Rescue on Stage: Border Enforcement and Public Attention in the Mediterranean by Giacomo Battiston, RF Berlin. This event is part of the Political Economy Lunch Seminar (PELS).
Irregular migrants take risks crossing borders. Border control has to balance deterrence and humanitarian motives. Exploiting georeferenced data on sea rescues for migrants crossing the Mediterranean between 2014 and 2017, this paper shows that more humanitarian rescue policy (i) increases future crossing attempts and (ii) reduces migrants’ death risk. Further, (iii) it estimates a dynamic model of border enforcement with endogenous public attention, delivering attention and policy counterfactuals. In the estimated model, temporary attention increases intensify rescue incentives. Leveraging policy outsourcing enforcement to Libyan authorities, I show policymakers’ evaluation of irregular migrants’ lives is lower than comparable estimates for citizens.
No prior registration necessary. If you have any questions, please contact Amanda Slater at slater[at]hertie-school[dot]org