Abstract

This presentation introduces and develops the notion of “participatory detention” to conceptualise the cooptation of refugees into their own governmentality and control.  Asylum seekers are treated as deceitful and untruthful subjects and yet, at the same time, they are constantly interpellated by humanitarian agencies and nudged to speak about their use of technologies as well as about their life coping strategies. 

The talk critically engages with “digital innovation” in refugee governance, by investigating the digital unpaid labour activities  that asylum seekers are pushed to do in the name of their own good. It focuses on  digital unpaid labour activities that asylum seekers do in  different sites, drawing particular attention to refugee camps in Greece and Jordan. In the conclusion, I reflect on the centrality of extractive operations in refugee governance, with a specific focus on knowledge extraction activities.

Participatory detention: digital technologies and asylum seekers’ unpaid labour.
Martina Tazzioli (Goldsmiths University of London)

About the event series

STS-MIGTEC Circle is a small format which serves to reflect jointly on work-in-progress contributions related to the themes of interest to STS MIGTEC. The idea is to create a safe space for probing and experimenting with ideas, arguments, attempts of analysis, sense-making of empirical material. It’s the right space for you if you already invested substantial energy and dedication into that work, but you still feel the piece to be raw and fragile. We invite individual scholars – of all career stages – to take other interested scholars on board to jointly reflect and discuss with care and constructive feedback.