4. Studying Border Police
accessing, gathering, processing, and analysing the ethnographic data. Finally, my position in the field, issues of representation, and ethical considerations are discussed.
Fieldwork and Participant Observation
In order to study the social interaction between the officers and the emergence of a (intelligence police) community of practice, it has been necessary to conduct participant observation. Participant observation refers to the method of collecting data in “natural”
settings which have not been set up for research purposes (Hammersley and Atkinson 2007, 4). I have looked at the everyday interactions of the officers and how these interactions have developed during the course of the project.
According to Silverman (2013, 17), the instinct of the ethnographer is to find ordinary features in extraordinary events. Much of my time in the field consisted of observing everyday work, even when nothing “exciting” happened and the officers worked side by side on their laptops. These seemingly “ordinary” situations have, however, been of importance, as they describe how every-day work practices were carried out in relatively
“extraordinary” situations. The officers performed joint work duties as they would do back home, but in another country, and in a foreign office with people whom they did not know and whom they sometimes distrusted.
Speaking the Same Language
Studying organizations operating in several countries present a range of difficulties concerning language barriers, and access challenges due to the geographical locations of these organizations. Since I live in Sweden, the consequence was of course that I had easier access to the Swedish organizations and that it was easier to communicate with Swedish speaking officers (as Swedish is my first language) However, this issue was not as clear-cut since English was the spoken language among the intelligence officers in coordinating their everyday activities. English was not the first language of any of the participants during the Power Weeks. However, English is the official working language of the European border police officers. The EU commission has compiled an English style guide stipulating what terms and phrases are to be used in international work and when writing documents or reports for the EU18. There are thus guidelines of certain words and phrases, which the officer should use in order to understand one
18 English Style Guide: A handbook for authors and translators in the European Commission, Seventh edition: August 2011. Last updated: February 2018.
another. Even a few Swedish-speaking officers preferred talking about their work in English since they had become used to speaking English at work19.
As a researcher, it was necessary for me to learn specific border guard concepts and terms in order to understand the officers and be able to communicate with them. Of course, not speaking the same language as one’s informants might create obstacles as on two occasions when I had to rely on the help of interpreters. The interpreters were employed by the border organizations and were thus familiar with border and police related concepts, as well as being acquainted with anonymity and confidentiality issues.
The two interpreters who aided me in my work were police officers themselves, being thereby conversant with the work that the officers performed.
Multi-Sited Fieldwork
Doing ethnographic fieldwork has historically implied the idea of living and talking with the people one studies for an extended period of time. Early ethnographers and anthropologists, such as Malinowski (2014 [1922]) sought to understand how people perceived their world, to find pieces of social systems, and thereby discover how they fit together in the societies under consideration. The method of ethnography or participant observation is, however, not always bounded to a specific place or a physical space. Malinowski’s (2014) study of the systematic trade of the Kula ring in the Trobriand Islands is considered to be the first multi-sited fieldwork (Nader 2011, 215).
In Argonauts of the Western Pacific, Malinowski describes a network or trade, friendship, and exchange between Island societies in Papua New Guinea. The trade is viewed as a functional and “rational” system essential to the social life of the people involved.
Because of the trade, life-long obligations and expectations of reciprocity were created.
In comparison, police and border guard officers in this study described the countries and organizations included in the project as a “triangle of trade” and exchange of information.
The Triangle project (as well as another previous project referred to as Operation Gunder) was the predecessor of Project Turnstone aiming to increase collaboration between Estonia, Finland, and Sweden. However, one of the core purposes of the project was to include other border organizations to extend the collaboration network.
This entailed that the officers had to physically travel and meet one another in various locations in the five participating countries. As a researcher studying the participants in a project, my “field” has, in a way been the project itself. I have followed the participants as they travelled between various sites, such as the offices and conference rooms of the seven different organizations partaking in the project, as well as various ports, ferry
19 A few interviewed Finish officers were fluent in Swedish and asked to be interviewed in Swedish.
Other Swedish speaking officers from Finland chose to speak English in the interviews since they were more used to talking about their work in English.
terminals, cargo ships, border guard vans, police cars, and border crossings in the Baltic Sea area.
