por México. In Cortés, A. & Manjarrez, J., eds. Género y Movilidades: lecturas feministas de la migración, pp. 159–177.
París Pombo, M. D. (2019). Las barreras migratorias en México y los términos de colaboración con el gobierno estadounidense. In Calva, J. L., ed. Migración de Mexicanos a Estados Unidos. Derechos Humanos y Desarrollo (Vol. 20, pp. 961–982). Mexico City: Juan Pablos Editor.
Sánchez Gavi, J. L. (2016). Movilidad humana. El fenómeno migratorio de Puebla bajo la perspectiva de la Iglesia Católica. TLA-MELAUA Revista de Ciencias Sociales, 9(39), 108–130. Available at: http://www.apps.buap.mx/ojs3/index.php/tlamelaua/article/view/94
Unidad de Política Migratoria. (2019). 2019 Boletín Estadístico mensual.
Unidad de Política Migratoria. (2021). 2021 Boletín Estadístico mensual.
Walters, W. (2011). Foucault and frontiers: notes on the birth of the humanitarian border. In Bröckling, U. Krasmann, S. & Lemke, T., eds. Governmentality: Current Issues and Future Trends. New York: Routledge, 138-164.
WOLA. (2019). The “wall” before the wall. Mexico’s crackdown on migration at its Southern Border. Washington DC: WOLA. Available at: https://www.wola.org/analysis/mexico-southern-border-report/
Book review: Unexpected Subjects: Intimate Partner Violence, Testimony, and the Law. By Alessandra Gribaldo, 2021. HAU Books.
This short book is an ethnographic essay on the constitution of the abused subject through testimony in the Italian judicial system. How do experiences of intimate violence get translated into legally intelligible language? How does the ambivalence and trauma of intimate partner violence complicate the articulation of experience in the court? What inadequate institutional structure renders a victim’s narration of violent experience necessary but impossible at the same time? Gribaldo refers to domestic violence as “Violence Degree Zero” in anthropological research (13) – one of those “dead zones of the imagination” (Graeber 2012) that simultaneously represents “an excess of relevance” and an area of “violent simplification” (15). Her book fills this gap with a theoretically sophisticated investigation of the encounter between women’s words and the legal system, paying keen attention to the friction between intimacy and violence in the production of subjectivity and modalities of truth-telling.
Gribaldo makes a compelling case for ethnographic knowledge in providing a privileged site to examine the complicated relationship between intimacy and violence, the conflicting demands of victimhood in legal institutions, and the potentials of ambivalence and hesitations in narrating experience of violence. Engaging with a wide range of feminist and anthropological scholarship on violence, subjectivity, and silences, Gribaldo’s analytical focus is on the different modalities of “speaking violence” (4). The domestic violence cases in the book revolves around women as victims and men as perpetrators in heterosexual relationships.
In Chapter 1 (Un)Familiar Violence, Gribaldo draws on anthropological and feminist scholarship to expound on the tensions between intimate relations and legal institutions, and the paradoxes in rendering women’s victimhood legible and legitimate. Drawing on Foucault while bearing in mind “the unresolved tension between the chance to rethink and free gender differences” (30), Gribaldo focuses our attention on the issue of experience and the possibility of conveying and verifying such knowledge. The evidentiary requirements of the court – coherent, clear, objective – is contradicted by the subjective, experience-based, and emotion-filled narratives that victims produce.
Chapter 2 Wavering Intentions illuminates the contradictions of women’s subjectivization as victims and as witness in court. Originally introduced to protect women from familial pressure to withdraw their cases, the Italian Criminal Code requires mandatory prosecution of domestic violence cases, in which the women’s testimonies are central to the trial. This juridical protection presumes women as passive subjects who could not make their own decisions but also expects them to be reliable speaking subjects. For a host of reasons, many women choose not to press charges or retract their statements during the trial. Those who do testify would be interrogated not only for the veracity of their claims, their understanding of violence, but also their own subjectivity. Their testimonies are further constrained by the modalities of judicial procedure that requires coherence and focus. For example, a woman was stopped by the judge when she lamented “I didn’t go to work because I had a black eye…love is not enough.” Domestic violence hearings do not produce a simple dichotomization of perpetrators and victims, but rather, “the proof of the crime [of domestic violence] is constituted by the intimate relationship, the experience of violence, and the consciousness of the abused victim (53).” The victim’s perception and statements crucially become such proof.
In Chapter 3, Gribaldo questions the focus on victim’s testimonial proof, and critiques the burden of confession on the victim who “must supply a meaningful framework that allows for recognition and certification, making the production of evidence possible” (86). The centrality of the victim’s testimony means that she is the main target of interrogation and questioning – “not only to verify the facts but also verify women’s capacities to understand and communicate the intimate violence experienced” (91). Furthermore, because the intention of the perpetrator could only be evidenced by the victim’s testimony, “[t]he victim is asked to speak for the perpetrator, to clarify the reasons behind the crime” (85). Any difficulty in remembering events, inconsistency in narration, or failure to comply with the judicial modality of questioning, comes to be interpreted by the defense and the judge as the woman’s unreliability as a witness. Feelings, contexts, and performance pertinent to the woman’s own communication of the experience of violence are considered excesses in the judicial proceedings.
Gribaldo’s ethnography in Chapter 4 The Gender of True-Lying helps readers see vividly how the authenticity of women’s narrated experience is always suspect. Speaking up as a victim-subject renders unreliable the woman’s intentionality in breaking the silence. It is the entirety of the victim’s act of testifying that is being assessed – down to “the appropriate emotional tone” in which she delivers her testimony, as one prosecutor said (99). Gribaldo must be credited for effectively bringing together court exchanges with the perspectives of prosecutors, judges, social service managers, demonstrating the contradictory expectations that the victim “must be subjugated, passive, and aware at the same time” (99). Reflecting on these impossible expectations in institutionalized political language, Gribaldo advocates for “the need to consider hesitations, and the unexpectedly oblique and mediating modes of testimony, action, subtraction, and resistance” (112).
Gribaldo demonstrates a dexterity with theory and ethnography when analyzing the unorthodox testimony performed by Giovanna. Her expressions departed from the expectation of coherence and clarity required by the court, and resembled the mode of self-expression called ‘la piazzata’ (open quarrelling in public). By describing how Giovanna’s declaration of love for her ex-husband allows the judge to verify the authenticity of her testimony, Gribaldo demonstrates the ways the gendered subaltern subject made herself recognizable. The significance of love captured here echoes with legal scholar Mark West’s (2006) analysis of love as a significant discourse in Japanese court decisions on love-suicide, murder, and stalking. A brief discussion about how love is understood as an emotion both in popular culture and in legal institutions – something that West accomplished with ample room in his full-length book – would advance readers’ understanding of the role emotions play in mediating legal processes on intimate relations.
In condensing years of fieldwork into a short book that is both theoretically engaged and ethnographically illuminating, Gribaldo had to make some difficult choices. She states in the Introduction that she keeps the ethnography “suspended” (9) – not locating the juridical dynamics by setting them within the specific Italian context – in order to address specific theoretical issues. As such, the priority of Unexpected Subjects is theoretical elaboration over thick description. Therefore, readers may find ample room for reflection in Gribaldo’s eloquent exposition of concepts from Strathern, Ortner, Mahmood, Foucault, and Agamben, but may at times be left wondering how some of her ethnography fits in. For example, a woman at a shelter insisted on talking about the story of her intimate relationship, a narrative mode not accommodated by the Italian penal code. Gribaldo suggests that the resistance to speak about violence lies in the contradiction inherent in intimate violence – “[t]hese women have embodied a perception of intimacy with a liberal stress on self-responsibility and freedom. They are victims who see themselves as guilty for not knowing how to react to a context of power abuse considered to be obsolete in a society presumed egalitarian” (56). It is unclear to the readers how these ideas were articulated by her interviewees. Furthermore, readers who are not familiar with gender politics in Italy would appreciate an earlier discussion of the white woman-mother figure in the Italian imaginary (102, Chapter 4) that circulates in and behind these testimonies. For example, such contextualization may help readers understand how a woman, who was displeased with her children’s testimony exonerating her ex-partner, retracted her testimony and forgave the perpetrator when called upon by the judge (42, Chapter 2).
Unexpected Subjects should be applauded for being among the few ethnographic investigations into judicial proceedings on domestic violence. Its thoughtful engagement with a rich body of feminist and anthropological scholarship opens up a crucial space for theoretical reflections on violence, testimony, and the law. To accomplish all these in such a short book is an intellectual feat. The book should be read by researchers, postgraduate students, and upper-level undergraduate of all disciplines interested in gender, violence, and the law.
Reference
West, Mark. 2006. Law in Everyday Japan: Sex, Sumo, Suicide, and Statutes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Podcast Episode 1: Histories and futures in monocrop palm oil plantation
In the 1st episode of PUAN podcast, co-host Saumya Pandey interviews Anthropologist Tania Murray Li on the history and future of palm oil plantation in Indonesia and other parts of the world. Professor Li explains what monocrop palm oil plantation may be revealing about economic inequality and why is it so important to pay attention to dominant conception of development.
Militarisation, Racism and Russophobia: What the War in Ukraine Produces and Reveals
After Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a large-scale military invasion of Ukraine on Thursday morning, 24 February 2022, European publics and leaders have responded urgently with nearly unanimous condemnation and rallied to support the Ukrainian state and people. Like many others, we are deeply troubled by the unfolding of war. However, as scholars studying war, we also raise concerns about the current and hasty militarisation of Europe. Moreover, while public empathy and support for the people of Ukraine are both understandable and warranted, we also point to the humanitarian racism it exposes and the global rise of Russophobia.
War in Europe
As we write this piece, thousands of soldiers and civilians have already died unnecessary deaths in the midst of war. Furthermore, more than a million Ukrainians have currently been displaced from their homes. And the war has just began. Millions more are likely to be hurt, die or be displaced in the weeks and months to come. How can we prevent this from happening? How can we avoid that the war and suffering in Ukraine escalates or becomes normalised (some still remember how the siege of Sarajevo was first met with similar outcry, which didn’t last long)? Moreover, how can we avoid both a new great war in Europe and the further militarisation of European societies with the unpredictable consequences this entails?
