International Political Sociology
Dispossession through Dysfunctionality; Technological Tools as Opaque Immigration Policy
2025-10-04
Technology is increasingly justified as a pragmatic solution to issues within border and asylum regimes. However, in spite of continued investment in expansive technological systems at the border, there are times when it fails to fulfil the stated purpose of its use. In this paper, I explore concepts of dysfunctionality and productive failure to interrogate the ways in which technologies used across border controls further experiences of harm implicit to exclusionary immigration policy and post/colonial borders in Europe. To do so, I present empirical data from fieldwork in Greece to explore the use of the Skype platform, which was presented as a tool for registering asylum claims. Importantly, Skype failed to provide an efficient means of claiming asylum. Instead, the platform presented an obstruction to accessing the right to asylum. As such, I look at how dysfunctional data infrastructures work to simultaneously dispossess people on the move in Europe of their fundamental rights, whilst distancing states from being seen as forcibly denying people of these rights, thus muddying the intention and outcome of immigration policy.