01 Construction of Borders <strong>and</strong> Practices of Labour <strong>Migration</strong> 11 <strong>Migration</strong> <strong>Processes</strong> <strong>in</strong> <strong>Central</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Eastern</strong> <strong>Europe</strong>: Unpack<strong>in</strong>g the Diversity
——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— Construction of Borders <strong>and</strong> Practices of Labour <strong>Migration</strong> ——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— ————————————————————————————— Why Cooperate? German <strong>and</strong> Polish Incentives for a Common Border Security Policy 1 ————————————————————————————— Alex<strong>and</strong>ra Schwell for illegal migrants from the East to enter the <strong>Europe</strong>an Union, the patrols were held to be an adequate means to prevent that migration. Likewise <strong>in</strong> 1998 the German-Polish contact po<strong>in</strong>t (Kota) at the city bridge <strong>in</strong> Frankfurt (Oder) was created. Here, German <strong>and</strong> Polish border police coord<strong>in</strong>ate jo<strong>in</strong>t actions <strong>and</strong> shortcut official channels. The last important step towards closer cooperation occurred with Pol<strong>and</strong>'s admission to the <strong>Europe</strong>an Union. S<strong>in</strong>ce 1st May 2004, the border policemen have no longer been the sole masters of their control boxes. In the course of a more efficient fight aga<strong>in</strong>st crime <strong>and</strong> traffic jams the “One-Stop-Check” was <strong>in</strong>troduced. Poles <strong>and</strong> Germans no longer st<strong>and</strong> separately from each other but work together <strong>in</strong> one control box <strong>and</strong> jo<strong>in</strong>tly check travellers. However, <strong>in</strong> the beg<strong>in</strong>n<strong>in</strong>g the border guards showed very little enthusiasm for the new idea. They felt helpless <strong>and</strong> literally speechless without adequate language skills. Poles expressed dislike of the arrogant <strong>and</strong> bor<strong>in</strong>g Germans. Germans, on the other h<strong>and</strong>, would never work with Poles, because “one's bike had been stolen already thrice this year” – by Poles, of course. 12 Border guards are the first representatives of the nation state a traveller meets when he or she enters a country. They embody the legitimate state order, <strong>and</strong> they are the liv<strong>in</strong>g symbol that one sovereign territory ends <strong>and</strong> another one beg<strong>in</strong>s. From the po<strong>in</strong>t of view of the nation state the national border is a sensitive area. It serves as a filter to prevent the <strong>in</strong>flux of crime <strong>in</strong>to the state's territory. In earlier times <strong>Europe</strong>an border security served not only to beat back crim<strong>in</strong>al subjects but also to protect the national territory from violation <strong>and</strong> observation by the potentially hostile neighbour<strong>in</strong>g country. The latter function especially has changed <strong>in</strong> mean<strong>in</strong>g due to the process of <strong>Europe</strong>an <strong>in</strong>tegration <strong>and</strong> the creation of a new “security field” (cf. Bigo, 2000), s<strong>in</strong>ce “cross-border crimes” have come to be perceived not as only a national, but as a common problem for the <strong>Europe</strong>an “Area of Freedom, Security <strong>and</strong> Justice”. In the follow<strong>in</strong>g, I will ask what conditions have to be met for nation states to engage <strong>in</strong> police cooperation. Subsequently, I will apply these theses to the German-Polish border police cooperation of Bundespolizei (BPOL) 2 <strong>and</strong> Straż Graniczna (SG) <strong>and</strong> will show the specificity <strong>and</strong> problematic nature of this k<strong>in</strong>d of cooperation, where Germany <strong>and</strong> the Schengen countries face the “junior partner” Pol<strong>and</strong>. Their relationship is marked by dependency <strong>and</strong> asymmetry 3 . GERMAN-POLISH COOPERATION AT THE ODRA The German-Polish cooperation has taken on a role as a trailblazer for <strong>Europe</strong>an border police cooperation. Already <strong>in</strong> 1998 German-Polish border patrols were <strong>in</strong>troduced. S<strong>in</strong>ce at the time the border was the last obstacle CONDITIONS AND MOTIVES FOR COOPERATION Successful police cooperation needs more than goodwill <strong>and</strong> a political resolution. Mathieu Deflem (2000) has provided a detailed account of the historic orig<strong>in</strong>s of <strong>in</strong>ternational police cooperation. With a reference to Max Weber's theory on bureaucracy, he designs a model of <strong>in</strong>ternational police cooperation which differentiates between structural conditions <strong>and</strong> operational motives (cf. Weber, 2005 [1921]). (1) Structural conditions enable national police forces to become active outside the borders of their national legislation. Therefore they must be specialised bureaucracies that have reached a sufficient degree of <strong>in</strong>dependence from their respective governments. This allows them to act semi-autonomously (cf. Anderson et al., 1995: 4). Moreover, only similar structural positions <strong>in</strong>side the state between police forces of different countries create the basis for cooperation, “as the police recognise one another as fellow professionals, rather than as diverse nationals” (Deflem, 2002: 457). As Deflem po<strong>in</strong>ts out, local experts from the respective <strong>in</strong>stitutions have always <strong>in</strong>itiated successful police cooperation before it was legally fixed. Only the fall of the Iron Curta<strong>in</strong> <strong>and</strong> the prospect of Pol<strong>and</strong>'s accession to the <strong>Europe</strong>an Union provided the framework for German-Polish border police cooperation to emerge. On the basis of favourable structural conditions (relative <strong>in</strong>dependence, Pol<strong>and</strong>'s EU <strong>in</strong>tegration) local experts from <strong>in</strong>side the organisations on the meso level of BPOL-Ämter <strong>and</strong> SG-Oddziałe had <strong>in</strong>itiated the cooperation. As semi-autonomous <strong>in</strong>stitutions, the border police organisations rema<strong>in</strong> untouched by any tensions <strong>in</strong> German-Polish relations; hence political differences between governments <strong>Migration</strong> <strong>Processes</strong> <strong>in</strong> <strong>Central</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Eastern</strong> <strong>Europe</strong>: Unpack<strong>in</strong>g the Diversity
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