The idea of what comprises a “multi-sited fieldwork” needs clarification, as noted by Hage (2005). Hage (2005, 463-466) criticizes the extensive use of “multi-sited ethnography” referring to it as a “buzz word”. The present ethnographic fieldwork has been multi-sited both for me and for some of the participating border officers. The officers, as well as myself always “travelled” to the “project”; the project was located wherever there was work to be done, regardless of the physical location.
During the first year of fieldwork, I witnessed how border officers who were strangers to one another have gradually developed close work relationships, and eventually conversing and joking as old friends. Although some of the officers were slightly acquainted with one another when the project started, working in new conditions and in new spaces provided a similar working experience to that of doing multi-sited fieldwork. Therefore, I was not the only one new to the environment or the only one unfamiliar with the local language or the area20. This sense of insecurity has accelerated the socialization process among us as most of us were out of our comfort zones. The choice of focusing this dissertation mainly on the traveling group of border officers participating in the Power Weeks has in this sense made the multi-sited fieldwork somewhat less multi-sited.
Being involved in more than one place or field at a time requires attention and determination from the researcher. My research was restricted to the duration of the project (which lasted between January 2014 and December 2015), the funding, the available recourses, and by the access granted by the different border authorities. The time frame and funding precluded extensive systematic observation of the operational police and border guard work at the seven border authorities. However, issues concerning access or funding have not provided any methodological obstacles for completing this study.
My fieldwork consisted of several brief visits (a few days up to a week at a time) to the border and police agencies during two years. As the focus of this study can be described as a “temporary” organization, that is, a temporary collaboration project, fieldwork and visits were often arranged in connection with other activities related to the project. Such project related activities, for example, involved the joint work weeks (described as the Power Weeks), a conference organized by the project members, and project related formal meetings.
20 Naturally, the work tasks were not new to the participating police and border officers and my position is in this sense not comparable to the officers’, as I had no education or previous experience of border related work.
The Power Weeks
During the Power Weeks (that took place eight times during two years) I was allowed to participate as an observer. During my first visits, I found it hard to achieve a comfortable balance between observing and interacting. As described by Hammersley and Atkinson (2007, 4-5), the exploratory character of ethnographic research means that it might not be clear from the start where one should begin observing, which setting one should focus on and which actors should be shadowed. Shadowing (Czarniawska 1997) or going-along (Kusenbach 2003) can be described as practices of observing people as they move over time and in different contexts (Hammersley and Atkinson 2007, 39).
I started out by following the officers with whom I had previously made acquaintance at the formal project meetings. I soon realised that most of the interactions, negotiations, and decision-making processes took place within the Power Week office.
The more informal interactions, such as those taking place during lunches, breaks, and dinners were also insightful in that they provided interesting comparison to the interactions that took place in the office. It is important to point out that each Power Week took place in one of the participating organizations, which meant that the Power Week officers changed location with each Power Week. The venue was usually a conference room or a large meeting room equipped with a big table, white boards, a projector, and various decorations such as maps of the local area, photos of sea vessels, flags or gifts received from visiting organizations. There were days when the officers went on excursions to explore the nearby area or visit other officers at the host organizations. Sometimes, the officers mostly worked in the Power Week office only talking and exchanging information or asking one another questions. My participation during the Power Weeks can be summed up in these activities:
• Taking notes and observing the events taking place in the Power Week office.
• Taking notes of the conversations taking place between the officers.
• Observing the various office settings and artifacts used by the officers (and taking photos of these after asking for permission).
• Following the officers when they went on excursions or visits in border areas (harbours and airports).
• Participating in joint work lunches, lunch walks, and coffee breaks.
• Participating in after work (related) activities such as having dinner at their hotel or drinks at a local pub.
• Talking to officers who participated in the Power Weeks during their breaks.
• Talking to officers who did not participate directly in Project Turnstone but who worked in the five participating organizations.
• Participating in the semi-formal meetings occasionally arranged by the Power Week participants (for example, morning start up meetings where the officers debriefed one another on previous day’s work and work activities of the day).
Most of my time was thus spent in the Power Week office listening to, observing, and taking notes of the officers’ work and interactions.
A “typical” research day usually lasted from nine in the morning to ten or eleven in the evening. I often stayed at the same hotel as the other visiting officers and we sometimes met up for breakfast in the dining room. One of the host officers would arrive at a quarter to nine and pick us up in a border guard or police van. The officers often joked about feeling tired for staying up late the previous evening. When arriving at the host organization we made our way to the Power Week office and unpacked our laptops.
