We do not know enough about how legislators from different political parties make sense of their ambitions and experiences in relation to the development of asylum policy. In this study we wanted to find out how political discussions can create conditions for legislative change. The present study therefore explored how the Swedish 2005 Aliens Act and the new system for appeals and procedures (NSAP) were negotiated and perceived by 15 legislators of the parliamentary Committee on Social Insurance (COSI) that considered this new legal framework that is effective since 2006. The participants were openly interviewed about their experiences of negotiating migration policy via their committee work. The study is inspired by interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) as it can reach an understanding of how research participants’ attempt to make sense of their lived experience. First, the interview transcripts were transcribed verbatim and then independently coded by the first two authors. Thereafter they collaboratively refined the themes and sub-themes and discussed them with the third author. The overall finding is that the preceding political negotiations can be one of the reasons for unclear aims when politicians’ propose new legislation. This is because directives can consist of many divergent perspectives and considerations. The specific findings are that the period under consideration was described as dramatic and stressful with the presence of uncommon political collaboration between political parties as well as the pushing of legislation via budget negotiations. In addition, they said that the suggested changes in asylum policy and implementation were mainly based on other policy aspects, such as fiscal considerations and state-municipality relations. Participants also viewed that identified problems with asylum decision-making have not been sufficiently resolved by the new framework. Even though this study was conducted in Sweden, its findings can be relevant to other political systems in more developed countries as these states also can struggle with contradictory aims with asylum policy.

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to explore how individual legislators perceive unaccompanied minors seeking asylum, their life situation, needs and best interests.

Design/methodology/approach– The total number of participants were 15. Thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2006) was used in order to identify and analyze patterns in the interview data. The authors focused on their responses to the questions about the best interest of the child in migration policy and practice, and how this principle was related to unaccompanied children seeking asylum.

Findings– The main finding is that chronological age becomes a key sign for how legislators understand the life situation, needs and best interests of unaccompanied children. Also, the findings from this study suggest that the moralizing welfare ideology of the past is still present in political discourse and social planning, construing unaccompanied minors as an ambivalent category between civilization and savagery. The findings from this study indicate that legislators enact reforms of importance for unaccompanied children without considering them as agents of their own future, with their own motives and reasons to seek asylum.

Practical implications– The findings from this study indicate a need to adapt the understanding of the existing Aliens Act (SFS 2005:716) to the knowledge that unaccompanied minors need to be assessed on their own terms.

Originality/value– This study contributes to increasing the understanding about how the subjective values of legislators may have influenced migration reform in Sweden that can be valuable to both legal and social research, as well as policy planners.

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore the key credibility principles used by Migration Agency case-officers in Sweden. More specifically it analyses how they construct arguments about asylum-seeking unaccompanied minors’ credibility in first-decisions.

Design/methodology/approach

The study is inspired by a social constructionist approach to discourse and explore how case-officers construct legally legitimate arguments about credibility. The qualitative text analysis is focused on discursive practice. The data selected for analysis consists of 827 excerpts containing case-officers’ credibility reasoning deducted from a sample of 916 decisions.

Findings

The main finding is that case-officers question unaccompanied minors by using argumentative techniques in which children appear to be expected to deliver detailed and coherent accounts. In addition, unaccompanied minors’ knowledge-claims can be questioned regardless of decision outcome (rejection or approval). As unaccompanied minors’ claims for asylum appear to be questioned in such an extensive manner, their humanitarian claims also seem to be reduced. The findings of this study suggest that there is a risk that the possibility to be understood as a legitimate asylum seeker, worthy of residency, can be restricted for unaccompanied minors.

Practical implications

The findings indicate that when case-officers base their understanding of credibility on unaccompanied children’s individual life experiences they make use of a limited repertoire of arguments.

Originality/value

This study contributes to insights about how case-officers fulfil legal expectations when assessing unaccompanied minors’ credibility. The findings can be of interest to both legal and social science as well policy planners and immigration practitioners.