144 Andrew Geddes
in 1975. In post-Cold War Europe, the distinction between external and
internal security was becoming blurred. The ‘securitisation’ of migration
emphasises the links between market relations embodied within the free
movement framework and the control of population. Of particular impor-
tance are the modern technologies of surveillance, with attention directed
towards the practices of security agencies and the implementation and
effects of new technologies of population control. From this perspective,
securitisation and the control of population are the foundation-stones of
EU liberalisation.
The ‘targeting’ of population acquired an EU dimension through the
development of the Justice and Home Affairs ‘pillar’ after the Maastricht
Treaty (1992) and the designation of the EU as an ‘Area of Freedom, Security
and Justice’ after the Amsterdam Treaty (1997). These contributed to an
intensif ication of cooperation between security specialists and other off icials
and a European-level representation of threats. In the multi-level EU f ield,
the implication is that relationships within and between states and between
states and non-state actors are better viewed as heterarchical rather than
hierarchical (Walker 2004). The Lisbon Treaty conf irmed this pattern with its
consolidation of EU migration competencies, as discussed more fully below.
EU migration policy is ref lective of this blurring of the distinction
between internal and external security and also of the complex relations
between freedom and security within the neo-liberal space created by the
EU’s single market. Migrants tend to be valued on the basis of their putative
economic contribution. If there is a perceived economic contribution then
certain types of migration, such as that into higher-skilled employment, are
facilitated while, if migration is seen as a danger in terms of its potentially
corrosive effects on labour markets or welfare states, then it is a danger to
be guarded against. This is more complex than the simple idea of a ‘fortress
Europe’, but exactly ref lects the dilemma exposed by Zolberg (1989), who
wrote that the key dilemma for the major capitalist economies is how high
to build the walls and how wide to open the small doors in those walls for
certain types of privileged migration f low.
We now brief ly survey the evolution of this external approach and some
of its key features in relation to migration as a security issue and to discus-
sion of migration dialogue. In 2005, the member states issued a strategy for
the external dimension of Justice and Home Affairs policy in the context of
terrorist attacks, organised crime and global migration f lows. Such attacks
and threats also provide institutional opportunities and impel cooperation
and integration, but ‘security policy is never compelled by external events’
(Walker 2004: 11). A security ‘frame’ is well-established at EU-level and was