Paper short abstract:

I will investigate and compare four different positions of illegality in two different national contexts. Legal and institutional practices on the one hand produce the conditions for migrant illegality as such, but are also decisive for both the lived experience as irregular migrant and the opportunities for agency and strategizing among migrants.

Paper long abstract:

Drawing on my ethnografic research in Denmark and Spain, I will in this paper investigate and compare four different positions of migrant illegality in two different national and legal contexts.

1. the transition from invisible irregular migrant to visible deportee (rejected asylumseeker in Denmark),

2. the position and everyday life as irregular migrant and visible ethnic minority (rejected asylum seeker in Denmark)

3. the position caused by transition from legal resident to irregular migrant (withdrawal of permitted family unification in Denmark)

4. the transition from legal resident (au pair in Denmark) to the position as irregular migrant (domestic worker in Spain)

Legal and institutional practices on the one hand produce the conditions for migrant illegality as such, but are also decisive elements in both the lived experience as irregular migrant and the opportunities for agency and strategizing. Differences in migration regimes and rationalities of government become visible comparing lived experiences in the Danish and the Spanish context of migrant illegality, given that the former produces a high degree of uncertainty and exclusion from human and social rigths, whereas the latter produces a relatively lower degree of uncertainty through access to some social rights and the possibility of regularisation. Different regimes or governmentalities creates different levels of experienced deportability which is important in order to understand different forms of agency and resistance.

However also gender, age, ethnicity, labour market opportunities, family relations and transnational networks influence the way the actual position of migrant illegality is lived and performed by the migrant.