"The Whitewashing of Europe" : A Comparative Analysis of Migration Policytowards the Middle East and Ukraine, as a Reflection of European Identity Politics

Abstract: In 2015, the high influx of refugees dispersing throughout Europe was represented as a crisis tocooperation and European security. In contrast, the response to the Russian invasion of Ukrainein February 2022, saw the EU institute the Temporary Protection Order to bypass standardmigration procedures to allow Ukrainian refugees safe access and asylum. This thesis aims tounderstand why the response to refugees varied to such an extent in the 2015 refugee crisis vs the2022 Ukrainian conflict, and to understand the role of EU discourse in influencing member states’ migration policies and attitudes to refugees.Using Critical Discourse Analysis, I analysed EU reports, immigration reports from Sweden andGermany, and a selection of national newspapers from the two states. Within the data selected,codes were isolated and analysed to extract three significant thematic discourses: protection,security, and humanisation. When further expanding and dissecting these themes, I applied aneo-colonial lens of analysis, pursuing instruments such as externalisation methods ordependency.The EU member states represent their own national interest, whilst simultaneously representingthe core values required of their membership. The final line of analysis investigated the role of European Identity in migration policies, and how this reinforces the neo-colonial alienationthrough “us” vs “them”. The thesis concludes that a form of neo-colonialism exists in migrationpolicies through trigger words within discourse. Additionally, there are implications thatcountries that have a higher prioritisation of their European Identity are more likely influencedby EU discourse, which acts as an indicator of national discourse and subsequent policy.