“They are like kamikaze terrorists, they have nothing to lose and everything to gain”
- A general of the Spanish Guardia Civil, Canary Islands ⁽²⁾

Since the early 1990s, the arrival by sea of unauthorised migrants to the European shores has become a common phenomenon. Every year, thousands of African migrants leave their homelands behind in overcrowded vessels with the hope that a better life awaits them on the other side of the Mediterranean Sea. Of those fortunate enough to cross the waters with their lives still intact, some apply for asylum, some face deportation, some remain irregular sans papiers immigrants, whilst yet others manage to obtain legal residence.⁽³⁾

Deplorably, this form of migration carries with it a disturbing magnitude of risk and human costs. The BBC reports that boat migration alone has claimed an estimated 25,000 lives in the past two decades,⁽⁴⁾ but taking into consideration the yet accounted for figures, the number is most likely higher. In recent years, the media has been replete with news stories of capsized ships, images of “scared, shivering and dishevelled” boat migrants ⁽⁵⁾ and accounts of the horrid conditions, violence, insecurities and uncertainties to which migrants are subjected during their journeys,⁽⁶⁾ as well as upon arrival to often deplorable detention centres.⁽⁷⁾ In spite of stricter policies, tightened security measures and information campaigns aimed at deterring clandestine migration, the flows show no sign of subsiding. Consequently, this form of migration presents major political, humanitarian, logistical and legal challenges to international, regional and national authorities, organisations, and policy makers who struggle to grapple with the issue and adequately redress its grave human and societal implications.⁽⁸⁾

The dynamics of migration are extremely complex and bring about immense problems for governments attempting to “steer immigration.”⁽⁹⁾ In today’s post-9/11 political climate, the discussion on migration has become largely inseparable from the securitisation discourse in which the ‘migrant other’ is framed as a threat to internal and international security.⁽¹⁰⁾ This discussion paper delves into the murky waters of high-risk unauthorised migration by sea. It briefly examines the global migration picture and Africa’s boat people, and the migration-securitisation nexus. The paper presents the argument that the European Union’s (EU) draconian policies aimed at keeping migrants out are not only proving to be difficult and ineffective, but moreover, run the risk of undermining the human rights of migrants and exposing them to even greater dangers.

An overview: Forced migration and Africa’s ‘boat people’

The migration domain - whether it concerns forced migrants such as refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs), or ‘voluntary’ economic migrants - is a highly politicised and internationalised realm.⁽¹¹⁾ According to the annual report of the Norwegian Refugee Fund (NRC), the number of forced migrants has steadily increased over the past decade, and reached a new global record high at the beginning of 2013 with an estimated 45.2 million forced migrants, of which 14.6 million international refugees and IDPs originate from African countries.⁽¹²⁾

Unauthorised boat migration across the Mediterranean to Europe is neither a new nor an ‘African’ phenomenon, but it is, indisputably, a problem that, as recent events have revealed, poses a grave and unresolved human crisis to this day.⁽¹³⁾ The term ‘boat people’ originally referred to the thousands of Vietnamese who fled their country by sea after the South Vietnamese government collapsed in 1975. Crowded into small vessels, they fell prey to pirates, and many suffered dehydration, starvation, or death by drowning. The term was later applied to waves of refugees from Cuba and Haiti who tried to escape their islands and reach the United States.⁽¹⁴⁾ Today, however, attention has largely been shifted to the central Mediterranean where the lives of tens of thousands of people from Africa and the Middle East have been jeopardised by embarking on the perilous sea passage to Europe.

Mass movements of populations, such as the recent arrivals of Somalis and Eritreans to European shores, are marked by both continuity and change,⁽¹⁵⁾ and are a product of societal events and processes. In brief, the causes of human mobility are generally understood as being underpinned by insufferable structural conditions – such as conflict, state failure, environmental disasters, and the alarming inequalities embedded in the global political economy (GPE) - combined with collectively held norms and beliefs, and individual attitudes at the micro-level.⁽¹⁶⁾

