Final Report Summary - MIGRINTERACT (Normative Interaction and Law-Making: Regulating Migration in the Maghreb)
The main objective of MIGRINTERACT was to explore law-making related to migration in the Maghreb, with a focus on Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania. It aimed to analyse the recent and current reforms in the three countries and to unfold the plurality and country-specificity of normative interactions in law-making.
When the project started, an unprecedented wave of reforms had recently been adopted within the Maghreb. Between 2003 and 2010, Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania elaborated several laws related to citizenship and migration, whose legal framework had remained unchanged since independence. Concomitantly with the starting of the project (mid-2013), Morocco launched the process of developing a “new immigration and asylum policy”, Tunisia was embarked into drafting an asylum law, Mauritania was undertaking a regularisation campaign, soon followed by Morocco. In the background of these historical legal dynamics in the region, debates were emerging and spreading, among the civil society, political representatives, the media and part of the population, on migration and protection issues as well as on related social questions such as discrimination and identity within the society.
My work has consisted in examining these societal evolutions together with the processes of law-making in the field of migration, with a focus on the various forces – actors and factors – involved in these processes. I have analysed and compared the laws adopted in the 2000s and the bills and measures in progress since the beginning of the 2010s, in consideration of other normative frameworks (international law, EU law, African law, related laws in other countries). I have explored the evolution of forces implicated in legal dynamics in each of the three countries: the emergence of new actors at the local level, the influence of changing (social, political, legal) factors, the impact of fluctuations in the regional and global contexts, the evolving position and role of some stakeholders.
I have progressively identified a set of forces likely to carry and diffuse norms and standards in the field of migration in each of the three countries. I have then sought to assess their normative impact on the law-making processes along the following questions: What norm(s) has/have been conveyed or supported by this actor/factor? By what means/ways has this force impacted the law-making process? What has been its influence? To complement this approach based on the potential normative force, I have also conducted an analysis based on each legal provision: From where does it come (international treaty or standards, EU law, foreign legislation, local standard, etc)? How has it made its way to the law/bill? What has been in support of it?
This research has been at the crossroads of law, sociology, anthropology and political science. I have been inspired by the literature on law-making, and on the diffusion, the trans-nationalisation and the globalisation of law. I have also invested networks and policy transfer studies. I have followed the research of sociologists and anthropologists of migration. I have interacted and worked with colleagues from various disciplines and institutions in Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania, as well as in Europe and Canada.
My findings are the result of both desk and field research. The desk research has included work on literature, legal texts and the search for information and data, but also interaction with and interviews of stakeholders involved in the legal processes as well as participation to transnational networks on migration. The field research has been coupled all along the project with participation to seminars and conferences. I have met and interviewed a plurality of stakeholders (members of governments and parliaments, activists, representatives of migrants, members of international institutions, academics), and disseminating my results has been an opportunity to develop contacts and interactions, get feedback and share key information on local on-going reforms and debates.
One of the major findings of my research lies in the substantial change that can be observed between the legal processes of the 2000s and the legal processes of the subsequent half-decade, singularly in Morocco and Tunisia.
I have observed a greater disparity between the three countries covered by the project and within the Maghreb as a whole, compared to the previous period of reforms –more homogeneous in terms of procedures and legal orientation. That disparity is due to a combination of factors, and among others, the following: the various national experiences of the 2011 events in North Africa (the so-called “Arab Spring”) and their impact on the social and political spheres; geopolitical changes and their impact on re-oriented national foreign policies; the development of alternative voices/forces related to migration, at international, regional and transnational levels and their impact on the “supply” of legal norms likely to be debated and adopted.
Besides, the normative forces involved in the law-making processes have multiplied and have been diversified, still with variations from one country to another. While the reforms of the 2000s were adopted within a very short period of time, with the combined impact of a small number of forces, the processes of the 2010s have involved a larger range of constraints (in terms of objectives, political and social issues, legal influences and number of spontaneous or formal participants to the process). In Morocco in particular, the process of elaborating a “new immigration and asylum policy”, including elaborating three new laws, undertaking a regularisation campaign, programming integration and building up an asylum regime has been opened up to and invested by a large number of stakeholders; it has been debated and partially publicised, and it has involved a plurality of factors. The Tunisian process has been more discrete and less prioritised, but influences and interactions have been more diversified than previously. Mauritania presents a more constant profile to this regard: the recent (limited) legal evolutions have constituted a continuation of the process begun since 2005 – within which a certain diversity of influences was already noticeable – rather than a break with it.
