Building Bridges: Redefining the EU’s External Migration Agenda

Since the 2024 reforms of the Common European Asylum System, the external dimension of migration management has gained renewed momentum. Throughout the 2024–2029 policy cycle, both EU institutions and national governments have intensified efforts to explore new forms of cooperation with non-EU countries. These efforts include handling asylum and return processes outside the EU, addressing the instrumentalisation of migration, and tackling human smuggling, among other priorities.

However, the push for so-called "innovative solutions" must be viewed in the context of mounting geopolitical challenges and growing uncertainty in the humanitarian and development sectors. Funding cuts, shifting donor priorities, and potential overhauls of the multilateral system are likely to impact not only neighbouring regions but also areas well beyond the EU’s borders. With the international order and its institutions under strain, and with geopolitical conflicts and security threats on the rise, implementing effective and sustainable approaches to migration management is becoming increasingly difficult.

At the same time, there is little clarity on how EU-level and national initiatives will align, or how they will contribute to a cooperation agenda that meaningfully incorporates partner countries’ interests and broader policy goals.

Against this background, this project aims to:

• Foster a dialogue with key stakeholder on the future of EU migration cooperation amid domestic and global challenges
• Explore and analyse the political, financial, operational and fundamental rights implications of migration cooperation models
• Develop policy recommendations for EU and national policymakers

As part of this project, on 18 June 2025, the EPC together with the Brussels Office of the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung organised the closed-door roundtable “Between Innovative Solutions and New Geopolitical Realities: What Way Forward for the EU’s External Migration Agenda?"

On 11 December 2025, a further closed-door roundtable “Countering people smuggling, revisiting visa policy: striking the right balance in EU migration cooperation” took place.