This project explores the ambivalent and shifting governance of socially marginalised groups in the criminal and administrative justice domains. Alongside the punitive discourses and practices that have long dominated the governance of marginalised groups in England (and elsewhere), in the last decades we can also observe an emphasis on safeguarding and care emerging in various areas of law and public policy. While the former orientation focuses on danger, blame and punishment (the ‘punitive turn’), the latter stresses vulnerability, empathy and protection (the ‘humanitarian turn’).

‘The Vulnerable State’ aims to trace how these apparently competing logics, values and affects frame the discourses, policies and practices implicated in the contemporary governance of the socially marginalised. While they have been studied in isolation, we argue that these trends need to be conceptualised together, as a humanitarian-punitive complex. Their interrelation is especially evident in two areas of public policy: the criminal and the administrative/asylum justice systems. The growing concern about criminal exploitation has rekindled attention in criminal justice towards identifying and protecting ‘vulnerable’ individuals (either as victims or offenders, and often as both through emphasis on trauma informed practices). Meanwhile, in the administrative domain, which has been traditionally oriented towards social care and welfare, an opposite trend is apparent. Particularly in the context of asylum, the language of abuse and security threats has legitimised policies and practices aimed at restricting access to humanitarian protection.