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The Arab Uprisings and the EU's
Migration Policies—The Cases of Egypt,
Libya, and Syria
Peter Seeberg a
a Center for Contemporary Middle East Studies, University of
Southern Denmark, Denmark
Version of record first published: 11 Mar 2013.
To cite this article: Peter Seeberg (2013): The Arab Uprisings and the EU's Migration Policies—The
Cases of Egypt, Libya, and Syria, Democracy and Security, 9:1-2, 157-176
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Democracy and Security, 9: 157–176, 2013
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ISSN: 1741-9166 print/1555-5860 online
DOI: 10.1080/17419166.2013.747909
The Arab Uprisings and the EU’s
Migration Policies—The Cases
of Egypt, Libya, and Syria
Peter Seeberg
Center for Contemporary Middle East Studies, University of Southern Denmark,
Denmark
The article analyzes the European Union’s (EU) migration strategies toward the Arab
states in the light of the Arab uprisings in a comparative context. Going through migra-
tory processes related to Egypt, Libya, and Syria, the article discusses Middle Eastern
migration and its diverse manifestations, critically assessing the relevance of the EU’s
migration policy ambitions vis-à-vis the different challenges in the Mediterranean
region. In its theoretical approach, the article draws on the concept of non-traditional
security, demonstrating that migration constitutes an anarchistic element in the rela-
tions between states, which goes beyond traditional foreign policy means. The article
characterizes recent EU initiatives concerning migration and demonstrates that despite
the fact that the EU has declared migration “one of the strategic priorities in the exter-
nal relations of the Union,” it seems apparent that the EU has not been able to develop
adequate new approaches regarding migration. Many of the suggested initiatives within
the framework of the new EU foreign policy setup have not been established yet—they
remain preliminary works in progress, projects in different stages or legislative pro-
cedures under negotiation between EU institutions. Summing up the cases of Egypt,
Libya, and Syria, the article concludes that the migration phenomenon since the start of
the Arab unrest in early 2011 constitutes a highly important issue in European–Middle
Eastern relations, regarding which, the EU foreign and security measures seem to be
relevant only to some degree.
Keywords: Arab Uprisings, Egypt, EU Migration Policies, Libya, Security, Syria
INTRODUCTION
As stated in an European Union (EU) Commission Communication of May 24,
2011 concerning migration,1the Arab uprisings in 2011 have induced signifi-
cant population movements in the Mediterranean, thereby creating new migra-
tory tendencies, which are highly complex and heterogeneous. Expressions
Address correspondence to Peter Seeberg, Center for Contemporary Middle East
Studies, University of Southern Denmark, Campusvej 55, DK-5230 Odense M,
Denmark. E-mail: seeberg@hist.sdu.dk
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158 P. Seeberg
of this unforeseen development have been seen, for instance, in connection
with the Tunisian migrants trying to enter Italian islands early in 2011, with
migrants from Libya (be they Egyptian guest workers leaving Libya or transit
migrants from other African states trying to reach Europe, etc.) and from other
states in the Maghreb and the Middle East, including Syrians seeking protec-
tion in Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey. The European coastline and the islands of
the Mediterranean is once again experiencing growing pressure from migratory
processes in the MENA region, this time as a result of unexpected uprisings in
the region, the consequences of which are still impossible to predict.
Furthermore, official European state institutions, national as well as
European, has registered an increased pressure from asylum applicants, as it
can be seen in official EU statistics, Eurostat, etc.2As noted by Alexandros
Bitoulas: “There was a large increase in asylum applicants in the second
quarter of 2011 compared with the same quarter of the previous year (...)
Reflecting the civil and political crisis in North Africa ...”3It is hardly doc-
umented that there was a direct connection between “the Arab Uprisings”
and the growing number of asylum seekers, but it seems likely that the two
phenomena were interconnected. Peter Feuilherade has recently pointed at
the “massive movements of refugees and displaced people across the Middle
East and North Africa,” and mentions among others Syria, Libya, and Egypt,
but also neighboring countries such as Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and
Turkey.4
As emphasized in a seminal article by Myron Weiner, migration and
refugee issues are no longer the sole concern of ministries of labor or of
immigration. Contrary to that they “are now matters of high international
politics, engaging the attention of heads of state, cabinets, and key ministries
involved in defense, international security, and external relations.”5The unpre-
dictability of the Arab uprisings of 2011 tend to make migration an even more
important foreign policy and security issue, thus making it a relevant research
focus in the coming years.
A large amount of research projects have been documenting the migratory
movements in the Mediterranean in the latest decades and, taking the Middle
East and its relations to the EU as point of departure, it can be claimed that the
political and institutional developments are creating huge challenges for the
attempts at cooperation within this area. On one side, the complex challenges
for the EU in the MENA region have led to pragmatic tendencies in European
foreign and security policy. On the other side, the EU itself is experiencing a
continuously slow integration process, which only recently has seen the Lisbon
Treaty setup beginning to function with the new EU political leadership and
the launching of the European External Action Service (EEAS).
At one of the new EEAS homepages, it is said that “Migration is at the heart
of the political debate in Europe and (...) is one of the strategic priorities in the
external relations of the Union.” In understanding migration as an important
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 159
issue in a security context the role of different forms of continued migration
networks becomes relevant. Processes like chain migration related to family
reunion, migration networks (via official, semiofficial, or clandestine channels)
or ethnic diasporas constitute examples of both transnational social formations
and local, more accidental developments.
But also more problematic phenomena such as illegal migration activities
organized by people smugglers are represented as part of the developments in
the Middle East related to the Arab uprisings. With the tendency since 9/11 of
securitizing migration movements towards the EU and with the growing
European focus on Islamist organizations in the MENA region throughout the
new challenges in 2011 the interconnectedness between security and migration
develops new dimensions in the narratives related to recent migration move-
ments. The unplanned and accidental character of a large part of the migration
processes linked to the Arab unrest contributes to the intense security focus
attached to them.
