The Mediterranean Migration Crisis, the UK, and Operation Sophia

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The Mediterranean Migration Crisis, The UK, and Operation Sophia

An Analysis of Securitization, Power, and Biopolitics

KYLE ADRIAN FINDLAY

Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts (Political Science)

Acadia University Spring Convocation 2018

This thesis by KYLE ADRIAN FINDLAY was defended successfully in an oral examination on APRIL 24, 2018

The examining committee for the thesis was:

______Dr. Jamie Whidden, Chair

______Dr. Lyubov Zhyznomirska, External Examiner

______Dr. Geoffrey Whitehall, Internal Examiner

______Dr. Can E. Mutlu, Supervisor

______Dr. Andrew Biro, Head of Department of Politics

This thesis is accepted in its present form by the Division of Research and Graduate Studies as satisfying the thesis requirements for the degree Master of Arts (Political Science)

………………………………………….

I, KYLE ADRIAN FINDLAY, grant permission to the University Librarian at Acadia University to archive, preserve, reproduce, loan or distribute copies of my thesis in microform, paper, or electronic formats on a non-profit basis. I undertake to submit my thesis, through my University, to Library and Archives Canada and to allow them to archive, preserve, reproduce, convert into any format, and to make available in print or online to the public for non-profit purposes. I, however, retain the copyright in my thesis.

______Author

______Supervisor

______Date

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Table of Contents

Abstract……………………………….………………………………………………………………………………………………V List of Abbreviations……………………..……………………………………………………………………………………VI Acknowledgements…..……….………..……………………………………………………………………………………VII Chapter One: An Introduction….……………………………………………………………..……………………………1 Organizational Structure……………………...……………………………………………………………………………3 Methodology…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….8 Chapter Two: Securitization, Migration, and Constructing the Other….……..………………….……13 Theories of Security Studies……………………………………………………………………………………………14 Securitization Theory & Copenhagen School………………………………………………………………….18 Securitization Moves & Speech Acts.……………………………………………………………………………..23 Securitization & Audience………………………………………………………………………………………………28 Securitization & the Societal Sector……………………………………………………………………………….32 British Societal Sector…………………………………………………………………………………………………….42 Conclusions…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...45 Chapter Three: Biopolitics, Power, and Migration…….………………………………..………………………48 Power, Sovereignty, & Migration…………………………………………………………………………………..50 Spaces of Security………………………………………………………………………………………………………….61 The ‘Other’ as a Statistical Category………………………………………………………………………………67 Governmentality & Biopolitics……………………………………………………………………………………….75 Conclusions……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………79 Chapter Four: The Securitization of Migration in the UK………….…………………………………….……81 Securitization of Migration…………………………………………………………………………………………….83 2015 UK General Election………………………………………………………………………………………………86 Securitization Acts- UK Prime Minister & Home Secretary…………………………………….……….88 Migration Debate…………………………………………………………………………………………………………..93 Sustaining the Securitization Act……………………………………………………………………………………98 Conclusions………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….103 Chapter Five: Biopolitics, Operation Sophia, and the UK’s Approach to Migration…….….…..105 Biopolitical Goals of the UK………………………………………………………………………………………….108 UK Government & Proposed Solutions………………………………………………………………………..111 Extra-Territorialization of Borders- Operation Sophia and the UK………………………………..117 Biopolitical Sorting- Migrants, Refugees, Criminals………………………………………………………124 Conclusions………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….128 Chapter Six: Concluding Remarks and a Look to the Future of Migrants in Europe………………130 Findings of Analysis…………………………………………………………………………………………………….131 Reflections for the Future...………………………………………………………………………………………..134 Bibliography………………………..……………………………………………………..………………………..….……..139

Abstract

What is the relationship between migrating populations, security policies and practices, and borders in the context of the government of the United Kingdom (UK) vis-á-vis the

Mediterranean migration crisis and its participation in Operation Sophia? How does the UK government manage migrant populations with security policies? How is sovereign power exercised over migrating populations, and how is that power managed? To what end do security practices, related to migration, serve, and for whom? What do mechanisms of power and security practices mean for the lives of migrants? How do the methods of categorizing migrants as refugees, economic migrants, and smugglers facilitate

(im)migration policies at the national level? These questions are answered through the engagement of Securitization Theory, and theories of Biopolitics and governmentality.

Through Securitization Theory analysis, it is demonstrated that securitizing actors within the

UK framed the crisis in a way which sees irregular migrant as the referent object of security, and human smugglers as the referent subject of security. This specific framing of this crisis is then coupled with the biopolitical tactics of filtering and controlling migrating populations through Operation Sophia. Analysis of power, biopolitics, and governmentality, further demonstrate that participating in the militarized Operation has facilitated the domestic political goals of reducing net-migration and maintaining secure borders in the UK. This is accomplished through the extra-territorialization of UK borders—an exertion of sovereign power, through maritime involvement in the Mediterranean, and the biopolitical rendering of migrants as a statistical population of the ‘Other’.

List of Abbreviations/Terms

BREXIT: British Referendum Procedures for Withdrawing from the European Union

CATSA: Canadian Air Transport Authority

CEAS: Common European Asylum System

DUP: Democratic Unionist Party

EEAS: European External Action Service

EU: European Union

EUNAVFOR-MED: European Naval Force Mediterranean. Also knows as Operation Sophia

EURODAC: European Dactyloscopy (Fingerprint Data System)

EUROPOL: The European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation

FRONTEX: European Border and Coast Guard Agency

HOC: House of Commons

HOL: House of Lords

NATO: North Atlantic Treaty Organization

PMO: Prime Minister’s Office

SIS: Schengen Information System

SNP: Scottish National Party

UK: United Kingdom

UN: United Nations

UNCLOS: United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea

Acknowledgements

This thesis is the culmination of more than eight months of work between July 2017 and March 2018. It undoubtedly has been the biggest academic endeavour I have ever undertaken. The knowledge I have gained through research on security, power, biopolitics, and governmentality has given me a deep understanding of the many problems facing the world today around the issue of human migration. In spite of my research, I could not have completed this thesis alone, and therefore giving thanks is in order.

Throughout the research and writing phases, my thesis supervisor at Acadia University, Dr. Can E. Mutlu, has shared his wealth of knowledge on security studies, migration, international relations, and so much more. Without his guidance and expertise, this project would never have gotten off the ground let alone be finished. I wish to extend sincere thanks to Dr. Mutlu for his friendship, his advice, his comments, and for the numerous meetings in which he guided me through my frustrations.

I also must extend thanks to my loving family for their endless support throughout the course of my studies. My mom, dad, step-mom, step-dad, and brothers and sisters have all been there for me without hesitation. I am eternally grateful for the confidence you have in me. I truly am fortunate to have such a large and supportive family.

To my closest friends, thank-you for putting up with my endless “rants” about all things political over the past number of years, not least of which include the subjects of migration, war, Vietnam, Canadian politics, and US Presidential elections. Most of all, thanks for letting me think out loud as I completed this thesis.

As a final note, I must acknowledge the music of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Herbie Hancock, and Thelonious Monk for providing the soundtrack to months of work in cafés, libraries, and at home.

Kyle A. Findlay- March 2018, Halifax NS

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CHAPTER ONE- An Introduction

“[…] you have to understand, that no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land […]” (Shire n.d.)

This thesis begins with a series of questions; what is the relationship between migrating populations, security policies and practices, and borders? Moreover, how do individual governments —specifically of the United Kingdom— manage migrant populations with security policies? How then is sovereign power exercised over migrating populations, and how is that power managed? To what end do security practices, related to migration, serve, and for whom? What do mechanisms of power and security practices mean for the lives of migrants? How do the methods of categorizing migrants as refugees, economic migrants, and smugglers facilitate (im)migration policies at the national level? Set against the backdrop of the 2015 Mediterranean migration crisis, these questions form the basis of research for this thesis.

The migration crisis in the Mediterranean Sea region presents one of the most pressing and challenging humanitarian, political, and security issues in continental Europe and the UK today. As the excerpt from the poem above suggests, migration is not a choice made lightly, if a choice at all. Yet, tens of thousands of people flee their homes in regions such as the Middle East, North Africa, and beyond each year in attempts to find safety and security in Europe. European authorities have had to respond to the mass in-flux of people arriving at their borders, or worse, needing immediate rescue on the high seas. The regular migration paths of applying for a visa and being properly vetted are no longer capable of

processing the volume of applicants which has caused a spike in irregular migration routes.

One such irregular route is the Central Mediterranean route between Libya and Southern

Europe.

For migrants, their struggles are far more pressing and perilous especially for those left with no recourse other than to pay human smugglers great sums of money to be ferried across the Mediterranean in unseaworthy vessels. The results of such actions have been the drowning of thousands of migrants. These dangers do not discriminate: victims are not just the men, but the women and children too. Most notably, in April of 2015, a boat originating from Libya and carrying more than 800 migrants capsized off the Italian island of

Lampedusa resulting in the deaths of most migrants. (Kirchgaessner 2015)

Only a few short months after this tragedy, the body of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi washed ashore near Bodrum, Turkey. (Hopper 2015; Rayner 2015) The photo of the boy’s body lying in the surf captures the realities that so many migrants have faced and continue to face: asylum and safety is not guaranteed, the risk of death is incredibly high, and the

European governments, agencies, and authorities in charge of (im)migration, border security, and refugee resettlement function inadequately. Yet, as Warsan Shire’s poem notes, no one places their children in a boat unless the water is perceived to be a safer alternative than remaining on land.

These tragedies, and all those like them, raise questions around what is being done to mitigate the crisis—to save lives while ensuring border security. Mirrored to this, what is not being done, and why not? Following the April 2015 tragedy, the European Union (EU)

launched the European Union Naval Force- Mediterranean (EUNAVFOR-MED) or Operation

Sophia—a maritime naval mission designed to disrupt and destroy human smuggling rings.

(“EUNAVFOR MED Operation SOPHIA - EEAS - European External Action Service - European

Commission” n.d.) This thesis then explores the rhetoric and practices of the United

Kingdom’s (UK) government vis-á-vis the Mediterranean migration crisis and its participation in Operation Sophia.

Based on the research findings, I argue that that the UK has exercised, and continues to exercise, power over migrant populations to safeguard UK border security, limit net- migration to the UK, and establish biopolitical control over migrating populations extra- territorially. This is accomplished by the UK establishing a securitization act which uses the discourse of humanitarianism and criminality to securitize migration. The securitization of migration then informed how the UK would participate in Operation Sophia which sees the extra-territorialization of the UK border. As part of Operation Sophia’s mandate, the EU with

UK participation biopolitically filters of migrants into distinct categories emerges which, when used as a tactic of governmentality, serve to accomplish the domestic political goals held by the UK.

Organizational Structure

To answer the central research question, what is the relationship between security policies and practices of the UK in relation to the Mediterranean migration crisis, it becomes necessary to breakdown the relationship between the UK government’s political goals and its practices in Operation Sophia. Additionally, it is equally important to assess how the UK

government has framed the Operation specifically, and the migration crisis more generally.

Here, how the issue is framed and perceived forms the foundation for how the government will act. To understand the framing of the issue, discourse analysis and Securitization Theory as conceptualized by Buzan, Waever, and Wilde (1998), Balzacq (2011, 2005), Salter (2008), and others is used. Securitization Theory then forms the basis of chapter two. There, how issues move beyond what is considered to be normal political issues to security issues which require exceptional responses is explored. This requires an understanding of speech acts, audiences, temporality, and the roles that individuals play including definitions of the

“referent object of security”, the “referent subject of security”, “securitizing actors”, and

“functional actors” as defined by Buzan, Waever, and Wilde (1998).

Chapter two is broken up into six sections. The first outlines the varying theories of security studies including traditional security theories and critical security studies. The second section introduces the Copenhagen School and Securitization Theory. Section three draws focus to speech acts, persuasion, and securitizing actors. Section four discusses the audience in a securitization act including the distinct categories of audiences and the roles they play. Section five explores the societal sector and the unique aspects that securitization acts must consider within society. Finally, section six looks specifically at the societal sector of the UK. The values and beliefs held by British society inform domestic and foreign policy goals.

While Securitization Theory proves useful in analyzing how issues are framed as security issues, in the context of migration, analysis must extend beyond the conceptual

framing to the practices of the UK in crisis mitigation. The ways in which the UK is able to exercise sovereign power by and through participation in Operation Sophia becomes a vital area of analysis. The mechanisms and functions of power, and the ways in which mechanisms of power function over and create entire populations, on the one hand, and the spaces in which security practices manifest, on the other, are examined. The relationship, in the context of migration, between the exertion of power and the practices of security are closely joined and therefore chapter three discusses how both function together. Drawing primarily from the works of Foucault (2003, 2007, 2008, 1995) and Butler

(2004), the theories of biopower, biopolitics, spaces of security, and governmentality are discussed to show the ways through which governments are able to exert power to establish populations as statistical categories of which discipline and control function to render the populations complacent to policy goals.

Closely related to spaces of security and governmentality is the notion of “social universes” in security as outlined by Bigo (Bigo, Carrera, and Guild 2013a; Bigo 2014). Bigo’s work is important in the context of migration and security in that two distinct social universes are featured, and each allow for the manifestation of power over populations, albeit in markedly distinct ways. On the one hand, the military-strategic universe is central on the high seas where military forces are deployed. On the other hand, the universe of internal security takes over once migrants are taken to port in Italy. In this social universe, migrants are subject to biopolitical sorting or filtering which further reduces the individual to a statistical category of refugee, economic migrant, smuggler or asylum seeker. It is here

that the notions of biopolitics and governmentality are merged with Bigo’s social theories in this thesis.

Chapter three is broken down into four sections: the first examines power and sovereignty in relation to migration. Definitions of power, and the mechanisms in which power is exerted are discussed here. The second section examines spaces of security as related to migration. Here, power is exercised as a preventative measure designed to deter migrants through the extra-territorialization of European borders. Section three examines the constructing of the ‘Other’—in this case migrants—as a statistical category. Finally, section 4 examines biopolitical filtering and tactics of governmentality in the context of migration.

Chapters four and five feature the case study component of this thesis. With the

UK’s participation in Operation Sophia being the central issue of analysis throughout the thesis, chapter four begins by analyzing the specific ways in which the UK has framed the migration crisis. Specifically, it is argued that the UK has securitized migration using, on the one hand, humanitarian discourse to frame migrants as the referent object of security— that which requires protecting. On the other, the discourse of criminality frames human smugglers as the referent subject of security—those which are threatening and require exceptional policies to combat. Further, the migration crisis in the Mediterranean has been rendered as a security issue by highlighting the existential nature of the threats that migrants face, on the one hand, and through the proposed tactics to mitigate the crisis, on the other: a multi-lateral militarized maritime operation. Analysis then demonstrates the

ways in which the UK government has successfully securitized the Mediterranean migration crisis.

Chapter five analyzes the operational practices of Operation Sophia generally, and the role of the UK specifically, through the lens of biopolitics and governmentality. Here, analysis suggests that the Operation does very little to achieve its mandate of eliminating human smuggling, and rather functions more as a humanitarian search and rescue mission.

Despite this, the Operation serves the UK political goals of reducing net-migration and ensuring limited refugee resettlement in the UK. The Operation functions to extra- territorially extend the sovereign borders of Europe generally, and the UK specifically, by creating a ‘net’ of naval vessels and surveillance technologies which collect any and all crafts suspected of human smuggling that attempt to cross the Mediterranean and relocates the migrants to processing centres in Italy—far and away from the UK. This further establishes a mechanism of power over migration which constructs the migrant as a statistical category.

This statistical category is expanded further through the biopolitical filtering that occurs once migrants are deposited in Italy. Finally, through this processing, a digital data profile is established for each migrant which is then shared across agencies and governments. This serves a security end—knowing where migrants have been and who they are—but also serves the biopolitical ends of controlling populations by establishing knowledge and exercising power.

Finally, chapter six consists of the overall conclusions found in this research, as well as reflections about the research and a brief discussion about the migration crisis moving

forward. This includes a brief reflection of the current and near-future political powers and interests that have emerged since the 2015 crisis with special emphasis on the implications of Brexit and the surge of right-wing and anti-immigration political parties in Europe. This chapter ends with a critique of current practices and suggestions for mitigating the migration crisis in the short and medium term.

Methodology

The analysis within this thesis focuses on the period of March-October 2015. The reason for this period forming the window of analysis is two-fold. On the one hand, the UK held an election cycle in the spring of 2015. The results of which provide insight into the political attitudes of the UK electorate directly before the April 19th maritime tragedy. In addition to this, the political stance held by the Conservatives on issues of (im)migration, security, and the EU can be assessed as being untainted by the Mediterranean crisis and not as a reactionary position established because to the crisis.

On the other hand, this window of analysis covers the onset of EU efforts to launch

Operation Sophia and the implementation of its first phase in June 2015, and its second phase in October 2015. As a significant portion of analysis —including analysis of mechanisms of power, tactics of governmentality, and biopolitical filtering-- rests on the mandate and practices of the Operation, these two events become central. Furthermore, this timeline covers two immensely tragic events: the April 19th tragedy, and the discovery of Aylan Kurdi’s body in early September. Both tragedies functioned as a catalyst for action

to mitigate the ongoing migration crisis. On a personal level, it was the photograph of Aylan

Kurdi’s body lying facedown in the surf that was the impetus for undertaking this project.

Throughout this thesis, I employ the term ‘migrant’ to describe individuals embarking on ‘irregular migration routes’ regardless of their legal status. ‘Refugee’ and

‘asylum seeker’ are legal terms. The United Nations defines a “refugee” as an individual

“owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it” (Refugees n.d.). An Asylum seeker refers to “someone who is seeking international protection abroad, but hasn’t yet been recognized as a refugee”

(“Refugees, Asylum-Seekers and Migrants” n.d.).

Given that the individuals crossing the Mediterranean do not have refugee status at the time of departure, and that the Central Mediterranean route is outside of ‘regular’ or

‘preferred’ migration routes (visas, traditional border crossings), ‘irregular migrant’ simply refers to any individual migrating via an irregular route regardless of the legal status said individual will be granted upon arrival. As this thesis is concerned with all individuals migrating across the Central Mediterranean route, which is an ‘irregular migration route’ the term ‘migrant’ prima facie implies ‘irregular migrant’. This is not to diminish the importance in the legal differences between ‘migrant’ ‘refugee’ and ‘asylum seeker’, but as

is demonstrated in this thesis, all three of these categories of individuals migrate and are rescued together under Operation Sophia. Further, as is demonstrated in this thesis, the term ‘migrant’ is used by multiple politicians and the media when referencing all groups, and the crisis in the Mediterranean generally.

With Securitization Theory’s emphasis on discourse and speech acts, and the authority of the UK government to make decisions on international issues such as the

Mediterranean migration crisis, analysis focuses on the speeches and debates conducted in the UK House of Commons and House of Lords. Hansard—the Parliamentary records database—provides full accounts of every sentence spoken in Parliament and as such is referenced throughout this thesis. Specifically, chapters four and five analyze the debates on the migration crisis, refugees, and the UK’s position relative to the EU. Arguments are taken from both the governing Conservatives and the opposition parties including the

Labour Party and Scottish National Party.

Given the nature of parliamentary procedure and the distribution of power, it is essential to analyze the various positions on the migration crisis and the proposed remedies held in Parliament. By analyzing the Hansard records, I identify speech acts made by specific actors which enables the political landscape in the UK relative to (im)migration visible. The repetition of specific political stances as well as specific policy propositions are assessed.

Not only does analysis of debates and committee meetings provide deeper insight into the political stances, but also in how the positions have shifted as the crisis ensued. Close attention is given to the then Prime Minister David Cameron, then Home Secretary Theresa

May, and then Minister of Immigration James Brokenshire. These three figures not only held key positions within the UK government that directly oversaw security, immigration, and international affairs, but they are also high-ranking members of the Conservative Party which held a majority government. Therefore, it also becomes essential to analyze the

Conservative Party manifesto to discern the Party’s political agenda and ethos in relation to

(im)migration and security. This is done in chapters four and five.

Given that the timeline of analysis partially overlaps with the period during which the UK Parliament was not in session and therefore no parliamentary records exist, records of speeches made to the press and elsewhere are also analyzed to further assess the position of the government. Specifically, addresses made by the then Prime Minister to the press in Europe, and a letter written by Theresa May to the London Times are analyzed.

These accounts are essential in demonstrating the continuation of the securitization act.

Despite the Conservatives holding a majority government following the 2015 election and not requiring oppositional support for the passing of legislation, the speeches and debates made by members of the opposition provide an important contrast to the views of the governing party. While questions about the procedural aspects of enacting legislation within a parliamentary system are beyond the scope of this thesis, political debate is not. Specifically, the speeches made by then Chair of the Home Affairs Committee

Keith Vaz --which often criticized the policies of the government and were in support of increased refugee resettlement quotas— highlight the complex nature of migration and

further demonstrate how European governments are ill-equipped to effectively and efficiently respond to crises.

Ultimately, Operation Sophia and UK participation provide a unique example of the merger of a securitization act with biopolitical tactics of governing, as related to migration.

Through successfully securitizing human smugglers and participating in a militarized operation, the UK has been able to achieve its domestic political agenda of reducing net- migration to the UK due to the operational procedures of relocating migrants to Italy where they fall under Italian jurisdiction. This is not without cost: the extra-territorialization of borders, the biopolitical tactics of filtering, and the construction of migrants as the ‘Other’ form a unique security dispositif (Foucault 2007)—the ensemble of discourses, institutions, laws and practices concerned with mechanisms of power-- in which motivational factors are varied and complex. The results of which do little to disrupt smuggling rings or reduce the amount of people who attempt the crossing. While a migrant may have dreams of European salvation, in reality they become a member of a statistical category of people which informs security policies and practices more so than humanitarian efforts. The data collected on individual irregular migrants is used for risk assessments; it becomes a technology of security used to regulate and control (im)migration. The research and analysis that follows provide further insight into the shortcomings of the Operation, as well as contradictions in the mandate and actual practices. These insights are important for establishing more effective policy changes moving forward to address issues of security and humanitarianism as related to irregular migration on the Mediterranean Sea and beyond.

CHAPTER TWO- Securitization, Migration, and Constructing the Other

“[…] leave your clothes behind crawl through the desert wade through the oceans drown […]” (Shire n.d.)

Introduction

In the early morning hours of September 2nd 2015, the body of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi washed ashore near Bodrum, Turkey. (Hopper 2015) The child’s family had paid smugglers to take them from Turkey to the nearby Greek Island of Kos. The family set out on a small boat across the Aegean Sea in hopes of leaving the war in Syria behind and beginning life anew. The photograph of Kurdi’s body laying face down in the surf sent shockwaves throughout the world and brought forth intensified calls for more to be done about the

Syrian refugee crisis and the migration crisis in both the Aegean and Mediterranean seas.

(“The Independent” 2015; BBC News 2015c) In response, then U.K Prime Minister David

Cameron stated that “Britain is a moral nation and we will fulfill our moral responsibilities”

(Dathan 2015). This statement, perhaps intentionally ambiguous, had been repeated since at least the spring of 2015 (MailOnline 2015) when the migration crisis in the

Mediterranean became a central feature of debate and media coverage in the UK, EU, and indeed the world. Unfortunately, words alone could not save Aylan Kurdi, nor the thousands of other migrants that would drown in the Aegean and Mediterranean seas while trying to reach the safe shores of Europe.

The story of Alan Kurdi’s death, while immensely tragic, offers insight into the politics of migration. More specifically, it raises important questions such as why did the

Kurdi family, and tens of thousands of other families, resort to irregular migration routes?

What prevented them, and other families originating from Syria, Libya, and elsewhere, from entering the European Union via ‘regular’ methods? Further, and more pertinent to this thesis, what is the relationship between migrating populations and security policies and practices? This chapter introduces Securitization Theory, which focuses on how issues are transformed from ‘normal’ politics, to security issues requiring exceptional responses. The chapter is broken up into six sections and a conclusion. The sections presented discuss various aspects of Securitization Theory including speech acts, the role of society, and how identity and values are of central importance in constructing issues as security-based. These theories inform how the 2015 Mediterranean migration crisis was rendered a security issue, which is analyzed in chapter four. First, however, how the Securitization Theory approach differs from other, more mainstream theories of security studies is shown.

