Profit, Power and control: the theft of migrant workers' wages in England
(2025)
Report
Burnett, J., & Chebe, F. (2025). Profit, Power and control: the theft of migrant workers' wages in England. Leeds: Migrant Action
All Outputs (27)
Wage Theft and the Contours of Accumulation (2024)
Journal Article
Burnett, J., & Chebe, F. (2024). Wage Theft and the Contours of Accumulation. Justice, power and resistance, 7(1), 39-59. https://doi.org/10.1332/26352338Y2024D000000009This article examines the theft of migrant workers’ wages in England by their employers, drawing from original accounts and testimonies of a sample of workers employed between 2018 and 2023. It builds on and establishes new conceptual understandings... Read More about Wage Theft and the Contours of Accumulation.
Immigration Control, Mystification and the Carceral Continuum (2023)
Book Chapter
Burnett, J. (2024). Immigration Control, Mystification and the Carceral Continuum. In D. G. Scott, & J. Sim (Eds.), Demystifying Power, Crime and Social Harm The Work and Legacy of Steven Box. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-46213-9_11This chapter examines immigration control in the UK as a core site where carceral logics are actualised, drawing on the analytical framework developed in Steven Box’s Power, Crime and Mystification. Box’s seminal text in 1983 provided a compelling ac... Read More about Immigration Control, Mystification and the Carceral Continuum.
Marxism and the Political Economy of Abolition (2023)
Book Chapter
Burnett, J. (in press). Marxism and the Political Economy of Abolition. In D. G. Scott (Ed.), Abolitionist Voices. Bristol University PressThis chapter examines the ways Marxist and neo-Marxist thought has contributed to abolitionist praxis. In doing so, it first explores Marx’s early writings in the 1840s, demonstrating how these were foundational to his later critique of political eco... Read More about Marxism and the Political Economy of Abolition.
Immigration Raids and State Violence (2022)
Journal Article
Bhatia, M., & Burnett, J. (2022). Immigration Raids and State Violence. State Crime Journal, 11(1), 33-51. https://doi.org/10.13169/statecrime.11.1.0033This article develops an analysis of contemporary immigration raids in Britain, arguing that they operate ideologically as well as institutionally to sustain the material and political conditions of what is a vastly unequal form of social... Read More about Immigration Raids and State Violence.
Situating Immigration Fees in 21st Century Britain (2022)
Report
Burnett, J. (2022). Situating Immigration Fees in 21st Century Britain. London: Trust For LondonIntroduction to the Report:
The purpose of this report is to illustrate the cost – in the broadest sense – of obtaining and renewing a visa in the UK and the impact this has on migrants’ lives.
We have been aware for a long time that the cost of th... Read More about Situating Immigration Fees in 21st Century Britain.
Work and the Carceral State (2022)
Book
Burnett, J. (2022). Work and the Carceral State. Pluto Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv2724535During 2019-20 in England and Wales, over 17 million hours of labour were carried out by more than 12,500 people incarcerated in prisons, while many people in immigration removal centres also worked. In many cases, such workers constitute a sub-waged... Read More about Work and the Carceral State.
Torture and the UK’s ‘War on Asylum’: Medical Power and the Culture of Disbelief (2019)
Book Chapter
Bhatia, M., & Burnett, J. (2019). Torture and the UK’s ‘War on Asylum’: Medical Power and the Culture of Disbelief. In F. Perocco (Ed.), Tortura e migrazioni | Torture and Migration (161-179). Edizioni Ca’Foscari. https://doi.org/10.30687/978-88-6969-358-8/007This chapter explores medical power in the UK’s ‘war on asylum’, examining how medical expertise has been undermined in the asylum process when this expertise is utilised to add weight to asylum seekers’ claims to have experienced torture. It examine... Read More about Torture and the UK’s ‘War on Asylum’: Medical Power and the Culture of Disbelief.
Towards a Political Economy of Charging Regimes: Fines, Fees and Force in UK Immigration Control (2019)
Journal Article
Burnett, J., & Chebe, F. (2020). Towards a Political Economy of Charging Regimes: Fines, Fees and Force in UK Immigration Control. The British journal of criminology, 60(3), 579-599. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azz070Charging regimes and the extraction of revenue are integral components of immigration control in the United Kingdom. However, while these have been analysed in their individual guises, to date, there has been little substantive analysis bringing thes... Read More about Towards a Political Economy of Charging Regimes: Fines, Fees and Force in UK Immigration Control.
In the teeth of the machine: workfare, immigration enforcement and the regulation of ‘surplus labour’ (2018)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2018). In the teeth of the machine: workfare, immigration enforcement and the regulation of ‘surplus labour’. Justice, power and resistance, 2(2), 287-313This article examines the development of a particular policy framework that is coming to fruition in the UK after decades of gestation. It examines how the administration of ‘workfare’ and the operation of immigration enforcement, while existing inde... Read More about In the teeth of the machine: workfare, immigration enforcement and the regulation of ‘surplus labour’.
