External Borders Research Articles

Инструментализация миграции: управление миграционными потоками в двустороннем формате

This article assesses the theoretical contours and effectiveness of migration governance and diplomacy as an instrument of statecraft in interstate relations. The first part provides an overview of the stakes and challenges of migration within the fields of international relations and political theory. In particular, the category of migration defies the theoretical model of the nation­state, on which traditional IR and political theory are grounded. The second part highlights how the state, through the securitization of migration, uses migration as a tool to reaffirm its defining features: reinforcing its borders, legitimating state sovereignty, and building societal security. The third section demonstrates the usefulness of the category of statecraft within the context of migration governance at a bilateral level owing to the absence of a global normative framework. This relationship can serve different purposes, depending on the context: to harm, to deter, to bargain, to escalate. The last section presents contemporary case studies of the application of migration statecraft by the United States and Russia, as well as by member states along external border of the European Union and within the Schengen space. The elements of "migration statecraft" evidenced by these episodes focus on several objectives: trade blackmail, cooperation in an asymmetrical relation, political threat, and diplomatic escalation for electoral purposes. The variety of these cases illustrates the specificity of statecraft in comparison with foreign policy analysis. While the latter refers to a general and long­term strategy, the former is context­dependent and specific to achievement of a precise desired outcome.

Political and legal support of ensuring security and sustainable development of CIS member countries

CIS member countries are interconnected by both historical, cultural and economic components. Russia and China, as two global actors, influence the economic situation and security in the CIS. The purpose of the paper is to identify the dependence of the CIS member countries on Russia and China, as well as to identify dependence of the economic development of the member states on import of armaments. Applying a regional approach, as well as analyzing economic indicators, supplies of weapons and presence of the military industrial complex production and service enterprises, we can define Belarus and Kazakhstan as the states with the largest share of foreign (Russian and Chinese) investments and weapons in their home markets. The Russian Federation stands out in the general context of dominance throughout the CIS. There are also Russian geopolitical interests, which include protection of external borders by ensuring security and stability in the member states bordering third countries. Chinese interests are focused mainly in the border area, namely, Chinese interests in Central Asia. The growing influence of global actors in the region, which is ensured through their investments in industry, military supplies and setting up new production complexes, establishes an ever closer relationship among the nations of the region. Thus, such an influence may lead certain CIS member countries to closer integration with China and Russia in the future, namely, to create bilateral alliances with a higher degree of dependence on global actors in comparison with other CIS member countries.

The Share of Cross-Border Shopping in Poland's Trade Turnover of Food Products With Neighbouring Countries on the European Union Eastern Border in 2013-2018

Trade turnover of food products between Poland and its neighbouring countries on the external eastern border of the European Union (Ukraine, Belarus and Russia) is an important element of the international trade exchange of Poland. The registered trade turnover had an impact on the Polish economy, whereas, from the point of view of development of areas located within the border impact zone, the unregistered trade that is part of cross-border shopping was of great importance. The aim of the paper is to examine the dynamics and trends of changes in terms of the share of cross-border shopping in the total trade turnover of food products with the above-mentioned countries over the period 2013-2018. A case study analysis conducted in all three countries showed that there was a steady increase in the share of unregistered trade in the total trade volume throughout the entire research period. (original abstract)

The Mental Space of the Zaporozhian Cossacks in representations оf Dmytro Yavornytsky