Theories of Security Studies

In the realm of politics, how problems are perceived and how they are responded to is dependent on what particular view of the world is held by those making decisions. The two dominant schools of thought are, on the one hand, realist perspectives which describe how the world is, and idealist perspectives which suggest how the world ought to be, but both have been intertwined and reworked as security studies received a renewed attention and evolved. (Walt 1991a, 212–13) Within security studies, questions usually form around what

is in need of being secured, and from what or whom is it to be secured. Traditionalists, or those scholars rooted in the Realist school of security studies, hold the view that the interests of the state are to be viewed as the defining referent object of security (Wolfers

1952)—not individuals, or even populations. This view goes back at least as far as the

Leviathan (Hobbes 1651) wherein without the state structure, it is argued, the protections for people and populations would be non-existent. Under this assumption, or view of the world, threats against the security of the state-- whether real or perceived-- traditionally have come in the form of other states’ military power. (Walt 1991a, 214) Further yet, within traditional security studies, the notion of powers above the state (such as the EU or UN) can have no authority over the state. The focus of traditional security studies has almost solely been on military threats and responses to those threats. (Walt 1991b, 212)

Prior to the end of the Cold War, where the threat of nuclear annihilation loomed over the entire world, the focus on military power was seen as a zero-sum game (if one state gained security, another state necessarily became insecure). This view, for Realists and neo-Realists, was carried on after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War.

The end of the bi-polar world, and the emergence of new military powers on the global stage was assumed by some traditionalists to be a recipe for great instability in the anarchic international arena. Thus, the belief was held that each state must ensure it’s own security and survival. (Mearsheimer 1990) For neo-Realists, a further debate emerged between defensive realism, which holds that given the anarchic nature of the global society, states will act conservatively to ensure peace is maintained (Waltz 1979), and offensive realism

which holds that states will act aggressively in order to consolidate and expand its power relative to other states (Toft 2005).

The traditionalist view of security has been insufficient for many other scholars who see security problems as extending beyond the state and impacting the lives of individuals and see the role of international organizations that operate above the state as having authority and jurisdiction on certain issues; the idea of the international stage being anarchic lost some of its prominence. These “levels” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998a, 5) of analysis from the state to the individual allowed for more issues being viewed through a security lens. Scholars such as Booth (1991, 2005) and Bilgic (2015)use additional levels of analysis in security studies scholarship such as sub-state political units and individuals.

(Booth 1991, 2005; Bilgic 2015) Additionally, the assumption that security issues could and should pertain only to military action was challenged by some who saw security issues emerge out of other sectors such as the environmental, political, economic, and societal sectors. (Balzacq 2011, 2005; Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998) It is under these additional sectors that issues such as the migration crisis can be placed, whereas under traditional state-centric views it would be relegated to political or humanitarian responses and not treated as a security issue.

Migration is a critical issue in international relations and security studies in that it presents a complex problem in foreign relations, specifically in relation to borders and sovereignty. For some, such as Shain and Barth (2003), migrating and diasporic populations influence policy and international relations. The effects can be negative and destructive if a

state actively attempts to block migration through force and refoulment. Yet, a state can also benefit from large-scale migration as is the case with Turkey and the EU in which

Turkey uses migration as political currency to gain economic and political standing with the

EU (Timofeyev 2016).

Scholars such as Booth and Waever, known as “wideners”, hold the view that people and indeed states can feel threatened or insecure by a variety of issues that go beyond the realm of military action. This influx of new potential security threats then raises the question of how an issue or event comes to be treated as a security issue. The answer according to this view is that issues go through a process of “securitization” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998, 23). However, even within these more ‘critical’ approaches, debates remain over the best approach for analyzing security issues. On the one hand, there are approaches based on discourse analysis (Salter and Mutlu 2012, 113–19; Hansen 2006), while other approaches lean toward practice-based analysis. (Wæver 2004; Salter 2012, 85–

91) This is not to say that on the other hand, these two approaches are mutually exclusive; more recent scholarly works suggest that both discourse-based and practice-based approaches can and should be interwoven. (Balzacq, Léonard, and Ruzicka 2016) Further, the authors note that “[…] taken individually, neither of these approaches can help us fully understand the contents of and variations among securitization processes.” and that “[…] it is more productive to integrate them into a coherent framework through the use of different features of an ‘analytics of government’” (Balzacq, Léonard, and Ruzicka 2016,

517). This first chapter then, deals primarily with the discursive aspects of Securitization

Theory; it will examine how issues become securitized. A more thorough analysis of what

securitization does as a practice-based analysis of government, or how securitization facilitates government actions, will be discussed in the following chapter.

Securitization Theory and the Copenhagen School

For Buzan, Waever, and Wilde (1998b), securitization relates to the process of constructing issues in a manner in which they are “[…] presented as an existential threat, requiring emergency measures and justifying actions outside the normal bounds of political procedure” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998, 23–24). While the strength of this definition is its openness—the potential for a variety of issues to be securitized fits within the definition-

- it is also its weakness in that it lacks narrow specificity and has thus been open to criticism.

The definition of securitization as put forth by Balzacq however, goes beyond that of Buzan,

Waever, and Wilde, and is more comprehensive and theoretically specific. Balzacq defines securitization as

[a]n articulated assemblage of practices whereby heuristic artefacts (metaphors, policy tools, image repertoires, analogies, stereotypes, emotions, etc.) are contextually mobilized by a securitizing actor, who works to prompt an audience to build a coherent network of implications (feelings, sensations, thoughts, and intuitions), about the critical vulnerability of a referent object, that concurs with the securitizing actor’s reasons for choices and actions, by investing the referent subject with such an aura of unprecedented threatening complexion that a customized policy must be undertaken immediately to block its development. (Balzacq 2011, 3. emphasis in original)

This definition holds much more methodological coherence than that of Buzan Waever, and

Wilde, and thus can be analyzed and mobilized in a more precise manner. There are, however, several terms that must first be defined prior to analyzing the specific aspects of this conception of securitization of which Buzan, Waever, and Wilde provide. Specifically, the definitions of a “referent object”, “referent subject”, “securitizing actor”, and

“functional actor”, and what these terms mean in the context of securitization must be understood. Unpacking these terms will enable the process of securitization as presented through Balzacq’s definition to become clearer.

Referent objects in Securitization Theory relate to “things that are seen to be existentially threatened and that have a legitimate claim to survival” (Buzan, Wæver, and

Wilde 1998, 36). As noted above, traditionally the state has been held as the referent object, however, with the widening of security studies and the deepening of levels of analysis, anything in principle can be constructed as a referent object. More specifically, as noted by Huysmans (2006), in the context of the securitization of migration, the referent object tends to move away from the state and to the individual. (Huysmans 2006, 35) On the one hand, states that are not welcoming to migrants and refugees can frame their own social nexus or way of life as the referent object; an influx of ‘Others’ poses a threat to the

‘normal’ way of life that a society enjoys. On the other hand, a migrant or refugee fleeing from violence can be held as the referent object of security; a refugee can be faced with an existential threat to his or her life, and by virtue of being a human being, they have a legitimate right to life and human rights. (Huysmans 2006, 37) It is this latter form of referent object that will be employed for use in this work; migrants fleeing an unstable region seeking asylum and life anew while facing existential danger to their well-being not only from the perils of migration across the Mediterranean Sea, but also from the human smugglers.

In contrast to the referent object there is the referent subject. Simply put, a referent subject is “the entity that is threatening” (Balzacq, Léonard, and Ruzicka 2016, 495). For traditional security studies, a referent subject could be an opposing military force. In critical approaches to security, referent subjects can be anything from environmental issues such as pollution, or entities such as drug traffickers, terrorists, or in some cases even migrants or states. The main point is that a referent subject is portrayed to be threatening to the referent object, and discourse surrounding the subject will be shaped to achieve this portrayal. As demonstrated later, the referent subject of security for the following analysis are human smugglers and the associated criminal networks that support them.

Understanding what object(s) is held as threatened, and by what, requires that someone has proclaimed it as such; this person(s) is a securitizing actor. A securitizing actor refers to “actors who securitize issues by declaring something—a referent object— existentially threatened” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998, 36). The ‘actor’ is the person, or group of persons, who performs a security speech act. In contemporary contexts, the most common examples of a securitizing actor are political leaders, governments and lobbying groups. What is important here is that the specific actor holds a level of legitimacy; their speech act must be accepted as plausible by a given audience. The legitimacy an actor possesses is the thin veneer separating them from ordinary citizens and gives their claims weight. Balzacq places the actor in a specific level of analysis which he calls ‘agents’ (Balzacq

2011, 35). Under this agent designation are several aspects which describe how the actor relates to the issue being securitized. These aspects include identifying the power position of the actor and the social and individual identity of the actor which either enables or

constrains their behaviour. In the context of migration, a securitizing actor can most commonly be identified as a political leader who attempts to push a particular agenda such as increased spending on humanitarian efforts, increased quotas for granting asylum or broader approaches to search and rescue. On the other hand, the agenda could be for limits on immigration, stronger borders, etc. depending on whether migrants and the like are viewed as an object or subject of security. Further, it is important to note that a securitizing actor rarely speaks about his or her own security, and instead their argument will refer to the need to defend the security of the referent object-- migrants, society, populations, the state. (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998, 40) This is discussed in more detail below in the section on speech acts, and rhetoric.

Finally, a functional actor refers to “[…] actors who affect the dynamics of a sector.

Without being the referent object or the actor calling for security on behalf of the referent object, this is an actor who significantly influences decisions in a field of security” (Buzan,

Wæver, and Wilde 1998b, 36). An example of a functional actor in the context of migration is the role of Islamic terrorist organizations. By attempting to falsely represent all of Islam and carrying out violent attacks in the name of the religion, misconceptions and negative narratives can be constructed which cause some securitizing actors to associate Islam and

Muslims generally as existentially threatening to a referent object and thus can become securitized as has been argued in the context of the EU (Cesari 2012)1. Alternatively, within the context of the EU, and its multiple states, a functional actor can be a state which

1 For more on conceptions of Islam and Muslims in the west see, and how Islam has been framed as a politicized issue related to identity see (Amin-Khan 2012; Nagel and Staeheli 2011; Abu-Lughod 2015)

responds to a migrant crisis in a manner different from the norm. Italy for example acted as a functional actor by launching Operation Mare Nostrum: a “military and humanitarian operation aimed at tackling the humanitarian emergency in the Strait of Sicily[…]” (“Mare

Nostrum Operation - Marina Militare” n.d.) which brought scores of migrants to European shores. This created a change in the dynamics of the migrant crisis by openly bringing migrants to the EU instead of immediately turning migrant vessels back to where they originated; the Italian government set a new precedent on how European states were to respond to the crisis. This operation was the precursor to Operation Sophia, which forms the basis of analysis in chapters four and five of this thesis and features an analysis of a securitizing act.

A politics of fear can be established by functional actors such as radical terrorist organizations which then facilitate the process of securitization. Fear also functions with the discourse of security more generally as it influences policy decisions as well as the perceived urgency for a policy decision to counter the source of the fear. A politics of fear relates to fear being instrumentalized as a motivational factor inciting people to act in specific ways.

For Robin (2004), political fear relates to “[…] people’s felt apprehension of some harm to their collective well-being […]” (Robin 2004, 2). Robin further notes that what differentiates political fear from personal fear is that the former “[…] emanate[s] from society or [has] consequences for society” (Robin 2004, 2). In the context of migration, a politics of fear can manifest in several ways. For example, fear of violence at the hands of terrorists can motivate the public to accept extreme measures to provide a sense of security. This would be an example of fear being politicized from the top-down. Robin notes that this type of

instrumentalized fear comes in two distinct forms: fear used to unite the population such as in times of war or oppression, or it can be a divisive fear that seeks to place sects of the population in opposition with each other. (Robin 2004, 162–63) Alternatively, fear can manifest as fearing for the well-being of others. This empathetic fear can drive people toward humanitarian efforts that simultaneously alleviate their own fear and anxiety, and secure those whom they are fearful for. People can become empathetic and fearful for migrants and can call for increased efforts on the part of governments. This is an example of fear being politicized from the bottom-up.

While fear can be a uniting force, it can function as a catalyst that cause securitizing actors to call for exceptional policies to quell insecurity, while simultaneously creating a sense of urgency in the ranks of targeted audiences; the audiences will become more receptive to exceptional policies that may ease the sense of fear. As Williams notes, “[…] fear is an instrument which, far from being part of the existential condition of modernity, has been made more powerful and effective by the structures of modern politics” (Balzacq

2011, 219). How fear is used by securitizing actors then, becomes a prominent place of analysis.

Securitization Moves and Speech Acts

Returning to Balzacq’s definition of securitization (2011, 3), the specific aspects of the definition must be explored to further unpack securitization as a theory before applying it fully to migration. First is the construction of the “articulated assemblages,” or the speech act.

Central to Securitization Theory are speech acts. In simplest terms, a speech act refers to, in the context of securitization, the use of articulated utterances which bring about something: “[b]y saying the words, something is done” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde

1998b, 26). In the theory of language, certain formations of sentences that are uttered by a speaker have an impact on a hearer/listener/audience. They are “performatives” (Austin

1962, 83) in that they do not simply refer to something that can be verified as true or false such as “the cat is on the mat,” but that the uttering of a sentence is part of, or is also the

‘doing’ of an action. By saying for example “I bet Tottenham will beat Arsenal” something is done; a bet is made (if the sentence is uttered to another person who understands what betting entails).

Austin’s extensive outline of speech acts features a set of conditions that must be met in order for them to be successful. In broad strokes, there must exist a procedure in which there is the “uttering of certain words by certain persons in certain circumstances

[…]” (Austin 1962, 26 emphasis in original). The difference is then between what happens in saying something (illocution) and what happens by saying something (perlocution) (Austin

1962 107, 109; Balzacq 2011 4-5; Searle 1969 24-25). In the context of securitization, a securitizing speech act focuses on an actor attempting to persuade an audience that a specific issue or event is an existential threat to the referent object. What is important to note here is the notion of persuading, or convincing. This act requires audience acceptance and is thus considered to be an illocutionary act. Illocutionary acts go beyond the descriptive nature of a locutionary act-- which provides sense and reference-- to an act performed by speech such as ordering, warning, or informing. An illocutionary act can then

lead to a perlocutionary effect which focuses on the consequential effects of the speech act.2 Here then, is where the attempt to convince and persuade, for example, comes into play.

There is often confusion between illocution and perlocution because, as Balzacq points out “[p]erlocution does not belong literally to speech act since it is the causal response of a linguistic act” (Balzacq 2011, 5). Further, Balzacq notes how part of a speaker’s intent when performing a speech act is to bring about a perlocutionary effect.

Knowing the differences then becomes important when analyzing speech acts and securitization. To more tightly tie this to securitization, by saying that the act of trans-

Mediterranean human smuggling, for example, is a threat to the security of migrants, an actor is stating (an opinion, fact, or belief) to an audience. The “perlocutionary intentions”

(Vuori 2012, 133) of this speech act would be to convince, or persuade the audience that human smuggling is a threat to migrating populations; to agree with the speaker. Put more simply still, ‘the politician urged the public to support UK participation in Operation Sophia’ is in reference to an illocutionary act, whereas ‘the politician persuaded the public to support the UK’s approach to mitigating the migration crisis’ refers to a perlocutionary effect. The distinction here is that of the distinction between linguistic philosophy, which as

Searle notes is focused on method, and the philosophy of language which is a subject of study. (Searle 1969, 4) Balzacq echoes this distinction and adds that the latter is concerned with speech acts as a whole, whereas with the former, the focus is on perlocution: “[…]

2 For more on the consequences or effects of speech acts see lectures VIII-X of “How to do things with words”. (Austin 1962, 94–131)

linguistic philosophy is a mode of enquiry that tries to see how the analysis of language can help establish a link between the nature of reality and how we get to know that very reality.

Perlocution falls into this category” (Balzacq 2011, 5). In Securitization Theory, the focus is in drawing the link between a perceived reality of threats, and how the public and political actors act within that reality (whether it is accepted as reality or not).

While most of the focus here, and in Securitization Theory in general, focuses on the

‘speech’ component of a speech act and its contextual relevance (Balzacq 2011, 2005a;

Salter 2008; Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998b), others have drawn attention to the ‘act’ component. (McDonald 2008; Huysmans 2011) Some of the main criticisms of the focus on language is that it neglects other ways in which meaning can be and is communicated such as gestures, images, and events. Further, it is not only speech actors involved in securitizing practices, but also people with symbolic functioning roles such as police, military, and border security/service agents. The very presence of such actors shapes the perception of an event; armed officers at an airport emit different meanings and values than an open door into a country. Additionally the role of data collection, surveillance, and advanced screening measures all act as well, and cannot be overlooked simply because they are not speech acts, and indeed rarely need to be accompanied by a speech act to be implemented or used; they become “little security nothings” to borrow the term from Huysmans, which are actively “effacing speech acts with weighty decisionmaking [sic] significance” (Huysmans

2011, 372). It therefore becomes imperative to analyze both the ‘speech’ and ‘act’ components of a securitizing move especially in discerning the level of success it is afforded by the acceptance or rejection of an audience. While there is an ever-growing body of work

dedicated to the ‘act’ component of speech act theory, for the focus of this investigation, the analysis shall remain with the ‘speech’ component.

As a final note on speech acts, it is worthwhile to point out that the very terms used such as ‘act’ ‘actor’ ‘setting’ and ‘audience’ are terms borrowed from the realm of drama and theatre. Salter (2008) employs dramaturgical analysis in his examination of securitization and desecuritization in the context of the Canadian Air Transport Security

Authority (CATSA). The strength in using a dramaturgical analysis is that it “uses the vocabulary of theatre to understand social settings, roles, and performances of identity”

(Salter 2008, 328). Further, Salter points out the importance of setting in a speech act.

Continuing with terminology from drama and theatre, Salter notes that the setting of a securitization act “includes the stage on which it is made, the genre in which it is made, the audience to which it is pitched, and the reception of the audience” (Salter 2008, 328 emphasis added). These terms from the realm of drama are closely related to Austin’s emphasis on certain words, people, and circumstances in speech acts as mentioned above.

Further, if by imagining the setting of a securitizing act as a stage with actors and audience, a third group emerges. This third group is comprised of ‘petty sovereigns’ to borrow from

Butler (2004)—those who function within the securitizing framework and facilitate securitizing practices in a behind-the-scenes way. They are border service agents, FRONTEX agents, and immigration officials. Returning to the metaphor of theatre, these petty sovereigns would be the stage crew; they facilitate the action.

Speech acts and securitization-based analyses are particularly useful when engaging with issues such as migration that require government action yet are divisive; there are numerous proposed responses for mitigating the crisis and saving lives. Therefore, it becomes essential for a government to successfully persuade the opposition, the public, and international allies to accept the government’s plan. This notion is expanded upon in chapters four and five. Specifically, analysis draws on speeches made by political actors to the public, and during debates within the House of Commons and House of Lords in the UK parliament.

Securitization and Audience

The second aspect to consider then is the role of the audience in a (de)securitizing move.

While debate remains about the specific characteristics of an audience in terms of whom it is comprised of, and what, when, and how it comes to accept the securitization of an issue, it holds that without an audience there can be no speech act performance. (Watson 2012)

Watson notes that within the Copenhagen School and in framework theory, audience acceptance is a contested notion. Watson presents multiple interpretations of audience acceptance as set out by previous scholarly works. These interpretations include

“constructing shared understanding”; tolerating a “violation of rules”; “avoiding the escalation of public opposition”; “toleration of emergency measures”; and “acquiescence”

(Watson 2012, 284–85). Despite the varying differences in interpretations of audience acceptance, it appears that the audience plays an active role in (de)securitization; it is not a body of passive listeners, but indeed contributes to, or is instrumental to, a successful

(de)securitization act. Specifically for Buzan, Waever, and Wilde (1998, 41), the audience is

“those the securitizing act attempts to convince to accept exceptional procedures because of the specific security nature of some issue.” Balzacq is critical of this vagueness and concludes that “the role of audience in securitization processes remains significantly under- theorised in the Copenhagen School’s formulation of Securitization Theory” (Balzacq 2011,

59). These classifications, in addition to pointing out an active role for an audience also imply the significance of perlocutionary effects, as discussed above.

Salter (2008) takes the role of an audience further in his analysis of

(de)securitization. Implementing dramaturgical analysis of setting, actor, and audience,

Salter suggests a model of four distinct types of audiences and their associated speech contexts or settings. These types of audiences include the popular (the public population), the elite (political leaders, government officials), the scientific (scholars, researchers, academics), and the technocratic (specific industry experts, technical specialists). Each of these audiences, and the setting in which they inhabit are “markedly different—they operate according to different constitutions of actor and audience. A securitizing move is not the same in all contexts, because it is not simply made up of the internal grammatical elements” (Salter 2008, 329). This implies a reflexive relationship between actor and audience that differs in each setting. In particular, Salter notes that within each of these distinct settings there are “variations in the form, content, and success of speech acts[…]

[i]n each of these different settings, the core rules for authority/knowledge (who can speak), the social context (what can be spoken), and the degree of success (what is heard) vary” (Salter 2008, 322). For example, attempting to securitize migration to a popular

audience requires focusing on different aspects of the issue than would be used to persuade a scientific-based audience; focusing on emotive aspects may be more successful for the popular audience, whereas empirical data and research can appeal more generally to a scientific audience.3 In the case of the securitization of migration generally, and refugees more specifically, the audiences that will be most closely analyzed are both the public and the elite. The public is analyzed as they are not only the electorate and can support or remove a government (in democratic societies) by viewing the government as legitimate or not, but the public is directly invested in the makeup and functionality of society more generally; the public will either support or oppose ‘Others’. Secondly, the elite is also analyzed in the specific context of the UK as the lawmakers (politicians) either support of oppose securitization moves. This is not to overlook other stakeholders such as humanitarian groups or rights-based organizations which play a significant role in issues of migration but do not possess the same power and/or authority as the public or elite audiences.

Shaping speech acts to appeal to specific audiences while acknowledging the differences in authority and knowledge relates to Balzacq’s view that “[…]securitization is a sustained strategic practice aimed at convincing a target audience to accept, based on what it knows about the world, the claim that a specific development (oral threat or event) is threatening enough to deserve an immediate policy to alleviate it” (2005, 173 emphasis in

3 One of the common criticisms of Securitization Theory is that the theory has only been applied to contexts in which a democratically elected government holds power. Authoritarian forms of government for example, would not require the support of the public or any other stakeholder to implement policy. Vuori however, presents this argument but then argues that through illocutionary logic, Securitization Theory can be applied to non-democratic forms of governing with China as the case study. (Vuori 2008)

original). Here then, it becomes clear that different audiences possess different forms and levels of knowledge and the tactics to mobilize an audience will necessarily be varied and nuanced depending on the specific setting an actor is in. Balzacq’s passage also implies an active role for an audience; it must do something in order for an issue to be successfully securitized. This lends to Côté’s (2016) notion that an audience must be analyzed based on its capabilities. For Côté, the audience is best defined as “the individual(s) or group(s) that has the capability to authorize the view of the issue presented by the securitizing actor and legitimize the treatment of the issue through security practice” (Côté 2016, 548 Emphasis in original). Côté, who examined multiple empirical studies of the processes of securitization, suggests, as others have too (Salter 2008) that identifying an audience is highly context- specific, and varies depending on the issue being securitized.

Salter notes that to determine whether an event or issue is successfully securitized— successfully accepted by an audience-- four questions must be asked:

(1) To what degree is the issue-area discussed as part of a wider political debate? (2) Is the description of the threat as existential accepted or rejected? (3) Is the solution accepted or rejected? (4) Are new or emergency powers accorded to the securitizing agent? (Salter 2008, 325)

By analyzing the answers to these questions, two temporal dimensions of audience interaction emerge. The first refers to the duration of the securitization, or how long an issue is held to be an existential threat to a specific referent object. The second refers to what Salter calls the “entropy of the public imagination” (Salter 2008, 324). This temporal aspect relates to how long, and to what degree, an issue is captured by the public or audience’s attention. Having a sense of the degree to which an issue is of central

importance to an audience directly relates to the chances of a successful securitization of that issue. As is shown in chapter four, migration has been a central fixture in the wider political debate within the UK. Consensus however, had been reached on the seriousness of the migration crisis in the Mediterranean by both the government and opposition, yet consensus on the best way to mitigate the crisis was not reached. Salter’s four conditions for audience acceptance in the context of the migration crisis are analyzed further in chapter four.

Securitization and the Societal Sector

While within each issue that an actor attempts to securitize, different sectors— environmental, economic, political, societal, or military (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998b)-- become more centrally linked to the issue. For the securitization of migration, the societal sector is particularly important to focus on.

