Europes Migration

Crisis

Image: Press Association.

There has been a huge increase in the numbers of migrants seeking

refuge in Europe. James Hampshire examines the development of a
humanitarian and a political crisis within the European Union and
assesses the chances of a long-term solution.

urope is facing its second

existential crisis in the space
of five years. No sooner had
European leaders patched
together a solution to the Eurozone crisis,
than divisions over how to respond to the
surge of refugees and migrants arriving in
Europe threatened once again to tear the
EU apart. While the arrival of thousands
of Syrians and other migrants may appear
to have little in common with the travails
of monetary union, there are in fact
many parallels between the two crises. In
both cases emblematic achievements of

European integration are at stake: the euro

and free movement, respectively. In both
cases exogenous shocks (on the one hand,
the 2007-8 US banking crisis, on the other,
war in the Middle East) have triggered a
series of events that have exposed the
inadequacies of Europes institutional
architecture. And in both cases, the EU
has struggled to agree a collective and
sustainable response.

Europes Dysfunctional
Asylum System
Tensions about how to respond to asylum-

seekers arriving on Europes shores have

existed for many years. The establishment
of the Schengen Area in 1995, created a
borderless zone in which it was relatively
easy for asylum-seekers and irregular
migrants who had crossed the EUs external
border to move freely. This implied the
need for a common asylum policy, with
clear rules about which member state
was responsible for processing an asylum
application. The Dublin Regulation
stipulates that asylum-seekers can make
only one application for international
protection and that this should be in the
first state through which they enter the
EU. If an asylum-seeker is found to have
entered through a country other than the
one in which they claim asylum, they can
be returned to that country. The official
objective of the Dublin system is to prevent
POLITICAL INSIGHT DECEMBER 2015

multiple asylum applications so-called

asylum-shopping but it has also had the
(predictable) consequence of placing the
responsibility for processing asylum claims
on southern and south-eastern member
states with external land or sea borders.
While northern member states benefit
from the buffer this created, countries
such as Italy, Malta and Greece, have long
complained that the Dublin system places
unfair burdens on them. Up until the current
crisis, the EUs response has been to offer
frontline states financial transfers under
the European Refugee Fund, as well as
operational support such as the deployment
of the EU borders agency, Frontex, to
the Greek-Turkish border in 2010, or the
creation of the European Asylum Support
Office (EASO) in Malta. But these solidarity
mechanisms do not address the fundamental
inequity of the Dublin system and they have
not assuaged southern member states.
As the Arab Spring triggered new flows
across the Mediterranean, north-south
tensions reached new levels. In April 2011,
Italian authorities issued a small number
of irregular Tunisian migrants with travel
documents, in the expectation that they
would travel on to France. The French
government responded by closing its border
with Italy, and for a short time it looked as if
Schengen might unravel. The EU muddled
through by revising the Schengen rules, but
the underlying imbalances of the Dublin
system were left unresolved.
The situation worsened following the
overthrow of Colonel Gaddafi in October
2011, as Libya descended into factional
violence and then civil war. Gaddafi had
cooperated with the EU in preventing
irregular migration from Libyan shores,
but now people smugglers could operate
relatively unhindered. Boat crossings across
the central Mediterranean increased over the
next three years, only dropping off in 2015
as Libya became so unstable that smugglers
found it difficult to operate there, and also
due to increased maritime patrols by Frontex.
During 2015, two migration routes through
southeastern Europe became increasingly
important. First, in the eastern Mediterranean,
thousands of migrants have crossed the
Aegean Sea from Turkey to the Greek islands,
and second, unprecedented numbers have
tried to reach the EU via the Western Balkans,
DECEMBER 2015 POLITICAL INSIGHT

many crossing at the Serbia-Hungary border.

The large increase in the numbers of migrants
travelling along these routes was largely due
to the escalation of the civil war in Syria
over 50 per cent of arrivals in 2015 have been
from Syria but also conflict, oppression,
and poverty in other countries. Aside from
Syrians, the main nationalities represented
among recent movements include Kosovars,
Afghanis, Pakistanis, Iraqis, and Somalis.
While many of these migrants are fleeing
war or persecution, there are also substantial
numbers of people who are unlikely to be
entitled to protection under the terms of
the 1951 Refugee Convention. Thus not
only is the scale of the recent migration to
Europe unprecedented, it is also enormously
complex and rapidly changing.

