SOAS Research Online

Abstract

Pluralism is deployed to govern migration across the Global North and Global South in contradictory ways. Fearing the arrival of migrants on its own shores – a threat to its biopolitical constitution – Europe deploys discourses of pluralism in the Global South to encourage migrants en route to Europe to sedentarize in “transit” countries like Sudan. Neoliberal development projects propagate the virtues of pluralism to host communities in Sudan, who are exhorted to view migrants as potential economic assets. Yet, in the context of Europe those same migrants continue to be seen as an economic and racial threat. While a lack of skills and entrepreneurialism are framed as the “root cause” of migration to Europe, migrants are paradoxically presented as trainable and therefore economically productive in the Global South. This article offers a critical examination of consolidating migration management practices in Sudan, their imbrication with development projects, and the racial anxieties they evoke in both Europe and in “transit” countries. It homes in on not only populations headed towards Europe, but those intending to remain in Sudan, notably Syrians, and explores the lessons and aporias of Sudan's hitherto open-door policy towards the latter.