Shifting up and out: The foreign policy of European immigration control

Abstract

Traditionally a core aspect of state sovereignty, immigration control has first moved upwards to the intergovernmental sphere. It has then been brought closer to supranational governance, and is now gradually moving outwards towards the realm of EU foreign relations. This article interprets this move as the continuation of established patterns of transgovernmental cooperation in an altered geopolitical and institutional context. It explains internationalisation as a strategy of immigration ministers to increase their autonomy towards political, normative and institutional constraints on policy-making. Whereas these constraints were originally located at the national level, they are now increasingly perceived in communitarising immigration politics. The shift ‘outwards’ may thus be interpreted as a strategy to maximise the gains from Europeanisation while minimising the constraints resulting from deepening supranationalism. Yet this might in the long run also yield a widening of the external migration agenda, distracting it from the original focus on migration control.

Notes

1. The potentially influential role of the European Parliament in future legislation under co-decision is hinted at in its action before the European Court of Justice against the Council's Directive on Family Reunification and its very critical report on the Asylum Procedures Directive of 2005.

2. Interview with a representative from the Council Secretariat, DG H, Brussels on 4 March 2004.

3. Participants are representatives of Albania, Australia (observer), Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Moldova, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Rumania, Russian Federation, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, Ukraine, Yugoslavia, European Commission, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), International Organisation for Migration (IOM), Stability Pact Support Unit, Inter-governmental Consultations (IGC) and the International Centre for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD) which acts as Secretariat.

4. To date, there exist six different levels of agreements. In mid-2003, these were the following: (1) unilateral statement by EC on readmission (Vietnam); (2) agreement to dialogue or cooperation on readmission only (Tunisia, Israel, Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan, Belarus); (3) declaration on readmission of own nationals (Morocco – also with binding obligation to enter into dialogue – Yemen, Laos, Cambodia, Pakistan); (4) declaration on readmission of own nationals and negotiation of further treaties concerning third-country nationals (Jordan – also with binding obligation to enter into dialogue); (5) treaty obligation to readmit own nationals and negotiate further treaties concerning third-country nationals (Egypt, Lebanon, Algeria, Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Croatia, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) states (including South Africa), Chile); and (6) application of internal EC rules (Norway, Iceland; planned with Switzerland, Liechtenstein). See Peers 2003. In addition, standard readmission clauses were introduced in the Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreements with the group of Central American Countries comprising Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama and with the Andean Community (Bolivia, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela) which were signed on 15 December 2003.