Abstract
AbstractSurveillance studies have long argued that electronic databases are designed to maximize state surveillance as a “superpanopticon” or “surveillant assemblage.” But how are databases being implemented in practice, and do they actually enhance control? This article addresses these questions by examining the case of the German Central Foreigners Register (Ausländerzentralregister [AZR]). Established in 1953, the AZR was one of the first databases on migrants in the western liberal world, and remains a pillar of Germany's migration control system today. By analyzing internal ministerial records from the 1950s to the 1970s – the time when this database was introduced, expanded, and automatized while still relatively free from legal or public constraints – this article examines whether, or how, databases enhance state control. I argue that the AZR did not provide the “perfect surveillance” it was intended to deliver; rather, it produced major bureaucratic and political challenges and a series of malfunctions. This case study confirms that database surveillance, such as the German AZR in the 1970s and European databases today, depends on three basic conditions: shared expectations regarding data usages, cooperation in data supply, and capacities of data storage and maintenance. Moreover, databases serve the additional symbolic function of reassuring the self‐imagination of sovereign, modern state power.
Highlights
Following the “summer of migration” in 2015, EU member states at the southern Schengen border were criticized for delays in taking and processing fingerprints of newly arriving asylum seekers (Trauner 2016)
How are databases being implemented in practice, and do they enhance control? This article addresses these questions by examining the case of the German Central Foreigners Register (Ausländerzentralregister [AZR])
This case study confirms that database surveillance, such as the German AZR in the 1970s and European databases today, depends on three basic conditions: shared expectations regarding data usages, cooperation in data supply, and capacities of data storage and maintenance
Summary
Following the “summer of migration” in 2015, EU member states at the southern Schengen border were criticized for delays in taking and processing fingerprints of newly arriving asylum seekers (Trauner 2016) This left the EU database Eurodac out of date and incomplete, and prone to producing faulty search results when consulted by northern member states, a situation which facilitated clandestine entry and long-term irregular residence (Bossong 2018). This example raises the question of how effective database surveillance is.
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