Reshaping [legal] spaces : from security to social cohesion in EU asylum policy

Abstract

The societal construction of migration as a security problem (De Genova, 2017) has led to increasing human rights violations at the EU’s external borders. In light of the reforms underway in the Asylum Procedures Regulation and the Regulation on the Management of Asylum and Migration, the paper challenges the official justifications of EU asylum policy and puts forward two hypotheses: First, the measures taken by the EU to achieve security do not fulfil their proclaimed purpose, and second, they prevent residents from questioning and reshaping the path taken. In doing so, it pursues two goals: First, to support socio-spatial practitioners create spaces that promote societal equality, and second, to help actors in the legislative process understand the impact of their decisions and create laws that promote justice. To this end, the journey of a person from a West African country to the EU is followed from predeparture to post-arrival. In this way, ‘law-bricks’ – existing legislation when applied to space and people – that hinder the creation of just spaces are identified. The next step proposes a real-world lab to test an EUwide private sponsorship reception mechanism and to define evidence-based law amendment proposals that transform the current asylum system.