Since the emergence of forced migration and immigration as a modern ‘problem’, it has become increasingly apparent that the issue is beyond the capacity of any single government to effectively manage and mitigate.⁽¹⁷⁾ Boat people and other refugees find themselves in a situation in which their own government is unable or unwilling to provide rudimentary needs, ensure their physical safety and protect fundamental human rights. They are forced to seek protection from the international community. Under international law, refugees who are fleeing conflict, humanitarian disasters or persecution have a right to asylum, but the arrival ashore of hundreds of migrants overburdens the already-strained systems in place, and authorities face the difficult task of identifying who the ‘genuine’ asylum seekers are.⁽¹⁸⁾ However, as the majority lack the necessary paperwork to prove their nationality or place of origin, all legal pathways are barred to them and they resort to the only available option of making the passage to Europe by placing themselves in the hands of criminal bands and human smugglers.⁽¹⁹⁾ The existence of these fleeing ‘undesirables’,⁽²⁰⁾ as stated by Emma Haddad (2008) in her book The Refugee in International Society, “represent a permanent feature of the international landscape. They are the human reminder of the failings of modern international society.”⁽²¹⁾ As such, it becomes impossible to divorce the ethical from the political questions in the modern world of inter-state relations in the context of migration.

The migration-security nexus: 9/11, ‘Fortress Europe’ and the ‘migrant other’

It was not until the 1990s that the linkage between migration and security became more widely addressed by scholars and policy makers in the so-called developed countries.⁽²²⁾ Reviewing the EU’s migration regime reveals a significant and sustained policy move towards the securitisation of migrants and the externalisation of border controls. While the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam and the incorporation of the Schengen Agreements into the EU structure were accompanied by an incremental dismantling of European internal borders, they simultaneously reinforced a greater emphasis on external control, increased surveillance and stricter legislation aimed at preventing ‘unwanted immigration’ and bolstering the ever-growing walls encircling ‘Fortress Europe’.⁽²³⁾

This trend is believed by many scholars to have deepened as part of the general securitisation of policies that materialised largely in response to the events of 11 September 2001. Hence, the Western counter-terrorism policy discourse has played a significant role in the discursive construction of the current immigration, asylum and human rights regimes by drawing links between “the danger/risk/threat of terrorism and security, migration, asylum and border control.”⁽²⁴⁾ It has provided a powerful impetus for what Christopher Baker-Beall describes as “the return to a politics of fear and everyday insecurity that appears to be characteristic of contemporary social life in the era of the global war on terror.”⁽²⁵⁾ This has arguably shaped a “mad war on immigration”⁽²⁶⁾ whereby the arrival of waves of ‘foreign others’ is constructed as an existential threat, which, fraught with a sense of urgency and priority, works to legitimise the use of “extraordinary measures beyond the norms and practices of everyday politics.”⁽²⁷⁾ As is discussed in the remainder of the paper, this gives cause for great concern.

The manifestations and dangers of the ‘biopolitical border’

The discourse in which the freedoms of EU citizens require security from threats such as ‘unwanted’ immigration, poses a serious challenge to the EU institutions of justice and democracy.⁽²⁸⁾ As highlighted by many scholars, numerous dangers arise with the securitisation of societal issues such as migration. Europe is currently witnessing a manifestation of the ‘biopolitical border’,⁽²⁹⁾ whereby authorities attempt to govern the mobility of people by regulating aspects of everyday life and subjecting them to the Foucauldian notion of biopower. This extension of state power over both the physical and political bodies of a population, acts as a racialised control apparatus that strives to regulate the vulnerable ‘others’ within a “govermentality of unease.”⁽³⁰⁾ In this sense, the threats posed by the immigrant and the terrorist are framed as a combined problem, not because they constitute a direct menace to the survival of society, but rather because “scenes from everyday life are politicised…day-to-day living is securitised.”⁽³¹⁾ Securitisation policy that deals with the movement of populations, hence, appears as a product of a general desire to repel immigration altogether. The security discourse, rooted in tight external border controls and the exclusion of migrants, arguably, dramatises the issue as one of absolute priority.⁽³²⁾ In spite of there being “very little evidence that migrants from Sub-Saharan Africa present a terrorist threat to the EU…the changes to how migrants enter the EU have been informed by these beliefs and the counter-terror agenda.⁽³³⁾ The unintended consequence is that it runs the risk of producing a self-fulfilling prophecy: “Once turned into a security problem, the migrant appears as the other who has entered (or who desires to enter) a harmonious world and just by having entered it, has disturbed the harmony.”⁽³⁴⁾

