Borderline cases

European deportation practices are governed by a complex web of European, national and human-rights law, says the author of a paper in the International Journal of Migration and Border Studies. The study shows, based on 100000 French court cases, that national courts play a central role in determining whether individuals can be removed.

The research considers whether deportation is a form of “compulsory mobility”. In other words, movement across borders is imposed on individuals through legal orders rather than undertaken voluntarily. It brings together forms of removal that are often treated separately, including returns, expulsions and Dublin transfers, under which an asylum seeker may be transferred to another European country responsible for examining their claim.

The research looked at deportation judgements issued by French first-instance administrative courts between June 2022 and June 2025. France accounts for almost a third of return decisions issued to third-country nationals in the European Union, while deportation cases make up more than a quarter of judgements in the requisite administrative tribunals.

The study found that there are overlapping rules derived from EU asylum and migration law, EU citizenship law, readmission agreements and human-rights protections, including safeguards concerning family life and inhumane or degrading treatment. However, it then shows that these rules create competing pressures where legal frameworks generally facilitate removal and human-rights protections restrict it. Ultimately, because deportation orders can be challenged individually, national judges must reconcile these conflicting rules in everyday cases.

The work suggests that the way in which Europe’s deportation system functions cannot be understood solely through legislation at the European level. Its practical effects are also shaped by how national courts interpret and apply that framework in thousands of individual cases.

Lamé, A. (2026) ‘Reconciling the tensions of the European deportation regime: how the law shapes compulsory mobility across borders’, Int. J. Migration and Border Studies, Vol. 9, No. 6, pp.57–75.

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