It is the ambition of this article to analyze the European Union’s migration
strategies towards the Arab states in a Mediterranean perspective, with a focus
on to which degree the European measures seem to be appropriate vis- à -
vis the new challenges. Taking the cases of Egypt, Libya, and Syria as point
of departure it is the intention to analyze Middle Eastern migration from a
heterogeneity perspective, critically assessing the relevance of EU’s migration
policy ambitions vis-à-vis the different challenges in the Mediterranean region
in a comparative context.6
NEW EUROPEAN CONCEPTUALIZATIONS
OF MIGRATION
Since the analysis is concentrating on Egypt, Libya, and Syria the other states
in the MENA region will be included in the analysis only in so far as they
have relevance for migration in a European context. The Mediterranean states
taking part in the European Neighbourhood Policy are most relevant for the
examination because of their geographical proximity of Europe. As underlined
by Christopher Rudolph, national interests of states have external and internal
orientations and, taken in this context, they contain (at least) three important
dimensions: geopolitical security, the production and accumulation of wealth,
and social stability and cohesion.7
Rudolph argues that migration today should be considered an important
part of the threat perception of any state. Migratory movements are to be
considered central elements of processes of political learning, but also as polit-
ical battlefields, where the states compete in order to gain advantages from
the positive aspects attached to migration, while at the same time avoid-
ing possible negative internal security consequences. The focus in this article
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160 P. Seeberg
is more on the external dimension than the internal, with the intention of
constructing analytical tools taking their point of departure in the actual
European migration policies towards the Middle East.
According to Andrew Geddes, we have recently seen changes in the
European understanding of the concept of migration. First of all, we have
witnessed a widening of both the actual geopolitical and the conceptual inter-
pretation of migration. The geopolitical widening is following the gast-arbeiter
and post-colonial approach, which was typical for the period, where dominant
ideas of unity gradually developed along the lines of European integration in
the early post-war situation. “Traditional” work migration toward Europe was
supplemented by new and more diverse migration flows, which tended to be
more uncontrolled.8As Geddes emphasized, a “particular concern in central,
eastern, and southern EU Member States has been the development of irregu-
lar migration flows and the people smuggling and human trafficking networks
that have developed around them.”9
Added to that, however, we have seen groups of refugees coming to Europe
as a result of wars in Iran, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and as a result of the
new developments a diffusion of the EU asylum and migration acquis has
become a reality. In short, the more complex and varied migration patterns
can be seen as a key driver of new policy responses on behalf of the EU.
The policies are founded on a conceptual widening of migration related to the
European refugees and asylum regime, but also on problems related to illegal
and irregular migration. The official main interest of the EU is to fight these
forms of migration. There is, however, as mentioned by Geddes, an additional
ambivalence here, related to irregular migration flows, because these migrants
have played an important role in the European labor market, particularly in
southern Europe.
From the receiving states (France, Spain, Italy, Greece), this aspect adds
dimensions to the difficulties in planning for responding to migration move-
ments, be they clandestine and explicitly unwanted or officially unwanted
but in reality de facto policies of labor migration, as it has been very obvi-
ous in Spain for the last decades. It is an interesting irony, as demonstrated
by, for instance, Ahmet ˙
Içduygu, that “while most of the southern European
countries on the Mediterranean shores together with other EU countries tend
to be advocating or actually adopting a range of restrictive controls against
the incoming migrant flows, their economies are able to absorb thousands of
irregular migrants without any unbearable confrontation.”10
The important point here is that the southern European economies are in
some areas hardly able to function without an influx of a cheap labor force from
other continents, first of all from Northern Africa, but also from other regions
of the world. And gradually, this reality is spreading to the rest of Europe in
the sense that a growing part of the unskilled European labor market is being
dominated by immigrant workers.
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 161
The EU is experiencing radical changes in its demographic composition,
which make it necessary to implement new strategies. But, as a matter of fact,
this process started many years earlier. A shrinking European labor force has
for decades been balanced by immigration, resulting in a process of mutual
accommodation, on one side by the European host societies and on the other
side by the immigrants arriving to Europe. This general trend, however, has
in recent years been strongly affected by tendencies pointing in a different
direction, as a result of the global financial crisis, which seem to have hit the
southern European countries particularly hard, especially Greece and Spain.
Studies about European immigration policies toward the Southern
Mediterranean have often pointed at a more or less homogenous common
European migration policy approach. This perception is being contested by
the recent events concerning African and Arab immigrants heading towards
Europe. The incidents have caused several unilateral actions by different EU
member states, and taking these events and the broader context of the political
upheavals in North Africa as a starting point, this article will look at changes
within the EU immigration regime toward the Southern Mediterranean states.
Taking into account the particularities of Mediterranean migration dynamics,
it is the intention here to concentrate specifically on the security dimension of
immigration in the light of the events in the MENA region in 2011 and how
European security concerns result in changes of European migration policy
approaches.
The article is in its theoretical approach inspired by the concept of
non-traditional security, demonstrating that migration constitutes a com-
plex phenomenon, which is becoming more and more important and at the
same time constitutes an anarchistic element in the relations between states,
which goes beyond traditional foreign policy means and therefore might be
included in what the so-called Copenhagen school has termed non-traditional
security issues.11 Migration is here to be seen as one of several such “non-
controllable” phenomena in a context where developmental problems, environ-
mental disasters, rapid urbanization, and problems related to the uncontrolled
growth of mega-cities represent other possible trends related to non-traditional
security.
The characteristics of threats such as this are that they do not origi-
nate from state actors, that they are often transnational, and that they have
an unexpected, anarchistic character. States in the Middle East might not
consider this type of threats just as important as “normal” security threats
attached to state behavior, but they are nonetheless of great and probably grow-
ing importance in challenging the weak, authoritarian states in the MENA
region. Non-traditional security issues are thus highly relevant in discussing
European–Middle Eastern relations, since migration is one of the main themes
of Mediterranean politics, not least in the context of the Arab uprisings in
2011–2012.
