Eritreans demonstrate in Israel. Karen Zack (activestills)/Flickr. (CC 2.0 by-nc-nd)
The current migration and refugee crisis across the Euro-African borderlands, particularly as represented via images of human suffering and loss of life, has attracted media, public and academic attention. Yet the language of humanitarianism continues to construct migrants as passive and disposable victims. Academic discourses regarding the political and security implications of border regimes often portray irregular migration practices – including the actions of human smugglers – as taking place in a vacuum. They focus primarily on the political implications of systems that shape extralegal mobility and border crossings as risky. This approach has ignored the complex and dynamic relationships that emerge between migrants and smugglers in the migration process.
The media, far right populist politicians, and others portray smugglers as organised criminal gangs primarily interested in the economic or sexual exploitation of powerless migrants. Smugglers are blamed for kidnapping and torture; for ransom, rape, robbery and abandonment, particularly involving migrants from the Horn of Africa; and for migrant deaths in the desert.
