Development, security and the role of Frontex on the Turkish-Greek border
Development, security and the role of Frontex on the Turkish-Greek border

Author(s): Burcu Toğral Koca
Subject(s): Geography, Regional studies, Security and defense, Geopolitics
Published by: Transnational Press London
Keywords: Frontex; borders; security; Turkish-Greek border;
Summary/Abstract: Parallel to the intensification of the EU integration process, the discourses and practices governing the migration issue have significantly changed in Europe. Previously seen as an innocent economic activity, blessed with a vital role in the construction of European economies after World War Two, welcomed and encouraged by European states, dealt with through economic and humanitarian discourses, migration has been transformed into a security matter in that it ‘constitutes’ a threat to European societies. It has been increasingly linked to criminality, socioeconomic problems, ‘cultural deprivation’, and lately to terrorism. This transformation started mainly in the mid-1970s, but accelerated with the redefinition of security in the wake of the Cold War. To be more precise, the traditional security thinking of the Cold War years, which confined itself to state-centric and military-oriented conceptualizations, has shifted to include various issues ranging from environment and poverty to population movement. This widening of the security agenda to different areas and utilization of security language for non-military issues have had important repercussions for migration. In this transformation of security, migration has come to be increasingly framed, analyzed and governed through security lenses. In other words, migration has been securitized and this securitization process has increasingly appeared in public discourses and academic research.

• Details
• Contents