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Policing - new material (19)

01 December 1996

Book review: Grenzenlose Polizei? - Neue grenzen und polizeiliche zusammenarbeit in Europa (Police without borders? New borders and police cooperation in Europe) Heiner Busch. Verlag Westfalisches Dampfboot 1995 ISBN 3-929586-46-0. This publication is Heiner Busch's doctoral thesis and is crammed with a wealth of facts, statistics and analysis. It is a study of national and international police cooperation against the background of the creation of a "Fortress Europe". Whereas the development of such cooperation is frequently justified by pointing to the fight against organised crime the drug trade and illegal immigration, the evidence presented here indicates that the reality of the situation is in fact the reverse: these issues are being raised in order to justify an increase in police powers and the creation of a European information-system for the purposes of internal security.

In 356 densely-packed pages (with almost 80 pages of end-notes) the author covers the Internal Market and external borders; an analysis of the efficiency of borders in dealing with drug trafficking or organised crime; the developments of hostile measures against asylum seekers; international police cooperation with case-studies of national police forces in Germany the Netherlands the UK and Spain; and the forms and methods of international cooperation including an analysis of the Schengen Agreement as a prototype for the EU. Those who know Heiner Busch's previous work will not be surprised that the book is highly critical and that his criticisms are expressed sharply and coherently based on extensive documentation and evidence.

The book really needs an index to make its contents more accessible but it is an invaluable source of information to anyone who can read German and who is concerned about the issues covered.