The aim of the article is to study the mental space of the Zaporozhian Cossacks in representations of the prominent Ukrainian historian Dmytro Yavornytsky (1855–1940). Historiographic analysis and synthesis are research methods. Sources: works of Dmytro Yavornytsky, memoirs of contemporaries of the scientist-historian, modern historiography. The main results are that the author actualizes the historical and geographical aspect of the mental history of Ukraine; shows the importance of understanding spatial identification and differentiation for the realization of historical and national identity, mental understanding of the world on the examples of achievements of Ukrainian and foreign European scientists. Based on the analysis of Dmytro Yavornytsky’s creative work, it is proved that the scientist-historian came to the conclusion about the ancient, organic nature of the territory of the Steppe Ukraine to the Freedoms of the Zaporozhian Lowland Army; its external borders are established; the internal Ukrainian territorial demarcation between the lands of the Army of the Zaporozhian lower and Poltava regiments of the Hetmanate is marked. An expert on the history of the Zaporozhian Freedoms established that the space of the mental world of the Zaporozhian Cossacks covered a huge steppe expanse that ran along both banks of the Dnipro; widely used the data of hydrography, topography, climate, flora and fauna of the Zaporozhian region to understand the features of this area, which had a huge impact on the mentality of the Cossacks. The Dnipro River, which united the two banks of the Zaporozhian Freedoms, was of sacred significance for the mental world of the Cossacks. To understand the spatial component of the mental world of the Cossacks, it is important to divide the military and territorial division of the Zaporizhzhya, to show the history of the Cossacks in the context of contacts with neighbors. Noting the peculiarities of the history of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, Dmytro Yavornytsky closely linked the struggle of the Zaporozhian Cossacks not only for the rights and freedoms of Zaporizhzhya, but also of other Ukrainian lands, which confirms the mental unity of the Cossacks with other parts of Ukraine. Brief conclusions. D. I. Yavornytsky revealed the spatial aspects of the diverse mental world of the Cossacks, which gave rise to a special historical energy, the basis of freedom-loving and the strength of spirit of the Zaporozhian society. The practical significance of the article is that its material will be of interest to students, graduate students, doctoral students and historians in the study of historiography and mental history of Ukraine. The originality of the article is in understanding of little- studied mental aspects of the heritage of the scientist-historian. Scientific novelty is in the development of insufficiently studied problem of the mental world of the Cossacks in the work of Dmitry Yavornytsky. Type of article: analytical.

Cross-border cooperation at the external border of the European Union in the context of political, economic and social conditions: the case of the Polish-Russian neighbourhood

Research background: Integration and globalization processes encourage activities for the development of border regions. For the north-eastern regions of Poland and the Kaliningrad region, cross-border neighbourhood enables regions to cooperate and provides an opportunity for economic and social recovery.
 Purpose of the article: The present article aims to analyse areas of cross-border activity taking place on the Polish-Russian borderland, based on the opinions of the inhabitants of the Kaliningrad region. Taking into account the rapidly changing political and economic conditions, as well as social relations, the following areas of Polish-Russian cross-border cooperation have been examined: economic activity, tourism, social activity, scientific cooperation, neighbourly relations.
 Methods: The study presents the results of the author?s own research carried out using standardized interviews with 1,022 inhabitants of the Kaliningrad region. As the research instrument, a self-designed interview questionnaire. The adopted time frame encompassed four stages of the functioning of Polish-Russian cross-border cooperation, each of them different due to political, eco-nomic and social conditions. The sample was selected using the quota method. The correspondence analysis was used for statistical tools.
 Findings & Value added: The suspension of local border traffic has significantly limited the development of cross-border cooperation. The Polish-Russian relations, encumbered with high risk and uncertainty, have led to a considerable decrease in cooperation between border areas. The level of risk results not only from mutual relations between Poland and Russia, but is also a consequence of political and economic relations between the European Union and the Russian Federation. In the long term perspective, local border traffic may be open and similar conditions for the functioning of cross-border cooperation may occur. Therefore, knowledge about the activity of cross-border residents of Polish-Russian border regions will be useful in counteracting the undesirable effects that may occur.

A Century of the Baltic States’ Independence: Some Similarities and Differences with Bulgaria

The article scrutinizes the Baltic States and their century of independence which have been the focus of interest of various sciences. On the occasion of the commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the proclamation of the independence of the Baltic States – Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia – some parallels could be drawn with the historical, economic and political development of these countries and Bulgaria. These parallels are not only found in the political and legal period but are contained in different stages, which shows the interesting legal and political nature of the Baltic States and some of their common problems and events with the countries of Eastern Europe and, in particular, the example with Bulgaria. The article has also drawn attention to a significant problem that the three Baltic States and Bulgaria have to deal with, namely the demographic crisis. This problem is particularly important in the light of migratory pressures that the countries outlining the external borders of the European Union are facing and it involves systematic and long-term efforts.

The securitisation of migration in the European Union: Frontex and its evolving security practices

ABSTRACT This article investigates the evolving security practices of one of the key actors in the handling of asylum-seekers and migrants at the external borders of the European Union (EU) Member States, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, widely referred to as ‘Frontex’. It does so by applying a revised version of the Copenhagen School’s securitisation framework, which focuses on security practices and is underpinned by an understanding of security as belonging to a continuum. The article compares and contrasts the practices of Frontex in the context of two significant ‘migration crises’ in the Mediterranean, in 2005–2006 and 2015–2016, respectively. The analysis of the more recent practices of the Agency following the 2015–2016 ‘migration crisis’ shows that this ‘crisis’ has led to an intensification of the security practices of the Agency. Frontex has moved towards the end point of the continuum, which is characterised by survival, existential threats, and militarisation. This has contributed to a spiralling of the securitisation of migration in the EU.

