Globalisation and migration in Europe : tensions giving rise to opportunities

Abstract

Due to its geographic location, the Mediterranean basin has always been a melting pot of cultures. It can be described as a complex system of countries with very different, and often contrasting cultures and religions, bordering a vast closed sea, which connects them with one another. This makes the region particularly likely to experience both tensions but also opportunities. The Mediterranean Sea has, in fact, by virtue of these differences, always been a hub for trade and of encounter, and therefore, also a highway for travellers, and other times, even a theatre of conflict. It is precisely in these tensions of opposing and contrasting forces that I am most interested in this paper, and how these tensions are manifested in the interplay between globalization and migration. I argue that due to its geographic location, the Mediterranean Sea, especially the countries in the southern European border is the locus of different kinds of tensions related to the complex issue of migration. I also argue that for the same reasons, this region has a long history of structures of social friendship that have developed organically to address the challenges that arise from migration. The paper is divided into three parts. In the first part of the paper, I briefly analyse such opposing forces and how they give rise to tensions: the thrust towards globalization on the one hand and the opposite drive towards insularity on the other; the movement of countries wanting to join the EU and simultaneously, the fragmentation of the EU; and finally, the push and pull economic factors that lead to migration across Europe and the Mediterranean. Second, using the lens of social friendship as proposed by Pope Francis in Fratelli Tutti I propose that there are already tools at our disposal in the Mediterranean culture and in the project of European unity to respond to the fragmentation and individuality that causes so much suffering among migrants in Europe. Third, I conclude by retrieving some practices that have a long-standing tradition in Europe and the Mediterranean, and which are rooted in Christianity, and which acts as a kind of globalization from below to respond to migration in a more wholesome way.