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25 November 2024

Politics, euphemisms, and secrecy

What’s in a word? More specifically, in the context of migration policy, what’s in the word “return”?

The academic Clara Lecadet describes it as “a euphemism for the violence inherent in expulsion,” that “erases the complexity of migration journeys in which expulsion is rarely synonymous with return.” Furthermore, “it ‘naturalises’ return as an inherent part of migration.”

Given this, we consider the word deportation – a word that encapsulates the force and violence involved in the process – more appropriate.

As one of the two analyses in this bulletin demonstrates, EU deportation policy is already synonymous with violence and harm. Unsurprisingly, official documents do not take this into account, and those examined in the analysis indicate that a forthcoming revision of the EU’s deportation law is likely to mean even stricter, harsher, and more harmful measures.

In official discourse, “return” is often supposed to be followed by “reintegration.” Through this, those who have been expelled from Europe are supposed to accept their situation, settle down, and not seek to leave their country again – at least not towards Europe.

“Reintegration” is also a political euphemism. It assumes that deported individuals were once “integrated” in a particular way – if at all – in the country to which they have been expelled.

EU reintegration policy is the subject of this edition’s other analysis. Frontex has been granted an increasing role in this area. Evidence from both the Nigeria and The Gambia indicates that this is likely to exacerbate existing problems for deportees: from inadequate “reintegration” support provided by a confusing array of agencies and providers, to questions over national sovereignty and democratic control.

Substantial sums of public money are going towards the EU’s deportation and reintegration policies: €20 million for “sustainable reintegration” of people deported to Bangladesh; the same amount for a similar project in Iraq; and in sub-Saharan Africa, €113 million for a joint EU-IOM project, and a further €180 million for another project on “sustainable reintegration.”

These figures come from one of the documents we are publishing with this bulletin on the Coordination Group on Migration (CGM), a secretive body in which the Commission and member states coordinate their spending on external migration projects.

The CGM was set up in late 2021, and aims to bring together high-level EU and member state representatives to discuss and coordinate ongoing or proposed projects around the world.

The aim is to find “complementarities and synergies” between EU and national actions. On the face of it, this may seem rather useful: it is of little use to anyone when governments waste money by duplicating each other’s activities, and collective action is usually more effective.

However, such superficial benefits are outweighed by a far more fundamental problem: the purpose of all this spending is to extend and entrench harmful migration and border control policies. Furthermore, it is development aid – vast quantities of it – that is being used for this purpose.

The projects discussed by the CGM are primarily financed by development budgets – for the EU, this means the Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument (NDICI).

Up to 10% of this €80 billion budget is supposed to be used for migration-related projects, subverting the purpose of development aid. Rather than being normalised, this needs to be opposed.

Opposition becomes more difficult, of course, when discussions and decisions take place in secret. The CGM is an “informal special group,” meaning it is not subject to the same transparency rules as other Commission expert and advisory groups (“informal special group” could be considered a euphemism all of its own).

This secrecy means there are vanishingly few references to the CGM in public documents, and no meaningful public information: as far as we know, we are the first organisation to publish any substantive documents it has produced or discussed.

Even these documents are somewhat limited, dating largely from 2021 and 2022. Access to more recent ones was denied on the grounds that decisions on the projects they detail have not yet been taken. Other denials and redactions were justified on the grounds of protecting “public security” and international relations.

Nevertheless, the documents should be of interest to anyone seeking to understand, investigate or challenge the further entrenchment of the EU’s external migration control agenda. They provide information on a wide number of projects, priorities and useful pointers for further investigation.

We will continue to seek access to more documents produced by the CGM and other secretive EU entities, such as MOCADEM. Likewise, we will continue to obtain and publish documents from other EU bodies. With a new Commission set to accelerate the externalisation agenda, finding ways to expose and challenge it is more important than ever.

Chris Jones, Statewatch