Informal Lawmaking in Maritime Migration

The flow of ‘boat migration’ across the world’s oceans involves the intersection of different formal agreements: the LOSC, the Safety of Life at Sea Convention, the Search and Rescue Convention, and the Migrant Smuggling Protocol. The scale of boat migration has prompted a series of informal agreements, including the 2004 Guidelines on the Treatment of Persons Rescued at Sea, and an agreement between the EU and Turkey. In addition, individual countries have pursued informal agreements with diverse actors, such as the code of conduct between Italy and the non-governmental organizations undertaking rescues in the Mediterranean. This chapter examines the use of informal lawmaking in response to migration flows across the Mediterranean. It assesses informal acts in formal settings, and informal acts by informal actors, finding that informal lawmaking provides an easier way out of the system of international law for states, but an easier way into the system for non-state actors.