The officers immediately started to check their emails and phones for any new messages or information. Sometimes, there were trouble with the internet connection and it would take some time before the officers were able to access their emails and search engines.
I would usually begin by starting my laptop, opening a new document for taking notes, and getting a cup of tea or coffee at the nearby coffee and snack table. The mornings were often spent taking notes, observing and listening to the officers as they exchanged information about previously committed crimes and updating one another on recent arrests or on-going surveillance activities. I alternated between the Power Week office room (where I often shared a large conference table with the other officers) and the corridor to talk to officers who were on their breaks. Occasionally, other officers from the host organization would come by, share a story and talk to me and the other officers about collaboration or recent events.
Lunch was usually organized in the afternoon, around three o’clock, but the officers took several snack breaks during the day. These breaks provided opportunities for me to conduct short semi-structured interviews with the officers who were willing to do so.
I conducted these interviews in empty office spaces, calm lounge areas or some other office that the host organization allocated to me. I usually joined the officers for lunch at a nearby restaurant21. Conversations during lunch breaks often focused on the local areas, the local food or other peculiarities about our current location. After lunch, the officers would go back to the Power Week office and would continue working until evening. I would continue to observe their work, take notes of their dialogues, and ask questions when I got the opportunity. Dinner often took place around half past nine in the evening, either at the hotel or at a restaurant nearby. Most of the officers participated in the joint dinners, whereas some stayed on to have a drink or a beer
21 On a few occasions, the officers thought that they had so much work to do that they ordered lunch or dinner (often pizza) to the Power Week office and ate at their desks.
afterwards. I often stayed on for a bit with the officers before heading back to the hotel where I would often stay up to write notes of the day’s events before going to bed.
With one exception I participated in all Power Weeks with the Power Week team members that took place in 2014 and 2015. My field co-researcher Goran Basic also conducted fieldwork during these weeks but in other organizations22 within the Turnstone project. The project initiators’ idea was that the Power Week team would serve as a hub for gathering, processing and analysing intelligence information relevant to the participating organizations. Any information generated or assembled by the team was sent to the other organizations during the Power Weeks. For example, if the officers received information that a suspected car thieve was currently in Tallinn, Estonia, they would contact the Estonian police and border guard board to share the information with them. The purpose of conducting field work in the organization hosting the Power Week team, as well as in other organizations during the same week was to get insight into collaborative work processes generated during the Power Weeks23. After each Power Week, Goran and I compared notes from our observations. In this way, we usually found similarities in how various events had been understood or interpreted at the different locations. In between the Power Weeks, the project initiators organized various formal meetings regarding the developments of the project.
Formal meetings
The initiators of Project Turnstone were responsible for organizing the project activities, such as the Power Weeks and some formal meetings. The purpose of the meetings, I was told, was to make sure that everyone knew what to do and understood the main goals and purpose of the project. Because Project Turnstone in itself was an attempt to increase informal collaboration (and thus decreases the formal aspects of collaboration), it was decided that the formal meetings were to be kept at a minimum.
Despite this attempt, Project Turnstone was generally made up of various meetings (some formal, some less formal) (Åkerström, Yakhlef and Wästerfors 2018). As noted above, I was granted permission to participate in several of these meetings. During the formal meetings (for example, the first introductory Management Board Meeting and a few other project meetings) my role was mostly that of an observer. One exception is a brainstorming session during the Management Board Meeting where I participated in a group discussion of our expectations of the project. During the Final Conference Meeting organized by the project initiators, I held a short presentation of my research and answered questions regarding the reports written about the project. Aside from
22 Except for our joint participation in some of the formal project related meetings, my co-field research partner Goran Basic and I conducted fieldwork and interviews separately. The reason is that we hoped to compare our experiences and thus achieve a more nuanced research material. In addition to conducting fieldwork in all the participating organizations, Goran and I both conducted interviews with members from these organizations.
23 In order to protect the anonymity of the officers I have chosen not to disclose the exact locations where the Power Weeks took place.
these occasions, I did not take active part in the meetings but only focusing on observing and taking notes of the events.
