“True love” as a bureaucratic utopia: the case of bi-national couples in Belgium

In this contribution I propose to examine the moral roots of the contemporary (in)hospitality of the city of Brussels by exploring one area of observation in particular: the handling of the fight against marriages of convenience for migratory purpose. Based on 2012-2013 ethnographic fieldwork, I reflect on the utopian thinking underlying the work of state agents in charge of implementing this fight. Through the detailed examination of two case studies, we will see how state agents select ‘good‘ couples and, in doing so, reproduce social and racial hierarchies by excluding undesirable forms of... Mehr ...