Ironically, such misleading assumptions lead many Europeans to view themselves as occupying the vulnerable position as the “real victims of the migration process,”⁽³⁵⁾ whilst African immigrants are by default framed in negative terms as the perpetrators of clandestine activities, despite many migrants being in dire need of protection. This is not to say that African migrants should be regarded merely as passive victims of the societal crises that pervade the worlds from which they seek to escape. The point is that migrants do not constitute a single homogeneous entity, and conceptual boundaries are never as clear-cut as regulation regimes imply. Dichotomies of passivity/agency, victim/perpetrator, innocent/guilty and illegal migrant/refugee are all immensely reductionist and problematic. That migrants display elements of agency in their active search for a way “out of a life that they feel to be without a future,”⁽³⁶⁾ does not disqualify them from simultaneously playing the role of a victim. Conceptual confusion adds to the challenge of managing migration through control policy because labels are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but rather intertwined, overlapping, and often conflated.⁽³⁷⁾ Hence, the categorisation of concepts “that are at once descriptive, normative and political” becomes tricky to apply in policy and in practice.⁽³⁸⁾

There has been a prompt and continual growth of mechanisms that formalise and reinforce the prohibition on South-North migration. These mechanisms have included restrictive visa and asylum policies, the deployment of patrols to intercept movement, and repatriation agreements. Such securitisation measures are, to a large degree, reactive as opposed to preventative in the sense that they are directed more at treating the symptoms than tackling the problem at its roots and eliminating some of the underlying triggers. Current EU policies produce added dangers and indignities due to the higher risk exposure as migrants resort to a “diversification in the strategies” and longer sea journeys to circumvent patrols, detention and repatriation to transit countries.⁽³⁹⁾ This often results in the loss of significant investments in the journey collected by individuals or their families, and longer journeys make failure and tragedies like the ones off the coast of Lampedusa more probable. It is imperative to acknowledge that in many cases, “no amount of deterrence can match the terror from which those who are genuine refugees are fleeing,”⁽⁴⁰⁾ and that exclusionary displays of biopower demonstrate a reversed effect. Deterrence-oriented strategies of migration control and awareness campaigns expected to deflect unauthorised and perilous migration, have proven ineffective with their failure to account for how people conceptualise risk in, and form, migration decisions.⁽⁴¹⁾

Conclusions: Ditching draconian policy approaches and promoting durable solutions

Southern Europe has become the ‘frontline’ of African clandestine immigration by sea. The tragedies off the coast of Lampedusa in October 2013 have triggered renewed calls for increased financial and human resources to better address migration.⁽⁴²⁾ The strengthening of external border controls that we have witnessed over the years is implicitly linked to the conditions of insecurity and uncertainty of a post-9/11 world. The issue of security draws links between various disparate phenomena, such as terrorism, drugs, organised crime and immigration whilst constructing them as mutually integral in an attempt to legitimise harsher measures of deterrence.

At the intersection of knowledge, policy and biopower, however, the EU’s immigration regime reflects a deep-rooted mistrust or fear of the “kamikaze migrant” as a foreign other, producing a precarious migrant discourse that is refracted back into social and political life. Emphasising restrictions and controls reinforces a negative portrayal of migrant groups and may lead to xenophobic ideas and practices or discriminatory stereotyping. The racial profiling that typifies these processes reflects the “unacknowledged and systemic racism” towards the African migrant throughout the Western policy sphere.⁽⁴³⁾ It becomes evident that while securitisation provokes a rise in the human costs of unauthorised migration, it also inhibits the inclusion of foreign immigrants in European societies by further diminishing the chances of promoting more multicultural integration policies.⁽⁴⁴⁾

Responding to migration flows is seen to represent a major challenge to world order, justice and the facilitation of international cooperation.⁽⁴⁵⁾ There is, thus, a need to pay greater attention to the role that the securitisation discourse plays in shaping the production and reproduction, domination and/or abuse of power and knowledge in the context of particular events, the institution involved and the social structures that frame contemporary migration politics. Amidst the heat of debates, it is important to take a step back and reassess the inherent complexities of the situation at hand. There are no easy answers, but this should not prevent us from asking whose rights and freedoms we are actually protecting and why the protection of stability and security within the EU must come at the expense of desperate migrants’ plight for protection.

