Systems of Suffering , livre ebook

Systems of Suffering
‘Elegant and disturbing [...] a brilliant analysis of the cruel biopolitics of
care in contemporary Britain.’
—Ash Amin, Chair of Geography, University of Cambridge
‘Indispensable reading for anyone interested in the contemporary
policies, practices, spaces, and politics of asylum.’
—Suzan Ilcan, Professor of Sociology, University of Waterloo, Ontario
‘A tour-de-force. Te evidence for the violence of the country’s system of
dispersal of asylum-seekers is shocking. Bursting with ideas, this book
contains the seeds of an urgently-needed political, social and cultural
transformation.’
—Ben Rogaly, Professor of Human Geography, University of Sussex
‘Rigorously diagnoses a long-term malaise in the UK system of “asylum
accommodation”. An inexorably unaccountable system hidden in plain
sight, in poverty blighted communities. A system that separates people
from mainstream life, frequently with loss of hope and health. A system
that reduces people to unit costs in ofen proftable company accounts.
A system that does not need to be like this. Tis book shows us how to
change it.’
—Graham O’Neill, human rights worker, Commission for Racial
Equality, Equality and Human Rights Commission and Scottish
Refugee Council
‘A forensic and compelling examination of how systems that exist in
theory to protect some of the most vulnerable people in our society end
up harming them.’
—Daniel Trilling, journalist and author of Lights in Te Distance:
Exile and Refuge at the Borders of EuropeSystems of Suffering
Dispersal and the Denial of Asylum
Jonathan DarlingFirst published 2022 by Pluto Press
New Wing, Somerset House, Strand, London WC2R 1LA
www.plutobooks.com
Copyright © Jonathan Darling 2022
The right of Jonathan Darling to be identified as the author of this
work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7453 4048 7 Paperback
ISBN 978 0 7453 4047 0 Hardback
ISBN 978 1 786807 20 5 PDF
ISBN 978 1 786807 21 2 EPUB
T ypeset by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, EnglandFor HelenContents
Acknowledgements viii
Introduction1
1. Dispersal, Debilitation, and Distributed Violence 21
2. Creating Dispersal 38
3. Outsourcing Asylum 64
4. The Retreat of Local Government 93
5. Dismantling Support 117
6. Enduring Asylum 142
7. Enduring Otherwise: Counter-conducts of Care 165
Conclusion 184
Notes206
Index233Acknowledgements
This book would not have been possible without the support,
insight, and generosity of a range of collaborators, colleagues, and
friends. First, I would like to thank all of those individuals and
organisations that so generously gave their time to discus-s disper
sal with me. From local authority staff and elected representatives
to volunteers and staff at refugee support organisations across the
country, your insights have provided the foundations on which
this book is built. In particular, my thanks to Lorna Gledhill, John
Grayson, and Graham O’Neill for your ongoing engagement with
this work and for your unwavering commitment to
questioning dispersal and advancing the rights of those seeking refuge.
My profound thanks to all of those asylum seekers and refugees I
met during my time exploring dispersal. Thank you so much for
sharing your experiences with me, for offering me your time and
insight, and for trusting me to convey at least some of the harm
that dispersal produces.
During the writing of this book, I had the enormous
privilege of becoming a trustee of the No Accommodation Network
(NACCOM), a UK-wide charity working to end destitution among
migrants. At NACCOM I have been lucky to work with a brilliant
and supportive team of staff and trustees and have learned a great
deal from their commitment to supporting and sustaining
accommodation projects. Their passion for social justice and for building
systems that care in the here and now has left a mark on this book
in multiple ways. My thanks to the team of Jessie Seal, Lucy Smith,
Paul Catterall, Hannah Gurnham, Katie Fawcett, Angela Stapley,
Dave Smith, Bridget Young, Hazel Williams, and Renae Mann, and
to my fellow trustees, Julian Prior, Catherine Houlcroft, Jochen
Kortlaender, Caron Boulghassoul, Washington Ali, Phil Davis,
Sarah-Jane Gay, Olivier Robin, and Shukry A.
This book began life with a research project, Producing Urban
Asylum, which was funded by the Economic and Social Research
viiiacknowledgements
Council (ref: ES/K001612/1). I am incredibly thankful for this
funding and for the opportunities it afforded me. This project
was completed while I worked in Geography at the University
of Manchester, a department that I am grateful to for giving me
an opportunity to develop my research and for believing in me
early in my career. At Manchester, I was lucky to work with a
brilliant group of colleagues and friends; my thanks to Alice Bloch,
Stefan Bouzarovski, Bridget Byrne, Noel Castree, Gareth Clay,
Martin Hess, John Moore, Saska Petrova, James Rothwell, Emma
Shuttle worth, Fiona Smyth, Mark Usher, Saskia Warren, and Maja
Zehfuss. In particular, I owe a debt of gratitude to Kevin Ward,
who not only served as a thoughtful mentor, but also a kind and
generous friend, always ready to offer sage advice and guidance, be
it about outsourcing and corporate finance or the merits, and
otherwise, of Chorlton’s bars and cafés!
