Humanitarianism, Human Rights, and Security

The Case of Frontex

Nina Perkowski

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780429514883
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Examining the relationship between humanitarianism, human rights, and security in the governance of borders and migration, this book analyses the case of the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex), challenging the common assumption that humanitarianism and human rights provide a critical basis for countering securitisation.

Arguing that these are not three opposing discourses and modes of governing, the author contributes to a deeper understanding of their connections and combined effects in border governance. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, interviews, and document analysis, the book offers three perspectives on Frontex's changing relationship to humanitarianism and human rights. In doing so, it provides a multifaceted account of Frontex and its gradual appropriation of what are often considered pro-migrant discourses. Combining organisational sociology with a Foucauldian analysis, the book speaks to ongoing debates on continuity and change in the security field and provides insights into studying security organisations more generally.

Drawing on insights from Critical Migration and Border Studies, Critical Security Studies, Critical Humanitarianism and Human Rights Studies, and Organisational Sociology, the book will generate interest to multiple disciplines, including Sociology, International Relations, Politics, Anthropology, European Studies, and Geography.

1
Humanitarianism, human rights, and security

Introduction

In public debates and academic writings critical of contemporary bordering practices, security-centred approaches to migration are often opposed to “better” alternatives, particularly human rights or humanitarian approaches. Where humanitarian or human rights language is used by security actors or in security-oriented policymaking, this tends to be dismissed as a strategic act, viewed as being insincere and divorced from “real” practices on the ground. This dismissal, however, fails to appreciate the intricate connections between humanitarianism, human rights, and security. In assuming that human rights and humanitarianism are opposed to security, it risks resulting in calls for a better implementation of humanitarian and human rights principles rather than fundamentally challenging existing border practices. Moving beyond the idea of a gap between humanitarian and human rights rhetoric and security practices, this chapter offers an analysis of humanitarianism, human rights, and security as three independent yet closely related discursive formations.

The chapter begins with a cursory overview of the connections drawn between humanitarianism, human rights, and security in EUropean border governance over the last 15 years. Exploring how this development has been understood within academic literature, the chapter proceeds by showing that existing analyses tend to focus on the connections between humanitarianism and security, neglecting human rights. Seeking to address this gap, the chapter proceeds by introducing each of the three discursive formations in turn. It briefly reflects on their respective histories and their contemporary manifestations in migration governance, taking into account their “colonial arcs” (Lemberg-Pedersen, 2019, p. 250). This historical grounding seeks to provide a context for the analysis presented in the remainder of the book, contesting policy framings that tend to portray migratory developments and policy responses as novel and unprecedented. Given the diversity of colonial powers, strategies, and contexts, this chapter cannot provide a comprehensive engagement with each discursive formation’s historical links to colonial regimes, as doing so would go beyond the scope of this book and “run the risk of a too-hasty homogenization of colonialism as a whole” (Scott, 2005). It will instead indicate some of the postcolonial continuities that are important to consider in relation to contemporary invocations of humanitarianism, human rights, and security. After introducing each discursive formation individually, the chapter examines their similarities and connections. In particular, it argues that understanding humanitarianism, human rights, and security as discourses of protection allows for making sense of their interconnections in border governance, as their shared characteristics have created the conditions of possibility for the appropriation of human rights and humanitarianism alongside security by state and security actors. This theoretical understanding provides the basis for the remainder of this book.

Humanitarian, human rights, and security in EUropean border governance

Humanitarian and security logics have been connected in EUropean border discourse and practice for at least 15 years. Ongoing discussions around extraterritorial processing illustrate this. In the wake of the Cap Anamur case¹ in 2004, the German and Italian Ministers of the Interior Schily and Pisanu first mobilised humanitarian arguments to promote the creation of extraterritorial camps for asylum seekers, claiming that these would put an end to deaths at sea (Hess and Tsianos, 2007; Klepp, 2011). While the UK government had presented similar proposals for extraterritorial processing already in 2003, these focused on improving migration management and enhancing security and were met with sceptical responses by other EU governments, in particular Germany and Sweden (Léonard and Kaunert, 2016). Reconsidering the idea a year later, Schily justified it in both humanitarian and security terms. He explicitly addressed his intervention in favour of extraterritorial processing centres to “those who justifiably worry about the people who become victims of smugglers or try to reach Europe from North Africa via the Mediterranean on their own with unseaworthy boats,” noting that “[t]his attempt has cost many people their lives. That can and must not leave anyone indifferent” (Schily, 2004, my translation). A decade later, in response to heightened arrivals in 2014, German Minister of the Interior De Maizière once again proposed to open what he referred to as “welcome centres” in order to facilitate the extraterritorial processing of asylum claims, arguing that this would speed up deportations, save lives, and protect individuals from smugglers (Braun, 2014). Indeed, humanitarian arguments have become one of the main justifications for externalising border controls over the last decade (Casas-Cortes et al., 2015, p. 74).

