Cette contribution explore les réponses de l’État à l’immigration dans le cadre de mode de régulation qui impliqunt davantages d’acteurs non étatiques (Guiraudon & Lahav, 2000). Il se concentre sur le cas des États Schengen qui coopèrent avec des prestataires privés pour mettre en œuvre leur politique de visas. Cette présentation applique le cadre théorique de la bureaucratie de proximité à un champ d’étude inhabituel: la frontière politique plutôt que la politique sociale. Reposant sur une enquête de terrain approfondie de (12 mois) effectué dans les consulats de Belgique, de France, d’Italie et de leurs centres de demande de visa par rapport à Casablanca, elle étudie le processus d’externalisation des services de visa au Maroc. L’objectif est double: identifier les processus conduisant à la gouvernance publique/privé comme mode émergent de la gestion des frontières Schengen; évaluer comment cette coopération public/privé change les conditions de coopération dans lesquelles la politique des visas est mis en œuvre et modifier les politiques publiques.

1. Bordering at the nonstate window.
The effects of public/private cooperation on
the Schengen visa policy implementation.
Federica Infantino
FNRS/Université Libre de Bruxelles (Cevipol)
Sciences Po Paris (CEE)

2. • Object: the practicing of borders carried out by state
and private actors, i.e. SLOs (Brodkin, 2011) policy‐
making
• Implementation theoretical framework applied to
border policies: the visa policy implementation
understood as a distinct phase of the policy process.
• Visa services outsourcing and the ‘neoliberal state’
embracing NPM paradigm. (Menz, 2013; Bezes, 2009).
Shifts in mode of regulation involving nonstate actors,
shifting sovereignty outwards (Guiraudon & Lahav,
2000).
• Methodology: in‐depth fieldwork (12 months)
Interviews and observations, immersion, informal
settings

3. Displaced borders in Casablanca

4. Plan of the presentation
1. Private actors and the making of Schengen:
institutional legitimation
2. Process tracing of how companies are
created and how they diffuse
3. Why outsourcing visa services?
4. The invisible convergence of Schengen visa
policy implementation practices

5. 1. Private actors and the making of
Schengen
• Since 2004, 18 out of 26 SSs have been
outsourcing to VFSGlobal, TLSContact or IKS
(only in Turkey) in 24 TCs. (but legalized in
2011)
• Outsourcing is presented as a cost effective
strategy for the VIS (COM(2006) 269 final).
• Negotiations ex post to legalize and regulate
the outsourcing in the Visa Code (art. 17‐45).
• SSs’ official justifications: the solution ‐
outsourcing ‐ has found the ‘problem’ – state
administration.

6. 2.New markets for old companies
• VFSGlobal, subsidiary of the Kuoni Travel Group.
TLSContact part of Teleperformance group.
Encounter with state actors (UK‐USA in India and
France in China), consequence of a casual effect.
Rani VFS: “VFS was born by accident; we discovered this market
by accident. The USA embassy in Mumbai noticed the work of
Kuoni India and asked us to go inside the embassy to do some
data entry and things like that”.
Jacques TLS: “He made the contact, I don’t know how, with a
friend who worked at the Embassy, (…) and at the moment that
there were call for tenders in China and some good relations,
everything has started”.

7. 2. How diffusion works
VFS (2004‐2011), from 1 to 17 SSs in 16 TCs.
TLS (2010‐2012), from 1 to 4 SSs in 8 TCs.
• Diffusion local context by local context, state by
state, region by region. Mimic effect, ‘do how the
others do’ as legitimization. The prime mover is
crucial.
Civil servant BE: “Since we noticed that other
countries like the United Kingdom, it was the
pioneer, it started already in 2000s, and the United
States too, we told to ourselves, maybe it is a good
idea to do as they do”
The case of Morocco confirms the pattern.

8. 2. Why outsourcing visas services?
• Cooperation
secured
by
business
opportunities. Profitable solution.
• Cost effective strategy (VIS).
• ‘Do how the others do’
• Outsourcing a bureaucratic ‘dirty work’
• Redirecting the burden of the implementation
of a policy that generates blame and complex
dynamics.

9. 3. Two new uniform implementing
conditions
• Documents based assessment of the
‘migratory risk’.
• The ‘missing document’ mechanism as a case
of administrative exclusion.

10. Documents based assessment of the
‘migratory risk’
When visa application centers handle applicants,
agents’ decisionmaking is no more based on
face‐to‐face interactions: the ‘migratory risk’ is
assessed relying on documents.

11. The ‘missing document’ mechanism
“The only issue (with the outsourcing) is to have
a completed file. By outsourcing, an
uncompleted file will be directly refused, they
will tell us this is completed, this is uncompleted
(…), we will not handle this anymore, we won’t
deal with such issue, we don’t outsource to have
more work to do! This is the reality of the
outsourcing that nobody understands”. Consul‐
general of one of these consulates

12. Nonstate window interaction to
convince applicants.
1. Uncompleted file: the CRISIS of the interaction
Window‐clerk: “you must lodge a completed file”
The threat ‐ Window‐clerk: “I may take the
application, but the application will be processed
on the basis of the documents you are
submitting”.
“It is your responsibility if you want to submit the
application anyway”.

13. Effects
• Administrative exclusion: non participation
attributable to organizational factors (Brodkin
and Majmundar, 2010). Effects on outcomes
and outputs.
• Relocating the responsibility of the policy
implementation from the consulate to the PSP,
from the PSP to the applicant.
• New uniform decisionmaking: if a file is
uncompleted, the visa is refused.

14. Conclusions
Private actors play a crucial role in the making of
the Schengen area because they are:
• A strategic political resource, cost effective
strategy (Lahav, 2006), and blame avoidance
strategy (Waever, 1987).
• A factor converging Schengen visa policy
implementing practices more than hard law
acts.
• A factor contributing to the automation of
border control through the automation of
bureaucracies’ tasks.

15. • A factor contributing to the de‐politicization of
the visa issue. Facing the nonstate window
reduces the scope of social conflict.
The private/public practicing of borders is a
political not technical development.