"Åldern är ju bara en siffra" : En antropologisk litteraturstudie om medicinska åldersbedömningar på ensamkommande flyktingbarn

The aim of this essay was to examine the justifications of the swedish government to perform medical age assessments on unaccompanied refugee children seeking asylum in Sweden. These governmental justifications were analyzed through Michel Foucault's theory of disciplinary power as well as through anthropological research on classification of age. The empirical material consisted of a selection of websites from different authorities that process medical age assessments. These were then studied through critical discourse analysis. The essay showed that these justifications can be understood as an expression of disciplinary power, where medical age assessments discipline individuals to docile bodies. Furthermore, the analysis also showed that the governmental justifications were partly founded upon western concepts of how a child is supposed to be and what a child is entitled to