Topics of Contributions
Social Work’s Entanglements in Externalization of EU Migration Regimes
This paper gives a summary of various geopolitical issues of colonial continuities in the context of migration and mobility.[1] The increasingly authoritarian character of EU border management raises a number of issues related to the role of social work within a context that is heavily charged, both ideologically and politically. Based on critical analysis of […]
8 October 2024
Externalization, Human Dignity and Asylum
This article is dedicated to the question of externalization and human dignity in the context of asylum in Europe. It is based on the assumption that administrative technologies that organize the accommodation of asylum seekers with the help of models of spatial segregation operate in a logic of externalization. This logic aims at the material […]
15 September 2024
Flipping the Narrative on Border Externalisation: An African Migrant Perspective
Border externalisation represents a growing trend in global migration policy, where nations seek to manage migration flows by pushing their border controls beyond their own territories. This practice disproportionately impacts African migrants, who face significant challenges and dangers as a result. This short piece examines these impacts through the lens of an African migrant scholar […]
26 August 2024
Externalisation and Northern European Dreams of Avoiding Asylum Seekers
In the 2020s, several European countries have witnessed the reactivation of policy ambitions to externalise parts or the entirety of asylum obligations beyond their national territory. This article explains the trajectory of such recent attempts by Danish and British governments, the controversy surrounding them, and the ways in which these attempts are linked to the […]
24 July 2024
Externalisation, “Asylum Ban” and the Future of Human Rights
Externalisation of asylum and its related concept of “asylum ban” are some of the clearest manifestations of a retreat by Global North countries from their own “celebrated” commitment to international human rights standards. They are the most potent challenges to the modern conception of human rights, originating from least suspected quarters that claim to have […]
23 July 2024
The colonial history of refugee externalisation. Sending refugees to Rwanda was done before and exposes an imperial world-view
Current discussions and recently failed plans to send refugees to Rwanda or other places outside Europe have historical antecedents. Among other places, the British imperial government even transferred refugees to Rwanda during the Second World War. This little-known episode connects with a longer imperial history of sending supposedly problematic groups from Europe to Africa or […]
18 July 2024
Supporting families and communities in their search for missing migrants
Externalizations practices, such as carrier sanctions or pullbacks, force persons on the move to select more dangerous routes to reach their countries of destiny. In consequence, every year, thousands of migrants go missing on life-threatening routes. They leave behind families and communities suffering from the uncertainty of not knowing what has happened to them, whether […]
16 July 2024
Negotiating belonging in an age of precarity: Externalization in Southeast Asia
This paper explores the notion and practice of externalization in the Asia Pacific region with a focus on Southeast Asia. Malaysia and Indonesia are not only transit hubs or corridor states but also viable destination countries for migrants and refugees, especially for the Rohingya. How does externalization reinforce itself not only as a state-imposed mechanism […]
5 July 2024
‘Offshore processing’ in Australia
As political debates on the ‘externalization’ of asylum spread throughout Europe and beyond, there has been growing interest in the Australian ‘model’ of offshore processing. For more than two decades, Australia has experimented with this method of border control, which involves intercepting asylum seekers at sea and forcibly transferring them to Pacific Island nations for […]
28 June 2024
From (in)junctions to a discreet implementation of EU migration and border management policies in Mali
Mali has had complicated relations with European states and the EU throughout the post-colonial period with regard to the management of readmission and its migrants in Europe. Despite the presence of a strong Malian colony in Europe, the public authorities have long been reluctant to comply with external injunctions in terms of externalized border management […]
27 June 2024