this occurred public protestsagainst the detentionof migrants.Not surprisingly, in responseto pressurefromboth outside and inside of the detentioncentre. Gender constructionscan serve as means to differently designate groups of and are as unauthorized or indeed illegal employed by states and migrants internationalagencies to better controlmigrants'mobility.Recentlyin the US, publiccriticismof the brutalseparation of mothersfromtheirchildren,following authorities,has led to the temporaryrelease of workplaceraids by immigration women from detention. This policy aimed to allow women to care for their children (providing the children themselves were US citizens) until their deportation,withoutcalling intoquestion the overall logic of the migrationraids and the eventual deportationorders (Luibhéid and Anderson,2008: 2). For the women in Lesvos the mechanism of preferentialliberation seems to serve a similarpurpose: on the one hand it reproducesthe assumptionthat womenare the primarycaregiversby transferring them into 'a more humane centre' where can better their role as mothers;on the other,this policyhelps accomplish they the state to legitimizeits violentpractices of detentionand removal,improveits public image and defend itself against humanitariancriticism. Similarto the way in whichthe state and internationallegislation created the figure of the 'victim of trafficking'as a female victim of sex trafficking (Andrijasevic,2008a), this example of 'detentionmanagement'that favoursthe release of 'womenand children'over men, can be understoodas a contradictory expressionof the uneasiness of the state to reconcileits liberal and democratic face withthe intrinsicinjusticeof immigration controls(Luibhéidand Anderson, 2008). The figure of the powerless migrantwoman, depicted as the more vulnerable subject deserving the exceptional treatment of (still temporary) release, epitomizes the way in whichsexualityand gender are integralto the differentiatingdevices through which illegality is produced (Luibhéid and Anderson,2008: 2). In this regard, there is agreement in both academic and policy debates that the tighteningof border controls ends up reducingthe possibilitiesforpeople to migratelegallyintothe 6U, whereas illegalitybecomes the usual way to describe currentpatterns of internationalmigrationand to stigmatizemigrants(Andrijasevic,2006: 123). The case of 'gentler detention' expressed in the selection of women indeed complicates the pictureof a simple restrictivepattern in migrationcontrolsin Europeand beyond,pointingto a situation in whichthe logic of detentionand border policing sometimes allow for 'spaces of circulation' and mobilityfor migrants,ratherthan puttingthem in a definiteconditionof immobility.With this regardthe use of these particular'gender techniques' throughwhichthese exceptions are constituted can be better understood within the broader framework of Greekpolicyand the £U regimeof migrationmanagement. Gabrieiia Alberti fe m i η i st This content downloaded from 163.1.255.60 on Fri, 10 Apr 2015 17:57:53 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions revi ew 94 2010 141