Interagency Relations and the {EU} Migration Crisis: Strengthening of Law Enforcement Through Agencification?

While scholarly literature on Frontex has mushroomed over the last decade, agency’s interaction with other EU Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) agencies has received less attention. It is the objective of this paper to analyse how the crisis has shaped the horizontal interactions between EU JHA agencies and ask whether these relations have either enhanced the law enforcement focus of EU JHA or, conversely, strengthened a human rights-promoting EU as a ‘Union of Values’. Empirically, the chapter assesses the relations of Frontex with other JHA-related agencies such as the European Asylum Support Office or the Fundamental Rights Agency before and after the 2015 migration crisis. We argue that despite an increased human rights sensitivity, the migration crisis has not substantially changed the border management approach of Frontex but rather consolidated law enforcement profile of interagency cooperation and led only to minor improvements of fundamental rights.