The Difference a Crisis Makes

By the spring of 2015, it was clear that
the European asylum regime was at
breaking point, but it took two human
tragedies to catalyse action. On 19 April

2015, a boat carrying migrants sank off

the Libyan coast, with an estimated 900
lives lost. At an emergency summit a few
days later, European leaders agreed to
step up maritime patrols and develop
a (frankly unrealistic) scheme to sink
smugglers vessels using warships. In May,
the Commission proposed a scheme to
alleviate pressure on frontline states by
redistributing asylum-seekers across the
EU, but in one of the most bad-tempered
meetings in living memory European
leaders were unable to reach agreement on
the proposals.
Then, in early September, the terrible
image of Aylan Kurdi shocked public opinion
and prompted another round of emergency
summits. Germany moved to support the
Commissions proposals for relocation of
forced migrants, followed shortly after
by France. The German government also
unilaterally announced that it would no
longer return Syrians to the first country
they entered, effectively tearing up the

Distribution of asylum seekers in Europe up to first half 2015

Map created by Benjamin D. Hennig.

2011

2013

2012
March 1, 2012

April 2011

The Bekaa
becomes a major
destination of
refugees

The Syrian refugee

crisis begins: Up to
5000 refugees flee
to Lebanon
July 12, 2011

April 4, 2012

Syrians find refuge

in Jordan

Domiz Camp opens

in Iraq

December 17, 2012

July 3, 2012
Fighting flares up
in Aleppo, many
flee to Turkish
border

Tuberculosis found
among Syrian
refugees in
Lebanon

September 25, 2012

Riots in Zaatari
camp
July 29, 2012
UNHCR opens
Zaatari camp in
northern Jordan

Timeline of an unfolding crisis

Dublin system. The longstanding southnorth tensions over asylum burden-sharing

evaporated almost overnight, only to be
replaced with a new east-west division. Five
central and eastern European countries
Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia,
and Romania made clear their opposition to
mandatory relocation. The Hungarian Prime
Minister, Viktor Orban, whose government
had responded to the influx by building a
razor-wire fence at its border with Serbia,
insisted that the Dublin system should be
upheld. As the situation on the ground
worsened, first Germany, then Austria and
Slovenia imposed controls at their borders.
During September, interior ministers and
heads of state met repeatedly to try to reach
agreement on some kind of response. The
Commission put forward a new package of
proposals, including an emergency relocation
scheme for 120,000 migrants in Italy, Greece
and Hungary, a permanent relocation
scheme, and a new EU list of safe countries
of origin. After a ministerial meeting on 14
September again failed to reach agreement,
the Council President, Donald Tusk, called an
emergency summit. With Hungary refusing
to participate in relocation, the scheme was
now refocused solely on Italy and Greece.
Tusk played a key role as broker and the
Polish government dropped its opposition,
but the other four opponents remained
steadfast. Unable to reach consensus, the
Council forced through the scheme by a

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Qualified Majority Vote. The Slovakian Prime

Minister, Robert Fico, defiantly insisted that
quotas would not be implemented on Slovak
territory and vowed to challenge the decision
in the courts (at the time of writing, Slovakia
is preparing its complaint to the European
Court of Justice).

Sovereignty and Identity

While Europe is facing unprecedented
population movements, the acrimonious
dispute over the relocation scheme is not
really about numbers. Europe is the richest
region in the world and the numbers
being discussed are quite manageable.
Under the first phase of the relocation
scheme, Slovakia will take just 802 asylumseekers, equivalent to 0.01 per cent of
its population. To put this in perspective,
Lebanon is struggling to accommodate
over 1.3 million Syrian refugees, some 29
per cent of its population. Nor can concern
about numbers explain the position of the
Hungarian government, which refused to
be one of the three beneficiary countries,
even though this would have meant
asylum-seekers being relocated elsewhere.
Opposition to the scheme is rather about
the domestic politics of sovereignty and
identity. Viktor Orbans attack on the EUs
response to the crisis is a clear move to see
off his main electoral threat, the far-right
Jobbik Party, which is both anti-EU and antiimmigrant. A recent poll showed that his

Fidesz Partys ratings have indeed increased

during the conflict over refugees. Orban
and other nationalists across Europe claim
that the Commission is using the crisis to
push for further supranational powers, in an
area that should remain a matter of national
sovereignty.
Nor are the four central European
countries that voted against the relocation
scheme alone in opposing further
Europeanization of asylum and migration
policy. Finland abstained in the vote, while
the UK government wielded its opt-out
and refused to take part. And in Poland, the
previous Civic Platform-led government,
which decided to support the relocation
scheme at the last minute, was defeated
in the October elections by the right-wing
Law and Justice Party, which opposed
it. It remains to be seen whether other
governments, particularly those facing
electoral threats from populist radical right
parties, will support the Commissions
more ambitious proposal for a permanent
relocation mechanism.
These are not simply technical debates
about how to achieve solidarity, but rather
a form of deep-seated and visceral politics.
Concerns over member state sovereignty
are closely tied to identity, and the migration
crisis has brought anti-Muslim sentiments
to the surface. Mr Orban presents himself
as the defender of a European identity,
rooted in Christianity, asking is it not
POLITICAL INSIGHT DECEMBER 2015

