MIGRATIONEurope’s Migration Dilemma
Hundreds of thousands of migrants made the dangerous journey to Europe in 2023, fleeing war, poverty, and natural disasters. The increase in arrivals has fueled support for far-right political parties.
The long and often arduous journey to Europe has not been a dealbreaker for the hundreds of thousands of migrants who have arrived on the continent illegally in recent years. More than 385,000 such migrants entered Europe in 2023, nearly triple the pandemic-era low in 2020. These were just a fraction of the twenty-nine million immigrants who arrived in the past decade, legally and illegally, placing significant strain on a migration system already considered ineffectual.
Migrants endure voyages on unseaworthy vessels, travel on foot through war zones or scalding deserts, and encounter predatory human smugglers or hostile locals. Last year alone, more than three thousand migrants died crossing the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe.
But disembarking in Europe presents new hurdles. Politicians have pledged to crack down on what they call a migration crisis, especially those from far-right parties, which are gaining support ahead of European Parliament elections in June. Meanwhile, European Union (EU) countries are grappling with how to balance stronger border enforcement with concerns over human rights and migrant safety.
Fleeing Conflict, Repression, and Poverty
While the vast majority of migrants to Europe arrive legally, the continent has seen a steady increase in irregular immigration, in which migrants arrive in Europe without legal permission.
Recent migration surges have often been driven by the disruptions caused by conflict. In 2015, the main cause was fighting and persecution in Afghanistan and Syria. More recently, Russia’s war in Ukraine has fueled a surge in immigration to Europe, including from African and Middle Eastern countries that rely on trade with Ukraine. Indeed, migration experts say a global rise in conflict over the last decade has caused the number of displaced people across the world to almost double [PDF], reaching 114 million people in 2023.
Other push factors include the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic fallout, a string of coups in the Sahel, humanitarian crises in countries such as Afghanistan, and natural disasters exacerbated by climate change.
Europe is also a magnet for migrants seeking better economic opportunities, reunion with family members, or access to greater protections for refugees and asylum seekers under EU and international law. Economic migrants can be a source of friction with locals, particularly as the EU weathers its own economic downturn, with record inflation and more than twenty-seven million people underemployed or unemployed this spring. The European Commission notes that most refugees from Africa and Asia will remain in neighboring countries rather than traveling on to Europe.