Shifting Governance Making policies against migrant smuggling across the EU, Italy and Sicily

Radboud University, 24 september 2020
Promotor : Ernste, H. Co-promotores : Velde, B.M.R. van der, Schapendonk, J.
Contains fulltext : 222053.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)
This research sought to understand the policy-making dynamics in response to migrant smuggling within the European Union, focusing in particular on the Italian and Sicilian case over the period 2014-2019. Through a dialogue between different disciplines and analytical approaches, the analysis focused on three different governance levels, moving from Sicily to Italy to the EU level, and considering the way in which anti-smuggling policies were elaborated and implemented. This made it possible to assess the way in which each actor (EU and national institutions, local governments, NGOs, etc.) moved within and across the governance levels, influenced and limited by institutional constraints and what their influence on the policy process was. Particular emphasis was placed on bottom-up dynamics and on the contribution of non-institutional actors. These results constitute a first systematic insight into a policy domain still to be explored and provide a definition of an analytical model aiming to look at similar policy-making processes in other fields and/or in other case-based and comparative studies.