Ukrainian Cross-Border Governance since the Beginning of COVID-19

European countries that are normally associated with freedom of movement have temporarily closed their internal (within the European Union) and external borders in response to the outbreak of COVID-19 starting spring 2020. Border closures have heavily impacted the whole European region, including its Eastern European neighbours. As of March, Ukraine stopped all regular passenger services, so that people were not able to leave the country by plane, train or bus. It seriously complicated routine activities of those Ukrainians who were planning to travel out of their country through Europe (and Russia) for various purposes, including work, study, and family visits.

Closed-form solutions to the dynamics of confined biased lattice random walks in arbitrary dimensions.

Biased lattice random walks (BLRW) are used to model random motion with drift in a variety of empirical situations in engineering and natural systems such as phototaxis, chemotaxis, or gravitaxis. When motion is also affected by the presence of external borders resulting from natural barriers or experimental apparatuses, modelling biased random movement in confinement becomes necessary. To study these scenarios, confined BLRW models have been employed but so far only through computational techniques due to the lack of an analytic framework. Here, we lay the groundwork for such an analytical approach by deriving the Green's functions, or propagators, for the confined BLRW in arbitrary dimensions and arbitrary boundary conditions. By using these propagators we construct explicitly the time-dependent first-passage probability in one dimension for reflecting and periodic domains, while in higher dimensions we are able to find its generating function. The latter is used to find the mean first-passage passage time for a d-dimensional box, d-dimensional torus or a combination of both. We show the appearance of surprising characteristics such as the presence of saddles in the spatiotemporal dynamics of the propagator with reflecting boundaries, bimodal features in the first-passage probability in periodic domains and the minimization of the mean first-return time for a bias of intermediate strength in rectangular domains. Furthermore, we quantify how in a multitarget environment with the presence of a bias shorter mean first-passage times can be achieved by placing fewer targets close to boundaries in contrast to many targets away from them.

EU Citizenship, Free Movement, and Covid-19 in Romania

Traveling freely, smoothly and unburdened by excessive formalities and the adjoining right to reside in another EU state for work, leisure or study are the hallmarks of the mobility regime applicable to EU citizens and their family members. Measures taken by the majority of EU states to deal with Covid-19 have severely disrupted EU mobility and led to the reestablishment of internal border controls, the introduction of restrictions to travel and even travel bans. These obstacles to mobility have highlighted the EU economy's reliance on EU migrant labor in several sectors, which was further exacerbated by the introduction of an EU travel ban at the external border. This contribution discusses measures taken by Romania that sought to restrict travel to and from Romania, while simultaneously allowing exceptions for nationals to travel to other EU states as essential workers. The Romanian response is discussed in relation to the wider EU attempts to reply to the proliferation of national measures affecting EU free movement and the functioning of the internal market and as an illustration of the need to ensure that mobility goes hand in hand with protection.

The influence of the length of heat sources on the external border on the temperature distribution in profiled polar-orthotropic ring plates taking into account there heat exchange with the external environment

We study the influence of N extended heat sources at external boundaries on the nonaxisymmetric temperature distribution on profiled polar-orthotropic ring plates and take into account heat exchange with the external environment. The solution of the stationary heat conduction problem for anisotropic annular plates of a random profile is resolved through the solution of the corresponding Volterra integral equation of the second kind. The formula of a temperature calculations in anisotropic annular plates of an random profile is given. The exact solution of stationary heat conductivity problem for a reverse conical polar-orthotropic ring plate is recorded. The temperature distribution in such anisotropic plate from N extended heat sources at its outer border is more complex than in the case of temperature distribution from N point heat sources at their external border.

