Externally driven integration in EU migration policy: enabling integration through indifference, undermining it through conflictive politicisation
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in: Journal of European Public Policy, 22.10.2025.
Publikation: Beiträge in Zeitschriften › Zeitschriftenaufsätze › Forschung › begutachtet
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Externally driven integration in EU migration policy
T2 - enabling integration through indifference, undermining it through conflictive politicisation
AU - Zaun, Natascha
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2025/10/22
Y1 - 2025/10/22
N2 - This article assesses to what extent we see externally driven integration in EU migration policies, focusing on three different periods over the past thirty years: (1) the path to partial integration of immigration policies through the Treaty of Amsterdam, (2) the full regulatory integration and subsequent consolidation in the 2000s and early 2010s, and (3) a phase of selective integration/EU capacity-building and non-integration since 2015. It argues that immigration policies are the prime example for externally driven EU integration, as policymaking in this area is usually reactive and not programmatic. Leveraging secondary data, original interviews with EU policymakers and original EU documents, it finds that joint external interdependence is not required for EU integration in the area, as long as some member states face (external) interdependence and (external) politicisation of the issue. Non-affected member states willingly accept more integration, as they do not consider themselves (negatively) affected by EU policy. However, once EU migration policies become more conflictively (unevenly) politicised, those previously indifferent about EU integration in the area block it further. This has led to selective integration of less politicised border policies rather than comprehensive integration of immigration policies in recent years.
AB - This article assesses to what extent we see externally driven integration in EU migration policies, focusing on three different periods over the past thirty years: (1) the path to partial integration of immigration policies through the Treaty of Amsterdam, (2) the full regulatory integration and subsequent consolidation in the 2000s and early 2010s, and (3) a phase of selective integration/EU capacity-building and non-integration since 2015. It argues that immigration policies are the prime example for externally driven EU integration, as policymaking in this area is usually reactive and not programmatic. Leveraging secondary data, original interviews with EU policymakers and original EU documents, it finds that joint external interdependence is not required for EU integration in the area, as long as some member states face (external) interdependence and (external) politicisation of the issue. Non-affected member states willingly accept more integration, as they do not consider themselves (negatively) affected by EU policy. However, once EU migration policies become more conflictively (unevenly) politicised, those previously indifferent about EU integration in the area block it further. This has led to selective integration of less politicised border policies rather than comprehensive integration of immigration policies in recent years.
KW - EU integration
KW - External shocks
KW - migration
KW - politicisation
KW - Politics
KW - Sociology
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105019652296&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/13501763.2025.2565214
DO - 10.1080/13501763.2025.2565214
M3 - Journal articles
AN - SCOPUS:105019652296
JO - Journal of European Public Policy
JF - Journal of European Public Policy
SN - 1350-1763
ER -