Desperate and vulnerable people, who take enormous risks to migrate to Europe in rickety boats or concealed in the containers of articulated lorries, are familiar images portrayed in the media of “irregular migrants”. Irregular migration has become a major political concern both at the European level and in the wider international context. In the European Union, politicians have identified irregular migration as a “problem” and have given priority to preventing this phenomenon in the development of the common asylum and immigration policy.
This collection of essays is the outcome of an international conference on Irregular Migration and Human Rights, which gathered together prominent scholars, policy-makers and practitioners working in the migration and human rights field. The objective of the book, in contrast to the prevailing political approach which focuses almost solely on prevention, is to discuss the human rights dimensions of irregular migration from theoretical, European and international perspectives. The book is divided into five substantive parts: the complex question of who is an irregular migrant and the difficulties in assessing the size of irregular movements: official and popular perceptions of irregular migrants, a debate which is frequently considered in terms of security concerns, asylum, and human trafficking and smuggling; the myriad strands of the developing EU law and policy on irregular migration, such as the adoption of readmission agreements, and the relationship of this law and policy to external border controls in the context of EU enlargement and other non-legal means of EU decision-making; the contributions of international and non-governmental actors to charting a rights-based approach to irregular migration; and the problems these vulnerable persons face while resident in host countries, such as discrimination and denial of access to social rights and public services, which is inextricably bound up with their irregular status.
Preface; Introduction
Kees Groenendijk;
Part I: Who are Irregular Migrants?;
1. Who Is An Irregular Migrant?
Elspeth Guild;
2. Measuring Irregular Migration: Implications for Law, Policy and Human Rights
Valsamis Mitsilegas;
3. Irregular Migration and Migration Theory: Making State Authorisation Less Relevant
Dora Kostakopoulou; <
b>Part II: Perceptions of Irregular Migrants;
4. Criminalisation of “Migrants”: The Side Effect of the Will to Control the Frontiers and the Sovereign Illusion
Didier Bigo;
5. Porous Borders, Terrorism and Migration Policy
David Bonner;
6. Irregular Migration and Asylum-Seeking: Forced Marriage or Reason for Divorce?
Johannes van der Klaauw;
7. Irregular Migration Networks: The Challenge Posed by People Traffickers to States and Human Rights
Ryszard Piotrowicz;
Part III: Irregular Migration in the Context of the Developing European Union
Acquis;
8. European Union Policy on Irregular Migration: Human Rights Lost?
Ryszard Cholewinski;
9. Irregular Immigration and EU External Relations
Steve Peers;
10. Modes of Governance For an EU Immigration Policy – What Role for the Open Method of Co-ordination?
Barbara Bogusz 11. European Union Immigration Policy after Enlargement – Building the New Europe or the New Iron Curtain?
Adam Cygan;
Part IV: International and Non-Governmental Responses to Irregular Migration;
12. Globalization/Migration: Imperatives for Civil Society and International Organizations
Patrick A. Taran;
13. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the Human Rights of Migrants in an Irregular Situation
Jillyanne Redpath;
14. Irregular Migration and Human Rights: A Council of Europe Perspective
Simon Tonelli;
15. Human Rights, State Sovereignty and the Protection of Undocumented Migrants Under the International Migrant Workers’ Convention
Linda S. Bosniak;
Part V: Fostering Integration;
16. Invisible Actors? Irregular Migrants and Discrimination
Mark Bel;
17. Fundamental Social Rights for Irregular Migrants: The Right to Health Care in France and England
Sylvie Da Lomba 18. Coping With Irregular Migration: The Dutch Experience
Paul Minderhoud 19. Regularising Migration in the European Union
Erika Szyszczak 20. Developments in the Case Law of the European Court of Human Rights
Nicholas Blake List of Contributors;
Index.