This chapter has developed a theoretical framework based on the first four hypotheses laid out in the introductory chapter of the thesis. Firstly, the chapter focused on asylum and migration theories in view of the fact that migration is a complex and multifaceted issue. It has been shown that asylum is often regarded as a subset of migration, making the issue blurred, more contentious and difficult to understand. Governments have to deal with these difficulties in order to create asylum policies. However, they may have different attitudes and behaviours
32 Besides, the government is fully aware that the aim of most of these migrants is to reach France and to a lesser extent Germany where they already have family and friends. France has closed its southern borders to prevent entry by train while Germany threatened to do the same (Frenzen 2011) breaching the Schengen Treaty while accusing Italy of being in violation of EU law. Italy has a very strict visa policy contrary to Germany whose more liberal policy on visas is seen as the “soft underbelly of the Fortress Europe” (Finotelli and Sciortino 2009, 131). As such, in Italy, many overstayers have actually come into the Schengen area thanks to visas issued by the German state.
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towards asylum seekers compared with other migrants, especially if under the influence of the tabloid media and public opinion. Policies will therefore differ.
Secondly, the analysis has reviewed the nature of the state. Liberal theorists argue that states, created by the demos for the demos, have a duty towards their citizens but also have a moral duty towards asylum seekers. However, nation-states consider asylum as a threat to their economy as they could represent a drain on public expenditure, but also to their national identity and even security, especially after 9/11. States have, therefore, implemented stricter policies and security measures in an effort to control migration and to deter unwanted arrivals.
The third aspect is that ‘government’ – perceived as a strong, unitary element – has become
‘governance’ through a delegation of powers to other state and also non-state actors. Some authors have interpreted this as a fragmentation or a ‘hollowing-out’ of the state. Others believe that the state is still powerful or that this fragmentation has not weakened the state but simply changed it. Furthermore, states may face constraints from an international perspective because of the EU and other transnational and supranational actors and, on the domestic front, from the growing number of pro-asylum, pro-immigration and pro-human rights pressure groups. When it comes to asylum and migration policies though, states display their power in determining who stays and who has to go. Governance has been described as a new way of making policy because of a whole new dimension: that of policy and issue networks. This is the last part of the theoretical model. These networks represent the so called meso-level of the policy process, i.e.
the level that connects the macro- and micro-levels of policy-making. In other words, understanding these networks reveals how policies come to be made through the formal and informal interactions between state and non-state actors. Issue networks are particularly relevant to understanding how asylum policy is made and how they reflect the power relations between the different actors.
This chapter has introduced the core theoretical approaches that will inform the empirical chapters that follow. In particular, Chapters 4 and 5 present the context in which asylum and migration policies were shaped in Italy and the UK. Chapters 6 and 7 present an analysis of parliamentary debates and interviews held with key actors to understand how policy was formed. Chapter 8 compares the two countries in terms of the nature of the state, issue networks
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and the different levels of policy-making. Finally, the last chapter concludes the thesis by arguing the validity of this study.
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CHAPTER 3
METHODOLOGY
This chapter outlines the methods used to validate the research problem and test its hypotheses.
To understand how asylum policy proposals become policy decisions in different states – that may perceive asylum differently – four hypotheses and consequent research questions were outlined in Chapter 1. In order to answer the research questions, different types of material and sources were collected and analysed. Although the thesis has followed mainly a qualitative approach, multiple or mixed strategies (Burgess 1984; Douglas 1976) were also relevant. For example, asylum statistics provided details of trends in the two countries (asylum applications, decisions, outcomes of the applications and top 5 sending countries). In 2002, asylum was one of the most important issues for the UK government but it was not for the Italian one. The statistical data are used to compare the differences in scale between the two countries and to inform the first two hypotheses: asylum as an issue because perceived as a threat; and the consequent manner in which it is dealt with by states.
This chapter is divided into two main sections. The first part relates to data collection and contains information on the documents used to carry out the analysis and the interviews made (such as the location and the selection of the participants). The second part concentrates on the analysis. The focus is the relevance of comparative analysis for this thesis, how the analysis of the documents was carried out and why and, finally, the difficulties encountered during the analysis of the documents and the fieldwork and how they were dealt with.