A NATION THROUGH HOME INVASION: WHITE SETTLER NATIONALISM, CHINESE CRIMINALITY AND THE 1999 “SUMMER OF THE BOATS”

A NATION THROUGH HOME INVASION: WHITE SETTLER NATIONALISM, CHINESE CRIMINALITY AND THE 1999 “SUMMER OF THE BOATS”

This paper examines Canadian responses to human smuggling by analyzing one of the most significant “boundary-drawing panics” (Berlant, 1997:14) in recent Canadian history: the 1999 arrival of approximately 600 Chinese migrants in four boats off the coast of British Colombia. I address how a relatively small number of economically impoverished and extremely vulnerable group of detained Chinese women, men and children could be constructed as a national and global security risk. Unlike previous research on the 1999 Chinese migrants, I argue that the disproportionate concern regarding their arrival is shaped by two interrelated factors: the positioning of Chinese migrants in the history of white settlement in the lower mainland of British Columbia, and the contemporary context of Western fears of “China rising.” Drawing on mainstream media documents, I emphasize how Western concern over China’s economic and political ascendancy fuelled constructs of the migrants as a threat.