Performing Credibility : Assessments of Asylum Claims in Swedish Migration Courts

Abstract

This article explores how adjudicators justify the rejection of an asylum application, by the practice of assessing credibility. This is done by analyzing written decisions from the migration courts in Sweden. By applying an intersectional theoretical approach which emphasizes the performative aspects of identities, it is argued that the court decisions constitute important sites for the formation, subversion and rejection of identities. The analysis reveals that the formal judicial criteria for assessing credibility are not the only tools that are used by the adjudicators. In addition, informal presumptions about how gender, education, culture and religion determine individual asylum applicants’ behavior play significant roles for the outcomes of the credibility assessments. The article suggests that the way in which these presumptions are articulated in the decisions indicates that they actively limit the possibilities for unique or deviant asylum narratives to get recognized as credible in the court procedure.