‘Blocked’ Youth: The Politics of Migration from South and East Mediterranean Countries Before and After the Arab Uprisings

Migration from South and East Mediterranean (SEM) countries has been considered a growing security threat in the EU and Gulf states following the 9/11 attacks and the Arab uprisings. Since 2011, the economic slowdown, regime changes and socio-political instability have spurred growing migration pressure from SEM countries. However, the securitisation of migration of young citizens from these countries in the EU and the Gulf states is manifested in the drastic limitation of migrants’ inflows, and in the selection of prospective migrants on demographic, socio-economic and political grounds. Today’s ‘governmentality’ of youth migration from SEM countries poses ethical and development-related issues.     

‘Bringing Geopolitics Back In’: Exploring the Security Dimension of the 2004 Eastern Enlargement of the European Union

Notwithstanding the functional and technocratic basis of the European integration process, and the fact that the accession criteria hardly mentions security issues, the 2004 eastern enlargement brought to the forefront of EU politics important geopolitical and security issues. Eastern enlargement came on to the agenda of the EU in the wake of 1989's peaceful revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe. Security and geopolitics mattered to the decision taken by the EU to embark on expansion in the early 1990s, and thereafter security issues remained prominent in enlargement debates. This article seeks to analyse the most important geopolitical issues that eastern enlargement has brought to the fore. In exploring the geopolitical dimension of the eastern enlargement process, the article foregrounds some key issues including: the potential power realignments in Europe triggered by enlargement, the EU's relationship with Russia and its importance to the unfolding of the enlargement process, and how eastern enlargement was conceived as a mechanism for stabilising the EU's external environment. The article contrasts realist and constructivist images of post-1989 Europe and the eastern enlargement process and assesses their contribution to enlargement scholarship. It argues that constructivist imagery best explains the way in which EU actors interpreted key geopolitical issues within the enlargement framework. In particular, it presents enlargement as the expansion of the existing European security community, wherein geopolitical issues were subject to a process of securitisation and desecuritisation.     

Negotiating one position: Switzerland at the Global Forum on Migration and Development

The paper explores intra-governmental processes in migration policy-making, using the example of Switzerland and examining its preparations for chairing the Global Forum on Migration and Development 2011. Switzerland's “one joint position”, presented at the forum, required intensive negotiations and cooperation between different Swiss federal offices. The paper highlights how and why Switzerland achieved this joint position. It analyses the intra-governmental tensions between national securitisation and global migration and development debates and how they were overcome. This experience of a “whole-of-government approach” offers an insight into politics underlying migration and development debates within donor countries, and its implications for global migration debates.     

CSDP,Strategy and Crisis Management: Out of Area or Out of Business?

The EU's ineffectiveness vis‐à‐vis Libya and the southern Mediterranean crises more broadly is largely explained by the CSDP's narrow mandate centred on crisis management. The EU's emphasis on external crisis management was strategically sound given the geopolitical context of the 1990s. CSDP's quiet drift towards a ‘softer’ kind of crisis management from the middle of the first decade of the 2000s was also instrumental in highlighting the EU's differences from post‐11 September US unilateralism. That said, (soft) crisis management has become progressively obsolete in the light of a rapidly changing geopolitical environment characterised by an overall retreat of Western power globally, a weakening of America's commitment to European security, an increasingly tumultuous European neighbourhood, and Europe's financial troubles. In order to meet the demands of a changing geopolitical environment, CSDP must break away from its distinctively reactive approach to security to include all the functions normally associated with the military including, chiefly, deterrence and prevention. This would allow the EU to actively shape its regional and global milieu.     

Evidence of securitisation in the economic sector of security in Europe? Russia’s economic blackmail of Ukraine and the EU’s conditional bailout of Cyprus

Although the Copenhagen school’s securitisation theory and their sectoral analysis are integral parts of European security studies, the school’s economic sector of security has almost been completely ignored. In this article I examine why this is, and whether it makes sense to retain this sector. In the process I flesh out the logic of securitisation in the economic sector. I suggest that one reason why the economic sector of security has been neglected is that real life examples fitting the Copenhagen school’s logic of security as the exception have – in this sector – remained outstanding. Research in other sectors of security has shown however that securitisation does not need to include extraordinary countermeasures; instead it can play out below the level of the exception. Using alternative formulations developed in securitisation studies that relax the threshold for the success of securitisation, I attempt to locate evidence of economic securitisation by looking at two empirical cases. 1) Russia’s economic blackmail of Ukraine at the start of that country’s ongoing crisis. 2) The EU’s conditional bailout of Cyprus during the Eurozone crisis which necessitated capital controls. On the basis of the empirical evidence gathered I conclude by arguing the case for the economic sector of security.     