On an EU policy level, the 2011 Global Approach to Migration and Mobility (GAMM) introduced a “migrant-centred” approach, outlining a range of concerns about the well-being and rights of irregular migrants (European Commission, 2011). Declaring that “migration governance is not about ‘flows’, ‘stocks’ and ‘routes’, it is about people,” the GAMM states that “policies must be designed to respond to the aspirations and problems of the people concerned,” and that special consideration must be paid to “protecting and empowering vulnerable migrants” (European Commission, 2011, p. 6). This humanitarian language is combined with an emphasis on human rights, and the GAMM makes clear that “[r]espect for the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU is a key component of EU policies on migration” (European Commission, 2011, p. 6). At the same time, the document retains a strong focus on security, declaring for instance that “irregular migration also needs to be considered in connection with organised crime and lack of rule of law and justice, feeding on corruption and inadequate regulation” (European Commission, 2011, p. 15). As such, the GAMM combines humanitarian, human rights, and security concerns in a single document.

Written shortly after the death of more than 1200 people in a single week in April 2015, the 2015 European Agenda on Migration (the Agenda) has an even stronger emphasis on humanitarian values and human rights. The Agenda sets out “to protect those in need,” “to avert further loss of life,” “[t]o try to halt the human misery,” and declares a commitment “to be a safe haven for those fleeing persecution” and “the need for swift and determined action in response to the human tragedy in the whole of the Mediterranean” (European Commission, 2015, p. 2). An emphasis on human rights complements this, with migrants’ rights invoked in particular in relation to deportations, reception conditions, fingerprinting, and the social rights of those legally resident in the EU. In “[u]pholding our international commitments and values while securing our borders” (European Commission, 2015, p. 2), the Agenda brings together this emphasis on “EU values” and legal obligations with a security logic. Invoking fears of uncontrolled mass migration, it notes that “there are serious doubts about whether our migration policy is equal to the pressure of thousands of migrants” (European Commission, 2015, p. 2) and outlines a range of measures aimed at deterring migrants and externalising migration controls. Presenting the EU’s response to the so-called migration crisis, the Agenda weaves together human rights, humanitarian, and security language seamlessly and further consolidates this triple focus in EU migration policy.

As these examples show, connections between security and humanitarianism within the context of EUropean migration governance are not new. Indeed, their connection in policy and practice has attracted increasing scholarly attention in recent years. Notably, Lemberg-Pedersen argues that “the observable ambivalence in the twin appeals to security and rights, which have characterized humanitarian action since its inception in eighteenth century anti-slavery politics” were already “[p]art and parcel of colonial matrices of power” (Lemberg-Pedersen, 2019, p. 253). Identifying “blurred boundaries between capture, rescue and predation” during colonialism as well as in contemporary externalisation practices, he shows that there exist contingent parallels between both (Lemberg-Pedersen, 2019, p. 265). Others focus their analyses on contemporary EUrope. Fassin (2012) has been influential in exploring the prevalence of “humanitarian reason” in the contemporary world, analysing among others how humanitarianism and security worked together in the governing of Sangatte camp. Ticktin (2011) shows how humanitarianism works as a strategy of government in France, where an opening of “humanitarian” residence permits was accompanied by a closing down of rights-based routes. Agier (2010, p. 30) refers to humanitarianism as “a form of policing,” problematising its use as a strategy of control in refugee camps. Within critical security studies, Aradau (2008) provides the most in-depth analysis of the convergence of security and humanitarianism/human rights to date. Using a Foucauldian approach, she shows how a politics of pity mobilised by NGOs on behalf of victims of trafficking is compatible with and gradually morphed into a rationality of risk management. She argues that being at risk (of trafficking, or abuse) is often coterminous with being a risk to society (of becoming a perpetrator of abuse, or an irregular migrant) and that the inscription of riskiness into women’s biographies subverts the pity mobilised by NGOs. In analysing the governance of human trafficking,² Aradau raises pertinent points regarding the cooperation between NGOs and police, the incorporation of a “victimisation” approach in the security dispositif, and the merging of humanitarianism/human rights and security in the governance of trafficked women. Importantly, however, Aradau does not distinguish between humanitarianism and human rights and uses them interchangeably. Other analyses of humanitarianism in border governance have continued in this vein.

