This paper is based on the early stages of the postdoctoral research which aims to develop a theory of extraterritoriality in the control of immigration through case analysis.

The development of the Safe Third Countries’ rule (STC) and its notion as well as practice have been researched mostly by legal scientists.

STC has been mentioned by political scientists in relation to the extra-territorialization of the asylum process. However, the political dimension of STC has been little examined, except for a few studies to explain the consultation process for the making of the Dublin Convention from an actor-centred perspective.

This paper addresses the social construction of STC through the constitution of a political concept. According to this paper’s assumption, the political conceptualization implicates firstly the development of STC as a political and administrative device that is crucial to restricting asylum policy and to reinforcing the territorial entry control of migrants. Secondly, this conceptualization further concerns the elaboration of the STC concept to be globally diffused.

Broadly speaking, the social construction of STC in global terms is divided into three phases.

The notion of STC emerged in the debate and negotiations on the protection and the relocation of Indo-Chinese refugees in the late 1970s and the early 1980s.

STC was subsequently introduced into the Swiss asylum act of 1979 and incorporated into the asylum laws of Scandinavian states during the 1980s such as Denmark’s Alien Act of 1986. Moreover, STC has been developed essentially as a legal framework for the Dublin Regulations since the mid-1980s.

Since the early 2000s STC has been diffused through a number of states outside of Europe including South Africa, the United States, Canada, and Australia.

Sociological institutionalism is one of the explanatory frameworks of social constructivism used to illustrate the worldwide diffusion of an institution or a norm among different nation states as a result of a global cultural model’s replication and internalization. But this global cultural model (“world polity”) has been scarcely elucidated.

This paper tries to clarify the political conceptualization of STC between 1979 and 1992 in Europe through the analysis of documents and secondary literature. Specifically, this paper demonstrates how the notion and legalization of STC is discussed as a significant device to restrict asylum policy and to promote deportation policy, analysing parliamentary discourse in Germany and the UK, and in the European Parliament and documents issued by the Commission and the Councils.

The multitude of crises that the EU has faced since 2010 has led to claims that the European Council’s (EUCO) role as an agenda-setter has increased at the cost of the European Commission (Commission). This claim is examined through analysing core elements of the response to two different migration crises: the 2015-2016 migration crisis and the EU-Belarus border crisis in 2021-2022. Through tracing the policy processes the following claims can be made about the agenda-setting roles of EU actors in formulating the response to these crises. First, viewing EUCO and the Commission as no more than uniform institutions provides a limited understanding of the role that different actors play within the institutions seeking their preferred policy outcome. Second, the relationship between EUCO and the Commission cannot be simply defined as ‘EUCO vs Commission’ rather it is more nuanced during crises.

The signing of the Maastricht treaty over 30 years ago provided the blueprint for the free movement of people in the European Union (EU) with EU citizens at the core of the treaty. While it has been successful in ensuring integration and free movement of goods, services, and people across member states (MS), it has also been a bit restrictive for third country nationals (TCN) who must have certain rights and documents before they can embark on intra-EU movements. Likewise the Directive 2003/109/EC aka the Long-term Residents Directive (LTRD) was done in order to correct this abnormally for TCN in order to ensure they enjoy full rights and benefits as EU residents however, it’s implementation has been very limiting and as such TCN intra-EU movement has been underexplored including non-Schengen area MS which defeats the single market principle of the EU which it prides itself with. For instance, as at 2017 TCN who held EU Long-term residence permit were estimated to be 3.1 million when compared to those holding national long-term permit at the same time, it was estimated that over 7 million people held such permit indicating less than 50% of TCN having access to EU LTR permit which invariably leads to restriction of movement in MS, loss of job, opportunities, economic upliftment, family reunification etc. which all hamper their rights to freedom of movement as enshrined in the LTRD. More recent data indicates that out of the 23 million TCN legally staying in the EU in 2020, only about 10 million have the EU LTR permits representing only 45% of all TCN across the EU. This paper explored the migration trends of TCN in the EU and the various ways LTRD has been limiting in their application. While the new reformation of the EU single permit for work and residence is a great way of fostering integration, opening borders to more opportunities and migrants’ talents across the regional bloc, however, the stringent measures of meeting the requirements of the EU LTRP has been a far cry of what EU hope to gain in enforcing the EU LTRP. Accordingly, the paper advocates an expansion of these rights to holders of permit slip as they are bound within their countries of residence for long months awaiting their permit cards which often infringe their rights to movements, various opportunities, and even family reunification within the EU and its associate MS.

Brexit represented a key societal/economic shift in the UK, having an immense impact on diverse migrant communities living in regions that are dominated by agricultural and food production industries, such as the region of Fenland in East Anglia. With huge national labour shortages in these industries, questions are being raised not only about how to fill the vacancies (the economic perspective), but also who can fill them (societal inclusion of different types of migrants) and what support is needed from the public authorities and civil society organisations, especially for ageing resident migrant population, migrant lone parents and families.

This paper presents key findings both from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government funded interdisciplinary research project undertaken by the authors between 2018-19 which investigated the impact of Central and Eastern European migration in Fenland[1] and the findings from an ARU QR funded follow-up pilot study (2021-23).[2]

This subsequent research builds upon some key results from the initial study, to focus on older (50+) EU migrants post-Brexit, investigating their experiences at the intersection of ageing and migration, and how the post-Brexit, post-pandemic world has impacted their social integration, access to services, retirement plans, settled status and challenges for relatives seeking to join family already in the UK.

Key EU Older Migrants pilot project findings address legal pathways for residency; factors impacting on access to services and support; employment, healthcare and social security issues; plans surrounding retirement, especially EU older migrants' concerns around pensions knowledge, eligibility and portability.

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[1] Greenfields, M, Smith, D, Dagilytė, E, Ramadan, S and Bright, J, (2019) The Impact of Migration in the Fenland Area. A Scoping Report. High Wycombe, BNU. Available at https://bucks.repository.guildhe.ac.uk/17885

[2] Smith, D, Dagilytė, E, Greenfields, M, Radley, C, Gargi, G and Dadswell, A, (2023) EU Older Migrants: Pilot Project Stakeholder Report. Cambridge, ARU. Available at https://aru.figshare.com/articles/report/EU_Older_Migrants_Pilot_Project_Stakeholder_Report/23783805/1