Security,subjectivity and space in postcolonial Europe: Muslims in the diaspora

Abstract

In this article, we call into question the assumptions that undergird conceptions of boundary, territory, community and ethno-cultural belonging in the constitution of European security. Both the term ‘human security’ as defined by development and human rights scholars and ‘securitisation’ as conceptualised by critical security studies concern the socio-psychological aspects of security. Yet, few attempts have been made to seriously discuss the psychological effects of securitisation on subjectivity and space. There is, as we will argue, a tendency in much literature to use concepts of ‘existential security’, ‘fear’, ‘needs’ and the ‘politics of belonging’ – obviously connected to the human mind and individual emotionality – without much space being devoted to the investigation of these concepts in terms of socio-psychological processes. We intend to fill this gap by discussing security and securitisation in terms of the psychology of subjectivity and space among young Muslims in Europe. Our principal argument is that through openness to the political psychology of subjectivity and space, and the (de)securitisation of both, we are able to develop more adequate maps of the European experience of danger and opportunity.     

Securitising proliferation, failing security governance: the European Union’s role in India and Pakistan’s nuclear rivalry

In 2003, the European Union declared the threat of weapons of mass destruction ‘potentially the greatest threat to our security’ and increasingly called for the issue of nuclear proliferation to be managed within its preferred multilateral security governance frameworks. In spite of this, and the increased securitisation of proliferation, the EU has fundamentally continued its historical record of failing to engage with India and Pakistan’s nuclear rivalry, and has not been able to move significantly beyond a relationship with South Asia based on trade and aid. This is deeply problematic given the regional instability posed by the Indo-Pakistani enduring rivalry, and the fact that Pakistan is not only an unstable nuclear weapons state, but has been known to harbour international terrorists and nuclear proliferators. Given these conditions, as the EU acknowledges, the stakes of failing to engage could not be higher. A deeper analysis of EU engagement, however, demonstrates that EU security governance is limited, ineffectual, inconsistent and largely perceived as neo-colonial in what is the world’s most likely nuclear flashpoint. If the EU is to be considered a global actor in security governance, a key objective of the Treaty of Lisbon, then this needs to be redressed.     

动荡中孕育变革、低迷里不乏希望——2011年国际局势总结与2012年展望

2011年,“阿拉伯之春”改变了中东、北非地缘政治生态;美国加速全球战略调整,高调“重返亚太”;全球政治思潮空前激荡,世界仍面临形形色色的恐怖威胁;西方主要经济体表现低迷,新兴经济体强劲增长势头放缓。2012年,多个主要国家大选,世界政治版图会以何种方式重建值得关注;欧债危机继续,但在欧盟干预下有可能得到缓解;中东局势将是全球政治最大聚焦场所,未来大国关系因中东局势如何调整是事关全球地缘战略格局的新挑战。     

“安全与发展”:巴西的地缘政治思想(二战结束至20世纪80年代)

二战结束后巴西地缘政治研究的重点是巴西的地缘政治形态、国内治理、国际关系、对外战略等问题,实现国家的"安全与发展"是巴西地缘政治研究的目标和口号。这种研究通过鼓吹加强领土控制、促进国内治理、主导地区形势来实现大国抱负,具有浓厚的意识形态色彩。巴西地缘政治研究的思想基础源自经典地缘政治的观点与逻辑,具有强烈的进攻性和强权政治色彩,但巴西学者对缩小国内的地区差异、促进国内经济社会发展的思考有其独到之处。在建设一个"强大的经济和稳定的国家"的口号下,巴西地缘政治学者高度关注巴西国内经济和社会发展对巴西的重在意义。戈尔贝里把使本国经济现代化和完成巴西的地缘政治目标视为一种相辅相成的关系。地缘政治思想对二战结束后至20世纪80年代巴西的内外政策产生了广泛影响,并成为1964年军政权上台后巴西国家意识形态的支柱之一,在巴西国家大战略的制订过程中发挥了重要作用。在具体实践过程中,巴西地缘政治思想提供的诸多政策手段不仅没有取得预期效果,而且加剧了地区的紧张形势。     

Visa liberalization processes in the EU’s Eastern neighbourhood: understanding policy outcomes