The book continued to take shape, and was completed, after
I joined the Department of Geography at Durham University.
At Durham, I am immensely fortunate to be surrounded by
colleagues who are supportive, sharp, and who do much to foster an
environment in which to think and work creatively. My thanks to
Louise Amoore, Mike Bentley, Mike Crang, Adam Holden,
Elizabeth Johnson, Sarah Knuth, Noam Leshem, Gordon Macleod,
Cheryl McEwan, Joe Painter, Anna Secor, Chris Stokes, and John
Thompson. In addition, my profound thanks to Ben Anderson,
Gavin Bridge, Lauren Martin, and Colin McFarlane, who all read
through drafts of the book and offered their considerable insight to
help develop the arguments being made.
During my time at Manchester and Durham, I have been lucky
to work with a brilliant group of PhD students, who have helped
to shape my thinking and offered me fresh perspectives over the
years. Thanks to Cécile Blouin, Georgia Dimitriou, Jessica Field,
Alice Fogg, Ben Ellul-Knight, Gwyneth Lonergan, Alistair
Sheldrick, and Xiaochen Yu. Alongside these colleagues and students,
I have benefited considerably from the advice, support, and
commentary of a range of wonderful scholars. The opportunity to
share ideas, collaborate on projects, and engage with the work of
others is a real privilege of working in this field. For their
contributions, friendship, and care, I would like to thank: Camilla Alberti,
ixsystems of suffering
Ash Amin, Les Back, Jen Bagelman, Harald Bauder, Dominika
Blachnicka-Ciacek, Dan Bulley, Kathy Burrell, Andrew Burridge,
Neil Coe, Michael Collyer, Elizabeth Cullen Dunn, Olga
Demetriou, Anne-Marie Fortier, Nick Gill, Bethan Harries, Ruth Healey,
Sophie Hinger, Sarah Hughes, Tariq Jazeel, Heather Johnson, Maria
Kaika, Irit Katz, Rene Kreichauf, William Kutz, Léa Lemaire, Piaras
MacEinri, Jon May, Eugene McCann, Sara Miellet, Gareth
Millington, Sybille Munch, Caitriona Ni Laoire, Lucas Oesch, Barbara
Oomen, Stijn Oosterlynck, Mark Rainey, Clare Rishbeth, Ben
Rogaly, Romola Sanyal, Nick Schuermanns, Michela Semprebon,
Anna Siede, Nando Sigona, Bal Soki-Bulley, Vicki Squire, Tobias
Stapf, Thomas Swerts, Imogen Tyler, and Ilse van Liempt.
Aspects of this book have been presented at multiple locations
and forums over recent years. In particular, I would like to thank
organisers and audiences of seminars and workshops at Utrecht
University, London School of Economics, Kings College London,
Sciences Po Paris, University of Luxembourg, Queens University
Belfast, Glasgow University, University of Newcastle, an-d Univer
sity College Cork, and to the organisers of the 2020 International
Migration Research Network Spring Conference at the University
of Lisbon who invited me to give a keynote lecture on the book.
At Pluto, I am immensely grateful to Neda Tehrani for
supporting this project from the outset and for all the advice and guidance
along the way. Thanks to Emily Orford and Kieran O’Connor for
working on the marketing of the book, and to Melanie Patrick
for the cover design. Thanks to Robert Webb for seeing the book
through production, and to Huw Jones for his careful and precise
copy-editing. Thanks also to the three reviewers for their generous
and instructive comments that have helped to sharpen the text.
Thanks to my family, who have all contributed in multiple ways
to the completion of this book. My parents Ann and Michael, my
sister Rebecca, and my niece and nephew Jessica and Charlie have
all been a source of unconditional love and support throughout.
They have shown an admirable interest in my work from day one,
and kept drawing me back to what really matters when writing and
thinking were tough.
Finally, my profound thanks to the person who has done so
much to shape my thinking, my writing, and my life: my partner,
xacknowledgements
Helen Wilson, whose constant and unwavering support has seen
me through the peaks and troughs of so much, and whose generous
editorial commentary has always challenged me to produce my
best. Helen, I am indescribably lucky to have someone to share so
much with and who brings such generosity, wisdom, and warmth
into my life. This book is for you.
xiIntroduction
On 25 June 2013, Stephen Small, the Managing Director of
Immigration and Borders for G4S, a multinational security services
company, was giving evidence to the Home Affairs Select
Committee on the nature of his company’s contract to