To begin, we want to highlight that the Russian invasion is not an isolated event but has a history of relations between Russia and Ukraine as well as between Russia, the US and NATO. For instance, although most media ignored it, approximately 14,000 people have been killed in the war in the Donbas since 2014, in a country that has been on the brink of large scale war since the Euromaidan. Moreover, the US and Europe have specific interests in the conflict, which currently risk turning the war in Ukraine into a proxy war. Also, frequent assertions that “war has no place in Europe” or that “this is the first European war since the cold war” are not only historically incorrect (think only of the war in the Balkans in the 1990s), but morally problematic as they neglect European countries’ violent interventions in foreign wars in Africa and the Middle East.
Less than two weeks after Putin started the invasion of Ukraine, there seems to be widespread popular understanding that diplomacy has been tried and failed, and that external military assistance is the only viable solution, a belief that is built on a fault premise. It is never too late to pursue diplomatic channels. Diplomacy can and does take place alongside violence, as has happened and continues to happen in conflicts around the world – indeed we should not forget that there are ongoing conflicts today that are concerning both for possible escalations as well as for the huge humanitarian consequences they bring, for example in Myanmar, Yemen, and Ethiopia.
To understand, and work towards ending, the war in Ukraine requires informed knowledge about its root causes and the evolution of the conflict. It might also require greater self-reflection on the part of Europe and its subaltern relationship with the US, as well as questioning of the Eurocentric narratives and beliefs that prevent us from understanding the complexity of the conflict and the fears and desires of all parties involved. In this piece, however, we do not dwell on the causes of the war, but recommend some easily available and accessible readings to better understand the context and the actors involved in a scenario that ranges from energy competition and interests to the expansion of NATO, as well as to the often cited support of Ukrainian neo-Nazis groups. Instead, we want to specifically focus on three broader and arguably under-addressed aspects of the war that have profound, long-term and possibly devastating implications: the militarisation of Europe, the problem of humanitarian racism, and the worrying phenomenon of Russophobia.
Militarising Europe
The special session of the German parliament on Sunday 27 February amounted to a political earthquake. The German chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that Germany would help Ukraine with the supply of 1,000 anti-tank weapons and 500 surface-to-air missiles. More than that, the military budget would be scaled up by an additional 100 billion euros. With this, the German government broke with an anti-militarist tradition that developed following the defeat of the Nazi regime and with the principle of not sending weapons of war to conflict zones. Before, the US, the United Kingdom, France, and the Netherlands had already provided or promised military assistance to Ukraine by sending weapons and mobilising troops in the NATO area. Apparently, the German move opened a space for other states to make “historical decisions”: among others, Sweden and Finland that have so far been considered “neutral” will send anti-tank weapons, rocket launchers, assault rifles and ammunition to Ukraine (see here). Forcing again in undesirable directions the predicament of its own Constitution, Italy is also sending weapons to Ukraine. The same has also been done by the “diplomatic champion” Norway, thus most likely undermining the possibility of serving as a credible broker in peace negotiations. Small NATO member states in the relative vicinity of the conflict, such as Croatia and Slovenia, do not have an armed industry they could call on and send to Ukraine. Balancing between obligations to NATO, the angry leader in the east, and the moral and political pressure to provide a tangible proof of being on the “right side”, they are bargaining with the lives of soldiers sent to the NATO’s borders. In the meantime, citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina are buying non-perishable food: they remember war.
To start with, we note how public affect has been mobilised and regulated to support these interventions in an information war controlled overwhelmingly by the US. Now, what is the argument for sending weapons to Ukraine? In the words of the German foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, the imperative for sending weapons is that “we must not leave Ukraine defenceless against the aggressor”. The aim is to prevent the weaker party being quickly overwhelmed by the superior force. But this is not the same as what we believe – maybe idealistically – would be the overarching goal: stopping war. Let us reflect on what could result from the externally assisted military build-up of Ukraine. Do we hope that it turns Ukraine into David defeating the Russian Goliath? Or, perhaps, this helps the US in its strategy from one of deterrence to cost imposition, which indicates that they predict, and might even seek, to prolong the conflict, in order to impose high costs on Russia?
The most optimistic scenario is that external military assistance could work to strengthen Ukraine’s bargaining position, and thus help to end the war. However, lessons from past interventions demonstrate the possibility of more harmful consequences. For example, let us remember the case of Afghanistan, which has been a theatre of external interventions since the late 1970s (if we only consider contemporary history and don’t go back to the British attempt to colonise Afghanistan). In response to the Soviet Union’s intervention in favour of the incumbent communist government in Kabul, the US CIA increased its support to the oppositional Mujahedin that were labelled as “freedom fighters” (this framing reappears in the statement by UK’s foreign secretary Liz Truss in which she also backs external volunteers that want to fight alongside Ukrainians). While the Soviet Union had anticipated a short operation, the external assistance enhanced the military capabilities of the opposition forces.
The war in Afghanistan continued until the Soviet Union ultimately withdrew its troops in February 1989 after ten years of fighting. War did not stop after the Soviet withdrawal. In 1992, the Mujahedin seized Kabul and killed then president Mohammad Najibullah. However, the Mujahedin government of Burhanuddin Rabbani never managed to pacify the country and the following period was characterised by battles between different Mujahedin militias, massacres, rape, kidnappings and looting. This period came to an end in the 1990s when the Taliban brought most of the country under control and established their “Islamic Emirate”. In 2001, Afghanistan became the main theatre of the global “war on terror” when the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom attacked it. Twenty years of war and “democratisation” later, the Taliban returned to power with more legitimacy than before. Now, we don’t want to delve deep into Afghan history, but we do want to get across what this and other cases suggest: this kind of external military assistance is more likely to prolong than end wars.
In the case of the current war in Ukraine, external military assistance also risks a horizontal escalation which, in the best case, can turn the war in Ukraine into a proxy war between Russia and NATO and, in the worst case, can lead to a new world war or nuclear war. As Judith Butler notes, “war begets war. It produces outraged and humiliated people”. It also justifies exceptional and otherwise unthinkable measures.
While some of these risks have been considered and debated, absent from most discussions are the more long-lasting and structural consequences of a military response to the Russian invasion. Among other things, the “historic decisions” in European countries risk orienting future policies and conflict resolutions away from diplomacy towards military action. At the same time, we are currently observing the militarisation of European societies by boosting their operational and combat readiness, in terms of logistics, manpower and minds. The consequences of this militarisation of European societies are unpredictable, but worrisome.
Humanitarian racism
As mentioned above, the Russian attacks on Ukraine have provoked massive moral outcry and mobilised European citizens across the continent to support the Ukrainian people. While we stress that these expressions of empathy and support are warranted, they also reveal some uncomfortable facts. Firstly, Europeans do not suffer from compassion fatigue, as many analysts suggested in the wake of the so-called “refugee crisis” in 2015. Conversely, seeing a European country with a largely white population being attacked awakens sentiments of solidarity and empathy in the European population that other wars and populations simply don’t. Scholars have long discussed the different degrees of humanity that are associated with world populations along binary views such as “civilized vs uncivilized”. Indeed, a massacre in Iraq or Afghanistan is described in global media (and perceived by the large majority) as less traumatic than a massacre in Europe or the US. It is not surprising, then, that many journalists, analysts, and politicians have described the war in Ukraine as more shocking and problematic than concurrent wars in “far-away”, “developing” or “non-democratic” places.
Moreover, countries including Poland and Hungary have also opened their borders to Ukrainians fleeing their homes, while Northern European countries have promised to accept thousands of Ukrainian refugees. While laudable, these actions expose a fundamental humanitarian racism.
On the one hand, Ukrainians, who are largely white and Christians, are deemed worthy of care, attention and protection, and allowed to cross even the most heavily policed European borders. On the other hand, the mostly black or brown refugees escaping violence and conflict in the Middle East or Africa remain excluded and unwanted, dehumanised as threats or burdens for European welfare states and societies.
The idea that Ukrainian refugees should be prioritised because they are Europeans or “like us” is not only morally repulsive, but also goes against the UN Refugee Convention which says that refugees should not face discrimination based on racial connotations, religion or country of origin.
Russophobia
In addition to this humanitarian racism, we are also worried about the current global rise of Russophobia. To be sure, Russophobia is not a new thing. In the wake of the Cold War and its aftermath, US pop culture has played a big role in configuring the Russian as the Other. We believe that the new, growing phase of Russophobia exacerbates divisions and jeopardises the possibility of dialogue.
In line with US interests, European leaders have quickly imposed severe restrictions on Russia and Russians with the intention to isolate Putin and create internal pressure on him. In fact, historically speaking, people/states under sanctions usually close ranks and persevere while the underprivileged/poor in their countries bear the consequences. In the process, global Russophobia enhanced by trends of cancel culture has been targeting Russians at all levels, as well as all expressions of their identity, culture and history. We also note with sad irony that political leaders and public figures in Europe and the US are demanding Russian personalities in foreign countries to publicly take a position against Putin or, if not, pay with a ban or public lynching, an attitude that resembles the idea of “regime” it claims to question.
Russophobia not only serves no purpose in ending the war, it is a form of injustice and creates the conditions for long term animosity and hate that will complicate future social and political relationships. Moreover, there are three major aspects this global Russophobia obscures. The first is the internal resistance in Russia against Putin and against the war. Being against the government in Russia is a difficult business that several have paid a high price for. Neglecting the efforts of oppositions and making “all Russians” a universal target of global blame is, simply put, short-sighted and immoral. The second aspect is the double standard used to look at war. Whereas in the case of Ukraine, Russophobia seemed a logical reaction for most, similar sentiments (with some exceptions) were not expressed when the US invented a Hollywood-style story to invade Iraq in 2003 or when NATO heavily bombed Libya in the name of human rights in 2011, to name only a couple of examples. We don’t think Europeans should be tolerant of military aggression; we just wish they would be as outraged as they are now with other military aggressions. The third aspect is the suffering the Russian population endures, especially under current Western sanctions. As Salla Turunen writes, “the sanctions on Russia will continue to take an ever-increasing toll on the Russian population, affecting the society as a whole. Lifetime savings plummet with the free fall of the Russian ruble, and access to basic commodities, such as medicine and food, decreases rapidly with an increasing isolation from the international system”.
