Immigration Frames: Economization, Securitization and Nationalism

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III. Immigration Frames: Economization, Securitization and Nationalism.

As briefly mentioned above, economization, securitization and nationalism are the three frequently observed frames in news about immigration. These three concepts are closely related and somehow hard to differentiate. Economic issue of immigration can easily be understood from the perspective of nationalism and nationalist grounds in attitudes toward immigration can be found in national security concerns, and vice versa. The present research will also attempt to identify these three frames in news about the Roma immigration issue.

Economization frame. A majority of studies examining frames in immigration issues has found an economic frame when representing an immigration issue. We call it the economization frame. In contrast to the traditional negative economization frame that argues immigration costs a lot to the host society, Merolla and Pantjoa (2009) defended in their study that this economization frame can be both positive and negative as immigration can bring a positive upsurge to a declining economy. Immigration is often considered as having a negative impact on the economy in terms of integration and welfare costs, but we need to remember that, historically, states of Western Europe sought for immigration and welcomed it as a very much needed flow of working forces that helped rebuild the countries and reshape their economies after World War II. However, the scarcity of resources gives leeway to conflict between groups over resources. Nowadays, demographics increase and life standards improve for an always larger part of the world population, while resources decrease (Friedman, 2008). The consequence is a competition over resources where dominant groups try to take advantage of minority groups to benefit materially (Soderlund, 2007). Regarding immigration, when the economy faces difficulties and resources become scarce, the receiving countries automatically shut down their

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borders, and this is when economization meets securitization. Negative stereotyping and prejudice against immigrant groups starts when there is stress upon the economy. The in-group (the host society) is privileged as opposed to the out-group (the immigrant populations) in the competition over resources, and the out-group is cast away on whatever pretext can be found.

Very often, the most readily pretext a state can give when shutting down to immigration or legitimizing anti-immigration laws is the national -or sometimes social- security.

Securitization frame. The securitization frame addresses both national and social security.

When facing issues with an immigration group, the state of the host country can enact anti-immigration laws on the ground that the immigrant group brings social unrest and/or increases insecurity for the citizens. The securitization frame is very often found in news reports when they choose to focus on crimes committed in a given immigration community and by members of an immigrant community, forgetful of the context. Buonfino (2004) argued that national policies on immigration reflect societies‟ fears and identity politics, restricting immigration and transforming it into a security issue. The securitization discourse in the news is thus “motivated by the need for national governments to control influxes, placate media pressures and comfort public opinion against the fear of being „swamped‟ by foreigners” (Buonfino, 2004: 24).

Immigration as a threat and a security concern has become the hegemonic discourse type in government policy.

In her study about immigration in Europe, Buonfino (2004) underlined that “securitizaton is the best possible discourse for the preservation of unity in a world of plurality because of its perceived ability to preserve existing boundaries and keep identity strong and legitimate” (2004:

48). Securitization is the discourse better able to address public fears and preserve the unity of the community as opposed to groups labeled “out-groups”. In fact, the securitization discourse

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threatens human rights, peaceful coexistence, freedom and justice, giving leeway to intolerance exclusion, discrimination and racism. Securitization and the derived racism are the response to the fear of the “Other” (Spoonly and Butcher, 2009). This „otherness‟ is the result of social categorization and can be observed in the discourse through semantic cues and codes, denials of being racist accompanied by commentaries about immigration that deployed a crude and direct construction of a racial „Other‟. Social categorization carries a danger of bias, prejudicial feelings resulting from social categorization. It is common knowledge that the media play an active role in sustaining this prejudice because “on an unconscious level, individual tend to believe ideas and events seen with frequency and will usually not account for ideas absent from presented material” (Soderlund, 2007: 175).

Because of their marginal way of life and their refusal to follow the shared social rules, the Roma have been considered as an out-group threatening the social order and by extension threatening the security of the in-group. They have therefore been „scapegoated‟ by the different host societies: they were made responsible for the society‟s flaws and deemed at the origin of whatever problem the society had. The Roma are cast away by the host societies which believe they can regain the lost social order once the Roma are gone. The politicians who are the actors enforcing the “send away goat” movement usually cover up the true reasons of their decision under the securitization pretext. The national security ground is summoned to legitimate the scapegoating process. This social violence is so deeply rooted in the society (Girard, 1987) that everyone buys the securitization discourse without much questioning.

Nationalist frame. The racial ideology found at the origin of the securitization discourse is embedded in the broader context of nationalism. However, studies about immigration have given little attention to the nationalist perspective and have merely stopped at the racial discourse

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theory that admits that the media endorse and even start racism in number of situations.

Fairclough (1989) hypothesized that a dominant group –usually holding the political power- can exert power over other groups –like immigrant minorities through access of the media. This power of the language theory accounts for the underrepresentation of immigrants in the news and the strong presence of a nationalist discourse, while supporting the hypothesis that the pervasive nationalist discourse in the media promotes racism and reinforces the in-group feeling of belonging, as opposed to minorities and out-groups.

In his book Banal Nationalism, Billig defines the nationalist thinking as “ways of conceiving

„us, the nation‟, which is said to have its unique destiny (or identity); […and] conceiving of

„them, the foreigners‟, from whom „we‟ identify „ourselves‟ as different” (1995: 61).

Nationalism is not a mere issue of identity; it is also a commitment to a group and a sense of difference from other groups. Immigrants are seen as out-groups that threatens the identity and the in-group‟s particular ways. The nationalist discourse helps building the nation and the national identity. Billig found that “in the established nations, there is a continual „flagging‟, or reminding of nationhood […]. Nationhood provides a continual background for their political discourses, for cultural products, and even for the structuring of newspapers” (1995: 8). The media take an active part in this process of nation-building as they perpetuate nationalism in their discourse when they reconstruct reality in their news reports. The pervasiveness of the media helps broadcasting the daily reproductions of the nation and conveys representations of the out-groups.

Billig argued that nationalism is a key concept in understanding politics: “The efficiency of the truly national leader consists primarily in preventing the division of attention of a people, and always concentrating it on a single enemy” (1995: 86). National discourse and securitization

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meet at this point where nationalism and the feeling of belonging to a group is opposed to the perceived threat coming from an out-group and the need to protect the nation against this

„enemy‟. This attitude is what causes the rise of racist feelings and discrimination against immigrant in a host society.

Immigrants and ethnic minorities such as the Roma challenge the imagined nation images conveyed in the media discourse. When immigrant populations like the Roma are said to threaten the national security, they are actually perceived as a threat to the social order as imagined by the whole community –or dominant group. The Roma challenge the traditional conception the host society –in the present case that would be France- has of herself, and “challenges to the received wisdom of a given society are depicted as sources of identity crises” (Sutherland, 2005: 190).

This received wisdom is people‟s social reality. Billig says, “our everyday „social reality‟ is always discursively constructed around a concept of the nation which is taken for granted”

(Billig, 1995: 193).