The 2023 EU-Tunisia Memorandum of Understanding as a Lens on EU Migration Governance: Externalization, Securitization, and Institutional Accountability

This research examines the role of the European Commission in EU migration governance through the case of the 2023 EU-Tunisia Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). The MoU, negotiated and concluded largely outside regular institutional channels, offers a lens through which to analyze how the Commission advances migration policy and whether this reflects broader patterns of externalization and securitization in EU governance. The study aims to investigate how migration is framed as a security concern, how responsibility for asylum and refugee protection is increasingly shifted beyond EU territory, and how such practices interact with questions of democratic accountability and human rights obligations. To address these questions, the research draws on securitization theory, literature on externalization, and van Dijk’s (2008) framework for critical discourse analysis, examining official Commission discourse including press releases, speeches, and policy briefs. By situating the EU-Tunisia MoU within the broader trajectory of externalization strategies and in the context of the 2024 Pact on Migration and Asylum, the objective is to understand how discursive practices intersect with institutional dynamics and to clarify the Commission’s role in shaping the evolving landscape of EU migration governance.