Focusing on EU visa liberalization policy with Russia and Eastern Partnership countries as a case study, this article seeks to investigate the drivers of EU external migration policy in regards to its neighbourhood. In doing so, the article seeks to understand whether policy objectives and instruments employed by the EU emphasize security or normative considerations, or both. It also scrutinizes the factors behind this emphasis. In particular, it examines the degree to which EU external migration policy is framed by intra-EU bargaining and interaction with partner countries. The hybrid nature of EU visa policy towards its neighbourhood stems first and foremost from persisting differences in the prioritization of security and values among the major EU actors involved in the policy process. Yet as the article argues, interaction with partner countries crucially shapes the outcomes of the visa liberalization policy, thereby altering the balance between normative and security considerations that results from negotiations between EU actors.     

Economic Integration and Vulnerability in the EU Neighbourhood

In 2004, the EU launched the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP), a unified policy framework towards its neighbours in the external EU periphery, aiming at strengthening prosperity, stability and security around its geopolitical borders. However, in-depth empirical analysis provides clear-cut evidence that, while the size and composition of trade flows between the EU and the ENCs may be growing, they are not favourable for the ENCs from the perspective of export diversification, in terms of either products or number of destinations. This condition increases their exposure to volatility in international markets. These results provide valuable insight into economic integration theory and for policymaking.     

The EU,Russia and the Manichean Trap

Conceptualizing the EU as a postmodern cooperative power that “transcends realism” provides ideological scaffolding for an exclusive conception of “Europe” and veils a zero-sum geopolitical project as “European integration”. Neoclassical realism considers assigning morally opposite political identities to the EU and Russia to be “rational” to the extent it strengthens internal cohesion and mobilizes resources to enhance security in accordance with the balance of power logic. Yet, the artificial binary construction can also produce a Manichean Trap when compromises required to enhance security are depicted as a betrayal of indispensable virtues and “Europe”. The ability to harmonize competing security interests diminishes as the conceptual space for comparing the EU and Russia is de-constructed. Competition is framed in uncompromising terms as “European integration” versus Russian “spheres of influence” and democracy versus authoritarianism.     

The security–development nexus and securitization in the EU's policies towards developing countries

This article assesses how and to what extent the European Union (EU) uses a security perspective to define and shape its relationship with the developing world. In order to evaluate the EU's development policy and its relations with developing countries we link the concept of ‘security–development nexus’ with the concept of ‘securitization’. The article examines whether securitization can be observed with regard to four dimensions: discourse, policy instruments, policy actions and institutional framework. The analysis demonstrates a securitization of the EU's development policy and its relations with developing countries, particularly in Africa. However, paradoxically, the securitization's extent and nature suggest that the EU can also use it as a way to avoid a more direct involvement in conflict areas.     

Soft Security Threats in the New Europe: The Case of the Balkan Region

‘You cannot have a process where Balkan countries pretend to reform and we pretend to believe them.’

Chris Patten, EU Commissioner in charge of External Relations BBC World News, 25 November, 2002

Southeastern Europe represents for Europe a significant geo-strategic and geopolitical region whose stability and security directly affects Europe’s political and security infrastructure. Conflicts and instability are still prevalent in the Balkans and, as a consequence, security cooperation in Europe is struggling to cope with risks of a non-military nature. It is widely accepted that as a region, the Balkans at the dawn of the 21^st century remains weak and unable to deal efficiently with soft security threats. This article initially provides a generic picture of the Balkans and the hard security challenges prevalent there. It also aims to identify and assess the main types of new security threats that are currently present in the region, as well as to explore how these threats would be influenced by EU and NATO membership. The article also outlines the cooperative security measures adopted by the southeastern European countries, and it concludes by providing some thoughts on how the future developments in the region will be influenced by current international developments     

New threats – different response: EU and NATO and Somali piracy

When the European Union (EU) launched its first military naval mission, EU NAVFOR Somalia, Atalanta, the states who are members of both the EU and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) made a political choice: to prioritize the EU over NATO in their multilateral military efforts to fight piracy and its consequences. Thereby, Atalanta challenges the conventional assumption that EU security cooperation will remain limited. It also challenges the widely held belief that the European states will chose to act through NATO if dealing multilaterally with international security issues. How can we explain this decision? This analysis suggests that it can be explained in two phases where different mechanisms were at work. In the first phase, which can be accounted for from a neo-realist perspective, France, who held the Presidency, used particular favorable geopolitical conditions to put an autonomous EU operation on the agenda. However, agreement on the EU option cannot be explained as a result of strategic bargaining. Instead, in a second phase and in line with an alternative hypothesis building on the theory of communicative action, the EU member states came to support the French suggestion due to legitimacy considerations regarding the legal framework of the two operations.     