A second major set of findings relates to the dynamic nature and country-specific interaction of the forces, which impact law-making in Morocco, Tunisia and Mauritania. Although several categories of forces can be identified to be common to the three countries (e.g international law, EU pressure, the UNHCR, the civil society, arrival of refugees, etc), actors and factors in each category substantially vary in time and space. Two elements appear to be decisive in the assessment of normativity: the role of individuals (e.g. the UNHCR expert relating to national authorities, the minister of migration, the new president of an association, etc) and interactions between the latter and between the various forces (actors and factors).
The Tunisian civil society and the Moroccan civil society related to migration are linked by transnational and inter-personal networks with shared objectives. While the two countries have also been crossed by similar influences and issues (e.g. building an asylum regime, mobility partnership with the EU, UNHCR lobby action), the legal options advocated for by their respective civil society have differed, along the country-specific interaction of diverse features (social situation, political changes, geopolitical context, etc). The Moroccan civil society itself has been in constant evolution. Some of its components have been entangled, together with journalists and policy-makers, in networks of personal interrelations, but also in national institutions such as the CNDH (National Council for Human Rights), which has had a tremendous impact on the progressive development of the “new asylum and immigration policy”. Morocco constitutes a fertile laboratory for studying law-making related to migration. It has not only been engaged into unique legal developments in the region, it has also multiplied the cross-influence of national, transnational and international constraints imbricated in the processes.
The findings of the project are likely to impact subsequent research on migration. Law-making related to migration in the Maghreb and its neighbourhood (e.g. the Sahel) appears as a perpetual work in progress, at the crossroads of various recent dynamics. The project has highlighted on-going fundamental changes in the region, both in terms of evolving relation to law and evolving relation to migration, and the need to developing research on these concomitant processes. It has in particular prepared the ground for a trans-disciplinary approach to migration based on a dialogue between legal studies and other social sciences.
The project may also impact the way the civil society and policy-makers approach migration-related legal and policy developments in the EU, in the Maghreb and in Africa. It has revealed the interweaving and fluctuating relations between a plurality of stakeholders, which should contribute to deconstructing widely shared dichotomies – e.g. state v/ civil society or the EU v/ southern Mediterranean countries – and a top-down approach generally attached to law-making related to migration. In decrypting law-making as living processes, rooted in societies, the project may lead to a better understanding of current dynamics and to adapting negotiations and normative positions to moving configurations.
When the project started, an unprecedented wave of reforms had recently been adopted within the Maghreb. Between 2003 and 2010, Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania elaborated several laws related to citizenship and migration, whose legal framework had remained unchanged since independence. Concomitantly with the starting of the project (mid-2013), Morocco launched the process of developing a “new immigration and asylum policy”, Tunisia was embarked into drafting an asylum law, Mauritania was undertaking a regularisation campaign, soon followed by Morocco. In the background of these historical legal dynamics in the region, debates were emerging and spreading, among the civil society, political representatives, the media and part of the population, on migration and protection issues as well as on related social questions such as discrimination and identity within the society.
My work has consisted in examining these societal evolutions together with the processes of law-making in the field of migration, with a focus on the various forces – actors and factors – involved in these processes. I have analysed and compared the laws adopted in the 2000s and the bills and measures in progress since the beginning of the 2010s, in consideration of other normative frameworks (international law, EU law, African law, related laws in other countries). I have explored the evolution of forces implicated in legal dynamics in each of the three countries: the emergence of new actors at the local level, the influence of changing (social, political, legal) factors, the impact of fluctuations in the regional and global contexts, the evolving position and role of some stakeholders.
I have progressively identified a set of forces likely to carry and diffuse norms and standards in the field of migration in each of the three countries. I have then sought to assess their normative impact on the law-making processes along the following questions: What norm(s) has/have been conveyed or supported by this actor/factor? By what means/ways has this force impacted the law-making process? What has been its influence? To complement this approach based on the potential normative force, I have also conducted an analysis based on each legal provision: From where does it come (international treaty or standards, EU law, foreign legislation, local standard, etc)? How has it made its way to the law/bill? What has been in support of it?
This research has been at the crossroads of law, sociology, anthropology and political science. I have been inspired by the literature on law-making, and on the diffusion, the trans-nationalisation and the globalisation of law. I have also invested networks and policy transfer studies. I have followed the research of sociologists and anthropologists of migration. I have interacted and worked with colleagues from various disciplines and institutions in Tunisia, Morocco and Mauritania, as well as in Europe and Canada.
