Authors: Laura Cleton – Erasmus University Rotterdam, Lisa Pfister – Samuel Hall, Nassim Majidi – Samuel Hall, Alexis McLean – International Centre for Migration Policy Development, Müge Dalkıran – Koç University and Pelin Kılınçarslan – Koç University
The report examines how “collaboration” between states in enforced return procedures of irregular migrants is experienced and practised, especially in terms of identification of migrants and issuance of travel documents, which are prerequisites for deportation. It argues that the “return rate”, a Eurocentric performance indicator to measure how many ordered-to-leave migrants are actually returned, obscures a much more complicated reality of the practice of acquiring such cooperation. Using 47 interviews across both “Global North” and “Global South” countries, the report reconstructs how cooperation on return is negotiated, resisted, or shaped in practice. The analysis is informed by two broad logics: an instrumentally rational “external incentive model”, where cooperation is induced by carrots/sticks, and a norm-based “social learning” logic, where shared norms, identity or appropriateness inform cooperation.
The report finds that in practice cooperation and non-cooperation are structured by the wider geopolitical constellation between different countries, as well as dependence on the part of the Global North on readmitting countries. It shows that cooperation on the frontline of return policy implementation depends less on formal agreements and more on informal relationships, pragmatic negotiations, and domestic political considerations within origin states. Both logics referenced above guide cooperation. While short-term instrumental incentives (such as reintegration assistance and capacity building) often produce fragile and short-term cooperation, longer-term incentives (visa facilitation) and investments in relationships based on trust and shared expectations are seen to be more sustainable. The authors therefore argue that effectiveness should be reconceptualised through qualitative, relational criteria, not Eurocentric output statistics.