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Paper short abstract:

Drawing on the Daniel Trottier's notions of surveillance (2012) and “digital vigilantism” (2017), this paper proposes a methodological framework to reveal and describe the ingroup vigilance that intends to detect threats in international marriages.

Paper long abstract:

Under the pressure of law, that restricts extra-legal enforcement, many offline vigilant activities were translated online - into doxing, flagging, investigating, public shaming, leaking etc. Social media users often (re)formulate state security policies and act online as non-state actors on behalf on national states.

This article critically examines discourses on marriages between German men and women from Third countries that users articulate on one of the most popular Facebook groups of Russian-speaking migrants in Germany. Drawing on the Daniel Trottier's notions of surveillance (2012) and “digital vigilantism” (2017), a total of 114 wall posts and 24, 915 comments was subdivided into 5 large categories and qualitatively analyzed. The paper proposes a methodological framework to reveal and describe the ingroup vigilance that intends to detect threats in international marriages. The analysis shows that Facebook vigilant discourses are interlinked with micro level stereotypes both in Germany and in Russia as well as macro level regulations, where marriage is seen as a migration strategy and a misuse of intimate relationships. To a certain extent commentators function as guardians of the German migration system being simultaneously critical about Merkel’s migration policies. Attitudes towards migrant partners bear features of gender and nationalistic discrimination.

* Trottier, D. 2012. Social Media as Surveillance. Routledge: London and New York.

Trottier, D. 2017. Digital vigilantism as weaponisation of visibility. Philosophy & Technology, 30(1), 55–72.