The recent collapse of the Dublin system, a system meant to distribute responsibility towards asylum-seekers and refugees between EU Member States (MSs), has marked a new phase of the so-called European Refugee “Crisis”, where the inability of EU MS governments to address the situation in a unified and coherent manner ultimately harms those most in need of protection. Public discontent with EU and MS government responses to the crisis has led to strong citizen mobilisation in the form of civil society. This study focuses on the case of the UK and examines the role played by policy advocacy Civil Society Organisations (CSOs). The concept of Political Responsibility is used to establish the emergence of a Governance Gap in the UK's response to the crisis, where the government finds itself unable to bridge a growing distance between its representation and responsible governance functions. Policy advocacy CSOs are found to be now minding this gap. Critical Discourse Analysis is used to study how CSOs react to the UK government's response in terms of practice and discourse, and to highlight the consequences which language use can have on how we perceive and treat refugees and asylum-seekers in this context.

As immigration turns into the scapegoat of political and social tensions all over the world and politicians that seem to be talking about migration flows communicate instead their conception of the world and where it should head, this study investigates the refugee crisis of 2015 as represented in the two global television channels RT and BBCW. Widely studied for the depiction the press gives of the refugees, for the first time the refugee crisis is analyzed as an arena where competing understandings of international relations are constructed, in a media ecology where a myriad of actors have a chance to foreground their truth and where wars are fought, and possibly won, through the weapons of values, culture and the attraction they exercise (Nye Jr. 1990, 2013). Borrowing the concept of strategic narratives from international relations (Miskimmon et al. 2013) and applying it to textual analysis, the study employs framing analysis to operationalize it and explores a sample of 144 news items (74 from RT and 70 from BBCW) broadcast in August and September 2015 to retrace the narratives of the two channels. It finds out that, although conflicting with each other, both RT’s and BBCW’s narratives are strategic and aim at constructing a past, present and future of international relations that can influence what we expect, consider acceptable or conceivable on the international theater. The channels’ narratives are about the destiny of Europe and countries, depicting a reality that still responds to old Cold War dividing lines. An analysis of the actors allowed to speak and represented as acting confirms that in RT and BBCW political elites and the nations they represent have a greater chance, compared to other actors, to define international politics and shape shared understandings of how international relations works and where it is heading.

The research on natives’ attitudes regarding immigration has increased during the past decades. The overall findings question the common theory of labor market competition and that native attitudes are affected by personal economic considerations. In the same time an increased concern in the political debate has become immigration. In many countries, there is a growth and progress of political parties with a far-right orientation that disapproves and attempts to prevent immigration. We examine data on attitudes towards immigration from eight rounds of the European social survey (ESS) which covers the years between 2002-2016. We study if the attitudes in Europe towards immigration from poor non-member countries of the European Union have changed during the 21th century and examine if the massive acceleration of refugee applications during the refugee crisis in 2015 has had an impact on the attitudes towards immigration. We estimate different models to examine how different factors are associated with individuals' attitudes towards immigration. Furthermore, we test if the labor market competition model holds for the seventh round of ESS due to limitation in data. We find that natives’ attitudes have not become worse in Europe, and that the refugee crisis in 2015 has not made the attitudes worse. We find that the factors that are associated with individual attitudes towards immigration are to a large degree connected with cultural values and beliefs, and that individuals with more years of schooling are more likely to favor immigration regardless of where the immigrants come from. These findings are consistent with the growing body of empirical findings that considers that cultural values and believes are the main drivers of attitudes towards immigration, and that actual effects of immigration on income and employment are quite small. These findings put the labor market competition premise in forming immigration attitudes into question.

In this study, I will speak about the present migration wave and how the European Un-ion is managing the situation. Firstly, I will explain different arguments pro- and contra migration and detail the European Agenda on Migration. Then, I will concentrate on the issue of EU-Turkey Statement from 2016. The aim of the thesis is to show the topic of management of the "migration crisis" that we are now experiencing and help the reader to form his or her opinion on the subject. This goal will be achieved by analysis of online media.

Over the past years, a body of literature have emerged exploring FRONTEX’s work along the EU’s borders. It suggests that FRONTEX not only frame migration as a security issue, but also as a humanitarianist issue. The literature argues the framing of migration as both an issue of security and humanitarianism legitimizes FRONTEX’s operations in the Mediterranean. However, there is a lack of understanding in how FRONTEX frames migration at the Western Balkans border, one of the EU’s busiest borders and indeed the busiest during the summer of 2015, registering over a million migrants. Therefore, by investigating how FRONTEX framed migration at the Western Balkans border between the years 2014-2017, this thesis sets out to make a unique contribution to the research field, furthering the understanding of how FRONTEX as an organization frames migration. To examine FRONTEX’s framing of migration, a theoretical framework consisting of theories of framing, risk and threat construction, and humanitarianism is deployed. The concepts of framing devices and reasoning devices are used in a qualitative content analysis to identify the presence of frames in the material consisting of FRONTEX published reports and press releases. The empirical results indicate that FRONTEX frames migration in the Western Balkans as primarily a security issue through language connecting migration to risk and threat. The humanitarianist frame, mainly evoked by references to migrants’ vulnerability, appears relatively few times in contrast to the security frame.

