The real villains of the migration crisis are the smugglers, right? They are the ones who cram hapless refugees into unseaworthy boats or airless containers, who extort and exploit, right?
Think again. Or maybe, just think. Which is what Peter Tinti and Tuesday Reitana get us to do with their eye-opening investigation. The authors, who work with the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, present a complex and nuanced picture, a spectrum of those involved in the people-smuggling industry, from the trusted ‘family business’ networks, to the less common, but more publicized, evil cartels and criminal gangs.
Through personal stories, they show us refugees who are grateful to their smugglers; a good reputation is good for business. The smuggling industry is meeting a global demand. But, as the writers observe: ‘In a neoliberal world… it is often the criminals who help the most desperate of us.’
There are also truly evil bastards who rape and exploit and torture and kill. And, ironically, in a world full of unintended consequences, it is these violent operators that are benefiting from ‘tougher’ policies. Only they have the finance, logistics and ruthlessness to get around higher barriers and increased ‘criminal justice solutions’ that target smugglers.
The authors are clear that the current international system is broken, and only policies that address the demand for passage from zones of war and poverty into ones that offer greater security offer the slightest hope of success.
Tinti and Reitano also expose the cynical conflation of smuggling (getting people from a to b) with trafficking (slavery) as ‘hoping to operationalize universal disapproval of human trafficking to gain support for policies that are really intended to stem migrant and refugee flows’.
Powerful analysis, groundbreaking research, vividly and journalistically expressed. This is a must-read for policy-makers – and anyone who wants a more truthful approach to a defining story of our age.
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