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162 P. Seeberg
EU MIGRATION POLICIES IN LIGHT OF THE ARAB UPRISINGS
The EU has, after the events in 2011–2012, to deal with a Middle East where a
depoliticized political culture has been replaced by repoliticization, active par-
ticipation, and a new dynamic public sphere. The Arab uprisings have affected
the relations between the EU and the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean
countries, both in a broad, overall perspective and more specifically regard-
ing migration. This reality is reflected in the official EU homepages, where
the EU recently has added new initiatives to its efforts in dealing with migra-
tion. In a press release on November 18, 2011, it was stated by the Swedish
Commissioner for Home Affairs, Cecilie Malmström that the EU is
setting up a strategic policy framework for migration and development, which
is clear and consistent (...) The new EU Global Approach to Migration and
Mobility (GAMM) represents the strategic framework which is necessary to bring
added value to the EU’s and Member States’ action in this area.12
The GAMM contains two operational frameworks, the first one being
the Mobility Partnerships, which will be offered, as it is mentioned, to the
EU’s immediate neighborhood and to Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt in the first
instance.13 The second framework is covering the countries that are not part
of the Mobility Partnership arrangements and consists of the setting up of
Common Agendas on Migration and Mobility to facilitate the cooperation.14
The ambivalence mentioned above is inherent in the new approach. On one
side, it is the ambition, based on the so-called Europe 2020 Strategy,15 to secure
that Europe continuously is an attractive destination in the global competition
for talent. This implies a growing immigration to Europe, in order to compen-
sate for the demographic changes. On the other side, the EU will have to deal
with and develop policies on illegal migration, irregular migration, and the
external dimension of asylum and refugee issues.
The European Neighbourhood Policy launched in 2004 establishes in a way
its own differentiated migration regime in the sense that the inherent bilat-
eralism manifests itself in Action Plans, which all express an agreement on
the migration phenomenon. The EU has signed Action Plans with the follow-
ing MENA states: Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, PA, and Tunisia.
A second group of states, Algeria, Libya, and Syria, are states in a more unclear
relation to the ENP, which haven’t so far signed an Action Plan.
It seems that the most important Middle Eastern states in a migration per-
spective, seen from a European perspective, are the Mediterranean states. The
states are different and the differentiated approach inherent in the bilateral
approach of the ENP is therefore relevant. However, in order for the EU to live
up to its ambitions and show abilities to implement new policies need to be
decided on. As pointed out by Ana Ecahgue et al., the new situation after the
Arab uprisings raises demands:
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 163
It is fine to call for differentiation and more for more, but those elements
were already implicit in the ENP. What is required is more collective political will
and explicit indications of what will be on offer in exchange for which concrete
reforms.16
During 2011, the ENP was “reviewed” in a communication by the Commission
to the other EU political institutions, stating that
[t]he overthrow of long-standing repressive regimes in Egypt and Tunisia;
the ongoing military conflict in Libya, the recent violent crackdown in Syria, con-
tinued repression in Belarus and the lingering protracted conflicts in the region,
including in the Middle East, require us to look afresh at the EU’s relationship
with our neighbours.17
The perspectives of the European ageing are mentioned as preconditions for
what is going on in connection with the overall relations between the EU
and the southern and eastern neigbors. As mentioned in the Communication,
“Labour mobility is an area where the EU and its neighbours can complement
each other. The EU’s workforce is ageing and labour shortages will develop
in specific areas. Our neighbourhood has well educated, young and talented
workers who can fill these gaps.” It is worth noticing that these very positive
formulations are followed by promises by the EU claiming to be conscious of
brain drain and, if necessary, willing to mitigate possible consequences of this.
The document insists on involving the partner countries stating that coop-
eration on “fighting irregular migration is essential to reduce the human
suffering and diminished security that is generated.”18 The document is here in
accordance with the positive conditionality which is one of the key principles of
the ENP. Seen from the European side there is an inner coherence between the
ENP, the Global Approach to Migration and Mobility, and the newly adopted
Communication on migration.
The Global Approach Communication of November 201119 from the
Commission is quoting the UNDP Human Development Report stating that
“there are about 740 million internal migrants in the world—almost four times
as many as those who have moved internationally. By comparison, the con-
temporary figure for international migrants (214 million, or 3.1 percent of the
world’s population) ...”20
It is emphasized that the GAMM should be migrant-centered. However,
it is not specified what is meant by that in any detail, apart from general
remarks underlining that “the migrant is at the core of the analysis and all
action and must be empowered to gain access to safe mobility. The human
rights of migrants are a cross-cutting issue in the GAMM.”21
Also, it can be difficult to tell how the notion of the measures being equally
important should be interpreted. Each theme is described more in detail in
the Communication-document, which contains a huge number of suggestions
and plans for the work related to migration, asylum, and refugees. It seems
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164 P. Seeberg
that many of the (suggested) initiatives are initiatives that haven’t been estab-
lished yet. They are preliminary work in progress, projects in different stages
or Directives under negotiation between EU institutions.
The so-called operational priorities of the EU’s dialogue and cooperation
with non-EU countries are organized in four pillars. The first pillar deals
with “Organizing and facilitating legal migration and mobility” and is, as it
says, “based on the premise of offering employers wider opportunities to find
the best individuals for vacancies on the global market (...) seeks to offer
new European employment possibilities for talented people from around the
globe, fully respecting Member States’ competence to manage their labour
markets.” An important measure is the establishment in the partner coun-
tries of Migration and Mobility centers, which are supposed to facilitate “skills
matching, skills upgrading and proficiency in EU languages”22
The headline for the second pillar reads “Preventing and reducing irregular
migration and trafficking in human beings.” Again, the cooperation approach
appears in the document in the sense that priority is given to “transfer of skills,
capacity and resources to its partners in order to prevent and reduce traffick-
ing, smuggling and irregular migration, and to strengthening integrated border
management.” Also, the FRONTEX system is mentioned as an instrument to
be used in a partnership connection, even though it is not clarified how this
should be done. The third pillar is about refugees and asylum policies, which as
it says, should become an integrated part of the GAMM. As part of a new strat-
egy within this field, the EU claims it “has prepared a joint EU Resettlement
Programme with the aim of increasing resettlement in Europe.” It is worth
noticing that this measure is intentional and that it has little to do with the
actual practices of the EU member states, where increasing resettlement is not
taking place.
