Migration Policy: Between Crisis Preparedness, Ad Hoc Solutions, and Administrative Capacity-building

EU migration policy has been strongly influenced by crises, notably with regard to the arrival of asylum applicants. While they did not bring about major changes to the Treaty framework, recent events have resulted in forms of informal governance and the adoption of new legislation. These responses have rested on an expansive interpretation of the existing Treaty framework, and featured informal and non-binding instruments. The reasons for this switch are manifold. In the field of migration, soft law measures can serve as an experimental attempt to prepare for the adoption of legally binding rules or, more controversially, as an attempt to mould interpretation in a certain direction, as an alternative to legislative change. Of great importance are the two migration agencies, Frontex and the EU Agency for Asylum (EUAA), whose powers and resources have seen exponential growth in recent years; their operational characteristics distinguish the migration agencies from regulatory bodies in other policy fields.