The passport : aesthetics as a tool of colonialism from empire to passport apartheid

Abstract

This dissertation argues that the passport today is not neutral but is tied to enduring colonial structures that dictate the rights, identity, and mobility of all citizens of the world. I examine this across three main ideas: the historical, the visual and the ethical. My dissertation looks at 199 passports of UN states, plus some observers and some Indigenous passports where available from 2024 to 2026. I examine their designs, languages, and the conditions within them. By exploring the works of many authors and researchers, including Quijano, Scott, Anderson, Saussure, Fanon, hooks, Singer, Levinas, Rawls, Arendt, Foucault, and Bauman, I have developed the argument that the passport perpetuates colonial inheritance in three ways. Firstly, it does so by restricting the mobility of formerly colonised populations. Next, by privileging Western aesthetics as the dominant and legitimate visual framework, and lastly by imposing European categories of identity that reconstruct what it means to be a person. I hope my dissertation contributes to raising awareness of the passport, how it is used today, its history, and its consequences.