The Mobility Control Apparatus

Embark on an engaging borderland adventure with brilliant socio-legal scholar Maartje van de Woude and discover how the power of discretion dynamically shapes political and policy choices inside the mobility control apparatus - producing crimmigration. Featuring rich qualitative fieldwork, nuanced multiscalar analysis, and well-crafted prose, this is a must read!

Nancy A. Wonders, Professor Emeritus of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Northern Arizona University

This excellent book by Maartje van der Woude gives a new, important contribution to the growing field of “Crimmigration”, about the not always benign interaction of immigration and criminal law. Starting from her ground-breaking research with the Dutch Royal Constabulary, who are responsible for policing the internal borders, van der Woude explores the intricacies of European regulations of immigration matters within the so-called “Schengen area”, shedding light on crucial issues of human rights and discrimination. A must read for all students and scholars of this new emerging field.

Dario Melossi, Professor of Criminology, School of Law, University of Bologna

How and why do EU member states police, regulate, control, and discipline migrants across the internal borderlands of the European Union, a zone of free movement? This is the sociolegal puzzle Maartje van der Woude answers with exact detail and sharp insights in her new book The Mobility Control Apparatus, which draws upon her decades long research, expertise and engagement with border criminology. Van der Woude explains how the daily practices, complex legal frameworks, and racialized border politics have created a near totalizing machine of control and exclusion. Yet by tracking the internal dynamics and discretion of border agents as they operate this machine, van der Woude finds spaces of resistance, decency, and the possibility of to break this machine and its associated repression. A must read book for academics, students and policy makers interested understanding the complexity of border control and how it might be undone.

Vanessa Barker, Professor of Sociology, Stockholm University

This is a topical and original contribution examining Schengen internal border controls from a socio-legal perspective and linking the debate on the transformation of Schengen with the debate on crimmigration. The book is essential reading for academics and practitioners interested in European border control and internal security.

Valsamis Mitsilegas, Professor of European and Global Law and Dean, School of Law and Social Justice, University of Liverpool.

The Mobility Control Apparatus is a critical read for all scholars and students of crimmigration and mobility. The book navigates the complexities of politics, bureaucracy, law, and discretion to craft a clear picture of the mobility control regime of the Schengen borderlands. Deftly tying together pathbreaking field research on Dutch crimmigration practices with insights from the literature on multi-level governance and legal pluralism, the book provides a new window into the multiscalar nature of mobility control and crimmigration, uncovering its consequences for racialization and the flow of power. Finally, it points persuasively towards unexpected sources of change and resistance.

Juliet Stumpf, Edmund O. Belsheim Professor of Law, Lewis & Clark Law School