Description
For over three decades, securitisation has been the dominant trend shaping migration policies in Italy, which has intensified in recent years. Meloni and her government have implemented migration policies, claiming success in reducing the number of irregular migrants in Italy with a vast consensus from International and European leaders. This raises a question: does Italy have ‘a successful recipe for securitising migration’? To answer this question, this paper examines how securitisation of migration has evolved in Italy and to what extent it proves to be successful following the 2015 migration crisis and how it shapes the narrative surrounding the decrease in irregular arrivals in Italy.
The analysis of laws and decrees traces how official discourse and practice have evolved in the past ten years, becoming more nuanced. The language used has shifted from technical and bureaucratic vocabulary addressing migrants, such as ‘applicant(s)’ and ‘seeker(s)’, to more generic and charged terms like ‘immigrant(s)’ and ‘foreigner(s)’, fuelling the perception of migration as a matter of security. Moreover, engaging with the literature in the field of Italian migration policy, the paper shows how practices have become more sophisticated, leveraging externalisation of borders, delegitimisation of the protection scheme, and police enforcement in migration management.
An early analysis of the findings suggests that the security frame remains dominant both in discourses and practices over the 10-year time frame analysed. Triangulating these findings with migration and asylum data, the paper evaluates the degree and dimensions of securitisation ‘success’ and for whom, offering new insights into the evolving dynamics of Italian migration governance.