The societal sector holds the nation, or society as the referent object of security and the concept of societal security “could also be understood as “identity security”” (Buzan,

Wæver, and Wilde 1998b, 120). The nation or society differs from but is related to the state.

Whereas the state is comprised of the political institutions and structures of organization and is responsible for the security of its populations as the “ultimate mediator of the relation between humans and nature” (Huysmans 2006, 30), the nation or society deals more with identity and values. It is “the societal or socio-cultural sector is about the sustainability of collective identities[…]” (Buzan and Little 2000, 73). Hansen (2003) notes

that in some cases, specifically in her analysis of Nordic states, that “notions of ‘state’ and

‘nation’ [are] virtually indistinguishable[…]” (Hansen 2003, 312).

Returning to society, it is not to say that economic, environmental, or other factors do not influence society—they do—but the focus is on how identity and values are shaped.

As Buzan, Waever, and Wilde note “[s]ociety is about identity, the self conception of communities and of individuals identifying themselves as members of a community. These identities are distinct from, although often entangled with, the explicitly political organizations concerned with government” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998b, 119).

Huysmans notes that there is a difference between “cultural identity” and “political identity” in which the former is the basis of the latter. (Huysmans 2006, 118) There is also a distinction between “state” and “nation”. The former With identity being the primary organizing principle in the societal sector, different groups will form in different locations, however, the major organizing identities revolve around nationalism (in the European context, which features varying “regionalizing dynamics” and a “complex constellation of multilayered identities” (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998b, 132)) however, groupings based on religion or race may also emerge. By this logic of organization based on identity, there is an inherent dichotomy between those who share an identity, and those who are different, and thus the greatest insecurities of the societal sector come in the form of threats to the notions of identity within a given society. Identity in this context relates to the values, beliefs, cultural practices, language, and to a certain extent ethnicity or physical appearance. Beyond this, identity “is a relational concept, that it is produced through – and produces – juxtapositions between selves and others […]” (Hansen and Waever 2001, 24)

Migration then, is a leading source of societal insecurity as it disrupts or reshapes societal identity. (Buzan, Wæver, and Wilde 1998b, 121)

Society, however, is closely related to the state especially in how it reacts to perceived threats. Society is not a natural organism; it is constructed by mechanisms of power and circulations of ideas, values, and beliefs, as well as goods and services. With the issue of migration, the societal sector may be constructed in a way which sees its citizens feeling insecure about an influx of migrants, or it may be constructed in a way which sees the public act welcomingly toward newcomers. Regardless of the way society is constructed, it is through the political institutions that migration issues must be dealt with

(visa policy, border security, integration projects etc.) and therefore the line between state and society can be blurred or be non-existent as Hansen (2003) demonstrates in her analysis of Nordic states. What is important to analyze when assessing a state’s response to migration then, is in the relationship between the feelings expressed by society on the issue and the state’s actions (in democratic societies). The methods and policies for responding to an influx of migrants or refugees are born out of the views and values a society holds. If for example, a given society is comprised of people who view migration as economically necessary for the community due to an aging population or lack of skilled workers, a more open and robust immigration policy nexus may exist. If, however, society views migrants as threatening—whether in terms of violence or simply the disruption of the status quo— policies may focus primarily on undertaking increased security measures, stronger borders, and restrictive immigration policies. People may have split opinions on the subject as well. A person may wish for aid to reach migrants to reduce the likelihood of death, yet the same

person may not want migrants to be resettled in their community. This, as is demonstrated in chapter four, is very much the position of the British government and its citizens in the context of the Mediterranean migration crisis.

Similarly, Salter and Mutlu (2013) argue that visa policies are “a mirror that reflects how the state views its own population and the world: states who perceive their welfare system as being overly burdened may have tight regulations for refugee admission[…]states who are concerned with fertility rates, on the other hand, may encourage immigration[…]”

Salter and Mutlu, 2013, 113). Governments must also take in to consideration multiple stakeholders and interests when designing and implementing policy.

Both governmental and non-governmental actors act in accordance with assumptions they make about the factors and variables which drive agenda setting. Interest groups may, for example, adhere to broad general notions of popular democracy in which they expect issues which gain a high public profile to gain access automatically to official agendas.[…] Politicians, on the other hand, may subscribe to a set of process-related beliefs which provides a much larger role for administrative discretion and bureaucratic politics in preventing popular issues from obtaining serious consideration[…] (Howlett 2013, 37)

This passage suggests that there may be a disconnect between the views and values held by interest groups and indeed the general population relative to that of the government. This argument has been made by Mullally and Murphy (2014) who suggest that changes made to the UK migrant worker visa scheme is seen as a “move towards a more precarious migration status for migrant domestic workers [and] marks a rejection of the reforms secured through sustained political activism. It also highlights the contingency and instability of political moments that secure progressive change for migrants[…]”

(Mullally and Murphy 2014, 397) In other words, a government may have an entirely

different world-view on individual issues relative to the general public. The example of visa policy provides but one example of the nuances in societal values and policy goals as they relate to (im)migration. Some securitizing actors however, attempt to portray irregular migrants as threatening, and subsequently attempt to foster fear. As Huysmans (2006, 52–

55) notes, fear carries two unique features in relation to securitization. On the one hand, fear is political currency; if a society is fearful, it will call on the actor for more security to quell that fear. On the other hand, fear as a component of a securitizing practice is an organizing principle that “renders social relations as fearful” (Huysmans 2006, 54) Members of a society may become fearful of those perceived as different and react accordingly.

Fear is also a necessary component of an existential threat. A society may feel a sense of unease about migration for many reasons, not the least of which comes from representation in the media. The media can be seen to play a role that organizes events in ways that make sense to the general public. This ‘framing’, as suggested by Vultee

“prioritizes the data that make an event into one kind of story or another” (Vultee 2011,

79). Vultee also points out that “[w]hat appears in news accounts about war, an epidemic, or a fire is not necessarily the event itself but a careful, professionally structured reconstruction of what experts, authorities and victims have to say about the war, epidemic, or fire they have feared, observed, or endured” (Vultee 2011, 82). This suggests a reflexive and symbiotic relationship between the media, society, and political actors and structures. The narrative created is circulated between the media, government, and public continuously, with each group feeding off the others. How the public and authorities perceive an event shapes and is shaped by the media portrayal. Taking for example an

article published by CBC in November 2016, the specific framing of potential Mexican migration numbers increasing in Canada featured the headline “Canadian Officials preparing for potential flood of Mexican migrants after Trump wins presidency” (Harris 2017, emphasis added). Harris also writes that the government is making a plan to “cope”

(emphasis added) with the coming migrants implying the issue will have a negative impact on Canadian society and politics. Descriptive words such as “flood” or “swarm”4 invoke particular feelings such as unease or fear about migrants whereas terms such as “victims”

“refugees” or other more sympathy-generating terms have different affects such as empathy. Analogies are powerful tools in speech acts as they are intentionally employed to draw associations between the subject matter and whatever the analogy may be---swarm, flood, or the like. These trigger words or analogies are also used in speech acts by securitizing actors when attempting to persuade an audience that danger is imminent5.

What is important above all else here, is that the media plays a significant role in securitization. On the one hand, the public relies heavily on the media for information about a specific issue such as migration to make informed decisions such as whether to support a proposed legislation or oppose it. On the other hand, however, as Vultee notes, the media does not present issues equally. “It is entirely possible, if not commonplace, for one set of media actors to be pushing an issue toward the securitized end of the spectrum even as another is pushing back toward the domain of normal politics” (Vultee 2011, 83). What this

4 See (BBC News 2015b) 5 For more on media framing and representation see (Huysmans 2006, 45–47), (Cooper et al. 2017), (Dreher and Voyer 2015), (Hanson-Easey and Moloney 2009)

implies is that the media too has securitizing power and is a necessary tool for securitizing actors in the political realm.

The general feelings of unease about an issue within a society do not, however, constitute an existential fear; existential fear is a response to an existential threat.

Huysmans (2006) notes the connection between existential fear and societal vulnerabilities which may be exploited by an existential threat, and notes that to govern existential fear requires strategies of “[…]reducing the vulnerability of the political unit […]” (Huysmans

2006, 55) . Therefore, understanding the unique vulnerabilities of a society is necessary in identifying what is most threatening. If for example, an identity is constructed based on isolation or separateness, any increase in immigration will be disruptive and threatening. If an identity is based primarily on language as a principal component of nationalism, an influx of others that do not speak the common tongue will dilute the society. Only once the vulnerabilities of a society are identified can an actor begin to securitize that threat.

Securitization then, frames migration as an existential threat in two key ways:

(1) migration is transfigured into events and developments that existentially endanger the independent identity and functional autonomy of a political unit, and (2) in endangering the community it asserts and re-iterates the very existence of the community as an autonomous political unity. Securitizing immigration and refugee flows thus produces and reproduces a political community of insecurity. (Huysmans 2006, 51)

In other words, a community or entire society, when presented with migration as a threat, can unify as a cohesive unit in opposition to a migrating population. This is not to say that all of society will be influenced by the construction of a threat, but rather that the bloc of society which is influenced by the threat construction will be more centrally present. How a

society responds to migrants being rendered the referent object of security can become mixed and incongruous; the desire to mitigate the migration crisis may be paired with the desire to maintain the demographic makeup of one’s own society.

The greater the consequences that a threat poses, the greater the insecurity within a society will be felt. If the threat is perceived as becoming increasingly dire, the level of insecurity that is felt within society will increase accordingly. Here then, is where a securitizing actor runs the risk of losing all political currency; if an actor is seen as unable to offer the desired level of security, the society may remove him or her from office and replace them with someone who can (assuming the actor in question is an elected official).

Furthermore, by asserting its political unity and autonomy, a society is fundamentally asserting its sovereignty, and becomes a referent object (albeit ambiguous and abstract). A system of “inside/outside” (Walker 1993), or to borrow from Schmitt (2007),

“friend/enemy” is established. This dichotomous system is conducive to a strong organizing principle in which social relations are arranged in accordance to those whom trust is shared with and those whom are to be feared. Further, Schmitt expands on this notion of a friend/enemy dichotomy:

[t]he distinction of friend and enemy denotes the utmost degree of intensity of a union or separation, of an association or dissociation. It can exist theoretically or practically […] The political enemy need not be morally evil or aesthetically ugly; he need not appear as an economic competitor, and it may even be advantageous to engage with him in business transactions. But he is, nevertheless, the other, the stranger; and it is sufficient for his nature that he is, in a specially intense way, existentially something different and alien, so that in the extreme case conflicts with him are possible. (Schmitt 2007, 26–27)

In the context of migration then, the friend/enemy dichotomy is applied to the domestic society (friend) and the migrating others (enemy) based on the very fact that the latter disrupts the status-quo of the former which in turn causes the former to react negatively toward the latter. Actual transgressions committed by the migrating groups matter very little, for as Schmitt notes on multiple occasions (2007, 33,39), the importance of the possibility of conflict between friend and enemy is what matters. In the context of migration, conflict need not initially mean physical conflict, but simply the aforementioned disruption of a society’s perceived normalcy. Again, this is not to say that a society will stand against migrants in an absolute sense; there will always be members of a society that believe open migration is positive, or morally responsible. Yet, what cannot be forgotten is that in Securitization Theory, absolute support of the public is not required; in democratic societies, only enough support to maintain a securitizing actor’s/party’s government and power to enact policy and law is required for a successful securitization. O’Reilly (2008, 67) refers to this as the “critical mass” which denotes “enough of the right people” (emphasis in original) being convinced that a threat is existential. Fostering this possibility of conflict into a likelihood or an inevitability is the primary tactic of a securitizing actor; if he or she can accomplish this, enacting policies that treat migration as a security issue will be made easy.

The dichotomous framework that has been introduced here to denote the clash between domestic and migrating populations highlights an additional problem; the clash between space and time. On the domestic front, political issues and society are constructed according to time and history. As R.B.J Walker (1993, 61) notes, domestic issues, or those

‘inside’ the state focus on developing and maintaining a political community over time

(enacting legislation, developing the wellbeing of citizens). In contrast to this, issues that are international in nature or ‘outside’ the state (mass migration, refugee crises) operate in terms of spatiality; populations moving through and across states and borders are markedly distinct from static populations. “In the theory of international relations […] Same and

Other are differentiated spatially, and the possibility of temporal convergence towards a community of common identity is firmly resisted” (Walker 1993, 66). When considering the securitization of migration then, not only is the possibility of forging a common identity resisted by securitizing actors, it stands as entirely in opposition to the goal of securitization; the us/them friend/enemy distinction is necessary to foster fear and ultimately enact exceptional policies. The role of sovereignty will be discussed further in chapter three as it relates to governmentality and biopower, however, in the context of an organizing principle conducive to securitization, sovereignty plays a key role. To continue with Walker, “[t]he patterns of inclusion and exclusion we now take for granted are historical innovations. The principle of state sovereignty is the classic expression of those patterns, an expression that encourages us to believe that either those patterns are permanent or that they must be erased in favour of some kind of global cosmopolis” (Walker 1993, 179). Walker raises a critical point here. In the context of (im)migration, sovereignty is the ultimate barrier against Others. Sovereignty is more permanent and impenetrable than any wall or barrier.

While a migrant may indeed be able to traverse a wall or fence and enter a state, the sovereignty held by the state is the unequivocal authority and can be employed to remove the Other from the state. Further, while sovereignty may appear to be an abstract idea, its power is tangible. It is the defence used by states against calls for resettlement quotas, as is

discussed in chapters four and five. Short of establishing a ‘global cosmopolis’, sovereignty will continue to be the most powerful barrier facing migrants.

In Operation Sophia, the friend/enemy or self/other dichotomy is layered and complex.

First, the human smugglers are held as the referent subject—as threatening to migrants— and thus the language used to differentiate the smugglers from the migrants is markedly distinct. Second, the securitization of migration by the UK, as is shown in the case study of this thesis, is divorced from societal fear by the fact that the UK government was adamant in ensuring no resettlement of migrants occurred in the UK. The fear that was established was the fear of migrants dying, and not that migrants would disrupt UK society. It was a fear of having blood on one’s hands due to inaction. While societal fear certainly has been a great concern in the domestic politics of the UK, it is an issue that is separated from the securitization of migrants in the Mediterranean in this case. In fact, as is shown in chapters four and five, there were calls for resettlement of migrants in the UK which suggest that not only is fear constructed in society, but the feelings and desires of a society are never uniform.

British Societal Sector

The societal composition of the UK is of great interest then, as it informs the (im)migration policy of the UK and therefore the approach taken by the UK through Operation Sophia.

Understanding the demographic makeup will allow for a better understanding of what securitizing actors focus on, and where vulnerabilities of the society may emerge. As mentioned above, language, religion, and ethnicity are organizational categories of a society

and must be analyzed. According to the 2011 UK census, English (and Welsh in Wales) was the primary language for 92% of the population. ("2011 Census - Office for National

Statistics Language” n.d.) In terms of religion, while Christianity had fallen in the previous decade, it still accounted for 59% of the population. Interestingly, however, was that people holding no religion grew to account for 25% of the population, and those identifying as

Muslim saw the greatest increase and grew to 5%. (“Religion in England and Wales 2011 -

Office for National Statistics” n.d.) Finally, the ethnic makeup of England and Wales was still predominantly “white”, accounting for 86% of the population, yet this was a significant decrease from the 94% in 1991. Those identifying as Arab accounted for only 0.4% of the population. In absolute terms this represents 240,000 usual residents in contrast to the 48.2 million “white” residents. (“Ethnicity - Office for National Statistics” n.d.) What can be inferred from this data is, on the one hand, that England is overwhelmingly comprised of white Christians, and while absolute increases have been made by Muslims and other groups, it hardly seems to suggest an immediate threat to the perceived societal makeup.

On the other hand, by making gains in the demographic composition, securitizing actors have ammunition to present any additional (im)migration especially by Muslims from Arab states as threatening to the social fabric no matter how far-fetched, racist, and xenophobic it may be. In contrast to this view, these statistics suggest it would be difficult for migrants to be framed as the referent object of security by a society that does not—generally speaking— based on polling data, want migrants to be resettled in Britain. Operation Sophia however, provides an extraordinary example in which migrants are the referent object of security.

Following a 2016 poll conducted by IPSOS, Great Britain’s population dramatically overestimates the proportion of Muslims to the overall population by a factor of almost threefold. Additionally, respondents believe that Muslims will account for 22% of the population by 2020, when in fact, research from the Pew Institute suggest that they will only account for 6%. (“Perceptions Are Not Reality: What the World Gets Wrong” n.d.)

What is more, the Migration Observation at Oxford University released data that shows that in terms of whether immigration levels should be increased or decreased, 56% of those polled believe immigration should be ‘reduced a lot’ and 77% believe levels should be either

‘reduced a lot or reduced a little’ (“UK Public Opinion toward Immigration: Overall Attitudes and Level of Concern” n.d.). An additional survey in 2016 of over 200 British adults found that over half (56% net) disagree with the notion that Islam is compatible with British values. (ComRes 2017) Societal views in the UK on Muslims and immigration levels suggest that UK society is indeed vulnerable to the securitization of migration in which migrants are the referent subject. This is especially true for migrants from Arab regions as there seems to be an established sense of “unease” in UK society. As noted above, unease can be rendered into an existential fear by securitizing actors. What is difficult is persuading a society which holds Others as undesirable to accept migrants as the referent object of security. The UK government managed to frame migrants as the referent object of security and ensured that the political goal of reducing net (im)migration was carried out in the context of its participation in Operation Sophia.

Conclusions

Overall, the purpose of this chapter has been threefold. First, it is necessary to outline the theoretical framework that will be used in part one of the case study of this thesis.

Specifically, understanding the relationship between speech acts and the ‘securitization’ of an issue is vital in assessing how migration has been successfully securitized in the UK and in what manner. Further, Securitization Theory is not a static entity; it is ever-evolving. Recent innovations, including the analysis of contrasting roles of audiences and how society effects and is affected by securitization, have all been discussed.

Secondly, given the varying interpretations of Securitization Theory, it has been necessary to present the interpretation that will be used in this project. Specific choices have been made about what constitutes a successful securitization: It has been outlined that the role of the audience is not only vital to a successful securitization, but that the audience plays an active role in the process; audiences are not merely passive listeners. In addition to this, it has been made clear that the societal sector is a vital component to the securitization of migration and the formation of (im)migration policies. Understanding how identity and values shape and are shaped by policies will lead to theories of governmentality that are presented in the next chapter.

Finally, unlike traditional theories of security that react to ‘realities’, Securitization

Theory shows that security is a constructed notion, and therefore can be deconstructed.

This demonstrates that not only can an issue be securitized, it can be desecuritized, or rendered back into the realm of ‘normal’ politics. Taking migration as context, the flows of

populations fleeing from chaos and war ought not to be forced into illegal human smuggling rings, and instead should be able to enter regular migration streams with ease and receive aid and welcoming arms from those states which can provide it. This would require a dramatic shift in how migrants are perceived, how visa and immigration policy is formed, and to what end they strive to reach.

Peter Singer, in his paper on morality and ethics (1997), discusses how he posed a scenario to students in which they were asked to imagine walking by a pond and seeing a small child drowning. Knowing that to rescue the child would mean ruining their own clothes and shoes, the students unanimously agree that they are obliged to rescue the child.

Singer then tells the students that in this scenario, there are other people who could rescue the child, but again, the students agree that the actions of others would not impact their decision to recue the child. Finally, Singer then asks, “would it make any difference if the child were far away, in another country perhaps, but similarly in danger of death, and equally within your means to save, at no great cost - and absolutely no danger - to yourself?” (Singer 1997, 2). Again, almost all the students responded that those factors of distance mattered not; the life of the child takes precedence.

This exercise can tell us much about the current state of affairs pertaining to migration and securitization. The students in Singer’s class clearly are operating under a moral, ethical, and humanitarian framework; they do not believe that the drowning child poses risk, let alone an existential threat to their well being and therefore act without self-interest. One can only speculate what their responses would have been had they believed, because someone

persuaded them, that the child was an existential threat. On a macro-view, had the international community been able to offer more empathy and care toward migration mitigation—whether in establishing a global cosmopolis, or having a human-centric immigration system which seeks to share wealth and prosperity with the world’s huddled masses, perhaps Aylan Kurdi would not have drowned and washed ashore, perhaps he and his family could have travelled ‘regularly’ to safer havens to reunite with their kin. This highlights the fact that to securitize an issue in order to increase one’s security, necessarily runs the risk of increasing another’s insecurity. Operation Sophia would never have been required had the international community in Europe been more open and prepared to resettle those fleeing war and chaos.

CHAPTER THREE- Biopolitics, Power, and Migration

“[…] and even then you carried the anthem under your breath only tearing up your passport in an airport toilet sobbing as each mouthful of paper made it clear that you wouldn’t be going back […]” (Shire n.d.)

Introduction

In response to the migration crisis in the Mediterranean in the spring of 2015, the EU launched a search and rescue mission dubbed Operation Sophia. (“EUNAVFOR MED

Operation SOPHIA - EEAS - European External Action Service - European Commission” n.d.)

The Operation was launched to engage and disrupt human smuggling rings in the

Mediterranean Sea and ensure the security of European borders. Part of the mission, while not an official mandate, has been to rescue migrants and bring them safely to Italy for processing and aid. While the specifics of this Operation are analyzed in chapters four and five, the purpose of this chapter is to explore the mechanisms of sovereign state power, governmentality, and biopolitics as they relate to modern migration and refugee crises.

More specifically, the ways in which mechanisms of power function over and create entire populations will be of primary focus. This chapter outlines the theoretical basis of biopolitics and power vis-á-vis migration as conceptualized by Foucault, Butler, and Bigo’s (2014)

“social universes” in which the power is exerted.

While the end results that emerge from the governance of entire populations can be varied and intentional (a stable, productive, affluent and harmonious society), the processes though which they are accomplished is more imperative to this analysis. It cannot be simply

assumed that the entire collective of persons within a territory constitutes the population.

Instead, populations are created; they are “statistical categories” (Dillon and Neal 2008, 99) created for the regulation of society. Within the case of migrants and asylum seekers there arises a dichotomy of populations which not only are subject to different forms of policies and treatment but are framed in a form of opposition to each other. On the one hand, there is the population of citizens; those that enjoy the liberties and rights afforded by the state.

On the other hand, populations of migrants and refugees, or non-citizens, denizens, and asylum seekers, which are treated through security apparatuses and subject to mechanisms of power. The divide between these two populations, the distance that is created by spaces of security and mechanisms of state power, becomes a central area of analysis; through apparatuses of security, sovereign power is exercised over migrant populations. The mechanisms of power must be analyzed in terms of their function. What the sovereign power does is of more pressing interest than where the power originates.

In Security, Territory, Population, Foucault sketches out a notion of security in which there are four dispositifs that he takes time to describe. These four are the “spaces of security”, the “treatment of the uncertain”, the “form of normalization specific to security”, and finally the “correlation between the technique of security and population as both the object and subject of these mechanisms of security, that is to say, the emergence not only of the notion, but also of the reality of population” (Foucault 2007, 11). The following sections of this chapter explore the linkages between mechanisms of power as exerted on populations of migrants and refugees as they are tied to this notion of dispositifs of security.

Power, Sovereignty, and Migration

Upon initial analysis, it would seem as though a securitization act would naturally precede policies and action by government, and in the genesis of borders, notions of citizenship, and population regulation this most likely was the case; borders, walls, and policies that dictate who can and cannot enter a territory would first require the recognition of a significant reason to make a territory accessible by only select people and groups. Operation Sophia offers a unique example in which the UK’s securitization of migration is instrumental to serving a larger biopolitical goal: the reduction of net (im)migration within the UK. The question that must be asked is not whether a securitization act precedes the exertion of power, or vice versa, but rather how power, a securitization act, and physical barriers function with and reinforce each other, and what the consequences of these interactions are. Moreover, securitization acts are directly connected to regimes of truth: a set of discourse, practices, and techniques about a subject that is accepted as being true within a given society. (Foucault 1980, 131) They establish and facilitate a particular view of reality that then (if the securitization act is successful) is accepted by the public and key policy makers. Ultimately, this new regime of truth is the manifestation of a type of power being exerted-- the power of sovereignty. As Foucault notes:

In a society such as ours—or in any society […] multiple relations of powers traverse, characterize, and constitute the social body; they are indissociable from a discourse of truth, and they can neither be established or function unless a true discourse is produced, accumulated, put into circulation, and set to work. Power cannot be exercised unless a certain economy of discourses of truth functions in, on the basis of, and thanks to, that power. This is true of all societies, but I think that in our society, this relationship among power, right, and truth is organized in a very particular way.

