ABSTRACT
The political context from which the case-study presented in this chapter emerged is characterised by a rise in ‘right wing populism’ in the mainstream political sphere in the UK, as well as the US and other parts of Europe. Although the anti-immigration rhetoric has been ratcheted-up in the last decade, it has its origins in a much longer trajectory in which the rightward tilting of the bureaucratic state was augmented during the period of New Labour’s rule. From the perspective of the UK Conservative government, illegal immigration is an ‘ongoing problem’, which it seeks to further address through the Immigration Act 2016. The research that forms the basis of the case-study was designed as a seed-corn project, with the intention that the data produced would inform much larger funding application focused on in-depth research on impact of the Immigration Act.
