Why do we agree to take off our shoes at the airport?

7:30 a.m., Terminal 2E at Roissy. In the line leading to security, an executive unbuckles his seatbelt with a mechanical gesture, a mother takes bottles from her bag, and a tourist sighs as he unlaces his shoes. Everyone moves forward in silence punctuated by beeps, barely disturbed by the noise of lockers on moving walkways.

This scene is repeated tirelessly: according to the International Air Transport Association , 4.89 billion passengers will fly in 2024, or more than 13 million people passing through these screening devices every day.

One might see it as nothing more than a necessary technical procedure. Yet, observed with an anthropological eye, this banal moment reveals a transformation of identity as effective as it is discreet. For something strange is happening in these queues. We enter as citizens, consumers, professionals – we leave as “passengers in transit.” This metamorphosis, which we experience as a matter of course, deserves our attention.

What is immediately striking is the gradual and systematic dispossession. Personal objects, clothing, and status symbols disappear into standardized plastic bins. This logic seems arbitrary: why shoes and not underwear? Why 100 ml and not 110 ml? This apparent inconsistency actually reveals a symbolic function: to create a stripping away that affects the attributes of social identity.

The ethnographer Arnold van Gennep had identified this first phase of the rites of passage as early as 1909: separation . The individual must abandon his previous state, shed what defined him in the profane world. Here, the tied executive becomes an anonymous body, temporarily stripped of his costume, subject to the same technological gaze as everyone else. This forced equalization is not a side effect but the heart of the process: it prepares the transformation of identity by temporarily neutralizing the usual social hierarchies.

Then comes the scrutiny: scanners, detectors, questions about our intentions. "Why are you traveling? Who are you going to see? Did you pack your own bags ?" Each traveler temporarily becomes a suspect, having to prove their innocence. This reversal of the burden of proof—a reversal of the fundamental principle of " innocent until proven guilty "—goes unnoticed because it seems so "logical" in this context.

This phase corresponds to what Van Gennep called the margin or liminal period, which the anthropologist Victor Turner later developed: a moment when the subject, deprived of his usual social attributes, finds himself in a state of vulnerability that makes him malleable, ready to be transformed. In this technological in-between, we are no longer quite citizens, not yet travelers.

Finally, reintegration, according to ethnographer Arnold van Gennep: we are admitted into the post-control space. We have officially become "passengers" – a status that requires docility, patience, and acceptance of constraints "for our security." The post-control space, with its duty-free shops and overpriced cafes, marks this transformation: we are no longer citizens exercising a right to movement, but global consumers in transit, doubly dispossessed of our political and territorial roots.

A paradoxically effective security theater

These devices present a troubling paradox. On the one hand, they effectively detect contraband (forgotten knives, suspicious liquids) and exert a real deterrent effect. On the other, they struggle against the most sophisticated threats: in 2015, US test teams succeeded in smuggling fake weapons in 95% of their attempts .

In six years (from 2007 to 2013), the US behavioral detection program SPOT cost $900 million and failed to detect a single terrorist. It missed the only real terrorists who passed through airports, but there were no hijackings in the United States. The program therefore appears to be both useless (no real threat) and ineffective (failure to address real threats) .

This operational inefficiency is compounded by a major economic imbalance: according to engineer Mark Stewart and political scientist John Mueller , the tens of millions invested annually per airport generate so little effective reduction in terrorist risk that the costs far exceed the expected benefits.

Security expert Bruce Schneier calls this logic "security theater" : measures whose primary effectiveness is to reassure the public rather than neutralize the most serious threats. This is not a malfunction but a rational response to social expectations.

After an attack, public opinion expects visible measures that, although of questionable effectiveness, calm collective fears. "Security theater" responds to this demand by producing a sense of protection that helps maintain confidence in the system. Researchers Razaq Raj and Steve Wood (Leeds Beckett University) describe its airport staging , which is reassuring but sometimes discriminatory.

In this logic, we understand why these measures persist and become widespread despite their limited results. In addition, they contribute to reinforcing a tacit adherence to authority. This phenomenon is based in particular on the status quo bias , which locks us into already established systems and on a societal dynamic of ever-increasing demand for security , with no turning back seemingly possible.

The invisible learning of docility

Because these controls teach us something deeper than it seems. They first accustom us to accepting surveillance as normal, necessary , even benevolent. This habituation does not remain confined to the airport : it transfers to other social contexts. We learn to "show our papers," to justify our movements, to accept that our bodies are scrutinized "for our own good."

The system also works by reversing resistance. Resistance becomes suspect: anyone who questions procedures, refuses an additional search, or is annoyed by a delay automatically becomes a "problem." This binary moral classification—good, docile passengers versus difficult passengers—transforms criticism into an indicator of potential guilt.

Through repetition, these gestures become part of our bodily habits. We anticipate constraints: shoes without laces, pre-measured liquids, accessible computers. We develop what the philosopher Michel Foucault called "docile bodies" : bodies trained by discipline that internalize constraints and facilitate their own control.

Beyond the airport

This transformation isn't limited to airports. The pandemic has introduced similar practices: certificates, passes, and gestures that have become almost ritualistic.

We have become accustomed to "showing our papers" to access public spaces. With each collective shock, new rules are established, lastingly affecting our points of reference .

In the same vein, the requirement to remove shoes at the airport dates back to a single attempted attack: in December 2001, Richard Reid concealed explosives in his shoes. One man, one failure... and twenty-three years later, billions of travelers repeat this gesture, now part of normality. These events act as "founding myths" that naturalize certain constraints.

Sociologist Didier Fassin thus observes the emergence of a "moral government" where obedience becomes proof of ethics. Questioning control becomes a marker of civic irresponsibility. What makes this evolution remarkable is its largely invisible nature. We don't see the ritual at work; we simply experience the "necessary measures." This naturalization undoubtedly explains why these transformations encounter so little resistance.

Anthropology teaches us that the most effective rituals are those that we no longer perceive as such . They become obvious, necessary, indisputable. The system uses what the American political scientist Cass Sunstein calls " sludge ": unlike " nudge " which subtly encourages good behavior, sludge works by friction, making resistance more costly than cooperation. Social psychology work on freely consented submission shows that we accept constraints all the more easily when we feel we are choosing them. By believing we are freely deciding to take the plane, we are freely accepting all the constraints that come with it.

Identifying these mechanisms does not mean systematically denouncing or opposing them. Collective security has its legitimate demands. But becoming aware of these transformations allows us to question them, to deliberate on them, rather than to endure them.

For as the philosopher Hannah Arendt reminded us, understanding power is already about regaining a capacity for action. Perhaps that is the challenge: not to reject all constraints, but to retain the possibility of thinking about them.