The fourth measure is called “Maximising the development impact of
migration and mobility.” The description of the issue takes its point of depar-
ture in the fact that inter- and intra-regional migration in developing regions
exceeds migration to the EU—and this is certainly also the case for the in this
context relevant part of the MENA region. Therefore, this fourth pillar focuses
on what the EU intends to do helping migrants obtain better conditions for
themselves, thereby providing the involved countries (recipient and sender)
with a developmental advantage—based on migration movements both within
the MENA region and from the region to Europe. The specific measures are
vaguely described and include dealing with the brain drain phenomenon:
The EU Blue Card Directive allows Member States to reject applications in
order to ensure ethical recruitment and enables the Commission to monitor appli-
cation of the Directive with a view to mitigating brain drain.”23 Furthermore the
fourth pillar speaks of EU support for capacity-building in partner countries and
“mainstreaming of migration in developmental thinking.
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 165
According to IOM spokesman Jean-Philippe Chauzy, the EU efforts in dealing
with the migration aspects of the Arab unrest in 2011 has focused more on
control rather than partnership and support:
The European response, when the crisis began was a knee-jerk reaction aimed
at controlling the potential flows of illegal migrants from Tunisia and Libya. Little
has been done in the way of providing alternatives (...) that would involve enter-
ing into new partnerships with governments in Tunisia and Egypt, and Libya
when it stabilizes, to create wealth and job opportunities in those countries.24
This statement is obviously not in accordance with the official EU policy, as
described earlier. Prior to the GAMM the Communication of May 24 had pre-
sented a plan for handling the new challenges, which distinguished between
three levels of EU action: urgent measures, short and medium term measures,
and measures for the longer term. In this Communication, a large amount of
measures were mentioned, of which the so-called Mobility Partnerships were
referred to as examples of the EU initiatives in the long run. The EU has, as
mentioned by Anne Sofie Westh Olsen, so far concluded Mobility Partnerships
with Cape Verde, Georgia, and Moldova, but (at the time of writing) Mobility
Partnerships have not been signed with any MENA state.25
THE CASES OF EGYPT, LIBYA, AND SYRIA
The Middle East contains 22 different Arab states, all of which are character-
ized by containing specific forms of migration, from labor importing states like
the GCC states to labor exporting countries like Yemen or Egypt. The diver-
sity is emphasized by the existence of states like Algeria or Syria, in which the
migration patterns are highly complex or state-like entities like Palestine,26
which used to be an emigration country, but where political reasons resulted
in a reduction of the number of Palestinians working in other countries. This
article will focus on three varieties of states regarding migration.
Type one is a low level income MENA state, who is in possession of few
natural resources. Typically, the state will have a large population and a high
emigration rate. Attached to this type will be a significant inflow of remittances
from the many workers abroad. States such as Egypt, Morocco, or Yemen are
examples.
Gulf states, most of them rentier states, represent a second type of state
in this context. Rentier states are typically characterized by large numbers of
immigrants. For a number of years, Gulf states imported many Arab workers
from type one states—an example could be Saudi Arabia importing Egyptian,
Syrian, and Palestinian laborers. Within the last decade, many of the Arabs
were replaced by immigrants from Asian countries, especially with regard to
female workers.27 Libya, with its enormous natural resources, belongs to the
type two state.
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166 P. Seeberg
The third type is a state, characterized by differentiated migration patterns
with work emigration and immigration—and maybe also groups of refugees
leaving and/or entering the country. Syria is an example of the type three
state. Many unskilled Syrians are leaving for Lebanon every year to work there
for a period, often working in construction or cleaning business. Some skilled
Syrians are working in the Gulf in higher positions. Since the invasion of Iraq,
many hundred thousand Iraqi refugees have been living in Syria, and recently
large numbers of Syrians are fleeing their own country, staying in Lebanon or
Turkey to get away from persecution by the Ba’athist regime.
Egypt: The Uprisings, Migration, and EU Policies
Egypt is one of the largest emigration countries in the Middle East and
is clearly a type one country.28 According to the Migration and Remittances
Factbook by the World Bank, Egypt is, with 3.7 million emigrants, number
one among the top ten emigration countries in the Middle East.29 They are,
however, also the recipient of a large number of transit migrants, a large part
of whom are coming from Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Eritrea. One of the
reasons for this is that Egypt is hosting large resettlement programs—run
partly by the UNHCR and partly by national programs financed by Canada,
Australia, and others.
It can be difficult to distinguish precisely between economic and politi-
cal causes for migration toward Egypt, and often there will probably be some
overlap.30 During 2011, a large number of Egyptian migrant workers left Libya,
and probably it will take some time before they are back again. This has, of
course, affected the amount of remittances received and, added to that, the
unstable situation in the region has reduced the migration-induced income sig-
nificantly. Historically, as shown by Dina Abdelfattah, the Egyptian regime has
considered migration as an important pillar in its economic strategy and “a
way of letting pressure out of the labor market, and providing financial gains
that outweighed the cost of brain drain.”31 The remittances important for the
regime have been affected by the return of many Egyptians, especially migrant
workers who left Libya during 2011, but it is still impossible to say anything
about the actual amounts of “lost means.”32
Abdelfattah mentions that in the fall of 2011, against expectations, the
Central Bank of Egypt issued a report covering 2010–2011 showing the high-
est amount of remittances in the history of Egypt. Obviously, this can be a
result of the return of Egyptian migrants, who in connection with their return
transferred their deposits to the home country. The political dispute related
to the decision by UAE to close the doors on Egyptian migrants following the
announcement by Egypt that it would put Hosni Mubarak on a trial probably
also has had some significance. The conflict was apparently resolved after a
visit by the Egyptian Prime Minister Essam Sharaf to UAE, which took place
in July 2011.
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 167
The political unrest in 2011 has led to increasing instability in Egypt,
higher unemployment, and economic problems for the ordinary Egyptians. Not
surprisingly, this contributes to creating a migration push-factor, as it has been
demonstrated in a survey by the IOM. Based on 750 interviews in 17 different
governorates in March and April 2011, the survey showed that despite people
being rather optimistic about their long-term future, they were worried about
the current security situation and the lack of job opportunities.33
The motivation among the youngsters for migration seems to be, first and
foremost, economic:
The most important push factors for the young Egyptians who wish to migrate
remain lack of employment opportunities and unsatisfactory living conditions.
