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Asylum refers to a form of sanctuary in which an asylum seeker is granted protection to remain in a host nation after fleeing persecution in his or her homeland. More commonly the term used is political asylum, whereby the applicant must complete two major phases within a much more complex set of proceedings carried out by immigration authorities. First, upon arriving at a port of entry (e.g., an international airport), the applicant must clearly identify him- or herself as an asylum seeker, a claim that initiates an interview to determine whether the individual can establish a credible fear of persecution (based on race, ethnicity, religion, political opinions, gender, or sexual orientation). That interview is conducted by a relatively low-ranking officer in the immigration system but one with the authority to admit the applicant for further proceedings in an immigration court or else issue an order for expedited removal (i.e., deportation). In the second stage, the asylum seeker appears before a series of panels or hearings to verify further his or her need for sanctuary. Should the case prove convincing, the judges award asylum along with a range of legal protections. In some instances, entire groups of refugees gain entry and asylum under the auspices of the U.S. Department of State, for example, during periods of humanitarian crisis (e.g., war, genocide, or natural disasters).

Asylum seeking is a social problem due to its social, ethical, and political implications. In the United States and in Western Europe, officials commonly view asylum seekers not as desperate people fleeing persecution but rather as economic migrants abusing the asylum system to gain entry. Influences on the perception of asylum seekers falls along lines of social constructionism shaped by forces such as economics, politics, and public opinion, much like the suspicion about nonwhite immigrants. Indeed, since the attacks of September 11, 2001, asylum seekers face an even greater challenge in attaining asylum because of the power of labeling stemming from anxiety over threats of terrorism.

Greatly informing the social construction process is the societal reaction perspective, more specifically the concept of moral panic: an exaggerated and turbulent response to a putative social problem. Moral panic theory allows sociologists to refine interpretations of negative societal reaction aimed at people easy to identify and dislike because of differences in race, ethnicity, religion, and so forth. Cross-national studies have unveiled the subtleties of moral panic, noting that even though the prevailing notion of such unrest resides in its noisy features (e.g., public outrage), constructions also occur under the public radar. Despite similarities among Western nations in their harsh treatment of those fleeing persecution, differences persist in social constructionism. Recent research extracts the nuances in this moral panic by identifying distinctions between American and British constructions. Among the most striking features is the fact that the invention and dramatization of so-called bogus asylum seekers as a popular stereotype is much more of a British phenomenon than an American one.

Cultural divergence affects a discursive formula of moral panic: Some panics are transparent and others opaque. Societal reaction to asylum seeking in the United Kingdom manifests as a transparent moral panic because "anyone can see what's happening." Whereas spikes of panic occur in the United States over foreigners (most recently those perceived as being Arab and Muslim) and undocumented workers (generally Latino/a) before and after September 11, the putative problem of asylum seeking does not resonate in the public mind. However, U.S. government officials quietly embarked on a detention campaign similar to those in Britain. Although such detention practices were in place prior to 9/11, the War on Terrorism provided U.S. authorities with an urgent rationale for greater reliance on that form of control; specifically, U.S. government officials insist that policies calling for the detention of asylum seekers serve national security interests.

Particularly when of long duration, detention is among the gravest measures the state can take against an individual. Its seriousness is even greater when the person is held not on criminal or immigration charges but rather on fleeing persecution. The detention of asylum seekers, especially when stemming from moral panic, receives wide criticism as costly, unnecessary, and, under many circumstances, a violation of international laws intended to protect those in need of sanctuary. By its very nature, detention compounds a criminalization process by lumping asylum seekers together with prisoners charged or convicted of criminal offenses. Many asylum seekers are held in county jails because the immigration system lacks proper detention capacity. Again, the labeling process figures prominently under such conditions, adversely influencing their cases for asylum. These asylum seekers are not only confined in a correctional facility but must wear a prison uniform and be shackled with handcuffs during visits and transfers to court. Human rights advocates complain that the criminal justice model now dominating that asylum procedure unfairly undermines a system designed to protect people seeking sanctuary.

Finally, issues pertaining to asylum ought to be contextualized in a more global setting that attends to worldwide migration alongside political, economic, and military events that produce refugees in search of sanctuary. At the heart of those developments is the politics of movement, also known as the global hierarchy of mobility, in which freedom of movement is a trait of the dominant, forcing the strictest possible constraints upon the dominated. In the wake of globalization, borders still sustain their symbolic and material impact against the circulation of some classifications of people, most notably asylum seekers (and underprivileged non-Western workers). Therefore, borders are not disappearing; rather, they are fragmenting and becoming more flexible. Borders no longer operate as unitary and fixed entities; instead, they are becoming bendable instruments for the reproduction of a hierarchical division between so-called deserving and undeserving populations, wanted and unwanted others.

Bibliography:

1) Cohen, Stanley. 2002. Folk Devils and Moral Panics: The Creation of the Mods and Rockers. 3rd ed. London: Routledge.

2) De Giorgi, Alessandro. 2006. Re-thinking the Political Economy of Punishment: Perspectives on Post-Fordism and Penal Politics. Aldershot, England: Ashgate.

3) Schuster, Liza. 2003. The Use and Abuse of Political Asylum in Britain and Germany. London: Frank Cass.

4) Welch, Michael. 2002. Detained: Immigration Laws and the Expanding I.N.S. Jail Complex. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

5) Welch, Michael and Liza Schuster. 2005. "Detention of Asylum Seekers in the US, UK, France, Germany, and Italy: A Critical View of the Globalizing Culture of Control." Criminal Justice: The International Journal of Policy and Practice 5(4):331-55.

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