The Misleading Debate

Abstract: In the year of 2013, Swedish media accused the Swedish police for the implementation of discriminatory internal controls of foreigners, in Malmö, Stockholm and other places across Sweden. The controls were soon to be linked to project REVA. In this thesis, I examine how the internal controls of foreigners measure up to the Swedish Aliens act and whether or not the accusations of discriminatory controls against individuals with a perceived foreign appearance, are correct. The examination includes a legal approach, where I use practical legal method to analyze the provisions of the Aliens act, as well as an evolving conceptual approach, where I evolve the concept of discrimination in order to apply it to the controls. I found that it is possible to link project REVA to the external work with the internal controls of foreigners, despite the denial from people involved. I also found that, because of unclear regulations regarding the implementation of the internal controls of foreigners, it is not possible to assess how the controls measure up to the Swedish Aliens act. Some of the controls, most probably, can be identified as directly and indirectly discriminatory. The problem with this statement is the difficulty to measure police officers decision-making in order to confirm the discriminatory behavior. However, I argue that it is possible to claim that the Aliens act might be indirectly discriminatory. The results of this thesis indicate that the Swedish police should review their practices regarding internal controls of foreigners.