Carceral islands: the rise of the Danish deportation archipelago

Abstract

This article investigates recent plans for the offshoring and externalisation of the Danish border. It traces a series of proposals launched by the Danish government to establish deportation centres on Danish islands for ‘rejected asylum seekers’ facing criminal charges, as well as the Danish People’s Party’s call for their relocation to Greenland. It reads these plans in conjunction with recent legislation enabling the full externalisation of asylum processing to Rwanda (and/or elsewhere), launched with the stated goal of ‘zero asylum-seeking’ in Denmark. These plans, to expel an unwanted population as far as possible and prevent new arrivals, extend an increasingly carceral and exclusionary border regime.