With an increasing pressure on European leaders to solve the recent refugee crisis, the EU resorted to the CSDP as one of the means to tackle this crisis. Before 2015, Frontex, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, has been responsible for tackling the immigration of illegal migrants to the EU. Frontex has engaged in various joint operations and projects. Between 2013 and 2014, the Italian government reacted to an increased immigration to Europe by launching a naval and air operation Mare Nostrum. But, in 2015, the Council of the EU established a military operation, EU NAVFOR Med Operation Sophia, the first of its kind, to address the refugee crisis. The purpose of the operation is to fight and disrupt human smugglers and traffickers. Further, the civilian missions in Niger, Mali and Libya have been adapted to address the flow of migrants and smuggling already in the countries of origin and transit. The Council agreed to reinforce the mandates of these missions to combat irregular migration. The EU also decided to deploy Frontex liaison officers in all the countries of the Sahel region. The cooperation between the EEAS (and CSDP missions) and Frontex has intensified. Plans for the establishment of institutional arrangements for the coordination of joint CSDP-Frontex actions are ongoing.
This shift in the CSDP politics has significant implications for the conceptual and policy-based understandings of crisis management. Policy makers and scholars did not initially see much room for the CSDP in tackling illegal migration and refugees. The use of this crisis management instrument for such purposes blurs the boundaries between external and internal security policy. It signifies a watershed for the CSDP as it brings the idea of collective defence to an operational momentum that has not been seen before in the history of the CSDP. This paper traces these new developments by looking at three main aspects. The paper first analyses the intergovernmental dynamics of decision- and policy-making in the Political and Security Committee and its preparatory bodies, which agreed on modalities of this shift. I also discuss the reasons behind failed proposals to launch CSDP missions in the Balkans to tackle the refugee flows. The analysis then moves to discuss the case study of the Sahel region where the mandates of civilian missions have been extended to tackle irregular migration and where the EU prepares to deploy Frontex liaison officers. Finally, I consider the conceptual and policy implications for the re-definition of conflict management approaches under the CSDP, in particular the shift from the use of the CSDP in the management of conflicts abroad towards its use for the protection of the EU and its citizens. The paper builds on a qualitative analysis of EU documents and extensive fieldwork in Brussels and in Mali, including interviews with EU officials.
