Boswell, Christina. "The 'External Dimension' of EU Immigration and Asylum Policy". International Affairs, Vol.79, No.3 (2003): 619-638.

Boswell, Christina. "The 'External Dimension' of EU Immigration and Asylum Policy". International Affairs, Vol.79, No.3 (2003): 619-638.

• The more restrictive immigration policies adopted in Western Europe since the early 1970s have been qualitifed and limited successes. Attempts to restrict access to asylum systems in particular have discouraged fraudulent applicants, but simultaneously made it more difficult for actual asylum-seekers to access these system, while fraudulent applicants have instead turned towards more dangerous methods of illegal entry (619).
• Given the mixed results of these programs, Western European states have increasingly sought novel methods of halting migration by strengthening the capacities of transit countries or sponsoring programs which incentivize migrants to stay in their home countries (619-620).
• These new policy approaches were generally developed during the 1990s in response to a large increase in immigration from the former Warsaw Pact, followed by latter floods of refugees from former Yugoslavia. Governments felt that traditional measures were insufficient to deal with contemporary levels of migration (621).
• The technique of halting immigration before it reaches your borders, termed the 'external dimension' of immigration policy by the EU, was first adopted by the EU in October 1999. Individual member states had been pursuing these policies since the early 1990s, however, and as early as 1991 there were suggestions for the EU to include migration issues in its coordination of foreign policy (620-621).
• Part of the rationale behind the developing of external measures to prevent immigration stems from constitutional or legal restrictions on the ability of Western European states to reduce migration within their own countries. Despite consensus during the 1980s that migration should be reduced, Western European governments were prevented from cutting many welfare provisions or increasing deportations by standards of human rights (621).
• The creation of the Schengen zone in 1995 further eroded any ability of many EU government to effectively curtail migration through policing of national borders, as traditional border controls with most of their neighbors had been abolished. This change demanded increased international cooperation in the policing of borders (621-622).
• The increased internationalism behind EU border and migration policy protected decisions made at this level from public scrutiny or review. Meetings and decisions were not transparent, allowing EU officials to advance anti-immigration agendas without the constitutional or democratic restrictions existing at the national level (623).
• EU states developed two systems of externalization of border control: the first increased the capacity of transit states to effectively police borders and handle asylum proceedures; the second established cooperation between the EU and the migrants' home states, or safe third states, to facilitate rapid deportation (622).
• During the early 1990s, public opinion in Europe became increasingly hostile to immigration, which was correlated with organized crime and Islamic terrorism. Many societal concerns about deindustrialization, alienation, and crime were associated with immigration in the public imagination. Politicians embranced these discussions, legitimately more punitive measures to prevent immigration (623-624).
• External measures to keep migrants in their countries of origin, or at least confined to that region, were originalized suggested by progressive and humanitarian voices in the 1980s as an alternative to fleeing long distances to Europe. Recognition of past policy failures and increased concern about human trafficking networks during the 1990s led to their adoption by European states within a simultaneous expansion of peacebuilding and development initiatives (625).
• The EU decided to adopt this development-oriented approach to migration issues at the 1992 European Council summit in Edinburgh, largely in response to peacekeeping activities in Yugoslavia, but the unaccountable organs of the EU delayed implementing anything but a punitive migration policy until the late 1990s (626-627).
• During their presidency of the European Council, the Netherlands demand the full incorporation of development into EU migration policy, securing a high-level working group for this purpose in 1998. The working group still focused, however, on expanding repatriation agreements with non-EU countries, demonstrating little will to actually make development a core element of EU migration policy (630).
• Overall, the actual functioning of the working group was terrible, with most reports generated hopelessly out of date and officials generally uneducated on both development and diplomacy. Its work was a real hack job, nearly resulting in the termination of migration cooperation with Morocco due to lack of consultation (630-631).
• By the early 2000s, the European Commission had implemented a major change in conceptions of development and migration, recommending that the EU use development assistance to encourage developing countries to sign repatriation agreements with the EU, allowing the EU to stem migration and more easily deport migrants through a single policy (635).
• The author believes that the increased leadership of the European Commssion on the issue of migration policy is a very good thing, since this body actually has the political will to enforce a development-centric migration policy that accounts for the wishes of source countries (636).
• The actually effectiveness of these policies for reducing migration is doubtful, however, as development aid can actually temporarily increase migration as more people are wealthy enough to attempt to emmigrate. This is likely to be an unwanted side effect of EU migration policy (636).
• If the level of migrants increases in the short to medium term as a result of a development-oriented migration policy, it is likely that power over EU migration policy will be transferred back to groups like the Justice and Home Affairs Council which wish to return to a punitive and security-centric migration policy (636-637).