International Migration and International Security

Why Prejudice Is a Global Security Threat

Valeria Bello

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780815347293
• eBook ISBN: 9781134979530
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Through an interdisciplinary analytic lens that combines debates emerged in the fields of international relations, political science and sociology, Valeria Bello reveals how transnational dynamics have increased extremism, prejudiced attitudes towards others and international xenophobia.

Bello begins her analysis by tracing similarities between Europe today and Europe before World War II to explain why prejudice is a global security threat and why it is arising as a current global concern within International Organizations. In such a light, Bello shows how changes in the International System and the attack on the UN practice of Intercultural Dialogue have become sources of new perceived threats and the reasons for which new exclusionary patterns have arisen. She argues that both those outcomes have been exacerbating the perceived clash of civilizations and the root causes of different fashions of extremisms. Bello concludes by portraying alternative ways to deal with these instabilities through a partnership of the different stakeholders involved, including both state and non-state actors at global, regional, national and local levels.

International Migration and International Security provides a unique crosscutting angle from which to analyze the current socio-political crisis connected to the theme of international migration that the world is currently witnessing. Bello expertly shows that different paths for the world are possible and suggest ways to further promote Global Human Security through local, national, regional and global practices of Intercultural Dialogue.

Part I
The Facts

1
CHANGES IN THE INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM AND CONSEQUENCES IN TERMS OF MOBILITY

International Background of Increased Migratory Trends and Instabilities

The changes that have occurred in the International System from the end of the Cold War have produced advanced capitalist trends, instability in some regions of the world and increased mobility across the globe. The first conflicts of the 1990s, in Iraq and in the Balkans, have entailed more insecurity in those geographical areas and the first rise in international migrations to Europe after these events. The consequences of these happenings have not stopped throughout the decade that followed the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). There have been more conflicts and more instability in the Middle East, Central Asia, and more generally in the neighbourhood of Europe, as elsewhere.

The dismantling of the Iron Curtain in 1991 symbolically put aside an age in which the confrontation between two different superpowers, the United States of America (USA) and the USSR, characterized the world and its international relations. The confrontation was substantially due to the two very diverse interpretations that the superpowers held of both the way that the state has to rule its territory and the role of the individual within the state. The two political “poles” of the world were struggling not only for power but also for showing that their respective ideology was the most successful. An example of how also the scientific debate reflected this ideological struggle is the commendation of the liberal victory that Francis Fukuyama wrote in the summer of 1989:

But the century that began full of self-confidence in the ultimate triumph of Western liberal democracy seems at its close to be returning full circle to where it started: not to an “end of ideology” or a convergence between capitalism and socialism, as earlier predicted, but to an unabashed victory of economic and political liberalism.

(Fukuyama 1989: 1)

To simplify by large, and without any presumption to be exhaustive or even complete on this, for the US system, and capitalist systems more generally, the individuals hold the main responsibility about their lives and what they achieve depends on the efforts and energies that they dedicate to accomplish their objectives. The state only needs to provide a good government of both the territory and its societal structure and guarantee personal freedoms but individuals have to take care for themselves. Instead, for the USSR and communist systems more generally, the individuals are embedded in a system, the community, in which they all must be equal. In order to make sure that this happens, though, according to the Soviet Union’s interpretation, the state needs to rule every aspect of citizens’ life. Therefore, the state is the agent that holds the responsibility of what persons achieve. As a consequence, within this system, very little space is left for individual freedoms (Gilpin 1987).

The clash between the two systems was ideological first and political and economic ultimately; both were totally committed in demonstrating that their own vision of the way the state and its society should work was the most advantageous. Between these two superpowers and their respective universes of allies stood Europe. Due to its special position – neighbour of the USSR, with at its heart, in Berlin, the separated German stronghold of the communist system – the European Union (EU) had found its own “Third Way” (Giddens 1998). According to the political compromise represented by the European Social Model, the individuals are responsible for their own destiny; however, the state has to supply basic services providing fair opportunities for everyone to achieve their personal fulfilment. In such a light, good public health and education systems, fair working conditions with effective protection of workers’ rights are considered the indispensable means for persons to live with dignity and to freely develop their personalities according to their own desires, abilities and efforts (Adnett and Hardy 2005). If in the first half of the nineteenth century the “American dream” inspired millions of European migrants looking for better opportunities in the “New World”, the second half saw the establishment of a “European dream”. Particularly from the 1970s, the EU member states became net-immigrant recipient (Bello 2014). Since then, the European Welfare State has contributed to creating the conditions for a “European Dream” that has inspired (and, despite all, still inspires) millions of persons. These include those who move – and sometimes even engage in perilous travels – to join this type of state and its society. Interestingly, amongst different nationalities, US citizens were the most numerous group of migrants to Europe in the first half of the 1990s (see Table 1.1).