Vaughan-Williams (2015) for instance contrasts humanitarian policy discourses with the “animalisation” and deaths of irregularised individuals at sea, in camps and detention centres. Attesting a “conceptual crisis” (2015, p. 6) in contemporary scholarship, he argues that analyses pointing to a gap between humanitarian “rhetoric” and violent “reality” fail to grasp that border practices are inherently ambiguous, simultaneously understanding people on the move as at risk and as risks. Reworking existing scholarship on biopolitics and combining this with insights from Agamben, Derrida, and Esposito, Vaughan-Williams provides important insights into the thanatopolitical and zoopolitical potentialities of EUrope’s bio-political borders and argues that EUrope’s border crisis can be understood as an auto-immune crisis, an excess of EUropean border security practices. Similar to Aradau, however, he conflates humanitarianism and human rights in his analysis, treating references to saving lives and protecting rights as one and the same.

Other scholars have focused their analyses exclusively on the articulation of humanitarian and security practices. Like Aradau and Vaughan-Williams, Pallister-Wilkins (2015, 2018) draws on a Foucauldian understanding of government in analysing the intersection of humanitarianism and policing in EUropean border governance. Examining the representation of Frontex’s activities, and drawing on work in what she calls critical humanitarianism studies – most prominently Fassin (2012), Ticktin (2011), and Agier (2011a) – Pallister-Wilkins notes that historically, both humanitarianism and policing have been bound up with notions of care and control. Reaffirming that humanitarianism and policing should not be thought of as opposites, Pallister-Wilkins contends that “there is nothing contradictory in the use of humanitarian ideas and practices in European border policing” (2015, p. 55). Examining EU hotspots, she points to the double function of humanitarianism as a liberal diagnostic (Reid-Henry, 2013) that enables the maintenance of liberal order at times of growing hostility towards refugees across EUrope on the one hand, and the efficient management of the “refugee crisis” in the Greek islands on the other (Pallister-Wilkins, 2018).

As noted, Pallister-Wilkins limits her analysis to humanitarianism and security, despite the prominent roles that human rights have had within Frontex and in setting up the hotspots. Indeed, she argues that

Frontex can talk in humanitarian terms, ask for humanitarian action, and manage risk in the name of human beings but, importantly … Frontex cannot uphold human rights, neither can they ensure territorial security as both human rights and border policing remain the sovereign responsibility of the member states.

(Pallister-Wilkins, 2015, p. 66)

Regardless of any legal argument made here, this analysis stops short of engaging with the centrality of human rights claims in Frontex’s organisational discourse. Beyond issues of legal competence – and accountability – there are important questions around the ability of institutional actors like Frontex to combine human rights, humanitarian, and security talk, which will be explored in the remainder of this book.

Unlike other scholars, Aas and Gundhus (2015) differentiate between humanitarianism and human rights in their analysis of border policing in EUrope. Meanwhile, they focus primarily on what they discuss as the challenges of policing humanitarian borderlands, where incoherencies between the rhetorical importance given to humanitarianism and human rights on the one hand and a practical focus on minimising risks for state security on the other prevail, thereby reifying the “rhetoric” vs. “practice” gap criticised by Vaughan-Williams (2015). Drawing on Fassin (2012), they understand Frontex as an example of how humanitarianism has come to shape contemporary policing, even if primarily in rhetoric. Challenging Fassin’s suggestion that a proliferation of humanitarian reason and governance occurs at the expense of human rights, they find that “the language of humanitarian assistance has grown alongside an intensified organizational focus on human rights” (Aas and Gundhus, 2015, p. 14). Also, Cuttitta (2017) differentiates between humanitarianism and human rights and conceptualises the latter as a constitutive part of the EU’s humanitarian border. In analysing the inclusionary and exclusionary effects of this border, Cuttitta critically examines the selective incorporation of human rights in affirmations of the humanitarian border by EU institutions. In particular, he notes that EU and Italian border practices in the Mediterranean affirm the ri...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of figures
• About the author
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 Humanitarianism, human rights, and security
• 2 Frontex as a compromise
• 3 Frontex as protector of Europe, saviour of lives, and promoter of rights
• 4 Frontex as a fragmented organisation
• 5 The effects of Frontex’s re-positioning
• Conclusion: reconsidering critique
• Index