Varieties of Securitization: Migration Governance along the Central Mediterranean Route

This book contributes to migration and security studies alike by examining the transformation of migration governance across the Central Mediterranean Route connecting Sub-Saharan Africa to Europe through Italy.

Leveraging this migratory corridor in historical and comparative perspective, the volume provides a multidisciplinary reappraisal of securitization theory, highlighting how different fields such as anthropology, history, visual semiotics, and science and technology studies can enrich, reappraise, and decentralize this paradigm. Far from merely exploring the different ways migration is framed as a threat after the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the volume systematically dissects the interplay between discourses and border enforcement practices as well as the diffusion of migration governance models worldwide, pushing securitization theory beyond security studies.

Eugenio Cusumano is full Professor of Political Science at the University of Messina, Italy.  He has published extensively on crisis management and border enforcement and is the principal investigator of the project “Securitizing Human Transit across the Central Mediterranean” (SHUT-MED), funded by the European Union and the Italian Ministry of Research.

Luca Raineri is Assistant Professor in Security Studies at the Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa, Italy, where he co-leads the SHUT-MED project. He has conducted extensive fieldwork across Sub-Saharan Africa and worked as consultant on issues like peacebuilding, security and development, which are the focus of his scientific research.

Diego Caballero-Vélez works on the SHUT-MED project as Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Messina, Italy. He is the author of Contesting Migration Crises in Central Eastern Europe, published by Palgrave in 2023.