Keeping Numbers Low in the Name of Fairness

Abstract

“I am interested in foreigners, other cultures. The basic idea is to help these people, even if we do – of course – reject many of them”, Gabriel, a caseworker in the Swiss Secretariat for Migration (SEM), once said to me (Gabriel, caseworker, interview transcript).1 The SEM is where first-instance asylum decisions are made in Switzerland. Officials working there – officials like Gabriel – make decisions about whether asylum seekers fulfil the requirements for refugee status, and whether they believe the applicants' statements are credible.2 Applicants must fulfil both preconditions before receiving asylum. Although Gabriel works in the SEM “to help people”, for him it is okay that most applicants get rejected. This has to do with his understanding of fairness, a core issue in professional decision-making. Thus, later in the conversation quoted above, he went on to say that it was the decision-makers' duty to meticulously examine the credibility of each case, because otherwise “everybody could just receive asylum and that would be unfair to those who