In the light of the current refugee crisis in the European Union, and the remarkably critical stance the East Central European states are taking in Brussels, this research contributes to a broader understanding of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland's policies towards refugees. By scrutinizing the process of developing refugee policies during the 1990s and 2000s, the research will demonstrate that the countries united in the V4 platform in their first years of transition generously contributed to international refugee protection. Steep increase of asylum applicants and negotiation talks with the EU in the late 1990s brought various changes to the refugee policies in the region, marked by more closely defining and the enhancing of asylum seekers' and recognized refugees' rights, but also by lower refugee recognition rates. Accession to the European Union ultimately resulted in more complete and comprehensive asylum policies in line with the Common European Asylum System (CEAS). However, the V4 states maintained rather restrictive interpretations of the European policy, explained by the pressure the CEAS places on the states at the EU's external border and lower economic capacity to accommodate large numbers of refugees. Recent developments are mostly the result of political exploitation...

Interaction between the civil society and the state has increased in modern democracies. This thesis analyzes the forms and dynamics of the interaction between civil society and governmental institutions in Skåne about the issue of refugee reception. This is done by examining two overarching research questions: 1. How, why and between which actors interaction occurs; and 2. How interaction develops over time and which factors influence the changing nature of the interaction. With the theoretical framework of civil society and state relations, governance, social movements and critical junctures, a research model is developed to analyze the case of interaction between the spheres in Skåne. The research model is based upon semi-structured interviews with governmental institutions and representatives from civil society organizations. The development of the interaction is described through the framework of critical junctures, showing the interaction developed with an intention of increased interaction and participation, while being cautious of the independence and neutrality of the civil society at the same time. The results show that the interaction occurs through partnership, networks, funding and personal informal interaction. Shared goals and the intention of increasing interaction because it is believed to better solve the complex problems are reasons for interaction. The empirical findings point at factors such as ideological affinity, structure, resources and experience to be important to gain access to the interaction. Another important conclusion is the lack of representation of certain valuable perspectives, such as Muslim organizations or free churches. The issue of representation stems mostly from structural factors and lack of resources. Relations between the civil society and governmental institutions in Skåne has grown closer, and the interaction is complex and dynamic. Together, the spheres address the complex issue of refugee reception. It is characterized by a mutual respect and an awareness of the necessity of an independent and neutral civil society. In spite of problems with representation, the interaction does facilitate knowledge exchange and increases adaptability to complexity. It has increased the overall participation in interaction between the spheres.

The research focus of this study is to investigate the ways in which the so-called European refugee crisis has been socially constructed as number one urgent matter for the European community in the years between 2015-2017. Noting the unprecedented rise of the public support for far-right parties in the European polls, the goal of this study is to understand and conceptualize the ways in which the refugee crisis has been presented as an existential threat by the right-wing political leaders in the Netherlands, France and Germany, three core European members, which held elections in 2017. This has been done by utilizing the theoretical framework, composed of the Copenhagen School, as well as the categorization framework which builds upon the results from previous literature on the topic of the securitization of migration. In addition, by utilizing critical discourse analysis this study probes the hypothesis that regardless of the magnitude of the crisis, the securitizing discourses are largely revolving around four overarching realms: the identity, criminological, political and economic realm. The findings infer that the securitizing discourses of the right-wing leaders in the Netherlands, France and Germany in relation to migration are identical and are revolving around the aforementioned domains, regardless of the countries’ political landscape.

The purpose of this thesis is to understand how Danish and Swedish news media and governments framed “the refugee crisis” in the context of the Swedish implementation of border controls in 2015 and the removal of external border controls in 2017. We operationalize framing theory (Entman 1993) to understand the differences and similarities in the framing of "the refugee crisis” in Denmark and Sweden. While the main focus is media representations, policy documents are included in the study to deepen the analysis and understand the similarities and differences across migration policies. Through a quantitative content analysis of 259 newspaper articles from eight Danish and Swedish newspapers, a framing analysis of ten policy documents and a qualitative framing analysis of the overall frames in the news articles and policy documents, we identified a dialectic relation of power between media and political discourse in both countries. We found that issues defined and represented in policy documents tend to reflect the challenges that news media define and the other way around. Even though Danish and Swedish newspapers and policy documents highlight similar problems, our data indicates clear differences in migration policies, in the two countries, in terms of the framing of asylum seekers, refugees and political events in 2015.

In 2015, 70% of the asylum-seekers in Sweden were men. This skewed ratio combined with the image of the threatful male immigrant have raised a topical question within the most gender equal country and self-proclaimed feminist state. Through a gender perspective that has never been researched and which gives voice to Swedish women, this issue is investigated. In particular, it is relevant to consider how socially engaged Swedish women reflect on male newcomers who have arrived in Sweden since the 2015 refugee crisis. Alongside it is pertinent to investigate how those Swedish women assess the impact of the new arrivals on their lives and the society they live in. Using qualitative research,fifteen women are interviewed on account of their relevant opinion on the topic, their experience with refugees, their political stance and their work. The informants reminisce about the refugee crisis in Sweden and examine the characteristics of male newcomers,their empathy and support towards male newcomers, gender (in)equality and the impact of the arrival of male newcomers in Sweden. Results display a dense and complex picture of the viewpoints of Swedish women on the refugee crisis and the arrival of male newcomers to Sweden, between enthusiasm and prudence on the issue.