Local border traffic as a liberalization of the Schengen legal regime in the regional dimension with particular regard to the EU-Ukraine border

Local border traffic has a legal basis in the Schengen acquis and is related to the EU’s free movement of persons, which, subject to certain conditions, is also available to third-country nationals. The subject of the article is the legal analysis of the Schengen regime in the context of cross-border cooperation with selected third countries on the external eastern border. The research thesis is proving that local border traffic is an exception to the Schengen regime and at the same time defines the regional dimension of the Schengen area. These analyses will be based on the practical context, which is the operation of the local border traffic on the example of the external eastern border of the European Union, particularly the EU-Ukraine border, which is also the external border of the EU and the Schengen area. In this context, the impact of the liberalized Schengen regime on the movement of people across the EU-Ukraine external border will be examined, which will indicate its phased nature with particular emphasis on the role of local border traffic as a transition phase between visa and visa-free traffic. The article uses comparative statistical data on both forms of liberalization of the Schengen legal regime on the border with Ukraine. At the same time, considering the local border traffic on the EU-Ukraine border, it is worth putting forward a thesis that the local border traffic is increasingly being replaced by visa-free travel. In addition, the LBT became the first step to introduce a visa-free regime, which is further liberalization of the Schengen regime.

Transmesoamericanas nepantleras: mujeres, energía y decolonización

This work presents the experience with indigenous women in Mesoamerica establishing a relationship between gender and energy, drawing the attention of injustices translated into energetic racism that perpetuates the feminization of poverty, non the less leading to a defense of life and territory manifesting in the women-led “web of life” decolonizing territories, as internal and external borders like «Nepantleras».

Old Borderlands

AbstractLarge zones of de facto political autonomy persist even as various state systems have endeavored to fix, rationalize, and secure external and internal borders. These spaces are products of long histories of uneven extension and exercise of state sovereignty in the subcontinent and much of Asia and Africa. Histories and legacies of borderland autonomy have important implications for contemporary sovereign practice in much of the world. This article examines the making, unmaking, and endurance of borderlands around Hyderabad in the eastern Deccan. It describes the region as an “old borderland,” from premodern frontier zone, to sovereign and autonomous state during the era of British imperial dominance, through its mid-twentieth-century reemergence as a site of state avoidance or resistance. Identifying the productive relationship among frictional environments, political sovereignty, and social and cultural dynamics, this article develops frameworks for historicizing borderland autonomy in South Asia and beyond.

The Management of The European Union’s External Borders

The progressive Europeanisation of the management of the external borders has been consistently portrayed as the necessary corollary of the lifting of checks at the internal borders between Member States. Initially, the lifting of the internal borders proceeded on the basis of minimum harmonisation, mutual recognition, and operational cooperation. Until this very day, Member States themselves remain responsible for their respective part of the external borders. This approach has been questioned in recent years, in which borderless travel has come under great pressure due to the threat of terrorist attacks, the 2015 refugee crisis, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic. As Member States resorted to a reinstatement of internal border controls, the call for a reinforcement of the external borders grew louder. Even if the introduction of a ‘shared responsibility’ for the management of the external borders under the European Border and Coast Guard (EBCG) Regulation of 2015 does not absolve Member States of the responsibility for their own borders, it does underline how they manage their borders serving a common interest, within an increasingly harmonised substantive and institutional framework.This contribution first provides an overview of the regulatory framework for the management of the external borders and discusses in more detail the substantive rules for crossing the external borders.This is followed by a closer look at the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (‘Frontex’ or ‘the Agency’), that has become the European spider in the web of national border guard authorities. A next section examines the accountability questions that flow from this multi-level structure of European border management. After that the rules for the reinstatement of internal borders and the exercise of police controls in border areas will be discussed. The concluding section will provide a brief outlook on the basis of trends identified in this chapter.

Covid-19 Using Border Controls to Fight a Pandemic? Reflections From the European Union

