Paper short abstract:

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that the new category of border zones (upon which some of the main innovations of the new European Pact on Migration and Asylum are articulated) has its historical foundation in different governance practices of the EU's Mediterranean states.

Paper long abstract:

Legal anthropology strives to demonstrate the fiction of Kelsen's pyramid and normative order as a construct emanating from legal think tanks. In this paper, my aim is to show that the new category of border zones (upon which some of the main innovations of the new European Pact on Migration and Asylum are articulated) has its historical foundation in different governance practices of the EU's Mediterranean states. This is not a minor change, but one that transforms the way in which the process of 'filtering' migration policy is thought about and validated, implying profound changes in the way we understand international protection or the best interests of child protection, to point out two fundamental issues.

I will present the origins of this category of governance (border zone), paying special attention to the background in Spain. Since the 1990s, the Spanish external border areas, mainly the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla but also the Canary Islands, have been a key scenario where some of the elements that define this new European regulatory reality have been politically forged.