(Foucault 2003b, 24) Emphasis added.

In the case of migration then, several ‘truths’, or perceived realities exist simultaneously: migrants are a burden on the system; migrants contribute to the economy. Migrants should be free to express their culture; migrants must assimilate. Migrants are a security threat; migrants are victims in need of assistance. What is important is not which of these statements is an absolute truth —none, and all can be— but what matters is that behind each of these statements lies a bloc of society which holds it as reality, and acts within this reality in specific ways. Further, each of these perceived realities carries with it specific relations of power which function for different outcomes. Power relations may exist which treat migrants as victims and thus offer financial, social, and medical assistance. This is usually the case when a migrant makes an asylum claim as a refugee. Power relations may also exist which treat migrants as threats and act with an assumption of suspicion. The common thread here is power; how it is exercised and expanded, who it targets, and what the consequences of its exertion are.

What then, is power? For Foucault, this question can be answered a number of ways. On the one hand, he describes power as “the concrete power that any individual can hold, and which he can surrender, either as a whole or in part, so as to constitute a power of political sovereignty” (Foucault 2003b, 13). On the other hand, Foucault outlines a

Marxist conception of power which focuses on the “economic functionality” of power.

(Foucault 2003b, 14) These conceptions of power are not mutually exclusive and can and should be analyzed together. The mechanisms of power are what interests Foucault, more so than their origins. The mechanisms of power, the relations between subjects, and the

tactics used to exercise power become the central focus. It is under this notion then, that power can be seen as “essentially that which represses”6 (Foucault 2003b, 15). Through this view of power, repression in the case of migration can be seen not only in the consequences of policies and technologies, but in many ways, it is seen as the driving purpose behind the policies and technologies; to repress the numbers of migrants attempting to enter into a state so as to maintain the status-quo of a society, to ensure the society is exposed to the minimal level of risk, and to ensure the general welfare system is not over-burdened.

The same mechanisms and practices can also be seen as the exertion of a productive form of power. For Foucault, this form of productive power, power that flows between relations of government and society with the goal of enhancing productivity of society in terms of health, well-being, and education, to name a few. This view of power “consists in reducing the state to a number of functions like, for example, the development of productive forces and the reproduction of the relations of production” (Foucault 2007, 109).

Under this view, power has a positive function, at least for the state and the society within it. For (im)migration, the mechanisms of power which can be seen as repressive for migrants, is positive in that it seeks to maintain the ‘regular’ migratory paths such as visas and traditional border crossings. These mechanisms of power are essential in ensuring the social welfare system, and society in general is not overburdened by facing needs greater

6 Foucault’s work also shows that power is not always negative and repressive; it is often also a positive force that is both productive and necessary. It can be a binding force within society which functions to ensure harmony, or at the very least the lack of violent insurrection. Further, as an organizing force, power creates a more productive and circulative society. For more see “Docile Bodies” in Discipline and Punish. (Foucault 1995, 135–69)

than what it can produce. Here again the hierarchy between a domestic population is held above migrating populations by the state.

Related to the forms of power, is the notion of the circulation of power, which

Aradau notes “[transforms] migrants into a social group which can be integrated within a population through identification and integration into the asylum system” (Aradau 2016, 8).

For migrants attempting to reach Europe then, once they are ‘rescued’ by EU naval forces as part of Operation Sophia, they are taken to port in Italy where they are processed, documented and either enter into the asylum system or are deported depending on their status. This process essentially collects, identifies, and categorizes migrants and then can be effectively and efficiently governed by EU authorities. This would be increasingly difficult to accomplish if the migrants were able to reach Europe without first being collected by the authorities; the migrants would be widely dispersed, and statistical data could not be collected. The biopolitical filtering is an essential process of any immigration system but becomes even more vital in the context of Operation Sophia which features not only migrants, but refugees and smugglers too. It becomes essential to properly group and process individual migrants. Here is where the intersection of Foucauldian biopolitics and

Bigo’s (2014) social universes manifest; the social universes of military-strategic, and internal security function to facilitate biopolitical sorting.

This separation and exclusion of people that the exertion of power establishes creates many additional problems for the migrant population in that they, in many cases, are excluded from legal protections that citizens enjoy, and are ultimately treated not as

another population of humans, but as group of sub-legal subjects. For a governing body, it becomes much easier to control a population if they are not subject to domestic rights and legal protections. Control here refers to governmentality—to how individuals are shaped, through mechanisms of power, or “[…] the way in which one conducts the conduct of men[…]” (Foucault 2008, 186), to fit into the political nexus put forth by a government. It also allows for the continued security of borders, while seemingly serving a humanitarian purpose of rescuing those who are perceived to be in grave danger. Power is also intimately linked to securitization in that both mechanisms of power and specific securitization acts work to identify, create, and facilitate power over a newly formed population. A securitizing actor may have the intention to persuade the general population that extraordinary measures are required to combat a perceived existential threat through the creation of stronger security measures and the increasing of the power and scope of sovereignty—the creation of a new truth and a new population over which the state holds power. In the case of migration then, the intention and consequences of a securitizing move is the separation of and exclusion of certain types of people from the targeted audience; those that are constructed as threatening are separated from the threatened and actively dealt with. In the context of Operation Sophia, human smugglers are constructed as the threatening entity whereas the migrant is that which is threatened.

Technologies of security which function as part of the mechanisms of power, also establish, facilitate, and exert sovereign power over targeted populations. Through the extra-territorialization of borders, visa policies, and security check points, the secondary category of people is created and reinforced repeatedly and ceaselessly. A UK Border

Service Agent, for example, acts with sovereign authority over who can and cannot enter a state or territory. For Butler, these types of individuals with the power to make decisions are “petty sovereigns” (2004, 65). Butler goes on to describe these individuals as

“unknowing, to a degree, about what work they do, but [perform] their acts unilaterally and with enormous consequence. Their acts are clearly conditioned, but their acts are nevertheless unconditional in the sense that they are final, not subject to review, and not subject to appeal” (2004, 65 emphases in original.). To be sure, Butler is discussing the unlawful detainment of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay and those that detain them, but the same form of unchecked sovereign power is exercised regularly at border checks across the globe. There is a difference in practices of border services agents and guards at

Guantanamo: while sovereign power at a border may be unchecked by design, unlike

Guantanamo, there are appeal procedures in place however, they are lengthy processes and many who are initially denied entrance may simply give up. The state has nothing to lose in this scenario.

Related to this is Bigo’s (2014) analysis of EU border control which sees three groups, or ‘social universes’ operate in relation to borders, migrants/asylum seekers, and law enforcement, and ultimately exert power over others. The universes are organized primarily by their function: the military-strategic universe which conducts maritime operations characterized “in terms of ‘patrolling’, intercepting; in terms of ‘containment’; as well as in terms of geopolitics of enmity, of ‘walls’ and of lines to defend” (Bigo 2014, 211).

The second universe of internal security which is characterized “in terms of ‘filtering’, of

‘separating legal and illegal travellers’, and of the management of flows of people” (Bigo

2014, 211). Finally, the third is the “cyber-surveillance social universe” which is “populated by computer analysts and operators who may be at the borders or in remote places and for whom individuals and populations are less physical bodies than ‘data doubles’, ‘dissociated persons’ to be disassembled and reassembled by their statistics” (Bigo 2014, 211). Here again, populations are seen to have less to do with individuals, but as a statistical category created for regulation and control by the state.

By conducting interviews with various border agents at multiple levels of authority and with multiple roles within the security institution, Bigo notes:

[i]n their own way, our interviewees have insisted on their own competences as agents, their know-how and their ‘art’ to use thoughtfully the various technologies when they were asked to think reflexively over their practices. The terminology of ‘art’, which does not appear in official texts, was central when interviewees sought to explain the mix of technical knowledge and ‘intuitions’ coming from previous experiences and shared professional dispositions. The majority of interviewees explicitly rejected the terminology of science and even expertise, preferring the idea that, like artists, they just look and ‘know’: they do not abstract, rationalize, ‘compute’. They also acknowledged that they do not act alone, on the basis of their own previous experiences, but often align themselves with the group to which they belong. Professional socialization is frequently a key element in the patrimony of dispositions that individual agents accumulate during their lives. It frames their practical sense and the way in which they develop their repertoire of practical justifications.

(Bigo 2014, 211)

The passage quoted above represents an analysis from sociological theory, which is useful in this thesis as it does provide some insight into the relationship between border service agents and securitizing actors, and the exercise of power more generally. Bigo notes that the “patrimony of dispositions of border control as the management of open and secure borders favours a nationalistic discourse, while asking that the discourse about the

‘necessity of cooperation’ be taken seriously as well” (Bigo 2014, 214). Further yet, he notes that these individuals, even those on the ‘left’ of the political spectrum view their role of sending migrants back from where they came as necessary, and that “strong rhetoric about migration is a ‘lesser evil’ than coercion if it can help to deter migrants from crossing borders; it appears necessary, as long as the rhetoric does not lead to the development of racist and fascist practices” (Bigo 2014, 215). This implies a mirrored effect between securitizing actors’ nationalistic and anti-other rhetoric, and the practices of border agents.

To be sure, more research into the ideological dispositions of border service agents would aid in determining any correlation between their practices—the exercising of sovereign power and authority—and how they are affected by securitizing rhetoric. It also cannot be forgotten that these agents are human and thus subject to human bias, individual opinion and belief, and shared values that can impact their day to day functions.

Bigo also notes how the actions and attitudes of border service agents can be analyzed through a Foucauldian lens which focuses on how they operate as part of the mechanisms of security. The function of these agents in relation to migrants and asylum seekers sees sovereign power being exerted through decision-making processes and practices much in the same way as Butler and her ‘petty sovereigns’. While a Bourdieusian analysis may show how the agents operate within the apparatus shared with their colleagues and the institution they represent, the effects of their practices—influenced and reinforced by others aside—cannot be overlooked. In Foucauldian terms, the first universe

Bigo describes can be seen as a disciplinary practice over individual bodies; the second as a

practice of governmentality in which data on the individual is gathered; and the third as a refinement of biopolitics in which populations are managed. (Bigo 2014, 220)

In the context of Operation Sophia, the military-strategic universe manifests itself in the form of the maritime search and rescue mission on the Mediterranean Sea. The practice of physically collecting migrants is a strategic practice both in being a frontline response to the crisis, and also in the larger sense of (im)migration control for Europe generally, and with the involvement of UK ships, the UK specifically. The second universe of internal security which ‘filters’ migrants manifests itself in the registration and processing of migrants once they are brought to port in Italy and elsewhere. Here, those who have a legitimate claim to asylum are separated from those deemed to be economic migrants and from members of criminal smuggling rings. This universe in the context of Operation Sophia is closely connected to the cyber-surveillance universe in that data on the migrants is shared through various agencies in order to ensure that there are no cases of repeated asylum claims from the same individual at various points of entry in Europe. This process carries a temporal aspect in that not only does it serve security in the present sense, but also in the future. Biopolitical data becomes a digital tag that every individual carry. It transcends borders, jurisdictions, and agencies, and can be accessed seemingly instantaneously.

Returning to the power of individuals who work in the border security realm, a border service agent or ‘petty sovereign’ who is vested with sovereign power—authority of and for the state-- decides that a person(s) is not permitted to enter a state, is making a decision that, perhaps unbeknownst to them, as suggested by Butler, reinforces the

creation of a separate population as described above. Their power is inherently repressive in the eyes of the turned-away migrant, yet it is productive in the eyes of the state in that it ensures the continuation of societal production at a level which it is not overburdened, and legal and expected in the eyes of governments and border security agencies. This seemingly dichotomous arrangement is an example of what Foucault called a ”Janus-faced reality: the triumph of some means the submission of others” (Foucault 2003b, 70).7 To reword it slightly, for the context of migrants and refugees: the triumph of some (state sovereignty, society writ large) means the submission (of migrants/refugees) to others. The mechanisms of power, while remaining constant, have contrasting effects and contrasting purposes depending on where analysis begins (with the state or with migrating populations).

Also related to this, is Foucault’s assertion that “[i]n the modern world […] a series of governmental rationalities overlap, lean on each other, challenge each other, and struggle with each other: art of government according to truth, art of government according to the rationality of the sovereign state, and art of government according to the rationality of economic agents[…]” (Foucault 2008, 313). In the context of the Mediterranean migration crisis this system rationalities manifests on the one hand, in the multiple methods proposed and enacted to mitigate the crisis, but also on the other hand, in how the same mechanisms of power have varying effects and consequences for the state and migrating populations.

7 Janus is the Roman god of, among other things, duality. He is represented as a being with two faces serving different ends.

The notion of one group submitting to another relates to the classic assertion in security studies that holds an increase in security for one necessarily means the increase of insecurity for another. While this zero-sum approach to security is somewhat outdated if not entirely archaic, clearly in the case of migration it still holds conceptual weight; a migrant can be the subject of security or the object of insecurity solely depending on how the situation is viewed. A migrant can be a victim in need of assistance and aid, or that same migrant can be seen as threatening. The irony is that, as pointed to above, a migrant is often seen as both, and this struggle of identity is a central argument in the politics of migration and refugees in legislative halls throughout the world. These two perceptions relate again to Foucault’s notions of truth regimes in which truth is not an absolute force, but rather the result of multiple powers engaging in struggle to be not only the louder voice, but to project the most widely accepted view. Once a particular view is widely accepted, and knowledge constructed in this reality is accepted as valid, power emerges.

This power/knowledge relationship then becomes the driving force for policy; if it is accepted that irregular migrants are dangerous, then policies that combat this perceived danger are easily accepted within a society. Further, power then shapes how knowledge about a situation is used. Ultimately power reinforces itself by creating the conditions through which it exists. But it is not as simple as either deeming a migrant as a victim or a threat; it has much to do about notions of insecurity of both migrant populations and of the society in which they are attempting to penetrate. As Bilgic notes, in relation to the consequences of increased border security and the power to stop irregular migration, “[t]he conundrum here is that the tighter the border controls that are imposed in order to ‘control

the uncontrollable’, the more migrants look for irregular ways of entry and residence. The result is more public hostility towards them” (Bilgiç 2013, 21).

While hostility can be, and certainly is a response faced by migrants, it is useful to locate where this hostility originates. There is a significant difference in hostility originating from a small population on the fringes of the political spectrum, and from a government.

The former has little power over the fate of migrants whereas the latter holds direct, absolute, and sovereign power. For migrants with a legitimate claim to asylum and refugee status, a state has little recourse but to facilitate resettlement. For the UK, in the context of the Mediterranean migration crisis, a loophole of sorts has been created. Briefly—as this will be further analyzed in the proceeding chapter—the UK’s position on Operation Sophia has been one of full naval participation for the rescue of migrants, but no domestic resettlement of said migrants on British soil. Here, even if a migrant does have a legitimate claim to refugee status, the UK is not the first port of arrival, and therefore not responsible for resettlement. On the one hand, the pre-emptive rescuing of migrants in international waters is the manifestation of the extra-territorialization of borders. On the other hand, this extra-territorialization seems to benefit states and not migrants; the state benefits by being able to capture vessels in international waters, yet the migrants are not directly and immediately afforded UK asylum despite being rescued by UK ships.

Spaces of Security- Keeping the Other Away

What is of interest in the context of migration, is not only the exertion of sovereign power, but also the spaces of security in which these decisions are made. For migrants hoping to

enter a new state, spaces outside of a sovereign territory where pre-screening for visas are administered becomes a critical area of analysis. These forms of spaces exist, for example, in and around refugee camps and transit areas where persons are either granted or denied entrance to a state before ever reaching the border. This act, in effect, circumvents international laws which hold that a country cannot turn away a legitimate refugee claimant who arrives at a country. (Refugees n.d.) Moreover, this practice is directly threatening to basic and international human rights. (Ibid) Agents at these posts which exist far and away from the recipient country not only are examples of ‘petty sovereigns’ but also facilitate the exertion of a state’s sovereign power outside the territorial boundaries of said state. The exertion of sovereign power outside a state’s territory requires innovative approaches to how international law is seen and used as it pertains to migrants and asylum seekers, especially for the latter, as states are now able to circumvent the traditional immigration processes that the laws were designed to align with.

As a case with similarities to the practices and mandate of Operation Sophia, Den

Hertog’s (2013) analysis of FRONTEX--the European Border and Coast Guard Agency-- suggest that the aims of the agency’s operations include targeting illegal immigration, detecting stowaways in vehicles and ships and, most central to Operation Sophia, “to stop migrants from leaving the shores on the long sea journey” (Den Hertog 2013, 206–7).

Ostensibly, these measures and practices fall under the counter terrorism umbrella and the ever-increasing security apparatuses that have emerged in the post 9/11 world. This is not to say that FRONTEX operations are one sided; Den Hertog notes that many of its operations involve the search and rescue of migrants in “unseaworthy boats on their way to

Europe” (Den Hertog 2013, 206). While FRONTEX operations centred around search and rescue are on the one hand positive endeavours—lives are in fact saved-- their processes suggest an underlying motive of ensuring that migrants do not enter EU territory and disrupt established levels of circulation in which traditional immigration processes maintain.

Bigo (2014) discusses the militarization of border enforcement, primarily with regard to the naval and other frontline agents that conduct quasi-military operations and view borders as concrete dividers that require active protection and enforcement. Bigo notes that

[i]t seems that military operations—particularly the naval operations used for border control under Frontex or under bilateral agreements between countries on both sides of the border—are effectively framed by these professionals’ dispositions to discipline migrants by the use of force, to defend a line, a ‘wall’, where the metaphor of solid walls is epitomized by an electronic system of surveillance (EUROSUR) and its local translation traces an imaginary line dividing the Mediterranean Sea between North and South. (Bigo 2014, 212)

Not only are borders or ‘lines’ defended, but a divide between the north (good) and the south (bad) is established and enforced. The division must be maintained. Additionally, the practice of ensuring undesirable or ‘illegal’ migrants do not reach the haven of the EU is also carried out in these maritime naval operations by way of agreements with third countries.

Den Hertog notes that many of the FRONTEX operations take place in the territorial waters off third countries—countries that are neither where migration originates from, nor where migrants seek to arrive--, and that agreements are in place with at least fourteen third countries to receive rescued migrants for asylum processing. This then shifts responsibility away from EU member states and on to these third countries, and “effectively prevent[s]

‘would-be immigrants’ from reaching a member state; it therefore constitutes a ‘policy of non-arrival’” (Den Hertog 2013, 209). This policy move is designed to create and maintain a geographical distance between the migrant and recipient state.

This tactic involving third countries is of interest because seemingly, it directly circumvents articles 31, 32, and 33 of the Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of

Refugees. (Refugees n.d.) These specific articles pertain to the restriction, expulsion, and refoulment of refugees. It therefore holds that if a refugee never makes it to a country, state officials do not have to break the Refugee Conventions as the refugees will not fall under the jurisdiction of said country and therefore international laws are inadequate and must be overhauled. It must also be noted that while the United Kingdom is not an official member of FRONTEX or a member of the Schengen area-- which affords free movement and a single EU passport between twenty-six member states--, (“Schengen Area Countries

List - Schengen Zone” n.d.) the United Kingdom does, however, participate in FRONTEX operations and maintains similar policies as the Schengen area countries. (“Brexit and

Borders: Schengen, FRONTEX and the UK - Free Movement” n.d.)

This separation between the UK and the EU is an example of the UK retaining a level of sovereign jurisdiction despite allowing free movement with other EU member states.8

Furthermore, this shows that the UK holds its own separate immigration policies that are more deeply entrenched in national security values than its EU counterparts. This is not to

8 At the time of writing this, the future of UK/EU mobility is uncertain as the process of Brexit is still ongoing. However, it would appear that if the UK has a ‘hard’ Brexit, mobility between the UK and the EU will be dramatically changed.

suggest that the EU and its member states do not value national security, rather it shows that on the spectrum of security and open borders the UK leans more heavily on security, sovereignty, and autonomy relative to the EU.

Governmentality is also seen in practices and spaces beyond the operations of

FRONTEX, specifically in visa policy which is of interest here as well. Meloni describes visas as a “state instrument to control access into the state territory by non-nationals in a

‘remote way’. They are used by states to block inflows of migrants and asylum seekers and to exclude actual or potential undesirables such as criminals or terrorists” (Meloni 2013,

151). For Vaughan-Williams (2010), this extra-territorialization or ‘offshoring’ of UK borders serves a specific security function by identifying and denying access to illegal or dangerous individuals prior to their arrival to the UK. The argument made in favour of this practice is

“the notion that by the time ‘risky’ subjects have arrived at traditional border crossings on

UK territory, such as ports and airports, it is simply too late” (Vaughan-Williams 2010, 3).

One of the most serious implications of this practice is in how the scope of sovereign power is increased and dispersed. This raises new questions about where sovereignty can be measured from in geographical terms. Vaughn-Williams concludes that “[i]ndeed, the offshore projection of the UK’s border is interesting precisely because it complicates commonsensical geopolitical notions about the location of borders as well as conventional understandings of the distinctions between inside and outside, domestic and international, and so on” (Vaughan-Williams 2010, 4). This certainly likewise runs the risk of further complicating cases for refugees and migrants and international law, conventions, and human rights; the strength of increased sovereign power will most certainly ignore the

needs of the huddled masses when faced with the false dichotomy of increased security and increased humanitarian aid.

It is not only on the high seas that sees the extra-territorialization of the UK border and a space of security that pertains to migrants and asylum seekers, the EU, and the UK; the Calais refugee camp in France provides another example that is worth a brief mention.

It is here that the UK materially operates in a way which exercises sovereign power beyond its borders in a preventative way. As Aradau (2016) points out, Calais is an important transit location for passage to and from the UK for both people and goods, and as a result, scores of migrants seeking the haven of the UK have lived in a make-shift camp with the hopes of finding passage across the English channel. To combat the potential stowaways on incoming transport trucks, the UK government has on multiple occasions sent special fencing to be erected at the Calais camp to separate the migrants from the truck drivers. Aradau adds

[s]ecuring the circulation of people and commodities entails the simultaneous attribution of subjectivity. The Calais borderzone gains meaning through the grammar of circulation, where migrants are turned into a governable population through the production of social groups. The population as a subject of circulation is divided into social classes: asylum seekers, refugees and lorry drivers. Moreover, the population of asylum seekers is again sub-divided into women, unaccompanied children and young men. In this grammar, walls and barriers govern populations by filtering, channelling and stopping depending on social differentials.

(Aradau 2016, 570)

The UK government, by funding the fencing in another country to ensure the continued circulation of goods from continental Europe to the UK while blocking the circulation of people, is exercising sovereignty abroad to protect the interests of its domestic socio- political body. As Aradau notes “fences are meant to protect lorry drivers and the circuits of

commodity to and from the UK” (Aradau 2016, 569). It would appear then that economic interests are valued above the lives of migrants and asylum seekers here, and that mechanisms of power—the erection of fences in another state—are exercised explicitly for the protection of economic circulation. All other concerns are secondary. Finally, as the fences are built, and statistical populations are created and cordoned off, those in the camp become subject to further levels of surveillance and control to ensure they do not enter the

UK illegally. While this example is certainly tangential to Operation Sophia, it does provide insight into the tactics used by the UK government to make passage to the UK difficult for migrants to achieve. As will be shown in the case study section of this thesis, the UK government has maintained a position of being opposed to migrant resettlement.

The ‘Other’ as a Statistical Category

What practices such as the maritime FRONTEX operations also do as mentioned above, as a tactic of government, is create a grouping, a category, a population of the ‘Other’. By attempting to isolate and prevent the entry of migrants into a member state, the migrants are categorized not as individuals with inherent rights, but as a population that is deemed-- implicitly or explicitly-- undesirable and thus subject to policies of control and regulation based on statistical analysis as opposed to subjects of law and rights. Further, the creation of a population separate from the domestic body, functions as an observable population which is constantly contrasted against the domestic body. By operating with practices that have the appearance of circumventing international law and the principle of non- refoulment, the EU, and the UK are implicitly suggesting that migrants, a priori, do not

count as people in the same way that citizens of EU member states do. This reinforces the notion of population as “neither the individual as singularity, nor the people as a whole”

(Dillon and Neal 2008, 99). Furthermore this shows a conceptual contradiction; the EU values and promulgates rights and the law, yet the practice of extra-territorialization of borders and immigration control “inherently results in the infeasibility to provide full respect for fundamental rights” (Bigo, Carrera, and Guild 2013a, 225). Den Hertog concludes that

[s]urely a tension between liberty and security and between human mobility and the management of migration flows may be identified, but the union’s constitutional values of fundamental rights and the rule of law cannot be sacrificed on the altar of fighting irregular immigration. That would require a Treaty change.