When Covid-19 was acknowledged to have arrived in Europe in February-March 2020, politicians and public health authorities scrabbled to find appropriate and effective responses to the challenges. The EU obligation contained in Article 9 Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) requiring the EU (including the Member States to achieve a common protection on human health, however, seems to have been missing from the responses.) Instead, borders and their control became a site of substantial political debate across Europe as a possible venue for effective measures to limit the spread of the pandemic. While the most invasive Covid-19 measures have been within EU states, lockdown, closure of businesses etc., the cross-border aspects (limitations on cross border movement) have been important. In the European Union this had important consequences for EU law on border controls, in particular free movement of persons and the absence of controls among Schengen states. It also implicated border controls with third countries, including European Free Trade Area (EFTA and Switzerland) all states neighboring the EU, the UK (having left the EU on 1 January 2020) the Western Balkans and Turkey. While EU law distinguishes between Schengen borders where no control takes place on persons, non-Schengen EU borders, where controls take place but are limited to identity checks and border controls with third countries and external borders with third countries (non-EFTA or Swiss) the responses of many Member States and the EU institutions abandoned many aspects of these distinctions. Indeed, the difference between border controls between states (inside Schengen, the EU, EFTA, or outside) and internal restrictions on movement became increasingly blurred. Two approaches—public health and public policy—were applied simultaneously and not always in ways which were mutually coherent, or in any way consistent with the Article 9 TFEU commitment. While the public health approach to movement of persons is based on ensuring identification of those in need of treatment or possibly carrying the disease, providing treatment as quickly as possible or quarantine, the public policy approach is based on refusing entry to persons who are a risk irrespective of what that may mean in terms of propagating the pandemic in neighboring states or states of origin. I will examine here the ways in which the two approaches were applied in the EU from the perspective of EU law on border controls.

Interests Under Construction: Views on Migration from the European Union’s Southern External Border

What do people think about unauthorised migrants reaching their shores? This article examines ethnographically what and how Maltese citizens think about recent migrant arrivals from northern Africa. This case study adds to research on public opinion formation in migrant-receiving societies in the European Union, offering perspectives from a small state tasked with enforcing the European Union’s external border in which migration is viewed critically. Embedding our research within constructivist institutionalism – which assumes that self-interest is not pre-determined but rather constructed – we are the first authors to take up Colin Hay’s call for ethnographic analysis in this field. We suggest that criticism of migration to Malta was grounded in fears and beliefs associated with unorderliness of migration management, perceived unfairness of EU requirements, uncertainty of the future, and a loss of control of being able to determine one’s own cultural identity.

Polish Response to Irregular Migration in Recent Years

The main aim of this paper is to examine the situation at the Polish borders, especially at the eastern border which is the external border of the EU. Poland’s border is 3,500 km long. 1,580 km is the Polish section of the external European Union border. The paper presents the Polish position on European migration maps in recent years. The author focuses on the dimension of irregular migration based on data for illegal border crossings from 2014 to 2018. Those data are compared with situations of the other EU external borders. The author also refers to the number of asylum requests in Poland to present the scale of the phenomenon and demonstrate why Poland rejects so many requests. Those statistical data were analyzed in relation to the Polish governments’ position against immigrant quotas. This position is politically justified by having a specific immigration situation due to a long border with Ukraine, a neighboring country with an unstable political situation that influences both irregular and legal migration. The author compares the government’s position with the real situation and evaluates the existence of any possible threat to border security. As the Polish policy is changing a lot in the recent years the author also presents the legal reaction to the so-called “migration crisis”.

Development Aid as a tool of EU's Migration Policy

Since the refugee crisis of 2015, European institutions and governments strengthened policies to better manage migration flows and protect EU’s external borders. In the external dimension, the Union implemented a wide variety of economic, political and deterrence measurers to regain control over migratory flows. Though development cooperation was declared one of important tools for addressing root causes of migration, the externalization of migration management to neighboring transit countries became the main pillar of anti-crisis strategy. Although this policy enabled to essentially reduce the number of irregular arrivals to Europe, it cannot be considered as a long-term solution, as recent developments on Greece-Turkey border reminded. To be better prepared for migration challenges of the future the EU should rethink its development cooperation with the origin and transit countries and include both forced and economic migrants in its comprehensive response. Aid can be a useful tool for the EU if it is used to manage rather than to stop migration.

Las restricciones a la libre circulación de personas en la UE durante la era COVID-19: hacia un futuro incierto

Este estudio analiza el impacto que la COVID-19 ha supuesto para la libre circulación de personas y el control de las fronteras tanto interiores como exteriores en la UE, en un momento especialmente delicado, ya que ha coincidido con la apertura de la Conferencia sobre el futuro de la UE. La hipotésis de partida es la inadecuación del marco jurídico de la libre circulación, tanto en el Derecho Internacional como en el Derecho Europeo, para adoptar las restricciones que la lucha contra la pandemia exige. Este hecho, unido a que los Estados miembros son competentes en materia de salud pública y en la preservación de su seguridad nacional, han alterado la esencia y los límites de un derecho clave para el presente y el futuro del proceso de integración europea. De ahí que sea necesario preservar el actual acervo normativo frente a estas y otras posibles derivas restrictivas, evitando así dar por sentado su irreversibilidad.