The most important pull factor is the possibility of gaining higher wages abroad
then in Egypt (...) Young Egyptians identified, Arab countries, especially Saudi
Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, as their favorite countries of destination.34
To fulfill those ambitions might, as mentioned above, be a problem, because
of the gradual replacement of Arabs by migrants from different Asian coun-
tries. The European relations with Egypt regarding migration are described in
the ENP Action Plan and focuses on legal aspects and practical issues related
to control of migration flows in cooperation between the EU and Egypt. The
Egyptian migration towards the EU is for historical reasons rather limited—
in spite of the fact that Egypt has enormous potential, the main migration to
Europe from the Middle East comes from the Maghreb states and Turkey. This
is reflected in the Action Plan, which regarding migration is vague and unspe-
cific. The uprisings in Egypt throughout 2011 are as mentioned hardly likely
to change the preferred destinations for the Egyptian migrants, so that the EU
becomes one of them.
As part of what is termed the EU “renewed migration strategy,” it is men-
tioned that Egypt will be included in the launching of Mobility Partnerships,
which will be offered to Tunisia, Morocco, and Egypt in the first instance:
“Mobility partnerships offer a concrete framework for dialogue and coopera-
tion between the EU and non-EU countries. These partnerships are focused on
facilitating and organizing legal migration, effective and humane measures to
address irregular migration, and concrete steps towards reinforcing the devel-
opment outcomes of migration.”35 So far, however, these initiatives are planned
and it is not yet known when the actual implementation will take place.
Libya: The End of the Gaddafi Regime, Migration, and the EU
Libya, being a type two country, with its obvious rentier state character,
has traditionally hosted a significant amount of migrant workers from the
neighboring countries, but also from states farther to the south in Africa. Not
surprisingly, the war during 2011 has had significant impact on the migration
situation in the country. Many migrants have fled or returned into Tunisia,
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Egypt, Chad, and Algeria and, added to that, there has been a minor flow across
the Mediterranean, mainly to Italy and Malta. As described by Abdelfattah, the
“current migration crisis in Libya is considered the largest since the first Gulf
War in 1990.”36
UNHCR and IOM have organized large repatriation programs, and it is
completely impossible to say anything about what will happen in a short-
term perspective. According to IOM sources, almost 800,000 migrants have left
Libya by November 2011.37 Sub-Saharan Africans constitute the largest group
of stranded migrants in Libya, and they are at the same time the most vulnera-
ble group, which always have been exposed to harsh Libyan migration policies.
Libya has had a status as a “migration corridor,” as stated by Sylvie Bredeloup
and Olivier Pliez,38 and this might also be the case for post-Gadaffi Libya.
“The eruption of the conflict in Libya as of mid-February provoked the dis-
placement of around 800,000 persons of many different nationalities towards
the neighboring countries, in particular Tunisia and Egypt,” as mentioned in
an EU Commission report.39 The situation is critical, not the least for the Arab
workers who stayed in Libya, because due to the recent conditions in their
home countries, they have severe social problems after their return. The finan-
cial crisis from 2008 resulted in declining opportunities in the low and middle
income MENA states, so the oil-producing states (including Libya) became a
remaining destination for migrant workers. Added to that, and maybe even
more important, the post-revolutionary slowdown in Tunisia and Egypt created
very difficult circumstances for the returning workers. As Abdelfattah sums up,
most of the “workers escaping the unrest lost their jobs and income, and often
had to leave behind their assets and often some of their savings. Some never
received their last wages and others saw their money and valuables taken by
the Libyan forces.”40
The conflict in Libya in 2011 started with the demonstrations in Benghazi
in the beginning of February. At that time, the country was home to between
1.5 and 2.5 million foreign nationals, many of them refugees, although they
were treated as irregular migrants by the Libyan authorities.41 The regis-
tered refugees came from countries including Côte d’Ivoire, Eritrea, Ethiopia,
Iraq, Somalia, and Sudan. The war led to hundreds of thousands of internally
displaced and created, together with the foreign work migrants from Egypt,
Tunisia, etc., who left Libya, a complex and chaotic situation for the large
migrant population in Libya.
The war in Libya in 2011 was a war between a regime and an opposi-
tion from many different segments of the Libyan population. But as it turned
out, a third actor, NATO, became a (probably decisive) part of the conflict. The
operation was successful, as concluded by NATO on October 25:
NATO took control of all military operations for Libya under United Nations
Security Council Resolutions 1970 & 1973 on 31 March 2011 (...) The mission
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 169
comprised of three elements: an arms embargo, a no-fly-zone and actions to pro-
tect civilians from attack or the threat of attack (...) On 21 October 2011, after
204 days, the North Atlantic Council The Council agreed that the operations were
very close to completion and took a preliminary decision to end the operation on
31 October 2011.42
Having won the war against Gaddafi the new Libyan political leaders faced
a difficult task in dealing with obvious economic and political challenges. But
added to that, there were also other issues that needed to be taken into account,
namely issues related to different security matters, as pointed out by Barah
Mikail.43 Within this area, the EU and other foreign partners could play an
important role in the future development. It has been claimed that Al Qaida
and different other terrorist groups have been taking root in Libya after the
fall of the regime. There is an ongoing anti-terrorist cooperation led by Algeria,
which might gain from inviting the new Libyan leadership. So far, the Libyan
authorities have rejected direct foreign interference in their affairs, but maybe
it will be possible to establish cooperation in the coming months and years
regarding this important question.
The migration issue is, of course, the more relevant question in the context
of this article. Gadaffi used migration as a political tool putting pressure on
Europe. Obviously, his fall has not resulted in stopping the floods of migrants
from sub-Saharan states trying to reach Europe via Libya, even though the
fighting in itself has reduced the amount of transit migrants in 2011. As men-
tioned by Mikail, the EU could help Libya by improving its migration policies
via control of the Mediterranean Sea in cooperation with the new Libyan
government:
The ‘Arab Spring’ has created a deeply insecure regional situation due to the
insufficiency or even lack of controls at the borders of countries undergoing tran-
sitions (Libya and Tunisia, and their borders with Egypt). Radical elements have
been able to spread in the region (...) A stronger involvement of Libya’s inter-
national partners to help strengthen border controls would considerably reduce
regional threats.44
A significant point is that the international community, having helped the
Libyans overthrow Gaddafi, now has an important task involving itself into
the further development of a new security community in the Mediterranean.