(Bigo, Carrera, and Guild 2013a, 226)

What is also expressed in these practices is that visas and borders alike, as a tool of the state to control flows of people, seek to identify and categorize individuals in a rather dichotomous fashion; individuals are categorized as high risk or low risk; threatening or not; undesirable or desirable. This categorization becomes a stamp on an individual’s digital profile that is shared between agencies and governments and follows the individual anywhere he or she may travel. These digital stamps are a by-product of relying on risk- assessment as the basis of immigration and the practice of categorization carries significant consequences not only for the individual (the admittance or rejection of asylum) but also for the group that the individual represents (nationality, ethnicity, etc.) When enough individuals from a given region, or whom are representative of certain cultures or religions, are categorized as undesirable, the individual loses some of their personhood, their individuality, and instead becomes a dot in a mosaic; a mere token for an entire population

which can then translate into all people from a given region to be categorized a priori as undesirable. They become guilty by association. While this logic would seem to be a slippery-slope fallacy, one need not look further than the preconceived negative notions that are currently widely held in the UK about Muslims, for example. Once an individual identity is attached to a group identity and vice versa, it is difficult, if not impossible, to disassociate from the group. The negative attitudes of some UK citizens towards Muslims discussed in chapter two further suggest that group association and identity are deeply connected.

The dichotomy between ‘desirable’ and ‘undesirable’ (im)migrants also appears in visa policy, which Meloni notes establishes both a “’black’ list of countries whose nationals required a visa to enter the Member States and a ‘white’ list of countries whose nationals are visa exempt[…]” (Meloni 2013, 154). Through a security lens, visa policy, especially the extra-territorialization of visas and pre-entry screening, function as one of the main instruments in (im)migration control. By establishing who can and cannot enter a state prior to the individual arriving, undesirables never reach a state’s soil and thus the security risks a state faces are relatively low. Bigo notes that “[t]he security of citizens is understood in political terms as the security of the majority and the negation of security for those on the margins who disturbed the feeling of homogeneity among ‘good’ citizens” (Dillon and Neal

2008, 105). It follows that the establishment of black and white countries mirrors Bigo’s claim of securing the ‘good’ from those who disturb them.

Visas may seem rather divorced from the role of a border, yet visas function in similar ways. Visas and borders are both technologies of human mobility in that they allow or deny entrance to an individual based on risk calculation. Visas are the preferred technology for immigration as they are applied for extra-territorially; the applicant is geographically separated from the border and thus function as a biopolitical filtering tool of the state. Those who are denied a visa do not have to be subject to refoulment as they are already outside the territory of a state. Through this ‘regular’ migration pathway, only those calculated as low-risk may be granted a visa. Additionally, visas function as a tool beyond traditional foreign relations in that they target the individual, not the state.

Yet there are other effects of these policies: they create and reinforce categorization, and more often than not this categorization is heavily unbalanced in its design and application. In the context of the UK, which has strong visa requirements, the countries with the largest numbers of refugees fleeing are all on the ‘black list’. According to the UNHCR, 55 percent of the worlds refugees originate from three countries: Syria,

Afghanistan, and South Sudan, all of which require visas for entry into the UK. (Refugees n.d.) Now, there is a technical difference that must be noted between refugees and migrants, namely that a refugee is subject to certain international rights such as non- refoulment, yet as discussed above, the UK and the EU operate in a way which undermines this principle. There is an argument to be made that visa policy has little to do with the people, and much more to do with governments and regimes of power, and how governments interact with each other on the international stage. Yet, this argument overlooks the fact that those who flee their homeland, especially those in the context of

Operation Sophia, which a 2016 HOL report notes are “‘prima facie refugees’, as defined by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees” (“HoL Report EU Action Plan Against Migrant

Smuggling 2015” n.d., 3) and are typically fleeing their governments. Therefore, it seems to be the case that visa policies run the risk of punishing the victims. Additionally, the visa policies of the UK and the EU are racialized, implicitly if not explicitly; there are no predominantly Caucasian or Euro-centric countries on the ‘black’ list. Again, this can be reduced to government to government relations, but this argument is weak and should be open to much criticism.

Visa policy directly impacts migration trends. A visa policy is structured to be the regular method for inter-state mobility. The problem lies in its rigidity and procedural structure. Not only are many people who are fleeing oppression, war, and other dire situations usually unable to gain entry to the EU or UK due to being from a ‘black’ list country, but given the long processing time for visa applications, it may be the case that waiting for a visa places an individual in greater danger than if they leave on their own accord. The urgency associated with fleeing violence is immediate, whereas ‘regular’ migration paths are time consuming and must follow specific procedures (applying, awaiting approval). It cannot be forgotten that a person would not put their families and themselves in over-crowded and less than seaworthy vessels if another more viable option was readily available.

Meloni writes that “visas are thus a reaffirmation of the state territorial sovereignty in the form of the state right to control access into its territory and exclude non-nationals

achieved through a projection of state power beyond the state territory which is unaccompanied by territorial (or arguably extra-territorial) responsibility” (Meloni 2013,

151). What is seen here then, as well as in extra-territorial operations such as FRONTEX, is the intersection of limitations of judicial order and practices that enter into a state of exceptionalism. There are two main thoughts on how judicial limits function. On the one hand, exceptional policies and practices that appear to circumvent or transcend law do so because of inherent limits of the democratic state; there are few if any precedents for dealing with mass migration and incredible numbers of refugees and therefore exceptions must be made to effectively control the populations and mitigate the crises. This is the view of Agamben (2005) and Schmitt (2007) who hold that there are structural limits of the reach and scope of the law. This view matches traditional conceptions of securitization in which an actor calls for more powers due to the limits of already established norms as outlined in the previous chapter.

On the other hand, is the view that laws and judicial practices have been instrumentalized in a way that allows them to directly control populations and mitigate crises through exclusion, separation, and categorization. This is the view of Butler (2004).

Neal notes that for Butler, “the necessity of exceptionalism is only a claim, a discourse, a tactic, a performance, a governmental technology, a series of knowledgeable political practices” (Dillon and Neal 2008, 47–48). Bigo remarks that “securitisation potentially the totality, the people as a whole, insecure by developing the category of risk, danger and death as a normality, but actually targets only margins” (Dillon and Neal 2008, 105). This lends to the notion that securitization is not about the limits, but rather about a means to

an end through the instrumentalization of fear and risk. This more aligns with Foucault, who

Bigo notes believes that “security is not the result of a system of logic of exception or of an exceptional moment of emergency […]” (ibid).

Butler’s view then is appealing in the context of this thesis also due to its emphasis on discursive practices; it pairs with securitization acts as outlined in the previous chapter which call for exceptional practices in order to combat a perceived or constructed threat. It follows that if migration and refugee intake is constructed as an existential threat due to the reality of migrant numbers ostensibly being limitless, then the tactics used to mitigate migrants will also be limitless. It is constructed as a threat by assuming that the combination of the foreignness of migrants and the sheer number of migrants described will disrupt the status-quo of society and/or present security risks for the state and society. In this sense, a new norm is established in which tactics and practices will be exercised without end and without limit. While a securitizing move can usually be seen as an attempt to move an issue beyond a perceived limit of policy or legislation, to a state of exception, which would run counter to Butler’s notion of instrumentality, I have argued in the previous chapter that a securitization move in the case of migrants and refugees is an attempt to remove or suspend any limits and laws and instead draw more sovereign power in order to block flows of migrants and refugees, and this is done by instrumentalizing other laws such as those pertaining directly to notions of national security and immigration controls at borders. As will be shown in the case of Operation Sophia, the blocking of migrants from entering the

UK is but one of the by-products, and that the main goal is to disrupt and disable human smuggling networks and saving the lives of migrants. The blocking of resettlement is

certainly a goal of participating in Operation Sophia—as on numerous occasions limiting net

(im)migration was an articulated policy goal of the Conservatives-- but it is not the primary articulated goal.

While Butler holds that laws are instruments, Neal notes that the problem of historicity is under-explored in her work and reminds us that “law has a historical and discursive dimension that is tied up with the constitution and contestation of ‘national’ and

‘racial’ forms of subjectivity” (Dillon and Neal 2008, 52). Butler notes:

[n]ot only is law treated as a tactic, but it is also suspended in order to heighten the discretionary power of those who are asked to rely on their own judgement to decide fundamental matters of justice, life, and death. Whereas the suspension of law can clearly be read as a tactic of governmentality, it has to be seen in this context as also making room for the resurgence of sovereignty, and in this way both operations work together.

(Butler 2004, 54–55)

Here again arises the notion of ‘petty sovereigns’; individuals who exercise sovereign power with little understanding of the broader implications of their actions. In addition, Butler’s problem of “indefinite detention” of Guantanamo detainees “does not signify an exceptional circumstance, but rather, the means by which the exceptional becomes established as a naturalized norm” (Butler 2004, 67). In the context of migration, the practices of extra-territorialization of sovereignty and the use of third-countries to circumvent and undermine existing commitments to international law is no longer an exception to mitigate the rising numbers of migrants associated with various crises, but rather these practices are established codified norms based on the fact that the migrant and refugee crises are ostensibly without limit and without end. Ultimately, this means that

the division of populations, the categorization of people into ‘black’ or ‘white’ lists becomes more deeply entrenched and increasingly more difficult to reverse.

Governmentality/Biopolitics

For Foucault (2007), governmentality is seen as the explicit and implicit directing of populations. It is an ensemble formed by institutions, procedures, and tactics that all are employed for the exercise of very specific power that has the population as its target, political economy as knowledge, and security as tactic. It is here that government forms apparatuses and knowledges, however, it is the processes rather than the results that shifted the state of justice to an administrative state and thus was “governmentalized”

(Foucault 2007, 108). Butler describes governmentality as “a mode of power concerned with the maintenance and control of bodies and persons, the production and regulation of persons and populations, and the circulation of goods insofar as they maintain and restrict the life of the population” (Butler 2004, 52). The common thread in both Foucault and

Butler’s definitions is in power and its relationship to populations with the goal of ensuring the population can serve a specific end as set out by a government.

In Security, Territory, Population (Foucault 2007), Foucault begins to sketch out a historical evolution of the orderings of society as related to governance and security.

Centuries ago the juridical-legal mechanism featured the establishment of what is and is not permitted within a society, and a punishment or penalty for doing what is not permitted.

Foucault notes that this is a “binary division between a type of prohibited action and a type of punishment” (Foucault 2007, 5). The juridical mechanism was supplemented over time

by having the law “framed by mechanisms of surveillance and correction” (Foucault 2007,

5). The establishment of discipline as a feature of the mechanisms of security strove to monitor and ultimately transform the behaviour of citizens. The aim then becomes to monitor persons and attempt to determine if they will break the laws laid out in the legal framework. Additionally, for those who have broken the laws and have been punished accordingly, the surveillance continues after the punishment to ensure that the person in question does not revert to criminality. Finally, and most recently, the notion of security was added to the mixture of law and discipline. In the broadest sense, security is seen as “a way of making the old armatures of law and discipline function in addition to the specific mechanisms of security” (Foucault 2007, 10). Further, this

third modulation is based on the same matrix […] but now, the application of this penal law, the development of preventative measures, and the organization of corrective punishment will be governed by the following kind of questions. For example: What will the average rate of criminality for this type? How can we predict statistically the number of thefts at a given moment, in a given society, in a given town, in the town or in the country, in a given social stratum, and so on? Second, are there times, regions, and penal systems that will increase or reduce this average rate? Will crises, famines, or wars, severe or mild punishment, modify something in these proportions?”

(Foucault 2007, 4–5)

With migrants in mind, the three mechanisms described by Foucault continue to function in relation to each other. There is the long-standing juridical-legal mechanism which clearly outlines who can and cannot enter the sovereign territory of a state. When a person enters or attempts to enter a state in an irregular or ‘illegal’ manner, there are specific penalties in place such as detainment or deportation. This, matched with the use of tracking, surveillance, identity screening, and other biometric monitoring technologies allow for the

mechanisms of disciplinary power to monitor and regulate all people attempting to enter a state. Finally, and most importantly, with the escalation of the extra-territorialization of borders, visas, the rescue/capture of migrants and refugees in transit, and the subsequent relocation of those persons to third-countries shows the preventative measures that are employed. What is also shown in the case of migration is that the three mechanisms that

Foucault describes function together; one does not supplant another. It is an evolution in tactics, but the previous tactics are never erased, they are built upon.

The risk-based questions that Foucault poses in the passage quoted above change slightly in varying contexts. In the case of migration, for example, the questions focus on the probability of an individual migrant (originating from highly specific parts of the world) having violent tendencies or connections to terrorist activities. Is this individual truly escaping persecution—a requirement for claiming refugee status in the UK and elsewhere

(“Claim Asylum in the UK: Eligibility - GOV.UK” n.d.) -- or are they economic migrants in search of work? There are two extremes to be considered: on the one hand, there is the view that everyone from ‘outside’-- everyone considered to be an ‘other’—poses a threat— existential or otherwise—to the well-being of the established society and therefore should not be admitted into said society. On the other hand, is the view that, whether for economic, humanitarian, demographic, or other reasons, (im)migrants are a vital component of a healthy and flourishing society and therefore admittance should be granted to the greatest number possible. These two categories are not without problems. Both take the position of identifying how a migrant can burden or benefit society and fail to ask what society can do for the migrant. No matter the perspective that is held on migrants, the two

ends of the spectrum cannot be exercised in the fullest sense simultaneously and therefore the use of statistical analysis and probability serves to set acceptable limits and “an average that will be considered as optimal for a given social functioning” (Foucault 2007, 5).

A need for the establishment of norms must be considered. For Foucault “[t]he norm is an interplay of differential normalities. The normal comes first and the norm is deduced from it, or the norm is fixed and plays its operational role on the basis of this study of normalities” (Foucault 2007, 63). So, for establishing a norm for the number of migrants permitted to enter a society, one would first have to look at historical data in which the number of migrants attempting to enter each year is analyzed: the norm would be an accepted average between years of high numbers and years of small numbers (in the

Foucauldian schema).

Not only are there two opposing ends of the spectrum—high volume and low volume-- but each end of the spectrum (and all the points in between) are backed by blocs of society. This adds an additional problem to the spectrum, namely that a government that sets the policies must also ensure that those policies maintain an acceptable balance of appeasing the values and political beliefs of the citizens. To be sure, as noted in the previous chapter, the values and political beliefs of citizens are always at risk of being manipulated by securitizing actors, and therefore are semi-fluid and wax and wane over time depending on any number of variables (terrorist attacks, humanitarian crises, economic hardships etc.)

This back and forth between the spectrum of views on (im)migration further echoes

Foucault’s notion that “politics is the continuation of war by other means” (Foucault 2003b,

15). This inversion of the famous Clausewitzian assertion relates to Foucault’s idea of struggle being a defining characteristic of society and one of the functions of government; to hold together the opposing sides as they continue to exist in a state of struggle to ensure the prosperity of the whole of society and the citizens within through the exertion of power.

In the context of migrants, and their ceaseless attempts at escaping hardship by entering a new country, we can see the emergence of a population separate from the domestic citizenry, yet intimately linked. On the one hand, as previously discussed, the emerging populations of migrants can be constructed as threatening or as threatened which establishes associations being drawn based on risk, fear, and the uncertain, or of empathy, compassion and hopefulness. Coupled with this is the economic nexus that migration issues create: jobs in border security, healthcare, aid, and law enforcement to name but a few.

This latter point can be seen as an incentive for governments to allow for the continuance of migrant crises, at least in terms of economics and circulation.9

Conclusions

This chapter has outlined the ways in which mechanisms of sovereign power function in relation to migrants, refugees, borders, and states. By focusing on the spaces where power is exercised—border checks, maritime theatres, refugee camps, and elsewhere—I have attempted to show that there are strong forces at play which directly repress masses of

9 This is not to say that there are not economic costs that a state must shoulder such as strains on the welfare system. While the economics of migration are beyond the scope of this thesis, it remains that the longer the crisis continues, the longer those working to mitigate it remain employed. The circulation of wealth from government budgets and emergency funds to the private and non-profit sectors continues to flow freely.

people attempting to enter a given territory. It is important to identify these mechanisms to show that not only is sovereign power immensely strong, it is also dispersed and ubiquitous which renders it virtually impossible to overcome. While focusing on the mechanisms in action has been the central feature of this chapter, the origins of sovereign power are also important—namely how power is entrenched through the actions of politicians and policy makers. Power functions in a way which renders individuals and populations as statistical categories which then are much easier to control and monitor. For a state, this may be a positive action, however, for those fleeing war and oppression, it only serves to further complicate their already difficult lives. This is not to say that security should be abandoned—there are and will presumably continue to be risk of violent terrorist attacks— yet what cost are governments willing to pay for a perceived sense of security? The

FRONTEX maritime operations, the extra-territorialization of borders and visas, the use of third-countries, and the funding of security infrastructure outside the sovereign boundaries of a state suggest that governments are more concerned with security than the well- being—or security—of individuals from abroad. This point is important to remember in the context addressing the ways in which the UK exercises power over migrating populations through its participation in Operation Sophia, which is analyzed extensively in chapter five.

CHAPTER FOUR- The Securitization of Migration in the UK

“[…] i want to go home, but home is the mouth of a shark home is the barrel of the gun and no one would leave home unless home chased you to the shore […]” (Shire n.d.)

Nero fiddled while Rome burned, and the EU has held summits while people are drowning and the countries of the Maghreb and southern Europe are being overwhelmed. -Keith Vaz, Labour Party

(“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 295)

Introduction

On April 19th, 2015 more than 800 migrants drowned in the Mediterranean Sea after their boat capsized whilst en route from Libya to Italy. (Kirchgaessner 2015) This maritime disaster brought forth calls for the European Union to act to prevent this kind of tragedy from occurring again. (Faiola 2015) As a result of this crisis and indeed the overall increase in trans-Mediterranean migration, on May 18th, 2015—less than one month after the tragedy-- the European Union (EU) adopted the European Union Naval Force-

Mediterranean (EUNAVFOR MED) and later renamed Operation Sophia after a baby born onboard a German naval vessel. (“EUNAVFOR MED Mission Fact Sheet” n.d.) The mandate of this mission was to carry out “systematic efforts to identify, capture and dispose of vessels and enabling assets used or suspected of being used by migrant smugglers or traffickers, in order to contribute to wider EU efforts to disrupt the business model of human smuggling and trafficking networks in the Southern Central Mediterranean and prevent the further loss of life at sea” (“EUNAVFOR MED Mission Fact Sheet” n.d.). With 27

EU Member States participating in the mission with the use of six naval vessels and six

aircraft (“EUNAVFOR MED Operation SOPHIA - EEAS - European External Action Service -

European Commission” n.d.) The mission, as of the time of this writing, has been extended until December 31st, 2018. (“EUNAVFOR MED Operation Sophia: Mandate Extended until 31

December 2018 - Consilium” n.d.)

While the mandate clearly outlines the desire to disrupt human smuggling and affiliated criminal organizations, some, including a 2016 UK House of Lords report (“UK HoL

Committee Report on Operation Sophia,” n.d.) have suggested that this is an unattainable goal due to the inherent limits of the operation, and instead see the mission as a militarized search and rescue operation. As concluded by a 2016 UK House of Lords Committee Report:

The intentions and objectives set out for Operation Sophia exceed what can realistically be achieved. A mission acting only on the high seas is not able to disrupt smuggling networks, which thrive on the political and security vacuum in Libya, and extend through Africa. […] Operation Sophia is viewed by NGOs in the humanitarian field as a search and rescue mission. It is undertaking valuable work in search and rescue at sea, but this is not its core mandate. (“UK HoL Committee Report on Operation Sophia,” n.d., 19)

This chapter analyzes Operation Sophia through Securitization Theory. Specifically, with the

UK government being the focus, two key questions must be explored. First, how has securitizing rhetoric been used by the UK government in relation to the migrants and irregular migration? Secondly, to what end have migrants been securitized? I submit that securitizing rhetoric has been used in relation to migrants not as a threat to the state, but rather as a threatened group requiring exceptional policies to ensure their safety and survival. This is interesting for that it shows that governments, specifically the UK, are focusing on humanitarian issues related to migration as well as security aspects. Further,

the securitization of migrants serves to gain support for and enhance the role the UK plays in the Operation. Security discourse holds the human smugglers as the referent subject of security, while humanitarian discourse is employed in relation to migrants—the referent object of security. Therefore, in this case, as migrants have been framed as humans facing existential danger requiring humanitarian intervention, the discourse of humanitarianism functions as a component of the securitization act. It forms a security/humanitarian assemblage in which each discourse is used simultaneously yet is applied in separate and specific ways.

The Securitization of Migration

While it can be easy, especially for far-right political parties, anti-immigration groups, and those with a xenophobic view of the world to portray migrants as an existential threat facing society, it is also the case that migrants themselves face existential threats in their attempts to reach Europe. The difference here lies in what or who is viewed as the referent object of security; what or who is viewed as being threatened and requiring protection. In the case for this study, the migrant is the referent object of security, and not that which is viewed as threatening: the referent subject.

It cannot be overlooked that prior to, and indeed after the maritime disaster in

2015, migrants were, and in some cases, continue to be, viewed by some European

Governments as the referent subject of security. This has been the case most notably in

Central Europe where, as reported by The Guardian for example, “[Hungarian] prime minister Viktor Orban has described the arrival of asylum seekers in Europe as “a poison”, saying his country did not want or need “a single migrant””, and also quoted Orban as

saying ““every single migrant poses a public security and terror risk”“ (The Guardian 2016).

This framework establishes the state and society as the referent object of security in need of protection.

Calls from other EU Heads of State for an immediate resolution to the crisis carried a softer tone than Orban. The BBC drew attention to a plea made by the Italian Prime

Minister Matteo Renzi for an “extraordinary” summit to be held for EU leaders to deal with the crisis. (BBC News 2015a) The seriousness of the crisis was further echoed by Maltese

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat who was quoted as saying “[w]hat is happening now is of epic proportions. If Europe, if the global community continues to turn a blind eye... we will all be judged in the same way that history has judged Europe when it turned a blind eye to the genocide of this century and last century" (BBC News 2015a). These remarks stand in stark contrast to those made by Orban, and indeed show a difference in political ideology.

The difference here is significant in that the referent object of security shifted from the state to the migrants, and the object of security shifted from the migrants being the threat to the act of maritime migration and human smuggling being threatening to migrants.

There is a clear case to be made for securitizing migrants and framing migrants as the referent subject of securitization in certain contexts, however, this is not the aim of analysis undertaken here. Instead, it will be shown that the UK government under former

Prime Minister David Cameron used different tactics to secure a similar end as other EU

Heads of State: to prevent migrants from entering their sovereign territory. The difference in tactics here is in the difference of naming the migrants as the referent object of security

as opposed to the state. Further, this case shows how humanitarian discourse is employed and functions as a component of a securitization move.

To contextualize the UK and its relationship with the EU, it has to be noted that the

UK is not a member of the Schengen Area: the EU states that have abolished passport requirements for travel between their shared borders. (EU Commission 2000) Although the

UK has chosen to opt-out of full participation in the Schengen Area, it does participate in the Schengen Information System (SIS). (“The Schengen Area and Cooperation” 2009) The

SIS is a shared governmental database of information on individuals for the purposes of national security, border and immigration control, and law enforcement. The UK participates in SIS primarily for the purposes of law enforcement cooperation. (“The

Schengen Area and Cooperation” 2009) Further, this participation shows the unique position of the UK in relation to the EU: it seeks to maintain its sovereignty yet draws on SIS for biopolitical data which can be used to flag undesirable individuals from entering the UK.

In addition to SIS, the UK also participates in EURODAC, the EU fingerprint database, and is subject to the Dublin II and III Agreements on asylum. EURODAC is a system designed to register fingerprint data on all persons who have entered the EU irregularly and apply for asylum. The data is then centred in the EURODAC database where sub-EU level policing and immigration agencies can access the data at anytime. (EU Commission 2016b) EURODAC is discussed further in chapter five in its relation to biopolitics.