When the Cold War between the two superpowers was over, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Iron Curtain, what had failed was the communist system and not the European Third Way. The triumph of the “West”, or better of the “Western” system, first of all entailed the total exhaustion of viable systematic alternatives to “Western” liberalism.¹ As a result, this situation suddenly deteriorated the position of leftist parties everywhere in Europe and has consequently allowed the introduction of some advanced capitalist policies in the Welfare State System. In particular, financial hardships and other market vulnerabilities (black market, unemployment, etc.) have been tackled with the so-called “politics of flexibilization” (Castells, Caraça and Cardoso 2013b; Jimeno and Toharia 1994). Its side effects have been the corrosion of both the European Social Model and its Welfare State System (Vaughan-Whitehead 2015).

TABLE 1.1 Relevant International Migrations Flows from and to Middle East and Central Asia (1990–1995)

This chapter does not go so far as to claim that a variety of economic hardships and market vulnerabilities were intentionally made to harm the European Welfare State. However, it highlights that conflicts and instabilities that have happened after the end of the Cold War, including the Gulf War, the Afghanistan War and the Iraq War, all have meant an increase in the price of crude oil. This has consequently raised the cost of production – and particularly for advanced economies – and has entailed cuts in the cost of the other part of the production process: human labour. Intended or not, this situation has played a role in destabilizing the European Welfare State System, thus amplifying the perception of a “risk society” (Beck 1992). On the one hand, in Europe, this has happened through the “flexibilization” of the labour market (Castells, Caraça and Cardoso 2013b; Jimeno and Toharia 1994). On the other hand, when European states needed to decrease their deficit or debts, the only possibility left was to cut public expenditures, and particularly the two expensive sectors of public education and public health, two pillars of the European Welfare State System. These cuts (see Charts 1.1 and 1.2) were justified and indeed made possible because the European socialist parties – which were the main supporter of the European Social Model – had lost their influence (Rhodes 2001; Vaughan-Whitehead 2003).

Concurrently, these international events have also increased the movement – and the forced movement – of people, who were in search of better conditions of life across the globe. Many had Europe as their privileged destination. Between 1990 and 2000, roughly 13.5 million migrants reached Europe and another 21 million came between 2000 and 2010 (Abel and Sander 2014). Although migrants’ percentage of the overall European population is still definitely small (in 2014, less than 7 per cent, according to EU official statistics²), they mainly concentrate in some districts, where house rents are lower. This consequently means that they mostly live in areas where the conditions of infrastructures are in general already poorer than in other districts. To the eyes of some European citizens, this fact made the growing presence of immigrants appear as the reason for the worsening of both work conditions and public health and education systems. The arguments to be exposed will illustrate how this was, instead, a corollary of the end of the Cold War.

The introduction of advanced capitalist trends and policies in Europe aimed at reducing both production costs and public debts, which had risen because of the first rise in the price of crude oil (1990–1991; see Figure 1.1). As a consequence, these fundamental public sectors intended for individuals’ perception of both societal safety and fair opportunities, gradually started to decay. The most vulnerable categories of citizens saw these deteriorating conditions happen together with an increasing presence of immigrants in their neighbourhoods. Therefore, they blamed immigrants for these worsening conditions, also under the pressure of some unscrupulous politicians who could exploit people’s discontent to increase their votes.

CHART 1.1
@Valeria Bello 2016 - Data source: Education at a Glance 2010. OECD Indicators. ©OECD 2010 Source: OECD. (www­.oe­cd.­org­/ed­u/e­ag2010).

1. Public expenditure only (for Switzerland, in tertiary education only).

2. Year of reference 2008 instead of 2007.

3. Year of reference 2006 instead of 2007.

Countries are ranked in ascending order of expenditure in 2007.

CHART 1.2 Annual growth rate of public expenditure on health, per capita, in real terms.*

* @Valeria Bello 2016; Data source: OECD Health Statistics 2015 - htt­p:/­/st­ats­.oe­cd.­org­/In­dex­.as­px?­Dat­aSe­tCo­de=­SHA­

As Saskia Sassen (2013) has argued, since the end of the Cold War there has been a growing consensus of states to denationalize economies by opening the borders for the movement of capitals, products and financial flows. However, simultaneously states have hardened border policies and controls for the movement of people. With the exception of the Schengen Area – which has allowed, at least until late 2015, the free movement of European citizens and permanent residents of member states of the EU – the European politics towards its outer borders has also followed these patterns of increased hardening of border controls and policies. Unfortunately, the broader securitization of migration that has followed the so-called “refugee crises” has meant the “temporary” reconstruction of internal borders and the limitation of free movement in Europe in 2016 (FRONTEX 2016).