Following Butler, we might note that war divides populations, not only between friends and foes, but between grievable and ungrievable populations. In the light of this actual Russophobia, the current and future suffering of the Russian population risks not only being obscured but justified. Eventually, these sentiments will keep nourishing the idea of a radical division between Russia and “the West”, thus reinforcing the mantra that war is inevitable, even just.
——-
This article was originally published with the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies.
Neoliberal and Neocolonial Entanglements: Women Seeking Asylum in the US
Paloma had been in the immigration detention center for four days when I met her. While in confinement, she and her children had been given clothes and a room to share with other families. While discussing her asylum interview, I asked about her job in her native country. Taking her hand to the back of her neck and pulling up the tag of her t-shirt to show me the brand name, she said: “I used to work in a maquiladora for this company. I made these t-shirts!”
—Based on a story told to me during a 2016 interview with an NGO staffer working at an immigration detention center at the US–Mexico border
Each year, thousands of heteronuclear families cross the US–Mexico border, fleeing from the violence in their countries of origin and seeking asylum in the United States. Even though locking asylum-seekers up goes against the UNHCR guidelines, many of these women and their underage children end up confined in one of the family immigration detention centers in the US. Migration regimes today are based on deterrence rather than human rights, and the confinement of refugees has become a common practice across the world. In this article, I focus on how the inclusion of private actors in the migration management arena has resulted in corporations profiting from the confinement of populations who are fleeing violence. In this way, women like Paloma are subject to an endless cycle of exploitation, first in their countries of origin and then once they reach the Global North seeking asylum.
Neoliberalism and migration
Migrant detention, visa processing, border surveillance, transportation of detained migrants, offshore processing, and so on have all been privatized and are managed by corporations. These companies receive money from the government for each person they keep confined. In this way, states cooperate with private actors to carry out their work. These public–private agreements increase restrictive migration control policies. Migrant detention became commodified mostly after the 1980s. Within border securitization, confinement today has become one of the key elements in detention, and thus in the management of migrant and refugee populations. The origin of confinement as a common practice in immigration governance is connected to the securitization of migration; after 9/11, US border security merged and became the center of national security. The securitization rhetoric is based on the idea that migrants are potential threats—to security, culture, the economy—and this justifies the confinement of any foreign population. The combination of the demonization of migrants and the privatization of migration management increased migrant detention. For instance, in fiscal year 2018, a daily average of 42,188 migrants were held by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Even though there has been a notable decrease of migrant detention with the Biden administration, in 2021 during the pandemic, the number of migrants detained increased from 14,000 early in the year, to 27,000 in June. Similarly, President Biden has kept the Trump-era public health rule to deter migrants from crossing the border.
Immigration detention centers such as Campsfield in Oxford, UK, the South Texas Family Residential Center, and Curtin Immigration Reception and Processing Centre in Australia are run by private corporations. Extreme cases of privately run offshore processing centers include the ones Australia has set up in Papua New Guinea and Nauru, or the one that the United States has in Cuba—Guantánamo Bay. One element that facilitates the global homogenization detention regimes is the fact that many of the same large, for-profit corporations that run most private prisons operate in almost all the countries of the Global North. This is one means through which techniques of confinement get diffused across different countries. To get a broad overview of how neoliberalism has reached different places through the privatization of detention centers, consider that in the UK, seven out of the nine immigrant detention centers—and all of the short-term holding facilities—are run by multinational, for-profit companies; in the US, for-profit companies control more than half of the detention bed spaces; and in Australia, all immigration detention centers are run by private companies.
Neoliberalism has been a key feature in the expansion of the immigration and refugee detention system. Private and nonstate actors have gradually entered the border control arena, including the sensitive functions of detention and removal. Within immigration and refugee management, many logistical services, such as the transportation of migrants and asylum-seekers, provision of clothing, food and telephone services in detention centers, airborne deportation operations, processing of visa applications, security, prison management, drone vigilance, and so on, have been privatized. Similarly, other companies profit from the private management of prisons, such as those providing food services, maintenance, education, health services, bail services, and so on. Research shows how the privatization of prisons has led to understaffed centers, with less training, fewer benefits, high employee turnover rates, more accidents, and discouragement of unionization.
Confining migrants and asylum-seekers in detention centers costs US taxpayers approximately $2 billion each year. Today in the US, nine of the ten biggest ICE immigration detention centers are private, accounting for 62% of all ICE immigration beds operated by private corporations. Of this, GEO and CoreCivic combined operate 72% of the privately contracted ICE immigration beds. Occasionally, counties charge ICE above daily cost and thus they use immigration detainees to fund jails and other county services. In addition, a Washington Post investigation found that CoreCivic receives $20 million per month to detain women and children at the South Texas Family Detention Center regardless of how many women and children are actually held there. CoreCivic and GEO are two very profitable companies that expanded their combined share of the private immigrant detention industry from 37% to 45% in 2014. CoreCivic’s profits increased from $133 million in 2007 to $195 million in 2014, and it has a $1 billion contract with Homeland Security. Similarly, in that same period, GEO’s profits increased by 244%. The stocks in CoreCivic increased by 34% and those in GEO rose by 18% the day after Donald Trump was elected president. In addition, CoreCivic’s subsidiary TransCor America LLC is the largest prisoner transportation company in the United States. This company gets paid by per prisoner per mile and thus overcrowds its vehicles, limits food and water intake, and does not take bathroom breaks. TransCor generated a revenue of $4.4 million in 2014 and $2.6 million in 2016. This data shows that the trend of privatizing detention centers and related services, combined with the increase in the detention of immigrants and asylum-seekers, serves the interests of private corporations. Although these companies have been profitable over the years, some of them also have other activities that are not exclusively related to immigrant and refugee detention, such as cleaning, IT, and parking management services, and it is hard to know how much profit they earn from each area of business. In any case, if prison management were not a profitable business, these companies would most certainly not be investing in the sector. In addition, data shows that in the United States, alternatives to detention, such as letting border-crossers live in communities, can cost as little as 70 cents to $17 per day per person, in comparison to the $159 that ICE spends to detain one person for one day.
Women, neocolonialism and neoliberal regimes
As in franchise colonialism, women in the Global South are exploited for their labor and positioned in an interdependent economic relationship of uneven development. These are ongoing structures of domination that remain in place to this day. The failure to acknowledge the constitutive role of colonial exploitation in contemporary neoliberalism leads to weak representations of what is happening today in regard to the confinement of asylum-seekers. The Western world has a long history of confining and exploiting the bodies of women and people of color. It is not only through the exploitative form of labor and resource extraction that characterized colonialism—echoed by Paloma’s example of making t-shirts in a maquiladora in her country—that Western states profit from postcolonial subjects; here, profit emerges from the technologies of exclusion themselves, where passive, confined bodies produce profit from being “out of place” rather than through their labor. The demonized asylum-seeker is confined and profit is generated from the physical care of her body (housing, feeding, clothing, and transporting it). This is how corporations extract wealth from asylum-seekers’ bodies. Even though there are alternatives to immigrant detention, confining refugees in private facilities is a more lucrative business than having them live in the receiving communities.
The detention of asylum-seekers illuminates how global confinement systems work. As most refugees come from countries in the Global South, confinement is highly racialized and can therefore be seen as a part of the larger racist system of mass incarceration. Punishment regimes are shaped by neoliberalism and are substantively enforced by transnational corporations controlling the detention, transportation, and visa processing (among other things) of migrants and refugees, tasks that were formerly performed by the state.
Note: this piece is based on the chapter “Women for Profit: Seeking Asylum in the U.S., a Neocolonial Story,” in Dignity in Movement: Borders, Bodies and Rights, edited by Jasmin Lilia Diab, pp. 191–206. E-International Relations Publishing, 2021.
Winner of the Public Anthropologist Award 2022
We are pleased to announce that the winner of the Public Anthropologist Award 2022 is Catherine Besteman for her book Militarized Global Apartheid.
Catherine Besteman is Francis F. Bartlett and Ruth K. Bartlett Professor of Anthropology at Colby College. Throughout her career, she has worked on issues related to power dynamics that produce and maintain inequality, racism and violence, as well as collective efforts for social change.
Militarized Global Apartheid effectively addresses key instances of exploitation, inequality, and division in the contemporary world. The book is a lucid and nuanced exploration of the global hierarchies that, whether we are aware of it or not, have a devastating impact on the lives of many while creating privileges for a few others.
Read below to learn more about Catherine Besteman’s work.
————-
Antonio: Can you share with us your personal and professional trajectories that brought you to the publication of Militarized Global Apartheid?
Catherine: Militarized Global Apartheid is the culmination of several strands of research and praxis extending back to my first period of fieldwork in Somalia in the 1980s before the collapse of Somalia’s government and the eruption of civil war in 1991. My fieldwork was an interrogation of the impact of land tenure reform in the Jubba River Valley, which was really about the imposition of neoliberalism by Western aid agencies (Unraveling Somalia, 1999). As the war descended in the valley, the patterning of violence followed a neoliberal necropolitics of vulnerability. This latter question – how vulnerability to social abandonment and premature death is created and sustained – then also informed my next fieldwork in South Africa. That fieldwork engaged with the question of how a society consciously trying to address the legacy of apartheid can actually confront the history of intentionally structured inequalities and injustices in order to overcome them. South Africa’s inability to transform the history of racism and inequality in any overarching and significant way taught me a lot about how apartheid operates.
Concurrently, I was working with a group of anthropologists to form the Network of Concerned Anthropologists to oppose the use of anthropology by the U.S. military for counterinsurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. This work helped me think about militarism, terrorism, security, insurgency, and counterinsurgency in new ways, some of which resulted in two collections I co-edited with Hugh Gusterson (The Insecure American, 2009, and Cultures of Militarism, 2019). The centrality of racial imperialism to the US-led occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan mirrored the imposition of neoliberal mandates I had tracked in Somalia and elsewhere, bringing into the same frame of analysis racial capitalism, imperialist militarism, and counterinsurgency broadly defined.