When observing meetings, I always tried to write down conversations and comments word for word. Some notes are therefore direct quotations whereas others are descriptions of the meetings. In my notes, I made a clear distinction between direct quotes and observation notes. When I did not have time to write full quotations, for example, during a PowerPoint presentation, I always wrote “person A said that…” or
“person B accounted for x in the following way…” in order not to confuse such notes with direct quotes.
During meetings I always took notes on a note pad or in a notebook. These notes were later entered into my laptop. As highlighted by Thedvall (2006, 32), in one’s role as an observer during meetings, the researcher has the possibility of paying full attention to the meeting members rather than focusing on one’s own input or performance. In addition to taking notes of what was said during the meetings, I focused on describing the tone of voice and facial expressions of the members. I also made notes of instances when the members looked bored, picked up their phones or sighted unabashed. The interactions before, after, and during breaks provided opportunities for talking to the members about the meetings and the project in general. The documents and material created and distributed by the project members during such formal meetings were also important for the analysis underlying this study (as described subsequently).
Visiting border zones: harbours and airports
In addition to observing the Power Weeks and the formal meetings, I visited the participating organizations in order to follow some of the daily work of the police, coast guard, and border officers. I also visited several harbours and airports in the five participating countries after having gained access to these by the project participants whom I met at the formal meetings or during the Power Weeks. Having a “contact”
person in each organization, who was very familiar with the Project Turnstone was central for me gaining access. My visits can best be described as shadowing (Hammersley and Atkinson 2007, 39), as I followed several officers during their workday in various situations. For example, when following the work of airport border officers, I often received a tour of their work area and a quick introduction to their work tasks. I then spent time in their office, talked with their colleagues, and witnessed some of their work in passport controls. I followed them around the airports or harbour areas when they met other officers or participated in staff meetings.
When following border officers who checked the passport or vehicle content of individuals I always took a step back and observed these practices from a distance in order to be respectful towards the passengers and allowing the officers to conduct their work in an undistracted way. When the officers had finished these controls, I usually had a chat with them about the day’s events. The officer’s coffee breaks often provided
opportunities for having deeper talks and for asking questions about their work. When shadowing officers in border zones, harbour areas or at airports I always brought a notebook and a pen to take notes. This was not always easy, as described in the next section.
Writing Field Notes
A vital aspect of community of practice is learning by doing. The importance of these issues was apparent to me during my very first encounter with the officers during the first Power Week (mentioned earlier in this chapter). After conducting an interview with an officer in the “interrogation room” that I had at my disposal, I went into the main work room (after asking for permission) to observe the officers at work and to write field notes. Since it was the first Power Week, most of the participants seemed unsure about the process and the outcome of the activity; several officers made phone calls, asked one another for advice and discussed cases that they were pursing at the moment.
At first, I sat down at a small table in the back of the room with my notebook and a cup of tea listening, observing, and occasionally writing. To my left was a small table with coffee thermoses, cookies, jars of candy, and a basket of fruit. The officers were all seated together at a larger oval table placed in the middle of the room. After a while I realised that several officers looked at me strangely when passing to get coffee or snacks on the snack table. An officer who had just grabbed a few biscuits walked up to me and smilingly asked me what I was doing24. I told him that I was taking notes of what I saw happening. Out of courtesy, I showed him my note pad with random scribbles. He barley looked at my notepad, said that it looked uncomfortable and proposed that I sit at the big table, next to the officers instead. A few other officers during that same day also commented on me using a notepad and pen instead of a laptop while taking notes.
The next day, I brought my laptop, sat at the big table, and used the laptop for taking notes. As the work days could last up to twelve hours during the Power Weeks, the laptop became a “shield”25 for blending in and for providing somewhere to rest my eyes during lapses of concentration (such as checking the weather or reading the news, as I also saw several officers do during their breaks)26. When “working” on my laptop, no one looked at me strangely or seemed to mind. As an indication of goodwill, I had kept
24 It is important to add that I had introduced myself and the purpose for being in the room several times prior to receiving this question from the officer.
25 A so-called involvement shield (for instance, reading the newspaper, as described by Goffman (1963) can be used to discourage involvement in public places, indicating that the person is not paying obvious attention to others and is not ready to get involved in their business.
26 Thedvall (2006) had a similar experience during her fieldwork among EU bureaucrats in Brussels (described in her dissertation Eurocrats at Work: Negotiating Transparency in Postnational Employment Policy).