Janua

Leban
govern
to regi

March 6, 2013

August 18, 2013

Syrian refugees
reach 1 million

Thousands of
refugees pour into
Iraq

ary 4, 2013

nese
nment agrees
ister refugees

2014
November 11, 2013
Bulgaria to build
fence on Turkish
border

September 1, 2013
2 million Syrian
refugees: half are
children

September 20, 2013

September 21, 2014

January 30, 2014

April 3, 2014

UK announces it
will take Syrian
refugees

UNHCR: Almost 1
in 5 people in
Lebanon a Syrian
Refugee

December 16, 2013

United Nations
launches largest
appeal yet: $6.5
billion

Sweden offers
permanent
residency to Syrian
refugees
October 18, 2013
Refugee resettlement: 16 countries
make confirmed
pledges

worrying in itself that European Christianity

is now barely able to keep Europe Christian?
There is no alternative, and we have no
option but to defend our borders. While
the Slovakian Prime Minister, Robert Fico,
said that Slovakia is built for Slovaks, not for
minorities and asserted that he would not
tolerate Muslim immigrants who would start
to build mosques.

Beyond Policy Failure?

Thus the domestic politics of sovereignty
and identity have prevented the EU from
developing a coherent, let alone effective,
policy response to the migrant crisis.
Apart from the emergency relocation
scheme which in any case falls well short
of addressing the half-million migrants
who have already arrived in Europe this
year the EU persists with policies that
are palpably not working. Increasing
powers for Frontex and further tightening
border controls will not stop people
coming to Europe. Such measures will
simply divert migrants to less well-policed
entry points and increase their reliance
on people smugglers. The construction
of fences, border patrols, and military
interventions, are not so much efficacious
migration policies, as exercises in symbolic
politics. Yet while the intensification and
militarisation of border controls may pay
electoral dividends, it entirely fails to
address the causes of irregular migration.
DECEMBER 2015 POLITICAL INSIGHT

By diverting movements and creating

markets for smugglers, the intensification
of external border controls actually
exacerbates the problem and moreover
costs human lives.
With an end to the Syrian war nowhere
in sight, the EU urgently needs to address
both the internal and external dimensions
of the crisis. Internally, as the Commission
has indicated with its proposed permanent
relocation scheme, the EU needs a
mechanism to distribute responsibility
for asylum-seekers. Without this, tensions
between member states will worsen, risking
further reintroduction of internal border
controls and the unravelling of Schengen.
However, given the controversy surrounding
even the emergency relocation scheme,
the chances of agreement on a permanent
scheme do not look good.
The EU could also take bolder measures to
address the supply-side of the refugee crisis.
First, it could provide more help to countries
such as Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan that are
hosting large number of refugees, as well as
the international agencies that run camps
and provide aid to refugees. These countries
are facing huge strains and as conditions
worsen in the camps more migrants will
conclude that undertaking the journey
to Europe is worth the risk. European
governments could also lean on other
countries in the region, such as Saudi Arabia,
to do more.

June 9, 2014

Isis attacks spark

massive refugee
influx into Turkey
October 8, 2014
Aid Agencies:
Jordan refuses
entry to Syrians

Isis Refugee Crisis

Begins: 500,000
flee Mosul
October 21, 2014
Poor living
conditions in
Bekaa: Rise in
infectious diseases

But this will not be enough to deter a

proportion of migrants from trying to reach
Europe. If the EU really wants to avoid more
chaotic scenes at its borders and undermine
the people smugglers, it needs to provide
more legal routes to protection. The EU
should develop an enlarged managed
resettlement scheme to provide Syrians
with a safer, cheaper, and more orderly way
to reach Europe. The handful of existing
schemes fall well short of the numbers
required (the UKs offer to take 20,000
Syrians over five years being a case in point).
Under a new, expanded scheme, Syrians
could apply for protection in Europe at
UNHCR camps or consular posts in transit
countries, and then be pre-screened to
establish whether they have a well-founded
claim for protection. This would not prevent
all irregular entries, but it could reduce them
by giving some migrants a legal route to
protection, which in turn, would squeeze
the market for smugglers and help restore
public confidence in governments capacity
to manage migration.
We are a long way from any of this, of
course. Instead, it seems likely that a deeply
divided EU will continue with the failed
policies that contribute towards rather than
alleviate the crisis.

James Hampshire is a senior lecturer in

politics at the University of Sussex.

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