On December 17th, the Biblioteca Mestre Martí Tauler in Rubí hosted the conference *Migrants, Migration Policies and Human Rights in Europe in Troubling Times*, presented by Professor Sònia Parella, a renowned expert in sociology and migration. The event offered a deep reflection on current human mobility dynamics and the tightening of migration policies, with a specific focus on the European context.
Parella began by analyzing the causes that force millions of people to emigrate, from armed conflicts and human rights violations to phenomena such as climate change and extreme poverty. The professor emphasized that the European Union's migration policies are heavily influenced by a securitarian discourse that, rather than managing human mobility based on respect for fundamental rights, does so from fear, social alarm, and the perception of migration as a threat.
The conference highlighted that this approach, embodied in the recently approved European Migration and Asylum Pact, perpetuates the systematic violation of human rights. Parella described this pact as a reflection of the "necropolitics" theorized by Achille Mbembe, where states decide, through actions or omissions, who lives and who dies at their borders.
During the event, Parella stressed the importance of revising the terminology used when talking about migration. She highlighted the difference between economic migrants and refugees, a more restricted category that often excludes people fleeing equally extreme situations, such as the mass loss of housing due to climate change or economic collapse. "The concept of forced migration should be introduced to recognize the complexity of these experiences without undermining the rights of refugees," she suggested.
The professor highlighted the asymmetries in the EU's response based on the origin of refugees. She compared the reception of people displaced by the Syrian war in 2015 with that of Ukrainian refugees, who have enjoyed rights and freedoms from day one. This double standard, she said, is further proof of the bias that prevails in European migration policies.
One of the most worrying aspects addressed in the conference is the externalization of border control, a mechanism that shifts human rights violations outside European territory. Parella denounced that current policies make safe arrivals for migrants more difficult, forcing them to take extremely dangerous routes like the Mediterranean or the Darién jungle.
The session concluded with an urgent call to reform migration policies within an international cooperation framework that guarantees legal and safe pathways for human mobility. According to Parella, this is the only way to end systematic violations and ensure that migration management is based on human rights rather than national security interests.
The conference was an exercise in critical reflection that brought both challenges and opportunities to the table for building a fairer future in migration management. Rubí, with events like this, is consolidating itself as a space for debate and social awareness.