As Didier Bigo notices, this growing securitization of migration has also happened more globally and has started since the end of the Cold War as well, according to him, as part of “the governmentality of the unease” (Bigo 2002). For Bigo, this reflects the interests of a transnational policy network made of those businessmen and professionals who, during the time of the Iron Curtain, gained their profits in the sector of security. With the end of the Cold War, they needed to reorient their activities in the global market and have pushed towards the securitization of a variety of sectors and, throughout the decade, have realized that the management of migration is a particularly profitable field (Bigo 2002).

Whether or not this governmentality of the unease is indeed a consequence of the interest of private non-state actors and security professionals in particular, with the end of the Cold War, some regions actually became the target of new violence and, consequently, the sources of new population movements that have required the intervention of a variety of actors in its governance. In Europe, the Yugoslav War (1991 to 2001), and in the Middle East, the Kuwait Invasion (1990) and the consequent Gulf War (1990–1991) have produced more instabilities and tensions in the broad area of the Mediterranean Sea, also due to an increased influence of Iran in the Arab world and to the role that Iraq has played for the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Castles, de Haas and Miller 2013b). The Gulf War has also had important costs in terms of subsequent conflicts and related economic instability. Since the following Iraq War (2003–2011), the price of oil per barrel has constantly increased (with the very exception of the years of the latest financial crisis, see Figure 1.1), with consequences both in the region and behind.

FIGURE 1.1 Changes in Oil Price Matching Main International Events.

© WTRG Economics, 2016.

The Instability in the Middle East

As Khadduri and Ghareeb (1997) clarify, there were “original” and “immediate” causes explaining the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait that originated the Gulf War, for which a US-led United Nations (UN) coalition then intervened against Iraq in 1990–1991. The original causes were an old dispute over the borders between these two Gulf countries, as Kuwait was part of a Southern province of Iraq during the Ottoman Empire and, only when the British started to control Iraq, the area split in two separate states. This dispute over the borders was particularly delicate because of two reasons: first, this area is the second oil-richest place on the planet; and second, these borders have always been fluid, as the nomadic groups living in the two countries – and particularly across their borders – are highly mobile and have never recognized any line of divisions in this desert zone.

The immediate reason was, instead, Kuwait’s increase of its quota of oil production beyond what OPEC had established, thus producing a decrease in the price of crude oil, for which Iraq’s income resulting from oil lowered as well (Malone 2006). This certainly exacerbated the feelings of Iraq’s government towards Kuwait: Iraq was experiencing a strong economic hardship after the eight years of war with Iran (1980–1988). In addition, the fact that Kuwait did not cancel the debt that Iraq assumed during those years aggravated the perception that Kuwait was not showing any gratitude for Iraq’s defence of the whole Arab world, including Kuwait, from the influence of Iran.

Therefore, while the rest of the world knew with astonishment the invasion of Kuwait, the Arab world was not surprised at all when Iraq invaded its neighbour (Khadduri and Ghareeb 1997). However, among the same “Western” analysts, some consider that the US, at the time, was also well aware of the imminent invasion of Kuwait, because of a possible complicity between the two countries to increase the price of oil (Cooper, Higgott and Nossal 1991: 404).

Beyond speculations, the facts are that the UN Security Council unanimously decided to defend Kuwait’s independence and a US-led coalition in only seven months obliged Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait. The coalition was very broad and included not only followers of the US leadership but also actors who supported the intervention for either geopolitical or economic purposes (Cooper, Higgott and Nossal 1991; Malone 2006). As these authors explain, the 36 members of the coalition had different reasons to intervene and this variety of motives explains the diversity of means they provided during the intervention. Even among strong US allies and friends, while some actually contributed with naval vessels and aircrafts (for instance France and Italy), others showed more reluctance towards being actively involved in military operations, such as Japan and Germany (Cooper, Higgott and Nossal 1991).

Yet, oil certainly played a central role in this war, not only as the immediate cause for Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait but also as a leitmotif of the intervention for many states in the coalition. Some observers even believed that, before the invasion, in June 1990, there was a collusion between the USA and Iraq to influence the price of oil (Emery 1991; Gross Stein 1991; Karsh and Rautsi 1991). Quite interestingly, Cooper, Higgot and Nossal also note that “Glaspie’s alleged comment in September 1990 to the effect that no one thought Hussein would take all of Kuwait did little to dispel the suspicion that Bush’s administration was implicated in an effort to spark a crisis in the...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Acronyms
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: From the World to Europe and Vice Versa: An Introduction to why Prejudice Is a Global Security Threat
• Part I The Facts
• Part II The Narratives and the Threats
• Part III The Alternatives
• Conclusions
• References
• Index