A number of different political and economic regionally based measures could
be relevant in order to enhance the new state building project, ranging
from technological assistance within health and education to helping with
stabilizing the overall internal security situation.
In an official EU Press Release of November 12, 2011, it is claimed that
“From the start of the Libyan crisis, the EU has stood by the people of Libya
in their quest for freedom. Together with the international community, it
will continue to help Libya’s process of democratic transition and economic
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170 P. Seeberg
reconstruction.”45 This might be something of an exaggeration. The EU did
not from the start support the rebels in their battle with the Gaddafi regime.
Some EU states even supported Gaddafi in the beginning of the conflict and it
took several months before the EU seriously backed the opposition.
The Syrian Tragedy and the EU
As mentioned in the CARIM report on Syria, the violent repression put
in place by Syrian authorities throughout 2011 and 2012 has caused massive
population displacements.46 Syria is traditionally among the top ten countries
regarding migration in the Middle East. The country is playing a role as a
large producer of migrants leaving Syria, the bulk of which are work migrants
going to Lebanon, the Gulf states, and Saudi Arabia, Libya, Turkey, etc. The
two largest groups of Syrian emigrants are those in Lebanon and in the Gulf.
Syria is also a recipient of large amounts of immigrants and refugees from
other Middle Eastern states and a transit migration country for migrants from
Asia and Africa. The largest group of immigrants in Syria is the Iraqi refugees,
arriving after the US invasion in March 2003.47 Together, the complex migra-
tion patterns paint a picture of socially significant population movements,
having evolved in the Syrian context over the last decades.
It is a well-known fact that since the end of the Lebanese Civil War, a
large number of Syrians have worked in Lebanon in connection with the recon-
struction activities in Beirut and elsewhere in the devastated country. The
narratives attached to the Syrian migrants in Lebanon have changed over
time. According to John Chalcraft, “positive constructions of Syrian migrant
labor before the civil war gave way to negativity and controversy in a context
of economic crisis and Syrian control (...) Syrian workers started to be seen as
a threat to Lebanese sovereignty, polity, economy and society.”48 It is my view
that this might be right, but that it represents something of a simplification.
It was and is a rather complex phenomenon with both political and everyday
life discursive connotations.
Seen from the Syrian side, Lebanon served as an important outlet for
surplus Syrian labor, as mentioned by Mona Yacoubian, “with an estimated
300,000 permanent Syrian workers in Lebanon. The figure rises to one million
when including seasonal laborers who come to Lebanon to work on construction
projects and in the agricultural sector.”49 An important aspect of the pres-
ence of Syrian workers was (and is) a significant amount of remittances, which
the migrants brought home with them after the work period or send home to
relatives during their stay in Lebanon.
Chalcraft shows that the Syrians headed back to Lebanon after the turmoil
related to the murder of Hariri and the Syrian troop withdrawal of April 2005.
This is also mentioned by Philippe Fargues, stating that “it is believed that
they returned en masse to Syria. Today, however, most are believed to be back
in Lebanon.”50 To which degree this still is the case is very difficult to estimate,
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 171
since a large part of the Syrian migration to Lebanon is temporary and takes
place “by chance”—organized by the Syrian workers themselves. According to
official Syrian statistics, the number of Syrian workers in Lebanon counted
more than 800,000 in 2010 and was supported by a Lebanese government-run
agency, which, based on talks with the Syrian side, took part in organizing the
migration process.51
Syria has since then attempted to renew its influence in Lebanon—first
of all in the foreign political field. This has been done via a permanent close
relation with Hezbollah, which despite a recent lack of popularity due to their
support of the Ba’athist regime in Damascus, still is an extremely strong orga-
nization. Hezbollah is able, partly because of its strong backing from Iran
and Syria, to maintain what I elsewhere have termed a “dual power” situa-
tion in Lebanon.52 The Iranian influence can be seen in the recent complex
regional situation as a double-edged sword for Syria, since on one side the
Iranian ally in principle gives Syria strength. The tragic development in Syria
in 2011–2012 definitely results in Syria maintaining a picture of itself as one
of the radical states in the MENA region.
The confrontations have produced a steady flow of refugees and asy-
lum seekers into southern Turkey and, in smaller numbers, into Jordan and
Lebanon. Jordan has not officially offered asylum to Syrians but helped with
medical emergencies and shelter to displaced Syrians.53 UNHCR have reg-
istered an increasing amount of Syrian refugees in northern Lebanon, in
mid-February counting 6,522 persons,54 contributing to tensions between the
two states, not least because the issue challenges the relations between the
staunch supporters of the Syrian regime, Hezbollah, and the Syria-critical
March 14 coalition. The Syrian army has positioned troops along the Syrian
borders in order to prevent defections to Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey.
The EU imposed sanctions on Syria during 2011, as described in the EEAS
homepage: “... the Foreign Affairs Council of May 2011 announced the sus-
pension of bilateral cooperation programs between the EU and the Syrian
government under the MEDA/ENPI instruments and to suspend all prepara-
tions for new bilateral cooperation. The EU also will not take further steps with
regard to the Association Agreement that had been negotiated with Syria.”
More specifically, the EU has carried out selective sanctions leveled at spe-
cific persons or entities, typically people close to the regime and in significant
position in the Syrian elite. The mentioned measures do only marginally have
a relation to the migration issue, and so far the EU has not addressed this
question in relation to Syria.
