Channel Crossings: Irregular migration, policies and politics in the English Channel

2020年，超过8500人使用小船和橡皮艇等非正式海上船只从法国北方前往英国海岸，截至2021年4月撰写本文时，已有超过1500名移民进行了类似的不规则和危险的穿越海峡之旅。他们这样做主要是为了在英国申请庇护（Grierson和Wilshire 2020），98%的人在抵达时这样做（内政部2020）。这些旅程对那些采取行动的人有着深远的影响，也有着深远的政治影响。他们制造了一场媒体风暴和一场政治危机，导致一系列被动的政策干预措施被计划、推迟和搁置;其中包括在英吉利海峡架设渔网或船队以防止非正常海上过境的计划，将寻求庇护者拘留在废弃的渡轮上，以及在大西洋偏远的英国领土上建立庇护处理中心。最近，就在这项提案提交之际，内政部概述了一项有争议的庇护和移民政策改革，其中大部分是对海峡过境现象的直接回应。围绕这些旅程的持续性和围绕它们的治理问题的反复出现和持续的争议，也导致了重大的政治动荡和对政府机构缺乏政治信任。近年来，英吉利海峡过境点的增加导致了英吉利海峡军事化的加强。无人机、海岸巡逻队和军舰的部署与军事化话语的部署相匹配，在这种话语中，“不受欢迎的”寻求庇护者被描绘成入侵力量，而不是逃离冲突或贫困的潜在弱势群体。虽然有大量的研究集中在加莱的非正式营地和动机，所面临的挑战，那些谁发现自己在那里（包括项目组的工作），一直没有系统的分析，英国的作用，并回应，那些谁管理，使或试图穿越海峡之旅。我们的研究将填补这一空白。它将研究不正常的海峡两岸的现象和英国的反应。我们在与后殖民理论的对话中提出了边界过滤的概念，以便在更广泛的，历史上出现的和种族化的逻辑中解释政策反应。我们将研究不断变化的反应，以不正常的海峡过境证明在国家一级的政策反应和指导。我们还将探讨民间社会的反应和海峡两岸自己的经验。在整个项目中，我们将整合不同类型的知识，并与非政府组织和决策者密切合作，通过制作各种及时、方便用户的产出，为可持续应对战略提供信息。

In 2020, over 8500 people have made their way from Northern France to the UK coast using informal sea vessels such as boats and dinghies, and at the time of writing in April 2021 over 1500 migrants have made similar irregular and perilous journeys across the Channel. They have done so principally in order to claim asylum in the United Kingdom (Grierson and Wilshire 2020), with 98% doing so upon arrival (Home Office 2020). These journeys have profound implications for those who take them, as well as far reaching political implications. They have created a media-storm and a political crisis, leading to a series of reactive policy interventions being planned, delayed and shelved; these include plans for nets or flotillas to be erected in the Channel to prevent irregular sea crossings, for asylum seekers to be put in detention on disused ferries, and building asylum processing centres on remote UK territories in the Atlantic Ocean. Most recently and just as this proposal is submitted, the Home Office has outlined a controversial overhaul of asylum and immigration policy, much of which is a direct response to the phenomenon of Channel Crossings. The recurring and ongoing controversies around the persistence of these journeys and the questions of governance which surround them, have also contributed to significant political turbulence and a lack of political trust in government institutions.Increased Channel crossings in recent years have led to the enhanced militarisation of the English Channel. The deployment of drones, coastal patrols and warships were matched by the deployment of a militarised discourse, in which 'unwanted' asylum seekers were portrayed as an invading force rather than potentially vulnerable people fleeing conflict or poverty. While there is a large body of research focussing on informal camps in Calais and the motivations of, and challenges faced by, those who find themselves there (Including work by the project team), there has been no systematic analysis of the British role in, and response to, those who manage to make or attempt a journey across the Channel.Our study will fill this gap. It will examine the phenomenon of irregular Channel crossings and British responses to them. We advance the concept of border filtration in dialogue with postcolonial theory in order to situate policy responses in broader, historically emergent and racialised logics. We will examine the changing response to irregular Channel crossings as evidenced by policy responses and guidance at the national level. We will also explore civil society responses and the experiences of Channel crossers themselves. Across the project we will integrate different types of knowledge and work closely with NGOs and policy makers to inform strategies for sustainable responses through the production of a variety of timely, user-friendly outputs.