Managed exclusion

The European Union’s stated commitment to human rights is tested by its own industrial and security policies. Investigations show EU companies are selling surveillance tools to China’s human rights abusers, exporting the means of repression while officially condemning its use. This trade in control systems is mirrored by a parallel internal project, where millions in science funding finance a secretive push into biometric technology for domestic policing and security. The logic of technological management is most visible at the continent’s perimeter, where the declared aim is to create a more “humane” frontier. In practice, this means a high-tech ‘makeover’ of Europe’s deadly border with Africa, replacing physical barriers with digital systems of tracking and exclusion.

This apparatus of technological control operates alongside a deep economic dependence on the people it is designed to manage. The European food supply chain relies on a workforce of migrant labourers who, despite their role, find that their status as ‘essential workers’ live in shanty towns and without basic protections. The cost of this system is borne by those who are simultaneously indispensable and disposable. This legal and social precarity defines the lives of a generation of undocumented Europeans – inspired by the ‘Dreamers’ in the US – who grew up inside the EU but are denied the residency rights needed to formally participate in its society. The contradiction is a functional component of the system.