ABSTRACT
More than 94 per cent of first-instance male Pakistani applicants were considered ‘undeserving’ of refuge and refused asylum in Germany between 2016 and 2019. As a ‘policy of deterrence’ and for the sake of ‘migration management’ Germany resorted to removal efforts in the form of deportation and ‘voluntary’ returns. While there is a significant amount of research on the irregularisation and removal of migratory men from several African countries, research on the experiences of Pakistanis subjected to removal remains limited. This chapter aims to close this research gap by providing insight into the lives of irregularised Pakistani men seeking labour and social mobility through cross-border mobility. In particular, the chapter focuses on the affective and temporal experiences of four migrant men and their resistance or acceptance of so-called ‘voluntary’ returns. It discusses how restrictive mobility regimes lead to migratory vulnerabilities and how social expectations (re)produce migratory masculinities within that context. Concurrently, it examines the temporal hope–destiny dyad of irregularised migration. Within this dyad, religious ideas of destiny that inform hope are employed to deal with the migratory vulnerabilities of masculine identity or the socially conferred loss of male identity that may occur due to a ‘voluntary’ return.
