The EU Immigration Pact – from Hague to Stockholm, via Paris

As EU leaders prepared to sign a new ‘Immigration Pact’ at the 15-16 October 2008 European Council, this Policy Brief by Elizabeth Collett analyses the pact’s content and what the changes made to the initial French Presidency draft tell us about the current state of the EU immigration debate. It argues that while the pact is unlikely to have much direct impact on EU policy, it does reflect a significant political shift in the direction of ‘control first’ policies.