The Dublin Agreements, specifically the Dublin III agreement, establish a common asylum framework throughout the EU. (EU Commission 2016a) The Agreement is designed

to ensure that asylum claims are made in the first state an individual arrives at. Further, it acts to prevent “asylum shopping” (“Dublin III” n.d., 6) which refers to an individual passing through multiple EU member-states before making an asylum claim. It is in the UK’s interest to ensure this is enforced in the context of Operation Sophia so that individuals rescued and taken to Italy remain under Italian jurisdiction. Further, the agreements can be used as a defence against calls for resettlement quotas of which the UK firmly opposes.

Returning to the process of a securitization act, Balzacq’s definition sets a useful framework for the analysis of speech acts made by key UK politicians.

(1)“[a]n articulated assemblage of practices whereby heuristic artefacts (metaphors, policy tools, image repertoires, analogies, stereotypes, emotions, etc.) are contextually mobilized by a securitizing actor”, (2) “who works to prompt an audience to build a coherent network of implications (feelings, sensations, thoughts, and intuitions), about the critical vulnerability of a referent object”, (3) “that concurs with the securitizing actor’s reasons for choices and actions, by investing the referent subject with such an aura of unprecedented threatening complexion that” (4) “a customized policy must be undertaken immediately to block its development”

(Balzacq 2011, 3. Emphasis in original, numerical ordering added).

2015 UK General Election

In the UK, Parliament was not in session at the time of the Mediterranean maritime tragedy off the island of Lampedusa in April of 2015. In fact, the UK was in the midst of an election cycle which would result in a majority Conservative government being elected on May 7th.

If for Salter and Mutlu, a government’s visa policy is “a mirror that reflects how the state views its own population and the world[…]” (Salter and Mutlu 2013, 113), the same logic can be applied to Party platforms on immigration. It therefor becomes vital to begin analysis by assessing the Conservative Party’s campaign platform to discern its political stance on

issues such as (im)migration, refugees, and asylum prior to the disasters. How the Party views these issues is directly related to its security practices.

The Conservative Party released its manifesto on April 14th 2015. (Perraudin 2015)

The document, which contains over eighty pages of its political agenda and policy goals, dedicates less than three pages on the broad subject of immigration. (Conservative Party

2015, 29–31) The Party clearly outlines its desire to dramatically lower the net-migration to the UK, and states that “[o]ur plan to control immigration will put you, your family and the

British people first. We will reduce the number of people coming to our country with tough new welfare conditions and robust enforcement” (Conservative Party 2015, 29 Emphasis in original). Of note in this passage is in how it constructs a hierarchical relationship between domestic citizens and foreign others. This broad sweeping statement establishes a distinction between these two populations that places them in inherent opposition to each other a priori any discourse on policy occurs.

The manifesto then outlines two distinct immigration policy goals. On the one hand, there is the commitment to increase enforcement domestically and remove all persons who are residing in the country ‘illegally’. On the other hand, the manifesto outlines a goal to cap the number of non-EU persons from immigrating, and greatly reducing the number of EU migrants. The manifest states “[w]e have already capped the level of skilled economic migration from outside the EU. We will maintain our cap at 20,700 during the next

Parliament. This will ensure that we only grant visas to those who have the skills we really need in our economy” (Conservative Party 2015, 30). This statement implies that the

Conservative Party is only interested in migration if the migrants have very specific skills:

only skilled economic migrants. This is not an unreasonable desire for a government in that unemployment rates of the domestic body, a highly political issue, must be maintained prior to offering jobs to non-citizens. However, paired with the fact that there is no mention of refugee resettlement or plans for asylum seekers within the document-- indeed the word

‘refugee’ is not mentioned once, and the word ‘migrant’ is only used in the context of skilled economic migrants-- the position becomes transparent: the party has little interest in admitting ‘Others’ into British society.

Also outlined in the manifesto is the manner in which the Conservatives believe is best for combatting terrorism and migration in the Mediterranean: “[o]ur long-term economic plan will ensure we have the economic strength to maintain our world-class

Armed Forces, to uphold our national security and project power globally. Aid helps prevent failed states from becoming havens for terrorists. It builds long-term markets for our businesses, by promoting global prosperity, and reduces migration pressures” (Conservative

Party 2015, 75). This position is also not without merit; international aid is essential.

However, it is clear that the Conservatives believe it is their responsibility to combat the sources of global strife as opposed to directly addressing the consequences of the strife such as migrants and asylum seekers by offering resettlement. This too is further analyzed in chapter five.

Securitizing Acts: Prime Minister & Home Secretary

Two key actors to examine are then Prime Minister David Cameron and then-Home

Secretary Theresa May. Not only were these two individuals leading figures within the

Conservative Party, but the positions held by each in government directly oversee issues of

immigration, security, and migration. Their authority on the issues—as is key for securitizing actors—is unquestionably powerful. The window of April 19th, 2015 until the return of the

UK Parliament on the May 27th, 2015 is important in that the EU would formally act on mitigating the crisis through the launch of Operation Sophia. While no official parliamentary records are available during this period due to the House not being in session, the Prime

Minister and the Home Secretary did separately address the situation publicly. It must be noted that the intended audience of both actors in this context was the public or ‘popular’ audience, and to a lesser extent the other members of Parliament—the ‘elite’ audience to borrow terms from Salter. (2008, 328) On April 23rd, 2015, UK Prime Minister David

Cameron made a statement to reporters prior to an EU summit meeting in Brussels on the subject of the crisis. Cameron stated, as quoted by the Telegraph:

[w]hat we are dealing with here is a real tragedy in the Mediterranean. Today's meeting has got to be about saving lives. Now saving lives means rescuing these poor people, but it also means smashing the gangs and stabilising the region. Now Britain, as ever, will help. We'll use our aid budget to help stabilise neighbouring countries. And as the country in Europe with the biggest defence budget, we can make a real contribution. I'll be offering the Royal Navy Flagship, HMS Bulwark, with three helicopters and two other border patrol ships, which will be able to help with these operations. Of course, under the right conditions, and that must include people we pick up and people we deal with are taken to the nearest safe country— most likely Italy—and don’t have immediate recourse to claim asylum in the UK. When these tragedies happen, Britain is always there - and this time is no exception.

(Raziye Akkoc, Matthew Holehouse, and Nick Squires 2015)

This statement, made just days after the maritime tragedy, highlights the stance of the UK government and more importantly, offers an early example of the UK creating a securitizing narrative on migrants.10 The statement opens by framing the migrants as victims and facing

10 It should be noted that the UK was not alone in establishing this type of securitizing narrative; The President of the EU Donald Tusk, for example, made a similar statement on the same day in which he said “[s]aving the

an existential threat: death. Using terms like “real tragedy” and “poor people”, Cameron is appealing to the emotions of his audience which in this case included the domestic UK public, the EU public and lawmakers, and the world at large. These heuristic artifacts—to borrow Balzacq’s term—are employed by Cameron—the securitizing actor—to mobilize the audience to become aware of the seriousness of the situation; the ‘critical vulnerability’ of the migrants. The speech appeals to a sense of empathy, pity, and heartache for the migrants within the targeted audience. An appeal to the audience’s pathos is central. Here, also is an example of humanitarian discourse functioning with and as part of the securitization act. Humanitarian discourse in this case serves to cement the migrant as the referent object of security—those who would benefit from enhanced mechanisms of security.

The second portion of this statement draws the audience’s attention to the need for stopping or “smashing” the referent subject—human smugglers and traffickers or “gangs”— from further developing and growing into a larger threat. The discourse of criminality is used to establish the threatening nature of the smugglers. It highlights the illegality of their actions which implies an effort must be made to stop, and then punish the smugglers. It is then through the tactics used to mitigate this crisis and stop smugglers that a security assemblage is created: Operation Sophia is a military mission mandated to disrupt smuggling rings. This ‘customized policy’ to keep with Balzacqian language, sees military

lives of innocent people is the number one priority. But saving lives is not just about rescuing people at sea. It is also about stopping the smugglers and addressing irregular migration” (“Special Meeting of the European Council, 23/04/2015 - Consilium” n.d.).

assets and personnel being offered by the UK government for a multilateral military operation.

Finally, the speech appeals to a sense of history and national duty. Sentences like

‘[n]ow Britain, as ever, will help’ and ‘[w]hen these tragedies happen, Britain is always there

- and this time is no exception’ steer the audience to agree with the notion of British leadership and nationalism in the crisis. In the context of a securitization act, the audience must accept both the nature of the threat as being existential and the proposed solutions.

The remarks made by Cameron are intended to do both by enticing the audience to actively support the proposed solutions. Put simply, humanitarian and criminality discourses function with and as part of the securitization of migration. Both discourses also reinforce the existential nature of threat facing migrants, and this assemblage then becomes a security issue through the use of military assets, tactics, personnel, and discourse.

On May 13th, 2015 Theresa May, then Home Secretary, wrote a piece for the

London Times in which she echoed the position of the government in terms of both immigration, and of the UK’s leadership role in Europe. The article also further securitized the migration crisis beyond that of the Prime Minister’s remarks. May wrote “[g]angs are profiting from the misery of their fellow humans, selling them false promises before loading them on to dangerous vessels and sending them — in many cases — to their deaths.” And she goes on to note that—in criticizing the perceived ineffectiveness of prior maritime operations— “[a]fter 300 migrants lost their lives in a shipwreck off the island of Lampedusa in October 2013, the Italian government launched its operation “Mare Nostrum”. This well-

intentioned initiative failed by the saddest metric. The UNHCR estimates that 3,500 people died attempting to cross the Mediterranean in 2014: more than five times as many as in

2013” (May 2015). Interestingly, May chooses not to point out the number of people rescued—which is estimated to be over 100,000 during the year the Operation was implemented (Taylor 2015; Scherer and Di Giorgio 2014) --, nor does she highlight that

Mare Nostrum was search and rescue in nature and not directly mandated for border security. This statement does outline the existential threat facing migrants and illustrates the referent subject of security: ‘gangs’ of human smugglers despite the political spin placed on the issue.

The choice of wording used by the then Home Secretary, much like the Prime

Minister, serves a specific purpose; it emphasizes the criminality and illegality of the smugglers. Smugglers are portrayed not only as an existential threat to migrants, but as criminals too. The discourse of criminality used by May certainly would appeal to the target of the article; the centre-right of which the London Times targets. In the next paragraph of the letter, May expresses the need for action to combat the threats and stated “[i]t demands a clear response from European nations” (May 2015). May then highlights the response specific to the UK “[w]e have now sent the Royal Navy’s flagship, HMS Bulwark, along with three Merlin helicopters and two border patrol ships” (May 2015). As in

Cameron’s speech, the militarized solutions proposed to mitigate the crisis cements the crisis as a security issue.

The role of the audience in relation to the remarks of the Prime Minister and Home

Secretary cannot be overlooked. Remembering Salter’s (2008, 329) categories of audiences, it is not difficult to see that in both cases, the popular audience was the target. Cameron’s remarks were designed to align with the Conservative platform as his remarks were made during the election campaign.11 For May’s remarks, the popular audience remained key following the election for her as Home Secretary and being responsible for the national security of the public.

How the crisis became further securitized can be seen following the return of

Parliament on May 27th, 2015. During the parliamentary session, there were multiple debates within both the House of Commons and the House of Lords, as well as discussion within the Home Affairs Committee—a multi-partisan committee-- about migration and the crisis in the Mediterranean. Analyzing these debates will outline the positions of the opposition as well as cement the position of the government. What must be analyzed is, on the one hand, how migrants have been framed through the discourse of humanitarianism.

On the other hand, analysis must examine to what extent consensus has been reached on the existential nature of the crisis, and in naming the referent object and subject.

Migration Debate

Six days before the launch of EUNAVFOR-MED-- on June 16th, 2015-- the House of Commons debated on the “Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean”. The debate was introduced by

11 Cameron’s remarks were made in Brussels following the EU summit directly to reporters and therefore fit the classification as being made to the ‘popular’ audience. To be sure, his remarks in the summit would be directed to the ‘elite’ audience as described by Salter.

Labour party member and Chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee Keith Vaz who noted that “[…] victims continue to [die] on a daily basis and countries such as Greece and Italy reach breaking point under the pressure” (“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean -

Hansard Online” n.d., col. 291). Vaz also notes that “[…] in the past six months, 1,725 people have drowned making this perilous journey, and there must be others who have died in small, unrecorded boats that have capsized. The figure is likely to exceed 3,000 by the end of this year” (“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 291). This statement is evidence of a securitization act for two reasons. On the one hand, Vaz highlights the existential threat that migrants face with statistics. However, on the other hand, he makes speculations that lend to further portray the situation as dire; the mention of ‘unrecorded boats’ and that the figure is ‘likely to exceed’ creates uncertainty in the government audience, or “elite” as categorized by Salter. (2008, 329)

Vaz also argues that the perpetrators of the crisis are the smugglers and traffickers.

“One obstacle is the prevalence of criminal gangs in Libya, which play a large part in trafficking migrants from their points of origin into the Mediterranean. These vicious groups have made millions on the back of the drowned victims” (“Refugee Situation in the

Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 292). By pointing this out, the smugglers become the referent subject of security which in turn requires a response for disrupting them in order to save the lives of migrants. Member of both the Scottish National Party (SNP) and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) questioned Vaz on what he views as the necessary solution. Similarly to the Conservative party’s position, Vaz calls for the government to take

“[…]more aggressive measures against the traffickers in international waters” (“Refugee

Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 292).

David Winnick of the Labour Party, however, also pointed to a solution that dramatically contrasted the position of the government when he asked “[i]s it not absolutely vital that every effort is always made to rescue people, whatever the result of their application for refugee status might be? The rescue of human beings must be made the first priority of any civilized society” (“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard

Online” n.d., col. 294). Vaz agreed on this point, as well with SNP member Patrick Grady who asked whether he agreed that “irrespective of hard and fast numbers, it is vital that the

United Kingdom takes in its fair share of people who are seeking refuge from north Africa?”

(“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 294) Although Vaz did note that “[…] quotas are not the complete answer[…]” (“Refugee Situation in the

Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 294) he did agree with George Kerevan of the

SNP that “there is a necessity for Europe, and Britain in particular, to take a mandatory quota of Syrian refugees” (“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 295). Here, like in the speech and statement made by Cameron and May, humanitarian discourse is employed.

In perhaps the most dramatic section of Vaz’s speech, in calling for greater work on the part of the UK in combatting the crisis in the Mediterranean, he concluded by saying

“Nero fiddled while Rome burned, and the EU has held summits while people are drowning and the countries of the Maghreb and southern Europe are being overwhelmed. To fail to

act now could result in one of the great betrayals of history” (“Refugee Situation in the

Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 295). This statement is an excellent example of

“[a]n articulated assemblage of practices whereby heuristic artefacts (metaphors, policy tools, image repertoires, analogies, stereotypes, emotions, etc.) are contextually mobilized by a securitizing actor” as outlined by Balzacq. (2011, 3) In this case, these heuristic artifacts are borrowed from humanitarian discourse.

Finally, James Brokenshire, the Minister for Immigration responded to the House for the end of the debate. Brokenshire is an important actor in this context as he was both a high-ranking member of the Conservative Party, and the minister responsible for immigration, and therefore carried a great deal of authority.

The right hon. Gentleman [Vaz] clearly underlined the fact that the situation in the Mediterranean is a tragic reminder of the risks that migrants are prepared to take in their attempts to make the perilous journey to Europe, and it is a stark illustration of the exploitation perpetrated by traffickers and organised criminals, who callously put people in harm’s way at sea. Frankly, they could not care whether people live or die. We need to focus on that callousness, that coldness and that complete disregard for human life, and the traffickers who are responsible for it. The loss of life is unacceptable, and I know the whole House is in absolute agreement on that. (“Refugee Situation in the Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 296)

Brokenshire too highlights the existential nature of the threats facing migrants and continues to describe the smugglers as the source of the migrant’s insecurity. His speech is effective in shifting the focus of what the government is not doing to what the smugglers are doing through the use of criminality discourse to describe the actions of the smugglers.

What this debate shows is that consensus emerged in the House that (1) migrants were facing an existential crisis, and that (2) ‘gangs’ of smugglers were to blame; both the

referent object and referent subject of security were established and agreed upon by all parties. Consensus was also reached on (3) the UK having a responsibility to both rescue migrants and stop the smuggling rings—two separate actions but needing to occur simultaneously. The securitization rhetoric was similar by members from multiple parties, however, the specific policy responses put forth by each greatly differed. Typically, there is necessity for a specific policy being accepted as a response to the perceived threat in a successful securitization act. Given that the audience in this case is the ‘elite’—the politicians—and given the nature of the distribution of power within a parliamentary democracy, this condition is not so clearly cut. On the one hand, the Conservative Party held the majority of seats and any solution presented in the form of a bill would be passed. On the other hand, measures taken militarily and in partnership with other states were made by the PMO and Home Office, and not the House. Therefore, it is the case that acceptance of the nature of the threat facing migrants, and the source of that threat by the opposition was all the government required to act autonomously.

Of Salter’s (2008, 325) four conditions for securitization, some but not all had been met in this debate: (1) The issues of this debate form part of two larger political debates: security and immigration. While migration had been a central issue within the UK generally, migrants were previously viewed as a potential threat to national security in the context of the Calais migrant camp and migrants illegally hiding on trucks and entering the UK (“Calais:

Border Management - Hansard Online” n.d.; “Border Management (Calais) - Hansard

Online” n.d.; “Calais: Illegal Immigrants - Hansard Online” n.d.); (2) the description of the threat as existential saw consensus. While not all members would agree that migrants

posed a threat to national security, they did agree that migrants face an existential threat by crossing the Mediterranean; (3) the proposed solutions put forth by the government were not accepted by the opposition and therefore general consensus did not emerge, but as stated above, it was not required; and (4) no new powers were granted as it was noted that the government used existing powers to mobilize the naval assets and allocate financial aid bundles to various regions at the source of the crisis. Finally, this debate further cements the Conservative’s desire to be viewed as a regional leader of crisis mitigation while simultaneously remaining steadfast against the resettlement of ‘others’ which opposition members hold as an essential component of resolving the crisis.

Sustaining the Securitization Act

While the case for a successful securitization act during the onset of the Mediterranean crisis has been demonstrated in the previous sections, the case for maintaining the securitization narrative after the deployment of resources to mitigate the crisis must also be assessed. The temporal dimensions of securitization—the duration of which an issue is viewed as a existential security threat and the “entropy of the public imagination” (Salter

2008, 324)-- cannot be overlooked. Securitization is a sustained process which requires repetition on the part of the securitizing actor(s). Therefore, additional debates within the

UK government must be analyzed to assess how securitizing rhetoric was sustained with migrants being the referent object as Operation Sophia moved to phase two on October 7th,

2015. Three important debates occurred before October 7th: September 8th on the Refugee

Crisis in Europe (HOC); September 8th on the Refugee crisis (HOL); and on September 9th

Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean (HOC).

Following the coverage of three-year-old Aylan Kurdi’s body being washed ashore in

Turkey, an emergency debate was held in the House of Commons on September 8th, 2015.

The debate began with Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper of the Labour Party giving an impassioned speech on the seriousness of the European refugee crisis writ large. It should be noted that the use of the term “refugee” in this debate is significant for two key reasons.

On the one hand, it is a specific legal definition that differs from migrant as outlined by the

UN Refugee Convention. (Refugees n.d.) On the other hand, the use of the term is significant in that it shows a shift in how opposition Members of Parliament view the crisis in more serious terms compared to the rhetoric used by the government during the onset of the crisis in which the term ‘migrant’ was centrally featured. Whereas the use of

‘migrant’ seems to have been favoured by the government, the opposition repeatedly used the term ‘refugee’ signifying a difference in how each party views the overall situation and indeed how they view the ‘Other’. With regards to the crisis in the Mediterranean, Cooper stated:

Refugees are moving across our continent on a scale we have not seen since the second world war, with a third of a million trying to cross the Mediterranean this year, many ready to pay their life savings to criminal gangs who board them on to overcrowded boats and then leave them to drown. Fifty-two people were found dead in the hull of a boat. They had been forced into an airless hold, forced to pay to come up to breathe, and those who could not pay suffocated to death. The pictures of Alan [sic] Kurdi have moved a continent—the image of a three-year-old on a beach, a picture that should have been full of life and joy and instead was a tragedy. (“Refugee Crisis in Europe - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 245)

This portion of Cooper’s speech highlights several things. First, it notes the existential dangers inherent to Mediterranean migration—further sustaining the securitizing narrative

established months earlier. Second, the statement maintains the notion that smugglers are the referent subject and perpetrators of insecurity. Third, the statement is rich with imagery and other heuristic artifacts that compel the audience to feel empathy. Finally, the statement shows that the opposition remained aligned with the government’s assertion of the seriousness of the crisis; consensus was maintained.

The then Home Secretary, Theresa May also made a speech and answered questions in the debate. Her use of language in relation to describing the crisis in the Mediterranean was more colourful and specific than in her letter from the spring of 2015. She described the journey across the Mediterranean as “perilous” “treacherous” and “dangerous” and stated “[t]hey [migrants] are taking their life savings in exchange for a place in a rickety vessel, or cramped in the back of an ill-ventilated lorry. The tragic death toll in the

Mediterranean—not just in recent weeks, but over the past two years—illustrates the great risks people are running and the vile disregard for human life of the gangs who encourage them[…]” (“Refugee Crisis in Europe - Hansard Online” n.d., cols. 257–260). By pointing to the multi-year trends of migration, May is opening up the temporal dimension of the migration crisis which simultaneously presents the issue as longstanding, and in need of immediate resolution.

This debate highlights the sustained consensus in the House of Commons on the existential nature of the crisis, as well as consensus on the commitment by the government to continue being a leading voice in crisis mitigation on the international stage. Here, as in previous debates, the discourses of criminality and humanitarianism are employed as part

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of the securitization act. The same day as the House of Commons debate—September 8th,

2015--, the House of Lords debated the “Refugee Crisis”. While this debate was short in length, and mostly saw arguing over the proposed solutions to the crisis and refugee resettlement, there was no disagreement on the seriousness of the crisis. Further yet, as with the House of Commons, the legal term “refugee” was used to describe those in the

Mediterranean as opposed to “migrant”. In terms of sustaining rhetoric, the Parliamentary

Under-Secretary of State for the Department for Transport and Home Office, the

Conservative Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon, repeatedly used the term “criminal gangs” to characterize the smugglers. (“Refugee Crisis - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 1316) This characterization was not contested by any other Lords, and thus shows the effectiveness of using the discourse of criminality.

Both debates on September 8th, 2015 show a sustained securitization act. While the use of the term “refugee” as opposed to “migrant” may well have been used simply to describe the larger crisis (beyond that in the Mediterranean of which Operation Sophia was focused on), it is interesting in that during the initial period of securitizing the crisis, refugee was used more by the opposition, yet by the fall of 2015, the governing Conservatives used the term refugee more frequently. As is mentioned in chapter six, this shows a softening in position for the government.

On September 9th, 2015, the House held another debate on the crisis

(“Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean and Europe - Hansard Online” n.d.) which was opened by a member of the SNP. The debate was by and large a call on the government to

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increase foreign aid and establish increased resettlement quotas. The calls for establishing resettlement quotas came as early as June 8th 2015 when the European Commission recommended that member states resettle 20,000 people requiring international assistance over the course of two years. (“EU Commission Legislative Train” n.d.) This UK debate then signals that the intensity of the crisis was fully understood by the opposition and the government. Answering these calls was the Minister of Immigration James Brokenshire who continually reiterated the position and approach of the government, and stated:

We are witnessing mass migration across Europe on a scale not seen since the end of the second world war. We have seen harrowing pictures that serve as a tragic reminder of the risks that people take when attempting to make dangerous journeys to Europe, and a stark reminder of the exploitation by smugglers and organised criminal gangs who put people’s lives at risk, put them in harm’s way, and, frankly, do not care whether they live or die. It is that loss of life that Members across this House take so seriously, and it is a further point we can all agree on. (“Humanitarian Crisis in the Mediterranean and Europe - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 502)

The narrative set fourth by the government and repeated by its high-ranking members and ministers is demonstrative of a sustained securitization act. The same terms were used to frame both the migrants and the smugglers as the referent object and referent subject of security respectively. Additionally, to return to Salter’s four conditions, close attention must be paid to the third—whether consensus emerged about the proposed solutions. These debates show that the opposition parties did not generally disagree with the measures taken by the government—as had been the case during the spring--, rather they called for more. The major criticisms directed at the government were that more refugees and migrants must be admitted into the UK, and that more aid be distributed internationally.