My findings are the result of both desk and field research. The desk research has included work on literature, legal texts and the search for information and data, but also interaction with and interviews of stakeholders involved in the legal processes as well as participation to transnational networks on migration. The field research has been coupled all along the project with participation to seminars and conferences. I have met and interviewed a plurality of stakeholders (members of governments and parliaments, activists, representatives of migrants, members of international institutions, academics), and disseminating my results has been an opportunity to develop contacts and interactions, get feedback and share key information on local on-going reforms and debates.
One of the major findings of my research lies in the substantial change that can be observed between the legal processes of the 2000s and the legal processes of the subsequent half-decade, singularly in Morocco and Tunisia.
I have observed a greater disparity between the three countries covered by the project and within the Maghreb as a whole, compared to the previous period of reforms –more homogeneous in terms of procedures and legal orientation. That disparity is due to a combination of factors, and among others, the following: the various national experiences of the 2011 events in North Africa (the so-called “Arab Spring”) and their impact on the social and political spheres; geopolitical changes and their impact on re-oriented national foreign policies; the development of alternative voices/forces related to migration, at international, regional and transnational levels and their impact on the “supply” of legal norms likely to be debated and adopted.
Besides, the normative forces involved in the law-making processes have multiplied and have been diversified, still with variations from one country to another. While the reforms of the 2000s were adopted within a very short period of time, with the combined impact of a small number of forces, the processes of the 2010s have involved a larger range of constraints (in terms of objectives, political and social issues, legal influences and number of spontaneous or formal participants to the process). In Morocco in particular, the process of elaborating a “new immigration and asylum policy”, including elaborating three new laws, undertaking a regularisation campaign, programming integration and building up an asylum regime has been opened up to and invested by a large number of stakeholders; it has been debated and partially publicised, and it has involved a plurality of factors. The Tunisian process has been more discrete and less prioritised, but influences and interactions have been more diversified than previously. Mauritania presents a more constant profile to this regard: the recent (limited) legal evolutions have constituted a continuation of the process begun since 2005 – within which a certain diversity of influences was already noticeable – rather than a break with it.
A second major set of findings relates to the dynamic nature and country-specific interaction of the forces, which impact law-making in Morocco, Tunisia and Mauritania. Although several categories of forces can be identified to be common to the three countries (e.g international law, EU pressure, the UNHCR, the civil society, arrival of refugees, etc), actors and factors in each category substantially vary in time and space. Two elements appear to be decisive in the assessment of normativity: the role of individuals (e.g. the UNHCR expert relating to national authorities, the minister of migration, the new president of an association, etc) and interactions between the latter and between the various forces (actors and factors).
The Tunisian civil society and the Moroccan civil society related to migration are linked by transnational and inter-personal networks with shared objectives. While the two countries have also been crossed by similar influences and issues (e.g. building an asylum regime, mobility partnership with the EU, UNHCR lobby action), the legal options advocated for by their respective civil society have differed, along the country-specific interaction of diverse features (social situation, political changes, geopolitical context, etc). The Moroccan civil society itself has been in constant evolution. Some of its components have been entangled, together with journalists and policy-makers, in networks of personal interrelations, but also in national institutions such as the CNDH (National Council for Human Rights), which has had a tremendous impact on the progressive development of the “new asylum and immigration policy”. Morocco constitutes a fertile laboratory for studying law-making related to migration. It has not only been engaged into unique legal developments in the region, it has also multiplied the cross-influence of national, transnational and international constraints imbricated in the processes.
The findings of the project are likely to impact subsequent research on migration. Law-making related to migration in the Maghreb and its neighbourhood (e.g. the Sahel) appears as a perpetual work in progress, at the crossroads of various recent dynamics. The project has highlighted on-going fundamental changes in the region, both in terms of evolving relation to law and evolving relation to migration, and the need to developing research on these concomitant processes. It has in particular prepared the ground for a trans-disciplinary approach to migration based on a dialogue between legal studies and other social sciences.
The project may also impact the way the civil society and policy-makers approach migration-related legal and policy developments in the EU, in the Maghreb and in Africa. It has revealed the interweaving and fluctuating relations between a plurality of stakeholders, which should contribute to deconstructing widely shared dichotomies – e.g. state v/ civil society or the EU v/ southern Mediterranean countries – and a top-down approach generally attached to law-making related to migration. In decrypting law-making as living processes, rooted in societies, the project may lead to a better understanding of current dynamics and to adapting negotiations and normative positions to moving configurations.