As I was finishing my book on South Africa (Transforming Cape Town, 2008), I learned that people from the small community in Somalia where I had lived in the 1980s were resettling to Maine as refugees. We began a decade of intensive community and ethnographic work together as they figured out how to survive in the U.S. while also supporting their family members in Somalia and in refugee camps. This work, and writing Making Refuge (2016) about their experiences, added what Harsha Walia calls ‘border imperialism’ to my perspective.
Thinking through border imperialism in conjunction with my earlier work on neoliberalism, militarization, apartheid, and security brought a new focus to my understanding of how these structures operate together to create a set of global operations to manage labor and mobility for the benefit of capitalist and military objectives (which are often the same thing). Militarized Global Apartheid was my attempt to sketch out these operations as they iterate and support each other across the globe.
Antonio: How would you briefly explain the nexus of militarization and inequality in our world?
Catherine: Nation-state, corporate, and parastatal militarism exists to maintain those inequalities against which people struggle who are labelled dissidents, revolutionaries, insurgents, irregular migrants, and/or terrorists. Militarism takes many forms, stretching from the creation of carceral institutions (prisons, jails, heavily policed migrant and refugee camps, detention centers, offshore holding facilities) to the maintenance of standing armies and military bases, and from the various forms of technosurveillance to the use of police in schools. Military power is most often used to maintain unequal social orders and sustain an unequal and injust status quo.
Militarism begets militarism, so it is not surprising that revolutionaries or insurgents are also militarized in their efforts to overturn the state, overthrow imperialists, or reclaim resources lost to capitalist expropriation. That does not necessarily mean, of course, that revolutionaries or insurgents are always on the side of greater equality.
Antonio: How confident are you in the capacity of contemporary anthropology to effectively expose and face the profound hierarchies and injustices that affect individuals and collectivities?
Catherine: Well, I guess I would say that anthropology is one of the most powerful perspectives available in the academic world to expose the profound hierarchies and injustices of the world. Much contemporary anthropology seems, to me, to be fundamentally concerned with the operations of power, and the interest in what we now call public anthropology offers tools and methods for engaging others in these perspectives. I do believe this is our responsibility and purpose in anthropology. Anthropology itself is not a radical or revolutionary discipline but its insights can be critically valuable to radicals and revolutionaries.
Antonio: What are your future plans?
Catherine: Researching Militarized Global Apartheid brought me to a much more nuanced and profound awareness of carcerality as a normative feature of contemporary life in the US. Contemporary carcerality, with its roots in settler colonialism, plantation slavery, and overseas imperialism, is an ongoing form of violence in the name of social control and securitization that operates, much like militarized global apartheid, to support the interests of white supremacy, racial capitalism, and militarization. I follow the lead of scholars like Ori Burton and Dylan Rodriguez who understand carcerality as war. It is war. After immersing myself in scholarship and activist work on carcerality and abolition over the past several years, last fall I built a statewide, collaborative public humanities initiative to promote abolitionist visioning for Maine called Freedom & Captivity. That project turned me toward efforts to expand educational opportunities for incarcerated students and to grow connections through education and the creative arts for incarcerated and nonincarcerated people to build community together. I expect to be thoroughly engaged in this work for the rest of my career.
Giudici e giustizia in Afghanistan
Una magistratura indipendente e competente e’ un elemento fondamentale di un apparato statale stabile e affidabile, in Afghanistan come altrove. Quando i talebani hanno ripreso in mano l’Afghanistan nell’agosto del 2021, molti giudici, in particolare giudici donne, hanno ritenuto che non ci fosse piu’ spazio per loro nel paese.
Nel giugno 2020 ho intervistato la giudice Anisa Rasooli, la prima donna nominata alla Corte Suprema nella storia dell’Afghanistan. Durante l’intervista, Rasooli ha dichiarato: “Credo che il sistema giudiziario afgano stia riacquistando una certa decenza. Ci sono ancora problemi, ma sono in corso notevoli progressi. Se la situazione attuale persiste, sono ottimista sul futuro della magistratura in Afghanistan. Tuttavia, se questa tendenza si dovesse interrompere a causa di conflitti o disordini politici e sociali, nessuno sa quale potrebbe essere il futuro del sistema giudiziario. Spero davvero che questo non accada” (De Lauri 2020). Un anno piu’ tardi, le paure della giudice Rasooli sono diventate realta’ e si e’ sentita costretta a lasciare il paese nel contesto delle caotiche evacuazioni seguite al ritorno dei talebani a Kabul.
La giudice Rasooli non è l’unica ad aver lasciato il paese. Di recente ho intervistato un’altra giudice, Tayeba Parsa (vedi intervista completa sotto), che ha deciso di fuggire in Europa. Molti altri hanno seguito lo stesso percorso o tentano di farlo. In una fase storica complicata come quella attuale, si mischiano i percorsi di coloro che sono realmente in pericolo con coloro che, piu’ semplicemente e legittimamente, desiderano cambiare vita o sentirsi piu’ sicuri.
Certo, occorre sottolineare che la magistratura afgana era ben lungi dall’essere perfetta e ben funzionante anche prima dell’agosto 2021. La massiccia ricostruzione giuridica promossa dalla comunità internazionale negli ultimi venti anni non ha avuto particolare successo, anche a causa dell’incapacità di comprendere la specificita’ del sistema della giustizia afgana in cui convergono diverse fonti del diritto, come il diritto statale, il diritto islamico e le norme consuetudinarie (De Lauri 2012).
Dal 2001 in poi, un ampio processo di ricostruzione dell’Afghanistan e’ stato promosso e attuato da una miriade di organizzazioni internazionali e diversi governi, i cui obiettivi umanitari e di sviluppo si intrecciavano a interessi politici nella regione, alle logiche dell’occupazione militare, agli interessi economici e alle contese geopolitiche. Durante tutto il processo di ricostruzione, si e’ imposto un approccio atto a legittimare tutti gli interventi esterni in nome della modernizzazione producendo allo stesso tempo un’immagine dell’Afghanistan come una società bloccata nelle proprie tradizioni e resistente ai “miglioramenti” imposti dall’esterno. Questo atteggiamento può spiegare perche’, nel 2004, e’ stato promulgato un codice di procedura penale provvisorio senza la necessaria competenza in diritto islamico e conoscienza della societa’ afgana, rendendone quindi molto difficile l’utilizzo: diversi pubblici ministeri di Kabul, ad esempio, mi hanno detto che spesso dovevano bypassarlo. Saber Marzai, procuratore dell’11° distretto di Kabul, mi ha riferito il 12 marzo 2008: “La collaborazione tra procuratori e polizia e’ molto difficile. Spesso abbiamo degli scontri duri. Il lavoro non è stato agevolato dal Codice di procedura penale del 2004, che non e’ adatto al nostro sistema. Nella maggior parte dei casi dobbiamo aggirarlo […]. Peccato pensare al lavoro inutile che viene fatto; unamaggiore conoscenza del contesto afgano e un po’ di pazienza avrebbero portato a un risultato diverso” (De Lauri 2012). (Alcuni anni dopo questa intervista, il codice del 2014 ha sostituito quello del 2004.) Nel complesso, l’opportunità di una riforma comprensiva e stratificata del sistema della giustizia e’ stata sprecata durante i venti anni di ricostruzione e, oggi ancor di piu’, persiste un diffuso senso di sfiducia da parte dei cittadini afgani nei confronti della magistratura.
Tra gravi problemi legati alla corruzione, al nepotismo, all’influenza politica e alla segregazione di genere, la presenza delle donne nella magistratura e’ aumentata nel ventannio dell’intervento umanitario. Prima del ritorno al potere da parte dei talebani, vi erano circa 250-300 giudici donne nel paese, la maggior parte a Kabul, che rappresentavano circa l’8-10 per cento della magistratura nel suo insieme. Le evacuazioni seguite all’agosto 2021 e il clima di insicurezza nel paese hanno lasciato una magistratura estremamente compromessa. Questo e’ stato in effetti un dilemma per coloro che sono partiti e indirettamente per coloro che hanno facilitato le evacuazioni, inclusi diplomatici, ricercatori, associazioni di magistrati, ONG e così via. Infatti, mentre l’obiettivo principale in caso di circostanze gravi come un’evacuazione è sempre quello di proteggere vite umane, non si può ignorare che, per pochissimi che riescono a partire, vi e’ una stragrande maggioranza che deve fare i conti con la realta’ di un paese che ora affronta in tutte le sue dimensioni lo spettacolare fallimento di venti anni di intervento militare e umanitario che hanno reso l’Afghanistan ancora più dipendente dagli aiuti esteri. Un fallimento culminato in una evacuazione frettolosa e non adeguatamente gestita dagli Stati Uniti e dai suoi alleati, letteralmete l’opposto di quello che Joe Biden ha affermato essere un “successo straordinario”. La caduta di Kabul era assolutamente prevedibile e una transizione di potere, se questa era l’intenzione implicita dei primi negoziati tra Stati Uniti e Talibani, avrebbe dovuto essere meglio preparata.
Nelle complicate negoziazioni che avranno luogo tra la leadership talebana, i governi stranieri e le organizzazioni internazionali, occorre ora prestare attenzione a quegli aspetti che sono cruciali per la vita quotidiana degli afgani, compresa l’organizzazione e l’amministrazione della giustizia (oltre, ovviamente, a questioni urgenti come lavoro e salari, cibo, ecc.). Molte competenze sono andate perse con la fuga di molti giudici dal paese per garantire la propria sicurezza e quella delle proprie famiglie. Molta preoccupazione rimane nell’immagine quale sara’ il futuro della magistratura e piu’ in generale della giustizia in Afghanistan.
Intervista del 29 novembre 2021
Antonio De Lauri: Vuoi condividere la tua traiettoria personale e le esperienze che ti hanno portata a diventare giudice?
