Assembling Containment at European Union Borders: Between Inclusion and Exclusion

The European Union migration governance is characterised by non-linearity and complexity. Such governance represents the competition of a multitude of actors that compete for power and visibility. The policies designed by its member states - based on the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights - oscillate between an inclusive and an exclusive migration governance approach. A concept that can offer a comprehensive understanding of the social and normative dynamics that transformed the Mediterranean Sea as a space of inclusion and exclusion is assemblage. The article suggests that the EU and its member states design migration governance policies on an instrumental assemblage of borders, territory and human rights. From the discussion of these assemblages, it emerges how the compromise developed by the European Court of Human Rights contributed to further exclusion and human rights violations in the Mediterranean Sea. Thus, assemblage offers a critical perspective on the normative limits of the migration management policies unfolding at EU borders.