CONCLUSION
Taking the changing conditions regarding the security environment in the
Mediterranean region as point of departure, it has been the ambition of this
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172 P. Seeberg
article to identify and discuss the EU’s recent migration strategies toward the
Mediterranean states in the light of the Arab uprisings in 2011–2012. With
tendencies since 9/11 and the tragedies of Madrid and London in 2004 and
2005 to securitizing migration movements toward the EU, the interconnect-
edness between security and migration has developed new dimensions in the
narratives related to recent migration movements. The accidental character of
a large part of the migration processes linked to the Arab unrest contributes to
the intense security focus attached to them. Furthermore, a growing European
focus on the security implications of the recent election success of Islamist orga-
nizations in the Middle East is a reality. The Islamists have won the elections
in Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, and Kuwait, and the European public sphere has
expressed on several occasions skeptical views of, not to say dissociation, from
the preliminary results of a new democratic political culture in some of the
former authoritarian states.
The Arab uprisings have resulted in significant population movements in
the Mediterranean and created new complex and heterogeneous migratory
tendencies. Despite the fact that the EU has declared that migration “is one
of the strategic priorities in the external relations of the Union,” it seems
apparent that the EU has not been able to develop adequate new approaches
toward “a changing neighborhood” regarding migration. The concept of non-
traditional security was suggested as an analytical category emphasizing that
migration as a highly complex phenomenon constitutes an anarchistic ele-
ment in the relations between the EU and the MENA states. Referring to
Echagüe et al., it was therefore underlined that what might be required by
the EU in order to deal with the challenges of the Arab uprisings is more
collective political will, for instance, expressed by offering concessions that
would justify a policy of conditionality that up to now has been hollow. This
emphasizes the diversity of the MENA region making, it so much more rele-
vant to distinguish between different types of Middle Eastern states regarding
migration.
The Egyptian case demonstrated that as long as migration processes in a
specific partner state in the Mediterranean only to a minor degree affect the
EU, the phenomenon has not devoted much energy in European policy-making.
However, migration is as shown extremely important for Egypt, and therefore
it seems reasonable to offer it more attention from the European side. The
fact that Egypt is mentioned as one of the Mediterranean states with which
the EU will establish Mobility Partnerships might imply that the significance
of migration in an Egyptian context has become obvious. Still, the Mobility
Partnerships are only planned, and we do know in detail what they will entail.
Egyptian migration in 2011 involved Libya in the sense that hundreds of thou-
sands of Egyptians and other migrants left Libya and went to Egypt. Most
of the migrants were Egyptian work migrants, for whom it meant a personal
tragedy to have to leave. As described, many of them left unpaid wages behind,
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 173
and a return to Egypt might be a very problematic experience for the Egyptian
migrants.
The most self-evident security issue mentioned in this article might be
the Libyan transit migration, which Gaddafi used to take advantage of as a
negotiation asset when dealing with Europe after he (re-)entered the inter-
national political stage some years ago. As mentioned, migration could be a
highly relevant field, where the EU could help Libya by improving its migration
policies—and at the same time attend to its own migration and security policy
interests. For the EU, the coming political and social developments in Libya
are very important. Given a problematic situation in the country where no cen-
tral government is able to control migration, an increased pressure on southern
Europe and the Mediterranean islands is a realistic perspective. The EU has an
important task in creating a security community in the Mediterranean region
in the coming years and—apart from the efficient NATO action throughout
2011—the European states and the EU as a whole are not popular in Libya for
their rather limited supportive actions in 2011.
This is also not the case in Syria, where the EU so far has represented a
rather slow and reluctant support for the regime opposition. The tragic devel-
opment in Syria in 2011–2012 has led to population displacements internally in
Syria and across the Syrian borders—mainly to Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan,
in that order. The situation in Syria might contribute to destabilization in
Lebanon and—in a worst-case scenario— in the Mashreq region. As mentioned,
the EU has imposed sanctions on Syria during 2011. The EU has carried out
selective sanctions leveled at specific persons or entities. The measures do not
have any relation to the migration issue, and so far the EU has not addressed
this question in relation to Syria.
The migration issue will probably, however, continue to play an impor-
tant role for the relations between the EU and the Mediterranean countries.
It has been the ambition of this article to analyze the EU’s migration strategies
toward the Arab states with a focus on to which degree the European measures
seem to be appropriate vis-á-vis the challenges related to the consequences
of the Arab uprisings regarding migration. Taking the cases of Egypt, Libya,
and Syria as point of departure, it was demonstrated that the migration phe-
nomenon constitute a significant issue in European–Middle Eastern relations,
regarding which the EU measures only to some degree seem to be relevant and
adequate.
NOTES
1. A dialogue for migration, mobility, and security with the southern Mediterranean
countries. Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the
Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the
Regions (Brussels: European Commission, 2011).
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174 P. Seeberg
2. Alexandros Bitoulas, Population and Social Conditions. Eurostat. Statistics in
Focus (Brussels: European Commission, 2012).
3. Ibid., 1.
4. Peter Feuilherade, “Refugee Tides Surge across Arab World.” The Middle East 429:
30–33 (2012).
5. Myron Weiner, “Security, Stability, and International Migration,” in Anthony
Geddes, ed., International Migration (Los Angeles: Sage, 2011), 245.
6. The article is part of a larger research project, analyzing foreign policy and security
relations between the EU and the Middle East in the last decades. As such, it is a
desk study, building on earlier and forthcoming publications; see http://www.sdu.dk/
staff/seeberg
7. Christopher Rudolph, “Security and the Political Economy of International
Migration.” American Political Science Review 97: 603–620 (2003).
8. Anthony Geddes, “Europe’s Border Relationships and International Migration
Relations.” Journal of Common Market Studies 43: 787–806 (2005).
9. Ibid., 795.
10. Ahmet ˙
Içduygu, “The Politics of Irregular Migratory Flows in the Mediterranean
Basin: Economy, Mobility and Illegality.” Mediterranean Politics 12: 141–162 (2007).
11. Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver, and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for
Analysis (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publications, 1998).
12. European Commission, Press Release, Stronger Cooperation and Mobility
at the Centre of the Renewed EU Migration Strategy. http://europa.eu/rapid/
pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/11/1369&format=HTML&aged=0&language=
EN&guiLanguage=en (accessed 10 June 2012).
13. Joint Communication to the European Parliament, the Council, the European
Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, A New Response
to a Changing Neighbourhood (Bruxelles: EU Commission, 2011).
