Findings & Recommendations

work on progress…

work on progress…

work on progress…

Key Findings:

• Migration management in the African and Middle Eastern regions has shifted from initial solidarity and/or pragmatism to an increased focus on coercing return. This follows from the ever more protracted nature of displacement as well as the EU’s emphasis on externalization and containment.

• Similar to practices in EU countries, regional host countries predominantly seek to return humanitarian migrants by creating push factors for self-return through irregularization and marginalization.

• Return migration governance in the settings studied is often highly informal and opaque as a consequence of securitization. Overtly coercive forms of return (pushbacks and deportations) in particular are not monitored.

• International organizations, often funded by the EU, play a fundamental role in providing the financial, legal, technological, institutional, and operational support that is necessary for assisted returns. Such capacities may also be used for deportation and pushbacks. There is thus a risk that European support for assisted return in regional host countries is repurposed for coerced return.

• Current forms of return migration governance in the African and Middle Eastern regions often undermine migrant protection and erode the principle of non-refoulement. EU and member states can be complicit in this in the form of chain refoulement.

Return migration governance has become a key agenda item and a key instrument of political leverage in international relations between regional host countries and the  EU.

Policy Recommendations:

1. Acknowledge the potential negative rippling effects of the EU’s focus on externalization and return for regional host countries in terms of intra-regional mobility.

2. Be transparent about the EUs internal conflicts of interest between externalization of migration governance on one hand, and upholding the adherence to the Refugee- and Human Rights conventions.

3. Prioritize protection over containment. Stop funding schemes and capacity building that in practice enable violations of refugee and human rights.

Ensure the systematic independent monitoring of return practices and demand access of independent observers to return centers and border sites, and the systematic inclusion of the capacity and voice of migrant-led organizations in return planning and monitoring.

work on progress…

Key findings

The following fifindings and recommendations stem from a large online survey on public attitudes towards return, with over 5,900 participants across Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Poland, and Sweden, conducted from August 2024 to January 2025 via social media recruitment.

• The public in all five countries (Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, Greece, Poland) support return of irregular migrants if home conditions improve, if they break any rules, or if they rely heavily on welfare.

• Germans emphasizes integration and economic contribution, resisting return of well-integrated or working asylum seekers.

• Right-leaning political orientation strongly predicts support for return; on the other hand, higher education, being of migrant background, levels of personal contact, and trust levels reduce support for return.

• Return is widely seen as easing pressure on social services, and in some cases also as creating job opportunities.

• The levels of dissatisfaction with government performance on asylum and return are widespread.

 Policy Recommendations

• Engage with public perceptions while addressing fairness, integration, and human rights concerns.

• Adapt return strategies to national contexts rather than relying on one model.

• Improve transparency and communication on asylum and return processes.

• Promote opportunities for meaningful citizen–migrant interaction to reduce hostility.

• Recognize and address polarization along political, educational, and income divides.

• Invest in trust-building measures in institutions and communities.

work on progress…

work on progress…