An Endogenous ‘Refugee Crisis’: Exploring Frame Drain and Emerging Conflicts in Migration Politics

Abstract Migration governance in Europe is shaped by contesting frames that reflect deeper tensions between security, humanitarianism and sovereignty. This article traces how these frames evolve over time and how the so‐called refugee ‘crisis’ reconfigures framing dynamics and actor relations between 2000 and 2020. Rather than treating the crisis as an exogenous shock, we adopt a constructivist and relational perspective that recognises crisis framing as a discursive act. Drawing on critical literature, we conceptualise the ‘crisis’ not as a neutral descriptor but as a performative category produced through discursive interactions. Methodologically, the study combines discourse network analysis of over 12,000 media statements with 16 elite interviews from European Union (EU) institutions, international organisations and non‐governmental organisations (NGOs). This mixed‐methods approach allows us to map long‐term frame trajectories and triangulate them with institutional self‐perceptions. We offer two core findings. First, the crisis moment amplified a pre‐existing conflict between security and human rights frames but also introduced a new fault line between hard‐line and moderate externalisation, with EU actors increasingly aligning with state‐centric positions. Second, we observe the rise of ‘frame drain’. Human rights frames remain widely invoked but are increasingly emptied of normative commitment. Meanwhile, governments dominate the discursive field, marginalising international organisations and NGOs. These findings challenge static understandings of ‘crisis’ and highlight how framing battles reconfigure political agency and legitimacy. The study contributes to scholarship on crisis performativity, EU migration governance and discursive power in global public policy.