ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the proliferation of states of exception and emergency across Europe, which are regimes suspending rights won in historic struggles. It attempts to unravel the tendency towards Europeanised and nation-state migration regimes, charting broader processes of de-democratisation and, according to Poulantzas, ‘authoritarian statism’. The proliferation of the migration states of exception reflects the reality of the trends and dynamics on the ground. The toughening of immigration control and a crackdown on the benefits claimed by asylum-seekers is well documented; this comes with immense economic and social costs. The chapter explores G. Frankenberg’s arguments by inserting the logic of dissensus and reads the potential for transcending the European states of exception as ‘authoritarian statism’. Profound effects in society were witnessed which reconstructed the migration and asylum dissensus at the level of public discourse and politics. The logic of racialising and exploiting subaltern migrants must be located within the context of a system of multiple migration regimes.
