The Interoperability Controversy or How to Fail Successfully: Lessons from Europe

This article aims to discuss the interoperability controversy in the EU that followed the 2015 Paris attacks. Supported by visual methods, it analyses the historical developments of the databases that aim at facilitating migration and crime control in the Area of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA). In so doing, it seeks to trace the paradox on freedom, technology, and surveillance since the Schengen area was established in the 90s, whereby the discourse on the freedom of movement (both as the rights of citizens and migrants crossing borders) has been reframed by the security reasoning using technological solutions. It critiques the technical framework within which the interoperability plans have been framed