Tayeba Parsa: Alla vigilia dell’invasione sovietica dell’Afghanistan, i miei genitori fuggirono in Iran temendo cosa sarebbe successo se fossero rimasti, e determinati a evitare che mio padre venisse chiamato alle armi. Io e i miei fratelli abbiamo imparato a cucire per aiutare a sostenere la famiglia. Come nuovi arrivati in Iran, abbiamo potuto frequentare la scuola, ma l’accesso all’universita’ era limitato. Andavo cosi’ bene a scuola, tuttavia, che la mia famiglia edcise di tornare in Afghanistan per far si che potessi frequentare l’università. Quando si rivelo’ difficile per mio padre trovare lavoro a Kabul, decise di tornare in Iran e sostenere la famiglia da lontano, in modo che tutti noi potessimo continuare gli studi. Ho cinque sorelle e un fratello. Una famiglia composta in gran parte da donne è considerata debole in Afghanistan. Mio padre vedeva la possibilita’ di superare questa presunta debolezza dandoci la possibilita’ di studiare e rendendoci indipendenti, capaci di reggerci sulle proprie gambe.
Mi interessava il diritto e volevo diventare un avvocato per evitare che i diritti delle persone venissero violati, ma non volevo essere un giudice perche’ la mia immagine dei giudice era solo quella dei giudici che infliggono condanne. Il sistema giudiziario in Afghanistan era corrotto e la magistratura, cosi’ come il percorso per diventare giudici, erano inadeguati, pertanto non volevo essere un giudice penale e mettere in prigione persone senza avere la possibilita’ di valutare prove sufficienti. Ma dopo aver ricevuto il punteggio piu’ alto all’esame di ammissione alla magistratura, ho deciso di sfruttare quell’opportunità per acquisire maggiore familiarità con le leggi e i regolamenti dell’Afghanistan. Dopo la laurea abbiamo avuto l’opportunità di scegliere a quale settore giudiziario interessarci. Non volevo ancora diventare giudice in un tribunale penale, quindi ho scelto un tribunale commerciale per fare esperienza come giudice per pochi anni. Quando ho iniziato a lavorare come giudice, mi sono scontrato con il fatto che le leggi e i diritti delle persone venivano chiaramente violati a causa della corruzione e mi sono resa conto che avevo la capacita’ e persino l’autorita’ di fare qualcosa per proteggere le persone e applicare il diritto. Questa, in fondo, era la mia vera ambizione, quindi ho deciso di rimanere una giudice.
Antonio: Puoi descrivere la tua carriera di giudice?
Tayeba: Ero giudice nella divisione commerciale della corte d’appello della provincia di Kabul. Lavoravo sulle sentenze dei tribunali commerciali di primo grado della provincia di Kabul determinando se affermarle o revocarle. Le sentenze riguardavano, per esempio, contratti tra aziende e privati (nazionali ed esteri), casi di proprietà intellettuale, contratti di trasporto, controversie tra aziende e dipendenti. Nel tempo ho svolto diversi incarichi, tra cui quello di giudice della divisione civile della corte di primo grado della provincia di Kabul (2019-2021), in cui mi occupavo della determinazione dei fatti e delle legge applicabili in materia di proprietà, illeciti civili, cause civili e azioni di risarcimento danni; giudice nella divisione per gli affari pubblici della corte di primo grado della provincia di Kabul (2017-2019), con mansioni legate all’analisi e alle sentenze di cause in cui una delle parti era il governo, per dispute sulla proprietà, casi di diritto amministrativo e controversie tra dipendenti e il governo in quanto datore di lavoro; giudice presso il tribunale commerciale di primo grado della provincia di Kabul (2012–2017), in cui mi occupavo dell’analisi e delle sentenze nei casi di prestito bancario, contratti tra società nazionali e straniere e persone fisiche, casi di proprietà intellettuale, ecc.; assistente giudice presso la Corte Suprema (2011-2012) con mansioni di studio dei fascicoli e stesura di sintesi per ciascuna decisione delle corti di primo grado e di appello in materia di diritto civile.
Ci tengo a dire che faccio parte dell’International Association of Women Judges (IAWJ) e ho collaborato affinche’ l’Afghanistan Women Judges Association (AWJA) divenisse membro dell’IAWJ. Circa 250 giudici donne afgane sono ora membri dell’IAWJ.
Sono anche in contatto con giudici donne nel Regno Unito e abbiamo istituito un programma di tutoraggio per dieci giudici donne afgane. Ognuna di loro ha una referente nel Regno Unito con la quale si incontra regolarmente online.
Inoltre, partecipo alla Alliance for International Women’s Rights (AIWR) che si dedica al rafforzamento dei diritti delle donne in Afghanistan. Ho cercato di includere piu’ giudici donne afgane nel programma di tutoraggio dell’AIWR e ho chiesto alla giudice Anisa Dhanji del Regno Unito di stabilire collegamenti per tutte le giudici donne afgane.
Ho anche lavorato come istruttrice nella formazione per i giudici in Afghanistan in quanto docente di diritto commerciale e diritto amministrativo.
Antonio: Quali considerereste i maggiori ostacoli e sfide per una donna giudice in Afghanistan?
Tayeba: Come sai, per i talebani, essere semplicemente un giudice che lavorava nella precendente amministrazione puo’ essere una ragione sufficiente per essere uccisi senza processo. Non molto tempo fa, due giudici uomini sono stati assassinati dai talebani. In molti casi, per le donne giudici il pericolo e’ persino maggiore che per gli uomini. I talebani credono che le donne non debbano essere giudici perche’ sarebbe contrario all’Islam. Per questo motivo, era per noi prassi comune ricevere lettere dall’agenzia della sicurezza nazionale che ci avvertiva di rischi imminenti alla nostra incolumita’. Le minacce contro le donne giudici erano frequenti e provenivano da coloro che si opponevano al fatto che le donne fossero giudici o, peggio ancora, da coloro che non volevano affatto che le donne lavorassero. Le minacce a volte andavano oltre le lettere e le telefonate. Nell’Afghanistan occidentale, un gruppo di aggressori ha preso il controllo di un tribunale e ha massacrato ogni singolo dipendente. In un attacco suicida davanti alla Corte Suprema di Kabul, due giudici donne neolaureate, Mina e Zarghoona, sono state uccise. Siamo ancora addolorate per la perdita di due nostre sorelle giudici, Zakia e Qadria, che sono state nel gennaio 2021. A un certo punto i talebani hanno iniziato a sparare direttamente contro i giudici e a mettere mine sotto le loro auto. Alcune donne giudici si sono licenziate. La maggior parte ha continuato, nonostante i timori per le proprie famiglie, sapendo che quando uscivano di casa ogni mattina, potevano non tornare. Alcune hanno iniziato a portare armi per proteggersi.
I problemi che ho incontrato personalmente potrebbero essere riconosciuti dalle donne giudici di tutto il mondo: non essere presa sul serio, essere umiliata. Molte giudici donne sono state esclusivamente inpiegate nella corte per l’eliminazione della violenza contro le donne. In una occasione in cui vi era una posizione aperta la mia candidature e’ stata ignorata ed e’ stato selezionato un collega maschio meno qualificato, tanto e’ vero che poi mi hanno chiesto di aiutarlo. In un’altra occasione ho ricevuto pressioni per cambiare una sentenza e temevo che se non l’avessi fatto sarei stata trasferita come era successo ad altre mie colleghe. Nonostante mi sentissi intimidita, ho mantenuto la mia posizione. Come sai, in Afghanistan una giuria e’ composta da tre giudici. Una volta un giudice uomo mi insulto’ solamente perché non ero d’accordo con lui in una decisione del tribunale. Queste cose possono succedere, specialmente alle donne giudici.
Antonio: Quando i talebani sono tornati al potere nell’agosto 2021, hai deciso di lasciare il paese. Puoi descrivere quel momento e cosa ha significato per te?
Tayeba: Quando le province hanno cominciato a cadere una dopo l’altra, abbiamo deciso di scappare. Mia madre e mia sorella hanno ottenuto i visti per partire. Io e il mio fidanzato ci siamo sposati in fretta senza celebrazioni e il piano era di volare con mia madre una volta ricevuto il documento di matrimonio. Tuttavia non ci siamo riusciti. Proprio mentre guidavamo per incontrarci, abbiamo notato che tutte le strade venivano chiuse e ci siamo resi conto che i talebani avevano preso Kabul. Mio padre mi ha chiamata e mi ha detto di non tornare a casa perche’ c’erano molti posti di blocco. Mi ha detto che avrebbero potuto perquisire la mia macchina e scoprire la mia identita’. Ha detto di non guidare perché una donna alla guida potrebbe creare problemi. A quel punto ho detto a mia madre e mia sorella di partire senza di noi. Ho temuto che non le avrei piu’ riviste e ho pianto. Il loro volo è stato ritardato di 12 ore, ma alla fine sono riuscite a partire. Quella notte io e mio marito siamo rimasti in macchina fino a tardi. Ho visto che i soldati e la polizia buttavano le uniformi per non fari ricnoscere dai talebani. Mi sentivo in trappola e avevo paura, non solo dei talebani ma anche dei criminali che avrebbero potuto approfittare della situazione. Alla fine sia tornati a casa e non siamo usciti per tre giorni. Durante quei tre giorni sono stata in contatto con l’IAWJ e raccoglievo informazioni sulle giudici afgane per loro, perché stavano cercando di avviare un programma di evacuazione. Ho poi ricevuto una telefonata da uno studio di avvocati in Polonia in cui mi proponevano di evacuare, anche per un’intervista in cui mi ero espressa contro i talebani. Non avevo mai avuto intenzione di lasciare il mio paese o il mio lavoro. Ma ero una donna giudice di una minoranza etnica (hazara) e religiosa (sciita) ed ero stata in contatto con organizzazioni e istituzioni all’estero, cosa che alcuni talebani potrebbero considerare un crimine. Andarsene e’ stato doloroso. Sentivo di aver perso tutto cio’ che avevo ottenuto.
Non volevamo che i talebani scoprissero che stavamo partendo, quindi non abbiamo portato nessun bagaglio. Ho preso solo i miei documenti e alcuni libri che amo e che non potevo lasciare indietro. All’ingresso dell’aeroporto c’era un assembramento e i talebani picchiavano le persone. Sono rimasta di fronte all’ingresso senza cibo e senza dormire per 24 ore, poi finalmente sono riuscita a entrare. Mio padre e mio marito hanno aspettato altre 48 ore. Abbiamo lasciato l’Afghanistan con voli separati. Non hanno avuto niente da mangiare e nessun posto dove dormire per tre giorni. Poi ci siamo ricongiunti in Polonia.