The first criticism cannot be mistaken for a lack of consensus amongst members of the

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house. The government did commit to increased resettlement quotas relative to their previous stance of not wanting any ‘others’.12 This commitment however, targets only

Syrian refugees currently in camps in the region, and not those who have already arrived in

Europe. (“Syria: Refugees and Counter-Terrorism - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 24) In terms of building consensus, the disagreement then came on the scope of the measures taken, not necessarily the measures themselves.

Conclusions

To conclude this chapter, I have argued that the UK government has used various securitization moves, rooted in the discourses of criminality, humanitarianism, and security, in order to (1) draw attention to an existential threat facing migrants—the referent object-- by human smugglers—the referent subject. (2) In order to carry out—based on this security assemblage—actions which protect the sovereign self-determination of the UK while simultaneously contributing to the rescuing of migrants and disrupting human smuggling rings through the use of (3) military operations and assets and increased financial aid as part of EUNAVFOR-MED or Operation Sophia. The key securitizing actors in this case include the

Prime Minister, the Home Secretary, the Minister of Immigration, and the Parliamentary

Undersecretary of Transportation and the Home Office in the House of Lords. Consensus emerged within the opposition too as members of the Labour Party, SNP, and DUP— specifically high-ranking members such as the Shadow Home Secretary and Chair of the

Home Affairs Select Committee-- all agreed on the existential dangers inherent to trans-

12 The proposed increase of the resettlement quota to 20,000 over the course of the government certainly was an absolute increase, yet as argued by the opposition, relative to other countries, and the crisis as a whole, the number remained meagre and unsatisfactory.

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Mediterranean migration. This sustained securitization act is unique in that migrants had been framed as the referent object of security which resulted in the UK government supporting Operation Sophia. To be sure, the securitization of migration served a greater purpose: to persuade the opposition and general public to support the measures taken by the Conservative government. Once the securitization of migration was accepted, the argument shifted to a debate on the scope of the measures taken, not the measures in and of themselves. While there was clear disagreement between the government and the opposition over whether resettling the rescued migrants and refugees was a required component to mitigate the crisis, there was no disagreement that the UK should participate in the Operation.

By sustaining the securitization beyond the onset of the crisis in the spring, to the fall of 2015 when phase two of Operation Sophia commenced, there was continued support for the UK’s participation. The sustained securitization act was not, however, without its problems. As will be discussed in more detail in the chapter five, greater calls for resettlement of migrants and refugees came forth and the discourse of humanitarianism was intensified resulting in a partial shift on resettlement quotas despite running contrary to the limited immigration ethos of the Conservative government as outlined in the manifesto and in speeches by Conservative politicians.

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CHAPTER FIVE- Biopolitics, Operation Sophia, and the UK’s Approach to Migration

“[…] no one chooses refugee camps or strip searches where your body is left aching […]” (Shire n.d.)

After outlining in chapter four the ways in which the Conservative government of the

United Kingdom (UK) has securitized migration in the Mediterranean beginning in 2015, it is now important to assess how that securitization move facilitates the exertion of mechanisms of power to achieve its domestic political goals of reducing net-migration and ensuring British borders remain strong. Specifically, analysis of where and how this power is being exerted is central. This chapter argues that the securitization of migration in the context of Operation Sophia functions as a means for the UK government to project sovereign power internationally while also serving its domestic political goal of limiting the number of migrants and refugees resettled on UK soil and lowering net-migration. Through participation in Operation Sophia, the UK government extends and exercises its sovereignty through the extra-territorialization of its borders on the Mediterranean Sea. This extra- territorialization of the border then functions as a net designed to catch all people in transit from North Africa to Europe. Additionally, the specific mandate of Operation Sophia biopolitically filters and categorizes these people into groups of migrants, smugglers, and refugees each of which are subject to different legal procedures.

The biopolitical function of Operation Sophia is important to analyze as it subjects migrants to digital registration, sorting, surveillance, and processing within the EU and UK immigration systems which are then used as a tactic of governmentality; the information and data compiled on migrants serves to categorize individuals into groupings which

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governments then can control. An individual deemed to be a criminal smuggler, for example, is funneled through the judicial system and steered away from immigration processes. As outlined in chapter four, the UK government’s desire to drastically reduce net- migration has been firmly outlined in its Party Manifesto, in statements made to the public by the Prime Minister, Home Secretary, and other high-ranking officials, and finally in debates within the House of Commons and House of Lords. Operation Sophia partially serves this policy goal by ensuring all rescued migrants are taken to processing sites in

Italy—and not the UK. The Operation also affords the UK the doubled advantage of being perceived as regional leader in humanitarianism and security while having no real obligations of resettlement within the UK as migrants are geographically and jurisdictionally distant.

The merger of biopolitics and migration/security is not a new area of research. Aliya

(2015) examines the relationship between forced migration and notions of identity through a biopolitical lens in the context of Kazakhstani forced migration. Bettini (2017) uses biopolitics to examine mobility and migration in the context of climate change. Finally,

Salter (2006) examines border technologies security practices that creation of populations that are ‘international’. Each of these works draw interesting analyses that focus of the creation and management of a population through a biopolitical lens.

Analyzing the mechanisms of power and biopolitical tactics of governmentality requires engagement with the theoretical foundations of biopolitics and governmentality as outlined in chapter three. For Foucault (1982), the mechanisms and relations of power are more interesting to analyze than the sources of power. Analysis must be centred on the

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tactics employed by the government in serving its political ends of reducing net-migration and ensuring border security. Therefore, analysis of the mandate of Operation Sophia through its various phases show how UK participation in the Operation benefits those political goals and allows for the projection of its sovereign power beyond its geographical borders. Additionally, analysis of the biopolitical filtering used to create categories of the

‘Other’ shows that the Operation functions in a much more complex manner than simply disrupting human smuggling and rescuing migrants: biopolitical control over populations is established through the categorization that manifests as a result of biopolitical filtering.

These categories allow for the easy management of populations based on the construction of power/knowledge assemblages specific to each population—refugee, migrant, and smuggler.

The securitization of migration, and the militarized responses that follow, creates a paradox between the protection of vulnerable migrants, and the security of international borders and domestic sovereignty. This paradox “manifests itself on the ground in daily activities of border police as a tension between the need to care for migrant welfare and the need to control migrant mobility[…]” (Pallister-Wilkins 2015, 54) Operation Sophia must then be analyzed through a lens of biopolitics: how do the tactics of the Operation create and control populations of people and how does this serve border security? By examining the practices associated with Operation Sophia—specifically through its first two phases— the ways in which biopolitical control is established while also extending protection and security to migrants is revealed.

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Biopolitical Goals of the UK Government

To contextualize the relationship between Operation Sophia and the UK, power, and biopolitics, analysis begins with the Conservative Party’s political goals on immigration and resettlement prior to the April 19th disaster, and in the early days of Operation Sophia during the spring and summer of 2015. Understanding the political goals held prior to the maritime tragedy provides the analytical foundation of how the actions carried out by the

UK reflect its political goals. The policy goals are found in the Conservative Party Manifesto, and in debates held in the House of Commons and House of Lords.

As noted in chapter four, the Conservative Party released its manifesto on April 14th

2015. (Perraudin 2015) While the language used—or excluded—aids in highlighting the securitization act, it also shines light on the biopolitical goals held by the UK government.

The policy goals of removing undocumented persons from the country, tightening immigration requirements, and seeking only skilled economic migrants in specific sectors are at the forefront of UK immigration policy. (Conservative Party 2015, 29–31) These policy goals have the doubled advantage of enhancing biopolitical digitalizing of (im)migration by introducing “satellite tracking for every foreign national offender subject to an outstanding deportation order or deportation proceedings[…]” (Conservative Party 2015, 30). These tactics of surveillance have a temporal aspect that cannot be overlooked: those who are removed from the country are flagged to prevent any attempts re-enter the UK or make an asylum claim. In other words, the government is ensuring that those removed from the country cannot return without due process and via regular immigration routes in the future.

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Those who were targeted in the Manifesto include persons residing in the UK after their visa has expired, undocumented migrants residing in the UK, and undocumented workers.

As mentioned in chapter four, the term ‘refugee’ was not included in the manifesto, and ‘migrant’ was used only to describe economic migrants, and not asylum seekers. The exclusion of a stated position on refugees and asylum seekers can be perceived in several ways: It can be argued that at the time of the manifesto’s release, the crisis in the

Mediterranean was not yet an issue of central importance in UK politics vis-á-vis other policy issues. While this argument may hold weight, it overlooks the global levels of migration and refugees which at the time were incredibly high. The UN estimated that in

2014—the year leading up to the April 19th disaster-- there were 59.5 million forcibly displaced persons including 19.5 million refugees globally. (Refugees 2015) In 2016—the most recent year of which data is available-- the UN estimated that there were 25.9 million refugees globally—a substantial increase from 2014. (“Migration Report Highlights 2017” n.d.) It may also have been the case that the issue was politically charged in the UK, and as a wedge issue, the Conservatives sought to strike a different approach than the other parties to pander to voters who identify as being anti-immigration. This latter point seems more likely given the nature of the Manifesto as an election platform tool, and the negative opinions and beliefs held towards migrants and others by British society as outlined in chapter two.

Returning to the Conservatives’ policy goals related to combatting terrorism and migration: “[o]ur long-term economic plan will ensure we have the economic strength to

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maintain our world-class Armed Forces, to uphold our national security and project power globally” (Conservative Party 2015, 75 emphases added). Here, the goal of ‘projecting power globally’ is closely coupled with both the extra-territorialization of borders and immigration in the case of Operation Sophia, but also with international development aid.

Aid is an extension of power in that its recipient is chosen strategically, and seldom given to states that do not have positive diplomatic relationships with the contributing country13. For the UK, international aid is perceived by the government to be a necessary component of halting human smuggling at its source as has been repeated by several government actors and noted extensively in chapter four. Foreign aid is also perceived favourably by other states and international bodies, yet as has been pointed out in the preceding chapter, the opposition parties in the UK did not agree that financial aid alone is enough for mitigating the crisis in the Mediterranean. It appears then, that by being the largest single-state donor in the EU (“Net Official Development Assistance 2015- OECD” n.d.)14 the UK assumes it has authority over other issues that impact the EU, namely immigration and addressing the migration crisis. This is evident in its repeated position of participating in Operation Sophia, but not in resettlement schemes. Money then, is equated with power.

Further, the touting of aid spending, and meeting NATO funding requirements15 was continually repeated during the spring of 2015 as though it absolved the UK government of any further humanitarian efforts such as increasing resettlement. The narrative which

13 Aid can be given to NGO’s or other groups when direct assistance to a state is not feasible or not politically strategic. 14 In terms of absolute dollars. In terms of percentage of GDP, the UK spends 0.71% whereas countries such as Sweden spend 1.41%. (“Net Official Development Assistance 2015- OECD” n.d.) 15 “PM at 2015 Global Security Forum - GOV.UK” n.d.

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places emphasis on aid was echoed in the Conservative Manifesto, remarks by Conservative ministers, the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and elsewhere; it is a point continually driven home by the government and thus forms part of its ethos. This shows that government had all but entirely dismissed the effectiveness of resettlement plans and instead held that aid money and political stability in the source regions are the only manner for resolving the crisis. This position, while perhaps not entirely incorrect, fails to account for the migrants that have already fled their homeland and require immediate aid. This failure, it would appear, is constructed by design; if the UK government publicly acknowledged the need for resettlement, their entire ethos on (im)migration would be contradicted and could be profoundly damaging to the Party electorally.

UK Government and its Proposed Solutions to the Migration Crisis

On June 18th, 2015, the House of Lords debated on EU asylum strategies in response to the migration crisis. (“EU: Asylum Seekers - Hansard Online” n.d.) The debate was put forth by

Lord Dykes who noted the importance of the issue and that finding a solution was necessary. The debate differed from that of the House of Commons in one key way: it focused more on the shortfalls of EU and British policy while already noting the existential nature of the threats facing migrants. Consensus was reached on the nature and seriousness of the threat, however, like the debate in the House of Commons, consensus could not be found on how best to respond to the crisis and combat the threat of death faced by migrants. Lord Alton for example agreed that the migrant crisis must be dealt with at its source, yet he went on to state “[…] but that is a long-term issue. What do we do in the mean time? I find it impossible to justify the 187 places for resettlement in the UK, as

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was just referred to, against Germany’s 30,000, Lebanon’s 1.2 million, Turkey’s 1.8 million and Jordan’s 600,000” (“EU: Asylum Seekers - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 45) and adds “I hope he [Minister for Immigration, James Brokenshire] will say whether he has considered the requests of the Refugee Council to consider legal avenues for refugees, such as humanitarian or asylum visas, and to look at ways to reunite families” (“EU: Asylum Seekers

- Hansard Online” n.d., col. 45). This debate brings forth a temporal issue in mitigating the migration crisis: whether it is more prudent to act on the immediate symptoms of the crisis, or on the long-term causes. This is a false dichotomy in that both the symptoms and root causes of the migration crisis can be and indeed should be addressed simultaneously. Saving the lives of migrants on the high seas should be viewed as important as changing the conditions on the ground in the countries of origin.

James Brokenshire, in a response during another debate (“Refugee Situation in the

Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d.) highlighted the actions the government was carrying out as part of Operation Sophia. He would go on to note the amount of financial aid given to combat the Syrian crisis and other areas deemed to be the source of migration. He also outlined the military contributions that the government has made to combat smugglers, and the partnership with other EU states in the Mediterranean. In contrast to calls by opposition members to increase the quota of resettled refugees, Brokenshire outlined the number already resettled—"187 in just over a year” (“Refugee Situation in the

Mediterranean - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 298)—but did not suggest that the government would increase the quota. These remarks made by a high-ranking member of the

Conservative government illuminate mechanisms of power in terms of material assets and

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financial contributions, but also power in terms of sovereign authority over who may and may not enter the UK. This latter form of power is not as apparent as physical assets but is no less important.

In the House of Lords debate there were comments made in stark contrast to Lord

Alton’s comments, Lord Marlesford—a Conservative—suggested that:

I strongly propose that we set up a new holding area somewhere in north Africa. Various countries have been mentioned, including Tunisia and Egypt. I favour Libya, which is already a failing state. We should not just set up a holding area but think a bit more widely and set up something that could one day itself become a state. I would call it Refugia, for want of a better name. It is not an EU problem; it is a UN problem, a world problem. We would need a UN mandate in the form of a Security Council resolution.

(“EU: Asylum Seekers - Hansard Online” n.d., cols. 42–43)

Despite the radicalness of the Lord’s suggestions, it is not so outlandish when considering the position of the UK government of constructing a self/other distinction between citizens and migrants. This proposal is an enhancement of that distinction and adds a geographical element to the separateness. The geographical distance is a recurring theme for UK foreign relations as is seen in the extra-territorialization of its borders, which is discussed further below. The calls put forth by the government and conservative politicians for aiding migrants and combatting human smuggling highlight the dangers specific to migrants, yet also reinforce the UK’s desire to extra-territorially control the processing and resettling of said migrants outside of the UK.

While consensus about a solution to the crisis could not be met in the first months of the crisis in either House, the House of Lords debate does demonstrate that the UK’s

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position was firm: there would be little effort put forth to resettle migrants on English soil.

There were consequences of the UK’s position resulting from its level of power and influence in Europe. As Lord Dykes stated in the HOL debate: “Britain started that process, I am sad to say. It was the first country to say that it did not want to take anybody and has taken just a small number. That led to the rot setting in regarding the co-operation in this field that is necessary” (“EU: Asylum Seekers - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 42). This statement—referring to the dispute inside the EU on refugee and asylum seeker quotas— suggests that the UK’s stance on the issue set an example for other countries to resist as well, which, while perhaps positive in the eyes of voters and constituents, certainly was profoundly negative for migrants with legitimate claims for asylum.

The position for the UK as being against resettlement quotas was cemented during the EU Summit of June 25-26, 2015. The summit concluded that “the temporary and exceptional relocation over two years from the frontline Member States Italy and Greece to other Member States of 40.000 persons in clear need of international protection, in which all Member States will participate” however, also noted was that “The UK will not participate” (“EUCO Conclusions June 2015” n.d., 2) Following this summit, the then Prime

Minister Cameron gave a speech and answered questions. While much of the speech discussed Britain’s desire to remain at an arm’s length away from the rest of the EU, and in establishing reform, it did discuss the migrant crisis in the context of the EU and British response. Maintaining the narrative set forth by the UK, Cameron touted the UK aid assistance and the need to combat the crisis at its source. He also was clear in stating:

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[n]ow the UK has been clear that we will not take part in any relocation scheme to move migrants who have already arrived across member states. But that is not to say we won’t play our part. We do play our part. Britain can hold its head up high in the world, not least because of the aid that we spend in African countries, not least because what we’re doing, the second largest bilateral donor in terms of helping the Syrian people at their time of need, and yes, we do take part in the programme of resettling the most vulnerable refugees, taking them out of refugee camps and elsewhere to give them the chance of a better life here in the United Kingdom[…]But we do think these relocation schemes for migrants who’ve already arrived, we think they could prove counterproductive and we’ve been very consistent about that.

(“European Council June 2015: David Cameron’s Speech - GOV.UK” n.d.)

In both speeches, Cameron’s remarks outline a set of policy goals that ostensibly would result in the disruption of smuggling rings and eliminate migrant deaths on the

Mediterranean. Yet the rhetoric used also suggests a policy goal of ensuring the migrants do not reach the UK. This goal, it would appear, seems to be of greater importance than the former for the Conservative government. This becomes a critical point given that the mandate of Operation Sophia is concerned with militarized efforts to disrupt illegal smuggling, and not with preventing asylum seekers from entering Europe; only the ways which migrants and asylum seekers enter Europe is of concern.

The policy proposals made by the Conservatives relate to the notion of the UK’s power being projected globally, or at the very least regionally in Europe. By being a powerful country—a country holding legitimacy, economic and military might, and having a voice of authority in international relations--, any decision made can influence decisions made by less powerful states, especially on highly contentious issues such as resettlement quotas. This is not without its problems: The UK seeks to be a leader in crisis mitigation while being able to pass the buck of resettlement to other EU states. The irony is that by

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being a leader, other states may follow suit, as the concerns raised by Lord Dykes show, which, in the context of migrants, means resettlement is not an overly popular policy. If power is “essentially that which represses” (Foucault 2003b, 13), in the context of the EU, the repressiveness of power can grow exponentially as more countries may adopt similar non-resettlement policies. Now, clearly the exertion of power in this context is not all negative. Indeed, it must be noted that the material assets employed by the UK for

Operation Sophia is an exertion of power in that the ships and aircraft are part of the UK’s sovereign naval fleet operating in international waters. Yet, the benefits that this exertion of power provide for migrants is a matter of life and death; migrants are rescued. What emerges is a dueling system of power which is positive on the one hand—rescuing those in need—but also inherently repressive in blocking resettlement, on the other. It establishes a

Janus-faced reality.

However, power can also be seen as a measurement of influence and authority. It highlights the level to which a state can autonomously act or choose not to act. In the case of Operation Sophia, this notion of power can be seen at play in how the UK chose to participate in the Operation, but very much under its own terms; being rigid in its position of non-resettlement. Despite the Operation falling under the jurisdiction and authority of the EU, the UK need not participate at all due to its increasing distance from the EU on the one hand, and that there would be no effective repercussions for non-participation on the other as it is not a member of the Schengen Area. It therefore seems to be the case that the

UK participates in Operation Sophia to project its power globally—a point raised in the

Manifesto (Conservative Party 2015, 29)—and to define when, how, and where migrants

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will be processed—if at all—for UK immigration. It should also be noted here that Italy is

‘officially’ the lead state, and operational headquarters are in Rome however, the projection of power globally clearly transcends titles.

Extra-Territorialization of Borders- Operation Sophia and the UK

The mission and mandate of Operation Sophia are essential for analysis in contrast to the actions taken by member states on the high seas. The Operation targets the Central-

Mediterranean route which encompasses the area of the Mediterranean between Libya and southern Italy. According to FRONTEX, 170,760 people took this route in 2014, 153,946 in

2015, and 181,126 in 2016. (“Frontex | Central Mediterranean Route” n.d.) With this many people attempting to cross each year, there ostensibly is a great need for humanitarian assistance, however, the mandate for Operation Sophia is focused elsewhere. As outlined in in Article 1 of the EU Council Decision which launched the Operation:

The Union shall conduct a military crisis management operation contributing to the disruption of the business model of human smuggling and trafficking networks in the Southern Central Mediterranean (EUNAVFOR MED), achieved by undertaking systematic efforts to identify, capture and dispose of vessels and assets used or suspected of being used by smugglers or traffickers, in accordance with applicable international law, including UNCLOS and any UN Security Council Resolution.

(“EU Council Decision 2015/778” n.d., 122/32-122/33)

This mission statement is in line with the UK’s view of the purpose of the Operation: the disruption of smuggling rings. It features the use of security rhetoric while failing to use the discourse of humanitarianism. The actual practices of the mission, such as efforts to search for and rescue migrants on the Mediterranean, are not mentioned in the mandate. This is an interesting exclusion especially in the context of UK participation which, as noted before,

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touts the rescuing of migrants and humanitarian efforts as a principal component of the mission along with the disruption of smuggling rings, as well as using humanitarian discourse to establish migrants as the referent object of security. While the actual actions of the Operation see scores of migrants being rescued, as the mandate of the mission shows, this is merely a by-product of the Operation and not a central pillar. This is demonstrated further in the mandate—specifically the section outlining its phases—show that there are no overtly humanitarian aspects of the Operation. The mandate states that:

(a) in a first phase, support the detection and monitoring of migration networks through information gathering and patrolling on the high seas in accordance with international law; (b) in a second phase, (i) conduct boarding, search, seizure and diversion on the high seas of vessels suspected of being used for human smuggling or trafficking, under the conditions provided for by applicable international law, including UNCLOS and the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants; (ii) in accordance with any applicable UN Security Council Resolution or consent by the coastal State concerned, conduct boarding, search, seizure and diversion, on the high seas or in the territorial and internal waters of that State, of vessels suspected of being used for human smuggling or trafficking, under the conditions set out in that Resolution or consent. (“EU Council Decision 2015/778” n.d., 122/32)

To be sure, these are only the first two of the three phases of the Operation but are the two relevant to analysis here. Both phases outlined here fall under the umbrella of military- security actions and in Bigo’s ‘military-strategic’ universe characterized “in terms of

‘patrolling’, intercepting; in terms of ‘containment’; as well as in terms of geopolitics of enmity, of ‘walls’ and of lines to defend” (Bigo 2014, 211). The naval forces continuously patrol—both on the water and from the sky—for vessels heading toward Europe. The naval fleet acts as a ‘wall’, or more accurately, as the extra-territorialization of the border itself; dividing north from south. The extra-territorialization of the border functions first and

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foremost as material barrier to Europe in which all people—migrants and smugglers alike— are collected without discrimination. This policy is absolute in that all vessels suspected of smuggling are commandeered and those aboard are placed in protective custody until being brought to port. The border is not only extra-territorialized in theory, but in practice too.

This extra-territorialization of European borders, and in the case of UK participation, of the UK border, may address the symptoms of the migration crisis and serve its immediate security needs—preventing the arrival of migrants outside of ‘regular’ channels and detaining suspected smugglers--, but it also creates a significant problem in terms of immigration and asylum. As a 2016 UK House of Lords report notes “[e]vidence suggests that a majority of those currently entering the EU as irregular migrants are ‘prima facie refugees’, as defined by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees” (“HoL Report EU Action

Plan Against Migrant Smuggling 2015” n.d., 3). With this in mind and knowing that refugees cannot legally be subject to refoulment, a fundamental problem manifests itself: if a refugee is able to reach UK soil, they immediately enter the asylum process. Yet, when a UK ship captures a vessel on the Mediterranean, those on board are brought to Italy and fall under Italian jurisdiction. This raises many questions on issues such as international law, human rights, and refugee convention that are beyond the scope of this thesis. Ultimately, this is not an exceptional or extraordinary policy manoeuvre, but rather appears to fall under what Butler (2004) refers to as the “instrumentalization” (Butler 2004, 50-99) of the law to serve a specific end. In the case of the UK’s participation, the extra-territorialization of the border paired with the operational practices allow the UK to easily achieve its political goal of non-resettlement.

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Related to the extra-territorialization of borders, Bigo notes that the militarization of borders and border control serves to place focus on the effectiveness of border control practices. (Bigo 2014, 213) In the context of Operation Sophia, the practices of the military are first and foremost designed to search for and disrupt human smugglers. The mandate, however, does not align with the reality that the military’s actions have been predominantly humanitarian in nature: the rescuing of migrants. The practices have been effective in maintaining border security, but do not align with the mission’s original mandate of tackling migration.

