The ‘Others’ amongst ‘Us’

Cambridge University Press eBooks, pp. 356–373

Abstract

This chapter brings together the findings of the other chapters and emphasises some common trends that came back repeatedly in the preceding chapters. The chapter starts with the general rigidity and stickiness of legal norms in the area of immigration and asylum. As a result, procedures, implementation, but also interpretation of these norms are changed more often than the norms themselves. On the EU level, the phenomenon called ‘reverse harmonization’, which led to vague legal norms, contributes to the discretion to install procedures on the national level leading to deliberate bureaucratic 'othering'. The chapter also highlights economic and cultural 'othering' as common treads throughout the book. The chapter concludes with some thoughts on what the treatment of the 'other' says about European Societies and what can be done to stop 'othering'.

Authors 1

1. Moritz Jesse corresponding Aachen

   Leiden University

   Affiliation as printed

   Universiteit Leiden