Antonio: Qual è la situazione della magistratura ora in Afghanistan?
Tayeba: Per quanto ne so, la maggior parte dei giudici che hanno lavorato nell’amministrazione precedente sono stati licenziati e sono chiamati a rendere conto di quanto hanno fatto. La magistratura ha perso praticamente tutti i giudici competenti ed ora ci sono persino analfabeti, e la società in generale paghera’ il costo di questa situazione. Inoltre, le donne sono state eliminate dalla magistratura. Avere donne nella magistratura era un grande traguardo che è stato perso rapidamente.
Antonio: Quali sono i tuoi progetti personali adesso?
Tayeba: Credo che nessuno possa sopportare la crudelta’ dei talebani e la mancanza di democrazia e stato di diritto. Quindi, un giorno, gli afgani si riprenderanno il loro paese e di nuovo la democrazia regnerà. E voglio prepararmi per quel giorno imparando e studiando per ricostruire la nostra societa’. Credo che molte avversita’ in Afghanistan derivino dalla mancanza di conoscenza. Quindi spero di ottenere una borsa di studio e di poter studiare e acquisire esperienza internazionale che potrò utilizzare per il mio paese in futuro. Ho lavorato e studiato nel campo del diritto per 16 anni e non voglio abbandonare la mia carriera. Spero di sfruttare questa opportunita’ di vivere in Europa per migliorare le mie competenze e servire la comunità internazionale. Spero un giorno di poter tornare in Afghanistan e contribuire a migliorare lo stato di diritto e la democrazia per la mia nazione. Fino a quel giorno voglio continuare a sostenere lo stato di diritto attraverso entità internazionali e fare pressione sui talebani affinché applichino lo stato di diritto.
Poiche’ tutti i membri della mia famiglia sono dispersi (alcuni di loro sono scappati in Iran, altri in Polonia, e presto dovro’ lasciare i miei genitori e andare in un paese di lingua inglese, che non rilascera’ un visto per i miei genitori), la mia speranza e’ che un giorno potremo vivere di nuovo tutti insieme nello stesso paese.
Riferimenti bibliografici
De Lauri, A. 2012. Afghanistan. Ricostruzione, ingiustizia, diritti umani. Mondadori, Milano.
De Lauri, A. 2020. Women Judges in Afghanistan: An Interview with Anisa Rasooli. CMI Insight, https://www.cmi.no/publications/7268-women-judges-in-afghanistan-an-interview-with-anisa-rasooli
The Poland-Belarus Border: A Conversation with Marta Bivand Erdal
Saumya: Could you share a little about your research on migration?
Marta: I am a human geographer, and I am interested in emigration as well as immigration and transnational ties that result from people moving from one place to another, but who have family members and close people in other places around the world. An important part of my research is on migration, development and remittances. Regionally, I am very interested in South Asia and my PhD was about remittance sending to Pakistan. Currently, I’ve started working on a project focusing on the interactions between social mobility and spatial mobility. I am looking at middle classes in four Asian cities namely, Karachi, Mumbai, Hanoi and Manilla. I am interested to find out what kind of roles have migrations of different sorts played in families becoming middle classes today in these cities.
Another important part of my research is based on work which I have done with interviews, focus groups and survey data in Norway about immigration and migrant experiences of life in this society, on questions of social cohesion and migration related diversity, including the religious aspects of this, which often get subsumed within migration related diversity. Writ large, these are questions about nationhood and its plurality, and about what it means to be a citizen.
My research interests also include migration in the Polish case. The reason for that is a combination of several factors—I was born in Poland and moved to Norway when I was three years old, I speak Polish fluently, and after Poland joint the European Union in 2004 more emigration took place from Poland to other countries in the EU and in the European Economic Area, and Norway is part of that. So, suddenly there were more and more Polish people coming to Norway. There was also more societal and research interest in Polish migration, especially because these migrants mainly came to work, but as often is the case with migrants who work, they also have lives and often stay longer than perhaps even they themselves and the society they move to assumes at the beginning. After I completed my PhD I was part of a research project, which was looking at the possibilities and realities of return migration with a focus on migrants from Poland in Norway. Gradually, I also continued to work on different topics linked to migration from Poland, including external voting and diaspora political engagements. I appreciate being able to do research in Polish and reflect on the ways in which the insider-outsider roles as a migration researcher play out differently in different contexts. There are all sorts of questions about researcher positionality depending on identity and language and how these things are often less linear than we assume them to be.
Saumya: How would you describe the current Poland-Belarus border migrant “crisis” or the humanitarian crisis?
Marta: This is sadly, a relevant and timely question. First, I would like to take a step back—how we use the word crisis in relation to migration is something we need to think about. Like you say, this is a crisis at the border. It is interesting to reflect on how in different countries and close to different borders, the border crossing of people is frequently described as a crisis. When these events are described as a migrant crisis or immigration crisis, migrants are directly associated with this word. I am concerned about the ways in which the word provokes ideas of migrants somehow being responsible for the crisis and also that it suggests that it’s a state of exception.
Instead, what I’d say is that what we see, time and again, is that crises at borders are border management or control crises. So, there is a crisis and it’s about how the state is trying to control the border and that is what is being put to test. As you also said, this becomes a humanitarian crisis because there are people involved. In this particular context, there are people on the Poland-Belarus border who have been dying and many more suffering at the border, on both sides of it.
It is also worth mentioning that this is not unique. The scenes which have been unfolding along this particular border, are familiar, in the sense that we have been seeing walls and fences, and people trying to traverse them, with border guards trying to hinder that, in different places, over the past few decades. One might consider the border between the US and Mexico, the Channel between France and the UK, as well as of course the Mediterranean Sea with the many different countries which surround it. These are well-known contexts where people have been dying while trying to cross into states that have not wanted to accept these border crossings, and who have in different ways effectively been stopping people from crossing in. This has caused both deaths and human suffering.
I think it is important to reflect on how this came about. My perspective as a migration researcher is that the “crisis” is a symptom of a bigger problem concerning overall migration management. Here, a clear responsibility lies with those managing the provision of legal pathways of migration. The Global Compact for Migration, which came from the United Nations in 2018, and which was finally endorsed also by the US, in late 2021, emphasizes legal and safe pathways to migration. Simultaneously, there is a critical need for real options to seek asylum for the people who are fleeing a well-founded fear of persecution and who are entitled to protection as refugees, under the 1951 Refugee Convention, which as we know, is quite narrow and does not fit the reality of many people who we might in an everyday sense see as fleeing for their lives. But there are people who do fit the 1951 convention definition, and still even they do not have a safe way of accessing the opportunity to ask for international protection.
So, while it is possible to gain asylum in Europe, or to work here, and over time become regularized in some countries, when you have actually entered in an irregular fashion, it is hard to square that with the official position that irregular border crossing is both impossible and unwanted. Essentially, there is a degree of speaking with two tongues here, if you will, and I think in this sense it is fair to say that European states are engaging in the mismanagement of migration. That is what I would describe as the crisis in the European context. Not only do we have a legal and moral obligation to offer sanctuary to refugees, we also need the work effort of so many of those people who are at the moment risking their lives in order to come to European countries. Poland, for example, has been one of the top countries in the EU granting work permits to people coming from outside the EU, in recent years. While these legal migration pathways do exist, for those who die at Europe’s borders, it seems the approach to managing safe and legal pathways is developing too slowly, and for some people ultimately, too late.
Saumya: What do you think is the historical and geopolitical context of the Poland-Belarus border “crisis”?
Marta: We are now speaking in late January 2022, and this unfolding situation on the Poland-Belarus border has been going on since the summer of 2021. It’s interesting to look at some existing materials, for instance a double webinar with researchers offering analysis and commentary on this coming from journalists and scholars who are based in Poland, not least at the Centre for Migration Research at the University of Warsaw. At the moment, in terms of the global political scene, the Poland-Belarus situation is not high up on the agenda. However, struggles for migrants persist: the NGOs that are working in the area are reporting that in the first three weeks of 2022 there are several hundred migrants in the border areas, on the Polish side, who have been asking for support and medical help, including at least 50 children who they have been offering support to. So, this situation at the Poland-Belarus border has not ended, and that is perhaps an important recognition, months on from when this issue first was in international news headlines.
From the Polish government’s perspective, a short-term goal is to build a wall along this border. Different types of fencing have been in place along this border, throughout the second half of 2021. However, now the Polish government is starting to build a wall, which is causing a lot of debate and concern in Poland, and for very different reasons. One dimension here is that this border region is in a part of Europe where the borders are really not naturally formed, but politically and historically constructed, which of course is not unique to this corner of the world at all. Many people who live in these border regions are communities that have been interconnected historically. It’s worth remembering that a border is in essence something that should be understood as a mechanism of both separation and connection, as an interface.
Another set of issues relates to how major constructions are expected to happen in a democratic society. Normally, there should be some kind of feasibility study, considering what kind of impacts a major infrastructure intervention, such as a huge wall along a border, would or might have on livelihoods, existing infrastructure, on the people who live there, nature and wildlife, and so on.
So, something that has come up is that this wall will in effect divide the vast and ancient Białowieża Forest, which is a UNESCO World Heritage site, with nature and wildlife that need protection. Imagine what constructing this huge wall might mean in this context? Since this has been projected as an exceptional “crisis” mode, things have not been properly investigated in this regard. That’s a huge concern and illustrates why these things are deeply problematic under the rubric of an exceptional frame.
Furthermore, there are serious concerns being raised by the political opposition in Poland about the ways in which the contracts to build these walls are being given to particular actors. Of course, we know that in countries where governments are democratically elected and accountable to the electorate, there is a requirement for transparency in terms of how public funds are used and there must be processes for these types of acquisitions. Now if these rules are not followed, due to “crisis” mode, where is the transparency and how can one trust the process through which this happens?