During an evidence gathering session in the UK parliament which would go on to form the House of Lord’s report on Operation Sophia, Edward Hobart--the Migration Envoy,

Europe Directorate, of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office—stated that the practices of

Operation Sophia lending to increased border security directly increase criminal activity.

(“Evidence Session No. 1” n.d., 6) As regular migration routes become increasingly secured, migrants without the proper documentation or means to use the regular migration path will, out of necessity, turn to criminal smuggling. The business of illegal criminal smuggling exists to fulfill demands. Related to this, Hobart notes that some activities which may not be directly linked to criminal activity, but in certain cases can be facilitated by criminal organizations, will also grow. Hobart names activities such as a market for life jackets and rubber dinghies as being linked to increased border security. (“Evidence Session No. 1” n.d.,

6) Hobart’s testimony suggests that there is a direct correlation between enhancing border security and immigration policies with increased irregular migration flows. The common denominator in this equation then appears to be the fact that regardless of policy or

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practices, people will continue to migrate from north Africa and the Middle East to Europe.

Therefore, it seems to be the case that efforts should be made to ensure those people can arrive safely, securely, and legally. Stricter enforcement and the building of walls—real or conceptual—will not mitigate migration and in fact will only increase the existential dangers inherent to migration. It was also noted in this evidence gathering session that the action of destroying smuggler’s vessels results in cheaper and more dangerous rubber dinghies being used as opposed to the more stable and seaworthy wooden crafts which dramatically increases the existential danger faced by migrants. (“Evidence Session No. 1” n.d.)

In the same evidence gathering session, Richard Lindsay—Head of Security Policy

Department, Defence and International Security Directorate at the Foreign and

Commonwealth Office—presented statistical evidence about the successes and failures of

Operation Sophia. Mr. Lindsay noted that between June and October of 2015—the period of

Phase 1— 69 smuggling vessels were captured and destroyed, 46 smugglers were detained and taken to Italy, and 3000 of the 8400 migrants rescued were rescued by British ships.

(“Evidence Session No. 1” n.d., 7) These statistics highlight the contrast between the mission mandate—to disrupt smuggling rings—and the real day-to-day practices. These statistics demonstrate that while the mandate of the Operation may be targeted towards smuggling, in practice it is a humanitarian operation conducted by and facilitated through a militarized security assemblage.

By being a militarized mission in name and design, individuals participating in the

Operation are primarily members of the military social sphere, and not one of humanitarianism. As Bigo (2014) notes, “[p]rofessional socialization is frequently a key

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element in the patrimony of dispositions that individual agents accumulate during their lives. It frames their practical sense and the way in which they develop their repertoire of practical justifications” (Bigo 2014, 211). Within the military-strategic social universe that

Operation Sophia occupies, institutional practices are fine-tuned in highly specific ways which sees those working within the universe conditioned to operate strategically and uniformly. Given the humanitarian aspect of migration, a militarized actor may be ill-suited to address the crisis especially given the UK House of Lords conclusion that the mandate of the Operation does not align with the realities on the ground and that “a military response can never, in itself, solve the problem of irregular migration. As long as there is need for asylum from refugees and demand from economic migrants, the business of people smuggling will continue to exist and the networks will adapt to changing circumstances”

(“UK HoL Committee Report on Operation Sophia,” n.d., 34). While this may be the case, it fails to acknowledge how participation in Operation Sophia by the UK necessarily requires a military-strategic response. For the UK government, reducing net-migration and preventing resettlement is of primary concern. Operation Sophia functions as a front-line barrier against migrants entering the domestic territory, and therefore the use of the military is seen as appropriate and necessary. Also, given the maritime nature of the crisis, the navy alone is equipped to patrol and meet vessels on the Mediterranean; it is the only tool that is useful, despite the differences in social settings a humanitarian response may feature. A humanitarian response would certainly be beneficial for migrants, but it would run counter to the domestic political goals of the UK. Ultimately, it is in the interest of the UK to

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maintain the militarized efforts against smugglers, despite it being a fool’s errand with no real chances of curbing migration—regular or irregular in nature.

The ineffectiveness of the Operation in meeting its mandate has been further described in the 2016 UK House of Lords report on Operation Sophia in which it was concluded that:

The mission does not, however, in any meaningful way deter the flow of migrants, disrupt the smugglers’ networks, or impede the business of people smuggling on the central Mediterranean route. The arrests that Operation Sophia has made to date have been of low-level targets, while the destruction of vessels has simply caused the smugglers to shift from using wooden boats to rubber dinghies, which are even more unsafe. There are also significant limits to the intelligence that can be collected about onshore smuggling networks from the high seas. There is therefore little prospect of Operation Sophia overturning the business model of people smuggling. (“UK HoL Committee Report on Operation Sophia,” n.d., 3)

Further, the failures in meeting the original mandate of the Operation relates to the notion that operations such as Sophia treat the symptoms of migration, and not the causes. This is not to say the mission should simply be abandoned, rather given the reality that migration trends show no sign of receding, the mandate of the mission should shift to better reflect the realities on the seas: people will continue to take irregular migration routes to Europe as long as the regular routes continue to be slow-moving and limited. For the UK, this is especially troublesome in that the government has continually argued against resettlement which is an unstable position to hold given the numbers of migrants fleeing for Europe each day. European leadership will require a plan for resettlement in Europe if for no other reason than a considerable number of migrants are, as noted above, prima facie refugees.

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Biopolitical Sorting- Migrants, Refugees, Criminals

As the Mediterranean Sea generally, and the area covered by Operation Sophia more specifically, is treated with mechanisms of surveillance, migrants become subjected to biopolitical practices of sorting, filtering, and control. Ceaseless surveillance by sea and air form a security assemblage which acts as a ‘barrier’ created by the naval fleet. Surveillance technologies and the security assemblage that forms extend the extra-territorialization of borders beyond the geographical location of naval ships; it covers the entire region.

Surveillance then forms a central pillar of the Operation’s mandate. In the first phase of the

Operation, the mandate was to “support the detection and monitoring of migration networks through information gathering and patrolling on the high seas in accordance with international law” (“EU Council Decision 2015/778” n.d.). Essentially, this phase focused on intelligence gathering to establish a more comprehensive understanding of the crisis. By design, the categories of Others were established through this mandate in that it assumes vessels are part of smuggling rings first and foremost which carry smugglers and migrants; two specific categories of people.

Vessels suspected of smuggling are then sought out and treated uniformly under standardized procedures of capture/rescue and then, if necessary, the destruction of the vessel. From this moment onwards, migrants and smugglers become statistical categories which are used to inform policy and processes for mitigating the migration crisis. After a vessel carrying migrants is captured on the Mediterranean, those aboard—smugglers and migrants alike-- are taken to the nearest port in Italy. Smugglers are then subject to Italian

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judicial processes led by Italian authorities (“UK HoL Committee Report on Operation

Sophia,” n.d., 16) while migrants are processed and categorized as having legitimate claims to asylum or not. While the relationship between the militarized Operation Sophia and migrants end after they arrive in Italy, the security mechanisms do not. Migrants become subject to the social universe of internal security which, as Bigo notes, is characterized “in terms of ‘filtering’, of ‘separating legal and illegal travellers’, and the management of flows of people” (Bigo 2014, 211). There, migrants are processed, and their fingerprints taken and shared with Eurodac—the EU database. Specifically, the mandate of Operation Sophia states under that:

EUNAVFOR MED may collect, in accordance with applicable law, personal data concerning persons taken on board ships participating in EUNAVFOR MED related to characteristics likely to assist in their identification, including fingerprints, as well as the following particulars, with the exclusion of other personal data: surname, maiden name, given names and any alias or assumed name; date and place of birth, nationality, sex; place of residence, profession and whereabouts; driving licenses, identification documents and passport data. It may transmit such data and data related to the vessels and equipment used by such persons to the relevant law enforcement authorities of Member States and/or to competent Union bodies.

(“EU Council Decision 2015/778” n.d., 122/33)

This is not to say that data is collected on all migrants, however, that is certainly the goal.

Significant efforts have been made to increase the percentage of migrants of whom data is collected. Indeed, “the level [of migrants fingerprinted] had risen in Greece from 8% in

September 2015 to 78% in January 2016, and in Italy from 36% to 87% over the same period” (“EURODAC” n.d., 4). This upward trend suggests that absolute data collection is within reach.

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The section of the mandate shown above, while perhaps necessary for security and immigration purposes, is alarming for two reasons. First, the information that is collected forms the basis of biopolitical tracking of migrants. The scope of the individual data that is collected creates a highly thorough digital identification tag that once collected and entered becomes permanent. This can be problematic if the wrong data is mistakenly entered or if a person is misidentified: an individual can be wrongly categorized as an economic migrant instead of a refugee, for example, which carries significant consequences for the individual.

Secondly, the sharing of data that this mandate allows for is widespread and ambiguous.

While issues of rights, the law, judicial oversight, and the sharing of personal data across borders and through various agencies are beyond the scope of this thesis, it is significant in that the data shared has direct consequences for the individual: the biopolitical control— resulting from being categorized and filtered-- and the sovereign power—in terms of immigration and borders-- that can be exercised over an individual based on their digital tag can have serious repercussions if handled improperly or misidentified. To be sure, under the

Common European Asylum System (CEAS) there is an appeal process which, among other things, can be based on procedural grounds (“Common European Asylum System Factsheet” n.d.), yet this process can be time-consuming and certainly complex and stressful for the individual.

There is also a temporal aspect of this data collection. Each time an individual crosses a border or makes a claim for asylum, it is documented. Agencies such as FRONTEX, and national policing agencies, have the ability to view a time-line of said individual’s activities and whereabouts. Certainly, this is necessary for security purposes, yet it can be

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problematic when issues of misidentification arise. As noted in chapter three, security and immigration practices function based on the categorization of individuals. For UK immigration generally, and visa policy more specifically, the categorization is based on

‘black’ and ‘white’ countries with the former being heavily scrutinized if not entirely repressed. To be sure, there is a security element in this dichotomous grouping of countries: visa policy, understood as a technology of security based on risk assessment functions to ensure those who do enter a country are calculated to be a low security risk. This is directly related to Foucault’s (2007) notion that mechanisms of security including “the application of

[…] penal law, the development of preventative measures, and the organization of corrective punishment[…]” (Foucault 2007, 4) are governed based on questions of risk.

Under this notion, the mechanism of power that is Operation Sophia becomes transparent: it features the deliberate coupling of judicial-legal practices, surveillance and biopolitical tracking as a preventative measure, and the codified regulations for processing migrants as either legitimate asylum seekers or individuals destined for removal: corrective punishment.

In this sense, ‘correction’ suggests that individuals acted outside of the normative practices established by governments, and intervention is required.

Governmentality is the explicit and implicit directing of populations carried out through institutions, procedures and tactics of coercive power. (Foucault 2007, 108) In

Operation Sophia the tactics of governmentality are made more visible as, owing to the majority of migrants come from ‘black’ list countries such as Syria, this categorization further establishes the migrant as the ‘Other’; as different. Once this is established it

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becomes easier for governments to control populations as they are no longer viewed as a collection of individuals, but rather as a statistical category; a number.

Conclusions

Operation Sophia provides an excellent example of biopolitical sorting as being a component of governmentality. In this case, the UK established clear political goals of reducing net-migration domestically and ensuring that migrants and refugees would not be resettled in the UK. The Operation allows for the UK to extra-territorially enforce its borders and sovereign power over migrants. The specific naval practices of the Operation function as an all-encompassing net which first captures/rescues migrants and smugglers alike, and then deposits them in Italy where they become subject to Italian jurisdiction.

The mandate of the mission is focused on disrupting human smuggling rings, yet as has been demonstrated above, it fails to do so. In practice, the Operation serves humanitarian ends as it primarily operates as a militarized search and rescue mission. There are problems with this disconnect between the mandate and practices, specifically on issues of human rights law and refugee conventions, and while being beyond the scope of this thesis, are significant. The construction of the Operation does, however, serve the domestic political interests of the UK in that it prevents migrants from arriving across southern

Europe, and instead are funneled directly to Italy.

The mechanisms of power that are exercised over migrants cannot be overlooked either. The collection of data and the creation of a digital data profile of individual migrants serve to ensure surveillance long after they are rescued; the EU may retain data for a period

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of 10 years. (“EURODAC” n.d., 6) This data is available to be shared with various agencies and renders the individual to a statistical category based on risk. The potential pitfalls of this process are enormous; a mistake in data entry, or the misidentification of an individual can mean the difference of asylum being granted, or a deportation order being signed.

Ultimately however, these potential problems appear to be worth the cost as the UK, above all else, seeks to have total sovereign authority over immigration. The construction of

Operation Sophia, while being ill-suited for achieving its mandate, does succeed in saving human lives and in accomplishing the political goals of the UK government. But success should not be measured in these terms; saving the lives of migrants is not enough. What is required is an all-encompassing EU policy of immigration which provides security to Europe and migrants yet is not so rigid as to leave migrants with no other recourse but human smuggling. The UK suggests repeatedly that the migration crisis can only be solved by fixing the conditions in the source countries, however, it would appear that what also is required is for European governments to examine their own policies of (im)migration and ask how they contribute to migration.

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CHAPTER SIX: Conclusions and Reflections

“[…] no one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear saying leave, run away from me now i don't know what i’ve become but i know that anywhere is safer than here […]” (Shire n.d.) Securitization Theory has been no stranger of irregular migration, refugees, and security studies. Recent scholarship has used the theory to analyze Syrian refugees in Turkey as

‘guests’ and ‘enemies’ (Togral Koca 2016), grassroots refugee-led community groups in relation to governmental securitization of migration (Mcconnachie 2018), media securitization of refugees in Slovenia (Vezovnik 2018), securitization and desecuritization of migrants in Croatia (Jakesevic and Tatalovic 2016), and the intersection of gender and securitization in the context of Somali women refugees and the EU (Gerard and Pickering

2014). Each of these works demonstrate the wide-ranging applicability of Securitization

Theory in areas of irregular migration and security. Clearly, the theory has proven useful in understanding how issues are perceived and constructed politically.

Biopolitical analysis has also proven useful in analyzing irregular migration and security. As noted in chapter five, the works of Aliya (2015), Bettini (2017), and Salter (2006) to name but a few, have all used biopolitics to examine issues to draw interesting analyses that focus of the creation and management of a population through a biopolitical lens. As scholarship evolves, there is an empirical opening for analysis of how these theories can be used in conjunction with others, such as Securitization Theory, to better understand issues of irregular migration, how it is framed, and how it is responded to.

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Findings of Analysis

UK participation in Operation Sophia provides an excellent example of the merger of a securitization act and biopolitical tactics of governing as related to migration. In assessing the relationship is between migrating populations, security policies and practices, and borders, it is shown in this thesis that the power exercised by the UK government serves to ensure UK border security, limit net-migration to the UK, and establish biopolitical control over migrating populations extra-territorially. Findings further demonstrate that that the UK government, beginning in the spring of 2015, had to reconcile the realities of mass migration with its domestic political goals of reducing net-migration and ensuring effective border security is maintained. By analyzing speeches, debates, and committee minutes, findings show that the use of humanitarian discourse to frame the plight of migrants on the

Mediterranean as an existentially threatened population was paired with the discourse of criminality to portray the smugglers as the existential threat to the security of migrants. The migration crisis further falls under the umbrella of security due to the methods proposed and ultimately employed to mitigate it: the deployment of a militarized operation featuring the use of technologies of surveillance, military assets such as naval ships and aircraft, and all with the mandate to seek, disrupt, and destroy human smuggling rings. This Operation was touted by the governing Conservatives as an essential part of protecting the lives of migrants while ensuring the borders of Europe remain secure and the regular paths of migration – primarily visas-- remain intact.

The securitization act successfully established migrants as the referent object of security, and smugglers as the referent subject of security. The primary securitizing actors

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include then Prime Minister David Cameron, then Home Secretary Theresa May, and then

Immigration Minister James Brokenshire—all of whom are high-ranking members of the

Conservative Party. The securitizing speech acts made by these actors allowed for consensus to be established on the nature of the threats facing migrants as being existential, and therefore requiring exceptional policy measures beyond that of normal politics. While Operation Sophia is an exceptional policy in that it was created specifically to respond to the Mediterranean migration crisis, it features more of what Butler (2004) refers to as the instrumentalization of the law, rather than the law having inherent structural limits as is the view of Agamben (2005) and Schmitt (2007). This instrumentalization of the law, specifically with regard to relocating migrants and smugglers from the high seas to processing centres in Italy as per the mandate of Operation Sophia serves the political ends of the UK government of reducing net-migration and maintaining border security. These political ends are met on the one hand, through the implementation of biopolitical filtering and categorization of migrants and the tactics of governmentality that use these statistical categories of Others to control and monitor the populations. On the other hand, the

Operation functions as a wall which extends the borders of Europe generally, and the UK specifically beyond the geographical limits. This forms the basis of the extra- territorialization of borders as a tactic of governing.

The mandate and practices of second phase of Operation Sophia raise numerous issues pertaining to biopolitics. First, the filtering and categorization of migrants into groupings of refugees, smugglers, and economic migrants function as statistical categories in which it is not the individual that is focused on, but rather the group as a whole. Further,

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the data that is collected as per the Operation’s mandate is used to establish a digital profile which is then shared through various agencies and authorities for purposes of security and policing. Here, the goal is to ensure individuals that are granted asylum or enter immigration streams pose a low security risk. Also, by basing these categories on risk management, a temporal aspect is established: assessing an individual’s past as well as the probability of future risk requires a comprehensive collection of data. The data that is gathered is then retained for up to 10 years, and as mentioned above is shared through agencies such as EURODAC, FRONTEX, EUROPOL and numerous national entities. Although processes of appeals are present, the incorrect categorization of an individual can have profound consequences such as the refoulment of legitimate refugees or, alternatively, the admittance of a high-risk individual into a society.

Despite these concerns, the practices and indeed the mandate of Operation Sophia allow for tactics of governmentality to be exercised over migrants. Instead of arriving at various points across southern Europe, all are caught in the naval net and taken to Italian ports. This, for the UK especially, is beneficial in that governments know who is where at any given time, and the likelihood of individuals entering Europe through irregular migration routes dramatically diminishes. For the UK, these practices ensure that migrants are unable to reach English soil thus lending to the accomplishment of the domestic political goals. Beyond these practical benefits, the UK is able to project its power globally, act as a regional leader in crisis management and mitigation, and all while maintaining sovereign control over how it chooses to participate.

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The UK’s exertion of power through the extra-territorialization of its borders as outlined in this thesis demonstrate how mass migration is causing states to make efforts to block migratory routes far and away from their sovereign borders. To be sure, extending borders into international waters seems to be ongoing and without any consequence. The third phase of Operation Sophia’s mandate however, poses immense risk to the nature of geopolitics, sovereignty, and the rule of international law despite its claim that it will only operate in coastal national waters if granted permission by the coastal state and adhering to international law. (“EUNAVFOR-MED Leaflet” 2016.) The potential issues that may arise are based on the fact that EU states seem to prioritize the success of the Operation over all else—despite its flawed mandate. This, paired with the fragile nature of the Libyan state— the state of which phase 3 will operate in—suggest that the EU powers may have little recourse but to act in the region regardless of the technical legalities through the further mobilization of military forces under Operation Sophia. While discussing a hypothetical situation may be antithetical to assessing the past and present practices of Operation

Sophia¸ it is useful when contrasted against the ways in which Operation Sophia has allowed for the instrumentalization of the law; it stands to reason that under the guise of a military/humanitarian mission, the rules may be bent once more to serve the perceived higher purpose of mitigating the Mediterranean migration crisis and ensuring European border remain secure.

Reflections for the Future

Following the death of Aylan Kurdi, the position of refugee resettlement in the UK seemingly softened. No longer could the UK government tout humanitarian responsibilities

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and regional leadership without addressing resettlement. On September 7, 2015, the House debated on Syria. The debate saw similar rhetoric as in previous debates: humanitarian discourse to describe migrants and criminality discourse used to describe smugglers. There was one significant difference; the government partially reversed its position on refugee resettlement. The then Prime Minister repeated similar descriptions of the migrant crisis in which an existential threat faced those crossing the Mediterranean, as well as continued to name the referent subject as “[…] criminal gangs who are profiting from this human tragedy[…]” (“Syria: Refugees and Counter-Terrorism - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 23). Again however, the government remained committed to the belief that the only solution to the crisis was in stemming the flow of migrants at the source via aid. Despite this, the Prime

Minister did discuss how the UK would be resettling documented refugees chosen from refugee camps in the region.

Turning to the question of refugees, Britain already works with the UN to deliver resettlement programmes and we will accept thousands more under the existing schemes. We have provided sanctuary to more than 5,000 Syrians in Britain and we have introduced a specific resettlement scheme, alongside those we already had, to help Syrian refugees who are particularly at risk. […] We are proposing that Britain should resettle up to 20,000 Syrian refugees over the rest of this Parliament. In doing so, we will continue to show the world that this is a country of extraordinary compassion, always standing up for our values and helping those in need […] We will continue with our approach of taking refugees from the camps, and from elsewhere in Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. (“Syria: Refugees and Counter-Terrorism - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 24)

Cameron would go on to state that the reason the government chose to resettle people from refugee camps was to deter migrants from attempting to make the dangerous crossing from North Africa to Europe, but also notes that Britain and the EU require a

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“comprehensive plan” to respond to the overwhelming number of people migrating to

Europe. (“Syria: Refugees and Counter-Terrorism - Hansard Online” n.d., col. 32) This position, while certainly beneficial for those in refugee camps, does little for migrants awaiting in Europe. In addition, whether the government will be able to accomplish this pledge remains to be seen. At the time of this writing, around 8,000 Syrian refugees have been resettled in the UK (Greenfield 2017) yet, as noted above, none have been migrants already in Europe. In the context of the UK and Operation Sophia¸ this demonstrates that the government’s repeated position against the resettlement of Mediterranean migrants has manifested itself into reality. Finally, while 20,000 refugees being resettled is a positive step forward in absolute terms, it cannot be overlooked that there are millions of individuals requiring immediate assistance; 20,000 pales in comparison relative to the crisis as a whole.

Recent statistics provided by the Office of National Statistics in the UK show that between 2015 and February 2018, overall net-migration to the UK has declined. (“Migration

Statistics Quarterly Report - Office for National Statistics” n.d.) This decline can be attributed to a dramatic decrease in EU migration to the UK based on Brexit uncertainty, but also in that the UK government’s overall policy efforts to lower net-migration have been successful. It remains to be seen whether the full scope of Operation Sophia will have any lasting impact in deterring smuggling rings moving forward as the Operation continues with the third phase having yet to been launched. Whether operating in the territorial waters of

Libya will have any positive effects cannot yet be known. If anything, the third phase will further extend the extra-territorialization of European borders beyond international waters

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and encroach on the sovereign territory of Libya. Notwithstanding, there seems to be no end in sight of migrants seeking safety and attempting to flee Libya, Syria, and other states in the region experiencing conflict and turmoil. Therefore, it is the case that efforts must be realigned to ensure the rescuing of migrants on the high-seas takes centre stage. If borders are tightened, ‘regular’ immigration routes restricted, and EU states placing more focus on deterrent efforts than humanitarianism, migrants will find other ways to flee tyranny—most likely through illegal human smuggling operations traversing irregular migratory routes.

Further uncertainty about the future of migration comes from the current political landscape in Europe. The results and consequences of Brexit, which at the time of this writing are unknown, will undoubtedly impact the migration crisis given the nature of the

UK as a leader, or at the very least a central actor in crisis mitigation. So too will other

European national elections. Most recently, Italy held an election on March 4th 2018 which saw an anti-immigrant coalition of parties capture 37% of the vote. (Tondo 2018) As Italy is at the epicentre of migrant relocation practices within Operation Sophia, a shift in policy can have profound consequences for migrants. The rise of right-wing anti-Other parties in

Europe has the potential to shift the EU away from an open border coalition to a closed-off and inward-looking set of states. These potential scenarios relate to the current structure of migration mitigation practices which see the burden placed on only a few European states such as Italy. This is not sustainable moving forward. What is required is a common EU resettlement scheme to more evenly distribute the burden and lessen the strains on any one state’s social welfare system. Unfortunately, the opposite trend appears to be on the upswing, especially in the UK where, as has been demonstrated in this thesis, anti-Other

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sentiments continue to permeate society and a lack of government motivation to increase humanitarian efforts of resettlement continues to exist.

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