Whilst the Europeans do a little soul-searching, Africans on their part must also pose questions about issues closer to home. What role can regional actors such as the African Union (AU) play in order to take a stronger stand to mitigate the crises in the Horn of Africa and the resultant human exodus? How can development become a more effective preventative tool? How is development aid distributed and does it reach potential migrants?

As long as the local conditions and grievances at home are not tackled at the root, European deterrence measures are unlikely to succeed. This suggests that it is time to review the draconian set of restrictive measures and move towards a more flexible approach that emphasises migrant rights and solidarity, pays greater attention to the narratives of the migrants themselves, establishes more equitable responsibility-sharing mechanisms, and encourages African-European cooperation and co-development. The proposition that “fewer controls on the flow of people would have positive impacts on the individual migrants themselves, as well as economic benefits for both African and European economies”⁽⁴⁶⁾ may not be such a bad idea after all.⁽⁴⁷⁾ How many more preventable tragedies and deadly wake up calls must take place before Europe puts an end to its rigid closed-door policy, and, together with African actors, looks for more durable solutions that focus on the wellbeing of those who seek protection?

Written by Akari O. Izumi Kvamme ⁽¹⁾

NOTES:

(1) Akari O. Izumi Kvamme is a Research Associate with CAI with a particular focus on global politics, peace and conflict, human security, gender equity and social justice. Contact Akari through Consultancy Africa Intelligence's Africa Watch Unit ( africa.watch@consultancyafrica.com). Edited by Nicky Berg
(2) Hernàndez-Carretero, M. and Carling, J., 2012. Beyond “kamikaze migrants”: Risk taking in West African boat migration to Europe. Human Organization, 71(4), pp. 407-416.
(3) Fernandez, B., ‘Why migrants die’, Aljazeera, 6 November 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com; Hernàndez-Carretero, M. and Carling, J., 2012. Beyond “kamikaze migrants”: Risk taking in West African boat migration to Europe. Human Organization, 71(4), pp. 407-416.
(4) Hewitt, G., ‘A 'European tragedy' off Lampedusa‘, BBC News, 4 October 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk.
(5) Raveneendran, M., 2012. Plight of the boat people: How to determine state obligations to asylum seekers. Notre Dame Law Review, 87(3), pp. 1277-1312.
(6) ‘Migrant boat capsize: survivor tells of ordeal’, BBC News, 13 October 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk; ‘Lampedusa boat tragedy: Migrants ‘raped and tortured’, BBC News, 8 November 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk.
(7) Povoledo, E., ‘Italy’s migrant detention centers are cruel, rights group say’, New York Times, 5 June 2013, http://www.nytimes.com.
(8) Hernàndez-Carretero, M. and Carling, J., 2012. Beyond “kamikaze migrants”: Risk taking in West African boat migration to Europe. Human Organization, 71(4), pp. 407-416.
(9) Boswell, C., 2011. Migration control and narratives of steering. The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 13, pp. 12-25.
(10) Baker-Beall, C., 2009. The discursive construction of EU counter-terrorism policy: Writing the ‘migrant other’, securitisation and control. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp.188-206.
(11) Haddad, E., 2008. The refugee in international society: Between sovereigns. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
(12) ‘Flyktning regnskapet: Alt om mennesker på flukt verden over’, Annual report Flyktninghjelpen/Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) Annual Report 2013.
(13) ‘Africa: UNHCR Warns of further boat tragedy Risk on Mediterranean’,United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 11 October 2013, http://allafrica.com.
(14) Encyclopaedia Brittanica. http://global.britannica.com.
(15) Carling, J. and Hernàndez-Carretero, M., ‘Kamikaze migrants? Understanding and tackling high-risk migration from Africa’, paper presented at Narratives of Migration Management and Cooperation with Countries of Origin and Transit, Sussex Centre for Migration Research, University of Sussex, 18-19 September 2008, http://www.pol.ed.ac.uk.
(16) Betts, A. and Loescher, G., 2011. Refugees in International Relations. Oxford University Press: Oxford; Hernàndez-Carretero, M., ‘Boat migrants’ perspectives on risk’, paper presented at the workshop The Human Costs of Border Control in the Context of EU Maritime Migration System, Amsterdam, 25-27 October 2009, http://www.rechten.vu.nl.
