The impact of migration policies on civil society actors' efforts to improve migrants' access to social and economic rights in Morocco

This paper discusses the influence of European migration externalisation policies on civil society initiatives promoting migrants' rights in Morocco. By looking at the nature of NGOs' interventions that aim to benefit migrants' social and economic rights, the paper attempts to uncover the contradictions inherent in the implementation of so-called rights-based approaches to migration management in a context marked by inequality, uneven social development and authoritarian rule. The Moroccan example shows how the EU's efforts have promoted a juridical, administrative and discursively justifiable policy framework in Morocco, in which NGOs could successfully deliver humanitarian aid and advocate for vulnerable migrants' rights to life. At the same time, however, the underlying rationale of distinguishing between the rights of legal and irregular migrants hampers NGOs in promoting a more inclusive approach concerning migrants as target populations of social development policies in the country. This is compounded by a national political context marked by limited opportunities for civil society participation in policy-making processes. By describing the dilemmas created through these tensions, this paper aims to draw attention to overlooked connections between development policies and externalisation measures in the Global South.