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RESEARCH PRODUCT

The market of migrant smuggling through Libya to Southern Italy since 2011: filling the knowledge gap as a human rights' strategy

subject

description

The first formal distinction between human smuggling and trafficking in international law was made with the signing in December 2000 of the Palermo Protocols. These definitions have influenced and shaped most of the academic research, discourse, methodology and language on human smuggling and trafficking. In turn, an understanding of the formal definitions of these crimes is necessary to appreciate their influence on policies and therefore their effects on the individuals and institutions involved (Campana and Varese, 2015). The argument at the basis of this thesis is that academic research on especially migrant smuggling has often blindly adopted the above-mentioned definitions as a given-for-granted and solid basis to apply to a multitude of diverse cases, failing to highlight the extremely polymorphic nature of migrant smuggling as an international phenomenon. One important consequence of this instance has been that at least some academic efforts in the field of human smuggling have more often than not created a “theoretical bias” whereby smuggling is interpreted as a constitutive element of “irregular migration”, and where research findings have served the interests of migration policies- most notably to prevent the irregular crossing of national borders- rather than of victims of smuggling per se. The thesis presents findings from a preliminary qualitative investigation conducted by the author in Tunisia, Sicily, and aboard a rescue vessel in the Libyan SAR zone. The study design and methodology were structured based on a human rights and social perspective which took account of migrant smuggling in the specific context of post-Arab Spring migration from Africa to Europe. The cases presented should be able to demonstrate how the current legal and institutional definition of migrant smuggling cannot explain some of the principal findings of the investigation, especially for what concerns the role of exploitation, consent and coercion, broadly regarded as more consistently related to trafficking than to smuggling. The thesis argues that studies should refrain from blindly adopting pre-defined definitions and social categories on the topic, but rather critically employ them on a case-to-case basis. This would divert academic efforts away from often controversial political interests concerning irregular migration, and help produce transparent and independent research that sheds light on the nature, causes and effects of human smuggling, and related policies.