A Game Changer in EU-Turkey Relations: The Opportunities and Pitfalls of Migration Policy

ABSTRACT

The mass migration from Syria has been a major turning point and an important ‘game changer’ in EU-Turkey relations, as it marks a watershed in immigration and asylum between two periods: from 1999 to 2011 and from 2011 to the present. During the first period, the EU was one of the driving forces of change in Turkey’s immigration and asylum policy, along with significant migration movements from the Middle East. Although EU demands were largely implemented due to the country’s changing migration profile, there was also ongoing resistance and reluctance towards the EU, thus a certain degree of conditionality. With the Syrian mass migration in 2011, however, and in particular the so-called ‘European refugee crisis’ in 2015, Turkey started to use migration as a foreign policy tool with which to oppose EU conditionality.     

The EU's Externalisation of Internal Security Objectives: Perspectives after Lisbon and Stockholm

The EU as an area of “freedom, security and justice”, faces a number of internal security concerns, such as organised crime, terrorism and illegal immigration which require external measures to combat them effectively. Limited progress has been made in the four dimensions of externalisation of EU internal security (the integration of internal security objectives into EU external relations strategy, cooperation with third countries, capacity building in third countries and common action within international organisations) and the EU must continue to expand its capabilities to use external measures to help solve internal security challenges. The Treaty of Lisbon and the 2010–14 Stockholm Programme are both likely to foster further externalisation of EU internal security objectives, but whether this becomes reality will depend to a large degree on the Commission's Action Plan.     

Geopolitical perceptions of the world today

Abstract

This article is based on the author's study of geopolitical perceptions of the power of nations made during the last decade.

He describes the thinking of scholars, especially Mackinder, Mahan, and Spykman, as they have related geopolitics to international affairs.

He cites the Soviet domination of Afghanistan as one of the primary current examples of a classical geopolitical objective of the USSR to obtain access to territory opening the way eventually to the Indian Ocean.

He points out that the Soviet Union, dominating much of the landmass of Eurasia, the Mackinder “Heartland,” has polarized world politics and military security alignments because of its totalitarian political system and its expansion into other crucial areas of the world.

For fifty years, the author explains, the United States has been forced to take defensive measures against totalitarian states, in recent times principally the USSR, to prevent their domination of the economic resources and peoples of the world.

The author proposes that the United States, destined geopol‐itically to be a sea power, must have sufficient military strength to develop and protect global maritime and trading links with other seafaring nations on the periphery of Eurasia and in the Southern Hemisphere. The U.S. forces would constitute a peacetime constabulary of the sea to insure the security and prosperity not only of Americans but of their friends and allies.     

Italy's Mediterranean role

ABSTRACT

Three main drivers underlie states’ intent to expand gas supply: energy security, geopolitics and climate goals. Such considerations also drive Greece’s expansive gas policy, but come with significant caveats. First, pipeline politics entails geopolitical costs and inflated anticipated gains. Second, while gas supply has yielded energy security for Greece, its cost-effectiveness is contentious. Third, the gas option obscures the transition to smart, clean energy sources and systems. A rational actor model within a rationalist-weak cognitivist framework can account for Greece’s gas policy. Yet, its limited success points to the need for a clean energy policy promising higher climate, energy and geopolitical gains.     

Deterrence and Protection in the EU’s Migration Policy

EU migration and asylum policy is facing tough challenges at the southern borders of the Union as migration and asylum pressures rise, fuelled by political instability and poverty in several regions of Asia and Africa. Current European border control practices create three spaces of control: externalised borders, through readmission and return agreements which enrol third countries in border control; the EU borders themselves through the work of Frontex and the development of a whole arsenal of technology tools for controlling mobility to and from the EU; and the Schengen area, whose regulations tend to reinforce deterrence at the borders through the Smart Border System. As a result, the EU’s balancing act between irregular migration control and protection of refugees and human life clearly tips towards the former, even if it pays lip service to the latter. More options for mobility across the Mediterranean and more cooperation for growth are essential ingredients of a sustainable migration management policy on the EU’s southern borders. In addition asylum management could benefit from EU level humanitarian visas issued at countries of origin.