Technologies of power in the management and control of migration flows

Although the topic of migration flows is not new, it is now more important than ever to understand the practices and discourses that not only regulate the movements of migrant populations, but also govern people’s very lives. Migration flows are subject to constant biopolitical calculation, management, regulation and control, as, from a migration policy perspective, states categorise migrants in order to implement different types of interventions. While some migrants (the most desirable or useful to the economy) are “allowed to live”, at the same time others (those considered a social burden or undesirable) are “allowed to die”.
In order to understand the functioning of neoliberal technologies of population governance in the context of migration, we approach this phenomenon through archaeo-genalogy, drawing inspiration from Michel Foucault’s toolbox. From an archaeological perspective, we highlight the discourses and discursive practices that produce the figure of the immigrant, while genealogy examines the forces that create the different subjectivities of the immigrant. Migration is thus created by centrifugal forces that expel immigrants from their places of origin, excluding them from the social protection system and basic services and exposing them to various forms of violence. However, migration is also shaped by centripetal forces that stigmatise, categorise and label immigrants. As if it were a complex formation, and by virtue of slow socio-political and techno-political processes, the figure of the immigrant has been generated by the logic of accumulation, combination and clash of forces, i.e. by the thread of multiple heterogeneous elements that produce it.

DANIEL TOSCANO LOPEZ | University of Cadiz

The event will be held in Spanish and Italian.

The presentation will take place in presence in the Aula Piccola FBK while places are available and online.

Registration is mandatory by 21 July 2025 at 12 noon.