There are also protests around the wall being constructed in the villages in the border region, and a politicized debate around, not just the wall, but even about these protests: how many protestors were there, who funds them and why did they really want to protest. This degree of politicization illustrates not only how contentious this wall is but also reflects the polarized nature of Polish political debate and the public sphere, in many ways. However, the situation in Poland is also not just binary; within the government the Ombudsman for human rights has had access to the border areas which have been restricted for NGOs and the media, for instance. And there are indeed NGOs who have been trying to monitor the situation, and provide assistance, also legal activists and lawyers who are trying to mobilize and assist migrants in need of legal assistance. There is also independent media in Poland who are consistently reporting on the situation, even if the media is restricted from a prohibited area along the border itself.
To return to the point of departure of your question here, on the geopolitical aspects. While we may assume this is well-known, the bizarre way in which this crisis of border control was caused, it is worth reiterating. Much has been said about the weaponization of migrants – in this case, where migrants have been flying to Minsk, from various airports (such as from Bagdad, but also from airports in Turkey) with entry permission into Belarus. Paying a lot for their airfare and entry too. Thereafter people have been transported in various ways to the Belarus border, both with Lithuania and Poland. Clearly, the geopolitical backdrop here is particular, and deeply troubling, but as other researchers have pointed out, the focus on weaponization of migrants is at the same time also a convenient way of detracting attention from the fact that legal options for entering Europe in order to apply for asylum in reality are meagre.
Saumya: As a researcher where do you place yourself with respect to the method and positionality in understanding the current situation on the Poland-Belarus border?
Marta: So, I haven’t done research in Poland on the situation unfolding at the border, I have been following it as a migration researcher though and following it as also someone who speaks Polish and understands the Polish context quite well. I guess it’s also relevant that the lens through which I’ve been reading and listening to the reports here, is also as someone who is concerned about the political developments in Poland, but also often frustrated with what I perceive as frequently one-sided and quite superficial media coverage pertaining to Central and Eastern Europe, in Western media, including in Norway. I think it’s important to understand what people on ground have to say about what is happening in the border area, and the media reports that have included locals in the border area, for instance, really help shed light on the unfolding reality there. There are a couple of methodological and ethical reflections that come out of this, which I could share.
First, who do you listen to and whose voices do you have access to? In relation to situations where migrants are central, do we only speak to migrants, or to those who speak about migrants? There is an increasing acknowledgement that we need to include other voices that are present—relatives of migrants back home, state actors, civil society, or other people living in the border area. So, in this context, I’ve tried to follow news reports of journalists on radio who have been speaking with people in the border region. Of course, the border guards on the Polish side live in these same local areas, it is their friends and families who have also been among those who have been lighting lights to signal to migrants that its safe for them to come to their house for food or a shower. I think there is a methodological reflection in this which is quite basic: to care for nuances, subtleties and the very banal fact that humanity exists within these types of contexts. We need to understand that there are humans on the Belarus side too, and we may not know why they are doing what they are doing exactly, who is organizing or paying exactly, but we do know that Belarus is not a free country. So, we can use our imagination a little bit to understand that those human beings also have their stories, their families, and probably their own reflections about what it is they are being a part of here. The humanizing aspect can and often ought to be brought in to overcome simplistic binary narratives.
A second methodological point is related to proximity and distance. So, how does this border crisis compare to other situations described in similar terms? I am thinking about the US- Mexico border, and what is happening in the Channel between France and UK, and the measures and pushbacks implemented there and what kind of responses that have entailed. And around the Mediterranean, countries like Turkey, Libya, Greece, Italy and Spain have been part of similar situations. So, what kind of angle should we have as researchers in terms of proximity and distance? When should one bring out the particularities or uniqueness of the context of a given situation, and when should one generalize? There is a balancing act here, in terms of exactly this sort of proximity and distance; about essentializing and generalizing, and when generalizing might slip into trying to make narratives fit a frame which we would like them to. I have this sort of slight worry about the ways in which we approach and write about these things, both when we are very close, and when we are perhaps too far away.
A third and last methodological point relates to the role we have as researchers. There have been these longstanding conversations within the field of humanitarianism, but also refugee studies and migration studies, about how research and activism do or do not go together, how they should or should not go together. I think this is about power, positionality, and questions of co-producing knowledge. In this particular context, there are many rich reflections on these issues from research colleagues in Poland, who have gone to the border areas and have tried to help. It then becomes a real and existential question of who you are, not just as a migration researcher, but also as a person. It brings home dilemmas and questions that for many migration scholars who are far away from the borders they might study most of the time, are not as present in their everyday lives, as has been the case in the past half year or so in the Polish context.
I do think there are a lot of dilemmas here, around which roles we take, how we take them and what we do. I also think there is an ethical responsibility for researchers to take those dilemmas seriously and make the choices that we have to make based on where we are, the values we hold, the type of research we engage in, and of course also knowing that as researchers, we are very differently positioned in terms of whether we have permanent contracts or not, seniority levels, gender, and many other aspects that define what we have the space and freedom to do. The way in which Polish researchers are engaging I think illustrates the dilemmas, but also offers lessons that perhaps we as researchers elsewhere might have much to learn from as well.
How Others See Us: Anthropologists, WikiLeaks, and the Vertical Slice
This essay draws on Laura Nader’s urging for anthropologists to study up, to consider how their work is used by those in power, and to consider where anthropological knowledge fits within a vertical slice connecting a scattering of anthropologists, research subjects, state actors, and nation states. Nader’s notion of the vertical slice—which focuses on how individual segments of society relate to each other in hierarchical power relations—helps us to consider how power structures shape social formations. The dataset used for this paper’s analysis comes from one of the most significant leaks of the Twenty First Century, the so-called Manning Cables (sometimes referred to as the “Cablegate” files) that were leaked to WikiLeaks in 2009 by Chelsea Manning, and which WikiLeaks began publishing in February 2010. These diplomatic communiques are as a body referred to as “cables,” though the more recent one were originally emails; this designation of “cables” refers to the earliest technology used to transmit these communication which were known as “diplomatic telegrams” (sometimes referred to as DipTel) or as embassy cables, which were confidential communications sent between diplomats stationed around the globe. Chelsea Manning was court martialed for various espionage related charges associated with the leaking of documents to WikiLeaks and was sentenced to 35 years in prison. Her sentence was later commuted to seven years by a presidential order issued by President Barack Obama, and she was released from confinement in May 2017—though she was later imprisoned again after refusing to testify before a grand jury investigating WikiLeaks.
This leak made public over 250,000 cables, dating from 1966–2010, coming from 274 United States’ consulates, embassies, and diplomatic missions located in 180 countries. These cables were a mix of unclassified and classified documents, and as such they provide an incredible sample of the larger universe of US Department of State cable traffic, a universe which is generally hidden from public scrutiny.
While many of the more sensational documents from this massive leak made significant news headlines (such as those relating to US military activities in Afghanistan and Iraq) soon after Wikileaks published these documents, there remains a wealth of more mundane information worth studying; information that can help us understand a range of significant topics relating to the American empire. This paper draws on one of the thousands of subsets of data in this record cache: it examines what these documents reveal about how the US State Department views, interacts with, conceives of, and ignores anthropologists and the field of anthropology.
Seeing Like a State Department: WikiLeaks and the Anthropologists
While the Manning Cables reveal many shocking details of illegal and unethical behavior of US civilian and military actors around the globe, beyond these startling revelations, this dataset provides us was a unique view into what is essentially the mundane realism of state department functionaries daily work.
My interest in this collection draws on Laura Nader’s conception of the vertical slice—essentially a heuristic device to help contextualize various actors’ positions within extant power structures, a tool that can help us consider how anthropology and the work of anthropologists is consumed and viewed by others within the US international political apparatus focused on maintaining US global hegemony.
These Manning Cables provide a unique view of mostly non-public interactions between State Department employees in embassies, consulates and Washington, D.C., and with a scattering of anthropologists. Using the WikiLeaks search engine, searching the Manning Cables for the terms “anthropology,” “anthropologist,” and “anthropological,” I identified 122 cables containing the term “anthropology,” 82 for “anthropologist,” and 31 for “anthropological,” after checking for multiple listings of the same cables, I found these terms appear in 207 unique Manning Cables. The below discussion summarizes the contexts in which anthropology appears in these cables and excerpts passage and critically analyzes anthropology’s appearance in the Manning Cables.
The Manning Cables document no single type of anthropological interaction with the U. S. Department of State. These cables instead show a range of ways that State Department employees interact with anthropological knowledge, or perhaps more significantly they reveal how the State Department views anthropologists, and the emerging narrative finds anthropologists performing many different roles for this audience. These roles include, anthropologists speaking truth to power—sometimes with information that power appears unwilling or unable to understand; advisors appearing to adjust their views to better coalesce with State’s mindset; consultants at times apparently destined to have their work taken out of context and used in ways that would likely make little sense to them; and informing US Consulate or Embassy personnel of developments in remote regions away from the capital or urban centers.
These types of interactions are familiar to most anthropologists engaging with various power structures, though the particulars of these engagements have some unique elements.
Read the full article on Public Anthropologist journal
The Judiciary and the Evacuation: Interview with Afghan Judge Tayeba Parsa
Antonio: Would you like to share your personal trajectory and the experiences that led you to become a judge?
Tayeba: On the eve of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, my parents fled to Iran, fearing what would happen if they remained, and determined to avoid my father being conscripted. My siblings and I learned tailoring to help to support the family. As newcomers to Iran, we were able to attend school, but access to university was restricted. I did so well at school, however, that my family returned to Afghanistan so that I could attend university. When it proved difficult for my father to find work in Kabul, he returned to Iran and supported the family from there, so that I and my younger siblings at least could go to university. I have five sisters and one brother. A family made up largely of girls is regarded as weak in Afghanistan. My father saw the possibility of overcoming that weakness if the girls were educated and were able to stand on their own two feet.