(17) Haddad, E., 2008. The refugee in international society: Between sovereigns. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
(18) Fernandez, B., ‘Why migrants die’, Aljazeera, 6 November 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com.
(19) Hewitt, G., ‘Italy boat sinking: Hundreds feared dead off Lampedusa’, BBC News, 3 October 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk.
(20) Bermejo, R., 2009. Migration and security in the EU: Back to Fortress Europe? Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 207-224.
(21) Haddad, E., 2008. The refugee in international society: Between sovereigns. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
(22) Bermejo, R., 2009. Migration and security in the EU: Back to fortress Europe? Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 207-224.
(23) Ibid.
(24) Ibid.
(25) Ibid.
(26) Fernandez, B., ‘Why migrants die’, Aljazeera, 6 November 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com.
(27) Baker-Beall, C., 2009. The discursive construction of EU counter-terrorism policy: Writing the ‘migrant other’, securitisation and control. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 188-206.
(28) Cross, H.M., 2009. The EU migration regime and West African clandestine migrants. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 171-187.
(29) Ibid.
(30) FitzGerald, S.A., 2010. Biopolitics and the regulation of vulnerability: The case of the female trafficked migrant. International Journal of Law in Context, 6(3), pp. 277-294.
(31) Baker-Beall, C., 2009. The discursive construction of EU counter-terrorism policy: Writing the ‘migrant other’, securitisation and control. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 188-206.
(32) Bermejo, R., 2009. Migration and security in the EU: Back to fortress Europe? Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 207-224.
(33) Baker-Beall, C., 2009. The discursive construction of EU counter-terrorism policy: Writing the ‘migrant other’, securitisation and control. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 188-206.
(34) Bermejo, R., 2009. Migration and security in the EU: Back to fortress Europe? Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 207-224.
(35) Fernandez, B., ‘Why migrants die’, Aljazeera, 6 November 2013, http://www.aljazeera.com.
(36) Hernàndez-Carretero, M. and Carling, J., 2012. Beyond “kamikaze migrants”: Risk taking in West African boat migration to Europe. Human Organization, 71(4), pp. 407-416.
(37) Boswell, C., Geddes, A. and Scholten, P., 2011. The role of narratives in migration policy-making: A research framework’, The British Journal of Politics and International Relations, 13, pp. 1-11; Haddad, E., 2008. The refugee in international society: Between Sovereigns. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
(38) Haddad, E., 2008. The refugee in international society: Between Sovereigns. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge.
(39) Hernàndez-Carretero, M., ‘Boat migrants’ perspectives on risk’, Paper presented at the workshop The Human Costs of Border Control in the Context of EU Maritime Migration System, Amsterdam 25-27 October 2009, http://www.rechten.vu.nl.
(40) McAdam, J., ‘Australia's draconian refugee policy is built on myths’, The Guardian, 30 October 2013, http://www.theguardian.com.
(41) Hernàndez-Carretero, M., ‘Boat migrants’ perspectives on risk’, paper presented at the workshop The Human Costs of Border Control in the Context of EU Maritime Migration System, Amsterdam 25-27 October 2009, http://www.rechten.vu.nl.
(42) Cross, H.M., 2009. The EU migration regime and West African clandestine migrants. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 171-187.
(43) Dover, R. (2008). Towards a common EU immigration policy: A secularisation too far. European Integration, 30(1), pp. 113-130.
(44) Baker-Beall, C., 2009. The discursive construction of EU counter-terrorism policy: Writing the ‘migrant other’, securitisation and control. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 5(2), pp. 188-206.
(45) Betts, A. and Loescher, G., 2011. Refugees in international relations. Oxford University Press: Oxford.
(46) Dover, R. (2008). Towards a common EU immigration policy: A secularisation too far. European Integration, 30(1), pp. 113-130.
(47) Schmidt, A., ‘Opinion: Europe must dismantle its barricades’, Deutsche Well, 4 October 2013, http://www.dw.de.