"Punitive reformation": state-sanctioned labour through criminal justice and welfare (2018)
Book Chapter
Burnett, J. (2018). "Punitive reformation": state-sanctioned labour through criminal justice and welfare. In S. Bittle, L. Snider, S. Tombs, & D. Whyte (Eds.), Revisiting Crimes of the Powerful : Marxism, Crime and Deviance (283-296). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315212333This chapter examines an aspect of the “imaginary social order” that was integral to the analysis within Crimes of the Powerful, but has rarely been adequately explored: the “belief that the interests of labour are essentially the same as the interes... Read More about "Punitive reformation": state-sanctioned labour through criminal justice and welfare.
Book review of Gendered Harm and Structural Violence in the British Asylum System by V. Canning. (2018)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2018). Book review of Gendered Harm and Structural Violence in the British Asylum System by V. Canning. Howard Journal of Criminal Justice, 57(2), 284-286. https://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12261Book review of Gendered Harm and Structural Violence in the British Asylum System by V. Canning.
Book review: Policing the Planet: why the policing crisis led to Black Lives Matter Edited by Camp, Jordan T., and Heatherton, Christina (London: Verso, 2016), 320 pp (2018)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2018). Book review: Policing the Planet: why the policing crisis led to Black Lives Matter Edited by Camp, Jordan T., and Heatherton, Christina (London: Verso, 2016), 320 pp. Race & class, 59(3), 108-110. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396817737239Book review of Policing the Planet: why the policing crisis led to Black Lives Matter
Austerity and the Production of Hate (2017)
Book Chapter
Burnett, J. (2017). Austerity and the Production of Hate. In V. Cooper, & D. Whyte (Eds.), The Violence of Austerity (217-223). Pluto PressThe Violence of Austerity collects the voices of campaigners and academics to show that rather than stimulating economic growth, austerity policies dismantled the social systems that operated as a buffer against economic hardship, exposing austerity... Read More about Austerity and the Production of Hate.
The Violence of Workfare (2017)
Book Chapter
Burnett, J., & Whyte, D. (2017). The Violence of Workfare. In V. Cooper, & D. Whyte (Eds.), The Violence of Austerity (59-66). Pluto PressThis chapter analyses the testimonies of 97 people who have participated in ‘workfare’ schemes in the UK and have raised concerns about the health and safety risks experienced on these placements. Overall, these placements, which were carried out bet... Read More about The Violence of Workfare.
Racial violence and the Brexit state (2017)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2017). Racial violence and the Brexit state. Race & class, 58(4), 85-97. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396816686283Research by the Institute of Race Relations into over one hundred incidents of racial violence reported in the mass media in the month after the EU referendum indicates that the ‘spike’ in such attacks has to be understood in terms of the racist clim... Read More about Racial violence and the Brexit state.
Book review of How Corrupt is Britain? Edited by Whyte, David (London: Pluto Press, 2015), 208 pp. (2017)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2017). Book review of How Corrupt is Britain? Edited by Whyte, David (London: Pluto Press, 2015), 208 pp. Race & class, 58(3), 103-105. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396816667022Book review of How Corrupt is Britain? Edited by Whyte, David (London: Pluto Press, 2015), 208 pp.
Entitlement and belonging: social restructuring and multicultural Britain (2016)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2016). Entitlement and belonging: social restructuring and multicultural Britain. Race & class, 56(2), 37-54. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396816657723In May 2016, two flagship measures of the Conservative UK government, the Housing and Planning Act 2016 and the Immigration Act 2016 were passed, despite opposition from rights and advocacy organisations, charities and individuals in both fields. Bas... Read More about Entitlement and belonging: social restructuring and multicultural Britain.
The war on welfare and the war on asylum (2015)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2015). The war on welfare and the war on asylum. Race & class, 57(2), 96-100. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396815595919This articles examines the parallels between the UK government’s ‘war’ on welfare and ‘war’ on asylum, in terms of the creation of widespread destitution and the rhetoric which punishes those depicted as ‘bogus’. In both cases, large private corporat... Read More about The war on welfare and the war on asylum.
Anti racism: totem and taboo – a review article (2015)
Journal Article
Burnett, J. (2015). Anti racism: totem and taboo – a review article. Race & class, 57(1), 78-87. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306396815582006Against a backdrop of punishing austerity measures, the ascent of the neoliberal project and the undermining of multiculturalism, anti-anti-racism is seeing a renascence in the UK. This resurgent critique decries anti-racism as set against white work... Read More about Anti racism: totem and taboo – a review article.