W/ordering in the EU. Changes of European Discourse on Migration

This article investigates how the securitisation of migration and the concept of b/ordering-borderism have shaped official European Union (EU) discourse on migration between 2015 and 2022. Drawing on narrative analysis, complemented by computational tools (sentiment analysis and lexical frequency/word cloud techniques), we examine 133 speeches and statements delivered primarily by the presidents of the European Commission, with a particular focus on the State of the Union addresses. Building on the Copenhagen School and van Houtum and van Naerssen’s triad of bordering-ordering-othering, we introduce the notion of w/ordering to capture the specifically textual and performative ways in which words enact borders between ‘We’ and ‘Other’. Our findings show a gradual shift from a moral and humanitarian framing (‘beacon of hope’, “humanity’ and ‘dignity’) and an emphasis on legal pathways towards an increasingly managerial and security-driven vocabulary centred on ‘management’, ‘control’, ‘returns’ and the ‘protection of external borders’. In parallel, solidarity is progressively reoriented from refugees towards member states, and the narrative of a ‘borderless Europe’ increasingly gives way to that of a reinforced ‘Fortress Europe’. We argue that this evolving w/ordering does not merely describe migration but actively participates in legitimising new border infrastructures, surveillance practices and restrictive asylum policies. The article thus highlights the constitutive role of language in European border-making and the ways in which textual othering precedes and underpins physical bordering.