I was interested in law and wanted to become a lawyer to prevent people’s rights being violated, but I did not want to be a judge because my image of being a judge was only as a criminal judge. The judicial system in Afghanistan was corrupt, and the judicial and educational systems were imperfect and not modernized, so I did not want to be a criminal judge and put people in jail without sufficient evidence. But after I received the highest score on the entrance examination for the judiciary, I decided to use the opportunity to become more familiar with the laws and regulations of Afghanistan. After graduation we had the opportunity to choose which court we were interested in. I still did not want to become a judge in a criminal court, so I chose commercial court in order to gain experience working as a judge for just a few years (because I did not want to remain a judge, I wanted to become a lawyer). When I started working as a judge, I observed that laws and people’s rights were clearly being violated as a result of corruption, and I realized that I had the ability and even the authority to prevent it, to protect people and implement the rule of law and justice. That was my ambition, so I decided to remain a judge.
Antonio: Can you describe your career as a judge?
Tayeba: I was a judge in the commercial division of the appeals court of Kabul province. I assessed the court decisions of the primary commercial courts of Kabul province, determining whether to affirm or reverse them. Cases included contracts between national and foreign companies and individuals, intellectual property cases, foreign exchange cases, transport contracts, disputes between companies and their employees, and others. I have worked in several different courts, including:
Judge in the Civil Division of the Primary Court of Kabul Province, Fourth District, June 2019–May 2021: Determining the applicable facts and law and issuing rulings on property, tort, and civil cases, and suits for damages.
Judge in the Public Rights Division of the Primary Court of Kabul Province, Fourth District, December 2017–June 2019: Analysing and ruling on lawsuits where one of the parties was the government, including property cases, administrative law cases, and disputes between employees and the government as employer.
Judge in the Primary Commercial Court of Kabul Province, June 2012–December 2017: Analysing and ruling on bank loan cases, contracts between national and foreign companies and individuals, intellectual property cases, foreign exchange cases, transport contracts, car businesses, and disputes between companies and their employees.
Judge Assistant in the Civil and Public Rights Division of the Supreme Court of Afghanistan, July 2011–June 2012: Studying the complete case files and drafting summaries for each primary and appellate court decision on property law and civil law cases for the judges.
I am a member of the International Association of Women Judges (IAWJ) and have been in touch with them for about a year. I have been collaborating with IAWJ judges and expanding the international relations and communication efforts of the Afghanistan Women Judges Association (AWJA). Thanks to my outreach efforts, the IAWJ has registered the AWJA as a member organization. As part of that effort, I provided and translated the AWJA’s founding documents for registration with the IAWJ and provided a list of Afghan women judges and their contact information so they could obtain IAWJ membership. As a result, about 250 Afghan women judges are now IAWJ members and their membership dues have been waived. I also arranged to bring approximately 30 Afghan women judges to the biennial conference of the IAWJ. I gave a speech at the regional meeting of the conference on the security problems and Taliban threats faced by Afghan women judges, detailing our concerns over the peace negotiations with the Taliban.
I also translated the news about the assassination of two women judges by the Taliban in January in Kabul, as well as the judges’ biographies, for the IAWJ. The IAWJ then issued a statement about the problems faced by Afghan women judges and called on the international community to support us. I rendered the statement to the Chief Justice in person and he published it on the website of the Supreme Court at my request.
I am also in touch with women judges from the UK. Working with my UK colleagues, I established a mentoring programme for ten Afghan women judges. Each of them has a mentor from the UK with whom they meet regularly online.
In addition, I am a participant in the Alliance for International Women’s Rights (AIWR), which is dedicated to enhancing women’s rights in Afghanistan. I have been trying to include more Afghan women judges in AIWR’s mentor programme, and I have asked Judge Anisa Dhanji from the UK to establish connections for all the Afghan women judges.
I have worked as an instructor in the judicial training of the judiciary of Afghanistan, as a lecturer on Commercial Law and Administrative Law, and in courses with the Hamida Barmaki Institution (Max Planck).
Before becoming a judge, I worked for the Legal Aid Organization of Afghanistan (LAOA) as a legal counsellor and instructor in advocate courses. I prepared draft defense statements; advised clients in family, criminal, and juvenile law cases; and taught inheritance law, the defense lawyers’ code, juvenile law, evidence, and legal research.
I was Assistant Director of the Cultural Committee of the AWJA from 2012 to 2016. We conducted law seminars and training sessions for women judges in capacity building.
Antonio: What would you consider to be the major obstacles and challenges for a woman judge in Afghanistan?
Tayeba: As you know, for the Taliban, simply being a government judge is enough reason to be killed without trial. Recently two male judges were murdered by the Taliban the moment the Taliban discovered the men were judges. Often, for women judges the danger is even greater than for men. The Taliban believe that women are forbidden from being judges by the rules and regulations of Islam. So, it was common to receive multiple letters from the national security agency warning us about imminent risks, and also threatening phone calls from the parties themselves. Threats against women judges were always more acute and came from those who were opposed to women being judges, and even worse, from those not wanting women to be a part of the workforce at all.
The threats sometimes went beyond letters and calls. In western Afghanistan, a group of attackers took over the entire courthouse and massacred every single employee. In a suicide attack in front of the Supreme Court in Kabul, two newly graduated female Afghan judges, Mina and Zarghoona, were killed. We are still grieving the loss of two of our sister judges, Zakia and Qadria, who were killed in January. At one point the Taliban changed the forms of their attacks and started shooting directly at government judges and putting mines under their cars instead of using bomb attacks. Some women judges quit. Most continued, despite their families’ fears, knowing that when they left home each morning, they might not return. Some started to carry guns to protect themselves.
The problems I personally encountered might be recognized by women judges all over the world—of not being taken seriously, of being humiliated, and also, I was passed over when there was an opening for a new head of my court although I was clearly the best qualified. A young male judge was appointed instead, and then I was asked to help him. Women were symbolically appointed as the heads of family and the elimination of violence against women courts. On a more threatening level, I was once pressured by some corrupt judges to change a decision and feared that if I did not, I would be relocated to the provinces, as had happened to some of my colleagues. Despite feeling intimidated, I held my ground.
As you know, in Afghanistan a panel comprising three judges makes the decision in each case. Once there was a judge who shouted at me and insulted me only because I disagreed with him in a court decision. These things can happen, especially to women judges.
Antonio: When the Taliban took over in August 2021, you decided to leave the country. Can you describe that moment and what it meant for you?
Tayeba: When the provinces were falling one by one, we decided to escape. My mother and my sister secured visas. My fiancé and I got married, without a wedding party, and the plan was to fly with them after receiving our marriage document. However, while driving in the city we observed that all the roads were closed and realized that the Taliban had taken Kabul. My father called me and told me not to come home because there were Taliban members at the checkpoints. He told me they might search my car and discover my identity. He said do not drive yourself, because you driving may make them angry. I told my mother, do not miss the flight, at least you can save my sister. My mother and my sister ran to the airport. As I watched them running away, I thought it was the last time I would see my mother and it made me cry. Their flight was delayed by 12 hours, but finally they were able to depart. I stayed in the car until night. I saw that the soldiers and police had taken off their uniforms in order to disguise their identity. I felt I was trapped and I was afraid, not only of the Taliban but also of criminals and thieves who might take advantage of the situation. A judge from the IAWJ had called me and told me to be careful because the Taliban had opened the prisons and released all the prisoners. Finally, my husband drove me home. We did not leave the house for three days. During those three days I was in touch with the IAWJ and I was collecting information on Afghan women judges for them, because they were trying to start an evacuation programme.
After Kabul fell, as I said, I was at home for three days. I was gathering up documents in order to hide them and destroying case notes to hide my identity. I was the first judge to receive a call from a Polish lawyer about evacuation because of an interview in which I had spoken out against the Taliban. I had never wanted to leave the country or my job. But I was a female judge from the Hazara ethnic and religious (Shi’a) minority, and I had been in touch with foreigners, something the Taliban would consider an unforgivable crime. If I had remained, I am certain I would have been killed. But leaving was painful. I felt I had lost all I had achieved.
We did not want the Taliban to find out we were leaving so we did not carry any luggage. I only took my documents and some legal books that I love and could not leave behind. It was so crowded in front of the gate. The Taliban were shooting and beating people. I stood at the gate without food or sleep for 24 hours. Finally, I was able to enter the airport. My father and my husband waited a further 48 hours for their flights. We left Afghanistan on separate flights. They had nothing to eat and nowhere to sleep for three days. Then they joined me in Poland.
Antonio: What is the situation of the judiciary now in Afghanistan?
To my knowledge, most judges who worked in the previous government have been fired and are being called to account. The judiciary has lost all its professional judges and is now conducted by illiterate and inexperienced people, and the society at large will bear the cost. Moreover, women have been eliminated from the judiciary. Having women in the judiciary was a great achievement that was lost so quickly.
Antonio: What are your personal plans now?
I believe no one can endure the cruelty of the Taliban and the lack of democracy and rule of law. So, one day, Afghans will take back their country and again democracy will govern. And I want to prepare for that day by learning and studying to rebuild our society. I believe many adversities in Afghanistan come from lack of knowledge. So I hope to get a scholarship and be able to study and work in legal areas, and to gain international experience that I will be able to use for my country in the future. I have worked and studied in the field of law for 16 years and do not want to abandon my career. I hope to use this opportunity of living in Europe to improve my qualifications and serve the international community. I hope one day I can return to Afghanistan and help improve the rule of law and democracy for my nation. Until that day I want to continue to support the rule of law through international entities and to pressure the Taliban to uphold the rule of law.
I will probably try to stay in an English-speaking country because of the advantage of knowing the language. It would be difficult to become proficient in another language for use in the legal sector.
As all my family members are scattered (some of them escaped to Iran, some to Poland, and soon I will need to leave my parents and go to an English-speaking country, which will not issue a visa for my parents), my hope is that one day we will be able to live together in the same country again.
Photo: Tayeba Parsa in her courthouse.
Here you can read an interview with judge Anisa Rasooli.
Suggested by Public Anthropologist: Margaret Mead
Public Anthropologist‘s suggested reading today is Margaret Mead by Paul Shankman.
Mead is arguably one of the most prominent anthropological figures of the twentieth century, an influential scholar who loved her public role, as Robin Fox emphasized in 1978 on the New York Times. Shankman’s book revisits Mead’s professional and personal trajectory by offering an accessible and informative introduction for anyone interested in learning more about the work and life of one of the firsts public anthropologists.