In the blatant absence of better ideas, and against the backdrop of irreconcilable interests, the approach of the European Union and its member states to migration and asylum is increasingly focusing on the externalisation of their management and on the returns of all those people who do not qualify for protection. This means asking the EU’s neighbouring country, such as Turkey, Libya, Tunisia or other African countries to control and stop migrants’ movements to Europe.
But this approach based on containment is not only morally questionable, it is also short-sighted and doomed to fail, as it ignore the complexity of the phenomenon and the manifold interests and motivations of all the actors involved: the migrants, the countries of origin and transit, and even the European Union member states’ authentic interest in receiving migrants.
With this dossier, the Progressive Post wants to look at the shortcomings of current European and national policies. It underlines that, unfortunately, the prospects of current negotiations and the difficulty of finding common ground among EU member states do not give much hope for an improvement towards more solidarity and more humane treatment of migrants, and for the badly needed opening of new legal pathways.
