TY - JOUR
T1 - ‘Formal informality’ in EU external migration governance: the case of Mobility Partnerships
AU - Cardwell, Paul James
AU - Dickson, Rachael
N1 - Funding Information:
Versions were presented at the workshop Migration and New Governance in the EU (University of Strathclyde 2019) with support from the James Madison Charitable Trust, UACES Annual Conference, (Lisbon 2019), and RESPOND conference, University of Cambridge (2019). The authors thank Natascha Zaun, Arne Niemann, Olivia Nantermoz, Violeta Moreno-Lax and the anonymous reviewers for comments.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2023/5/8
Y1 - 2023/5/8
N2 - External migration has become a site for extensive EU activity, not least in the years following the start of the migration ‘crisis’ in 2015–2016. It has also become a testing ground for forms of governance that are not generally associated with external relations. We term this type of governance ‘formal informality’ as there is the appearance of an EU agreement with a third country but lacking the legal protections or transparency for actions taken under it. The informality associated with tools of governance is potentially problematic when used to bypass the substantive and procedural formalities associated with law, and which in turn ensure transparency and the protection of rights. This article uses the emergence and evolution of Mobility Partnerships between the EU and third countries as a prism to analyse what the moves towards informality mean for the governance of external migration.
AB - External migration has become a site for extensive EU activity, not least in the years following the start of the migration ‘crisis’ in 2015–2016. It has also become a testing ground for forms of governance that are not generally associated with external relations. We term this type of governance ‘formal informality’ as there is the appearance of an EU agreement with a third country but lacking the legal protections or transparency for actions taken under it. The informality associated with tools of governance is potentially problematic when used to bypass the substantive and procedural formalities associated with law, and which in turn ensure transparency and the protection of rights. This article uses the emergence and evolution of Mobility Partnerships between the EU and third countries as a prism to analyse what the moves towards informality mean for the governance of external migration.
KW - European Union, migration, governance, mobility partnerships, neighbourhood policy
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85158112079&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/1369183X.2023.2193743
DO - 10.1080/1369183X.2023.2193743
M3 - Article
SN - 1369-183X
VL - 49
SP - 3121
EP - 3139
JO - JOURNAL OF ETHNIC AND MIGRATION STUDIES
JF - JOURNAL OF ETHNIC AND MIGRATION STUDIES
IS - 12
ER -