14. Furthermore, it is mentioned that so-called Migration and Mobility Resource
Centers will be set up to provide resources and support to individuals and partner
countries in the areas of skills and labor matching, an online EU Immigration Portal
will help migrants in their mobility toward the EU. The whole setup will be analyzed
in a report on the “Global Approach ...” every two years. See link to Press Release in
note 13.
15. See the EU 2020 homepage: http://ec.europa.eu/europe2020/index_en.htm (accessed
10 June 2012).
16. Ana Echagüe, Hélèné Michou, and Barah Mikail, “Europe and the Arab Uprisings:
EU Vision versus Member State Action.” Mediterranean Politics 16: 235 (2011).
17. Joint Communication to the European Parliament, the Council, the European
Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, A New Response
to a Changing Neighbourhood (Bruxelles: EU Commission, 2011).
18. Ibid., 11.
19. The Global Approach to Migration and Mobility. Communication from the
Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and
Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions (Bruxelles: EU Commission,
2011).
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The Arab Uprisings and the EU Migration Policies 175
20. UNDP 2009, Human Development Report 2009. Overcoming Barriers: Human
Mobility and Development, in Jeni Klugman, ed. (New York: UNDP, 2009).
21. The Global Approach to Migration and Mobility. Communication from the
Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and
Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions (Bruxelles: EU Commission,
2011), 7.
22. Ibid., 15.
23. Ibid., 19.
24. Peter Feuilherade, “Refugee Tides Surge across Arab World,” 32.
25. Anne Sofie Westh Olsen, “The ‘Right’ Mobility Partnership between the European
Union, Morocco and Tunisia” DIIS Policy Brief (Copenhagen: Danish Institute for
International Studies, 2011).
26. Anna di Bartolomeo, Thibaut Jaulin, and Delphine Perrin, Palestine. CARIM -
Migration Profile (Florence: Euro-Mediterranean Consortium for Applied Research on
International Migration, 2011).
27. Philippe Fargues, “Immigration without Inclusion: Non-Nationals in Nation-
Building in the Gulf States.” Asian and Pacific Migration Journal 20: 273–292 (2011).
28. Anna di Bartolomeo, Tamirace Fakhoury, and Delphine Perrin, Egypt (Florence:
Euro-Mediterranean Consortium for Applied Research on International Migration,
2011).
29. World Bank, Migration and Remittances Factbook (Washington, DC: World Bank,
2011).
30. Howeida Roman, Transit Migration in Egypt. Research Reports (Florence: European
University Institute, 2006), 33.
31. Dina Abdelfattah, Impact of Arab Revolts on Migration. CARIM Analytic and
Synthetic Notes (Florence: European University Institute, 2011).
32. Ibid.,1,8.
33. Roberto Pitea and Reham Hussain, eds., Egypt after January 25. Survey of Youth
Migration (Cairo: IOM, 2011).
34. Ibid., 21.
35. See the EEAS homepage: http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.
do?reference=IP/11/1369&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en
(accessed June 10, 2012).
36. Dina Abdelfattah, “Impact of Arab Revolts on Migration. CARIM Analytic and
Synthetic Notes,” 13.
37. See the IOM homepage: http://www.migration-crisis.com/libya/reports/view/589
(accessed 10 June 2012).
38. Bredeloup, Sylvie and Olivier Pliez, The Libyan Migration Corridor. Research
Report, Case Study, EU-US Immigration Systems (Florence: European University
Institute, 2011).
39. ”A Dialogue for Migration, Mobility, and Security with the Southern Mediterranean
Countries,” 2.
40. Dina Abdelfattah, “Impact of Arab Revolts on Migration. CARIM Analytic and
Synthetic Notes,” 14.
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176 P. Seeberg
41. Peter Feuilherade, “Refugee Tides Surge across Arab World.” The Middle East 429:
31 (2012).
42. Operational Media Update: NATO and Libya, Allied Joint Force Command Naples,
Shape, NATO HQ (Naples: NATO, 2011).
43. Barah Mikail, “The Multiple Challenges of Libya’s Reconstruction.” Fride Policy
Brief 114: 4 (2012).
44. Ibid., 5.
45. EU support to Libya. Press Releases RAPID, see homepage: http://europa.eu/
rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/11/779&format=HTML&aged=0&
language=EN&guiLanguage=en (accessed June 10, 2012).
46. Anna di Bartolomeo, Thibaut Jaulin, and Delphine Perrin, Palestine, Syria.
CARIM - Migration Profile (Florence: Euro-Mediterranean Consortium for Applied
Research on International Migration, 2011), 1.
47. Sarah Kenyon Lischer, “Security and Displacement. Responding to the Forced
Migration Crisis.” International Security 33: 95–119 (2008).
48. John Chalcraft, “Of Specters and Disciplined Commodities: Syrian Migrant
Workers in Lebanon.” Middle East Report 236: 28–33 (2005); John Chalcraft, “Syrian
Migrant Workers in Lebanon: The Limits of Transnational Integration, Communitarian
Solidarity, and Popular Agency.” EUI Working Papers, RSCAS 26: 1–21 (2006).
49. Mona Yacubian, “Syria’s Role in Lebanon,” USIPeace Briefing (2006), see homepage:
http://www.usip.org/files/resources/syria_lebanon.pdf (accessed June 10, 2012).
50. Philippe Fargues, “Work, Refuge, Transit: An Emerging Pattern of Irregular
Migration South and East of the Mediterranean.” International Migration Review 43:
553 (2006).
51. Muhammad Wahbe, “Syrian Workers in Lebanon is a Must,” (translated from
Arabic) Al Khayyam Online (2008).
52. Peter Seeberg, “The EU as a Realist Actor in Normative Clothes: EU Democracy
Promotion in Lebanon and the European Neighbourhood Policy.” Democratization
16: 81–99 (2009); Anthony Cordesman, Iran’s Support for the Hezbollah in Lebanon
(Washington: CSIS. Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2006).
53. Peter Feuilherade, “Refugee Tides Surge across Arab World,” 31.
54. Situation in North Lebanon, Lebanon Update, see homepage: http://www.unhcr.org/
4f3e557d9.html (accessed June 10, 2012).
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