Crossing Borders in the Migrant/Refugee Binary: Discursive Strategies for Asylum and Migration in the European Union

As the European Union continues to receive irregular border crossings, whether it categorises people on the move as political refugees or economic migrants produces vastly different outcomes for their rights. Focusing on this migrant/refugee binary, this paper builds on a growing area of critical scholarship, examining the complexity of contemporary migratory trends and its incompatibility with such dichotomous classification. Empirically, this project discusses and interprets public statements issued by political actors in the European Union since the 2015 Crisis as discursive strategies affecting the migrant/refugee binary, demonstrating that constructions of border crossers’ agency and deservingness have the power to influence outcomes in human rights protections.