So you want to come to Europe.

Afghanistan, where you come from, has been taken over by the Taliban and the economy is in tatters. You decide to try your luck at "The Game" -- the term you and your friends use to describe the perilous journey to Western Europe.

You start by paying 8000 dollars for a visa to Russia and then taking a flight to Dubai. Next, it’s on to Moscow, and later to Minsk, the capital of Belarus. Just when Europe feels nearer than ever at the border with Poland, you come up against a wall: a literal one with barbed wire, watch towers and surveillance equipment.

This situation is increasingly common as governments in Europe are finding appeal in border fences again, nearly three decades after the Berlin Wall came down.

Between 2014 and 2022, the length of border fences at the EU's external borders and within the EU and Schengen area grew from 315 kilometers to 2,048 kilometers.

"This is a way for governments to find a solution which is not really one," said Sergio Carrera, from the Centre of European Policy Studies, a think-tank. He attributes the construction of fences as part of the phenomenon of the institutionalization of migration, in which governments resort to push-backs and containment measures rather than offer viable avenues to obtaining asylum.

'Self-perpetuating' fences

Nowhere is the trend more visible than along the eastern fringes of the European Union where Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland have all built fences on their eastern borders and Finland is in the process of building one. The unrestrained passage offered by Russia and its ally Belarus to Middle Easterners and Africans to Europe beginning in the spring of 2021, as well as the return of war to the European continent led these countries to construct the barriers. 

Border fences are used by governments to take back control, but they tend to be "self-perpetuating", said Helena Hahn from the European Policy Centre think-tank. People will always find a way around walls, leading governments to construct increasingly elaborate and extensive barriers, she added. In the case of the 187-kilometer fence that Poland built along its border with Belarus, migrants continued to climb the fence and NGOs working in the region reported witnessing cuts on people’s bodies, broken spines and broken pelvises after people who had tried to climb the fence had fallen.

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Before border fences started going up in response to the Russian war on Ukraine, European governments already invested enormous resources in building fences to keep migrants out during the 2015 migrant crisis driven by the war in Syria. Hungary spent roughly 1.7 billion euros on protecting its southern border by building a double-layer barrier stretching for 157 kilometers along its southern border with Serbia and Croatia. This came after an estimated 400,000 migrants and refugees passed through on their way to Western Europe.

Also read: Latvia-Belarus border fence nears completion

‘An illusion that human mobility that can be contained’

Border fences "create an illusion that human mobility can be contained and prevented at all costs," said Carrera. Yet it’s important to ask the question of who is being stopped by the fence, he continued. In reality, most fences are often imperfect, local border traffic occurs and smuggling gangs may take advantage of the situation by charging migrants to help them pass. Fences often have the perverse effect of creating even more irregular entries into a country as desperate people seek ways to get through.

For governments, appearing not to be able to control borders can be a political liability. Spain put up barbed wire around its North African enclaves Ceuta and Melilla in the 1990s, shortly after it had joined the European Union. "This was a time when many countries needed to prove they were implementing Schengen security norms," said Carrera.

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Border policies also need to be considered in the context of the Dublin regulation, which stipulates that the first EU country a migrant enters is the country responsible for processing the asylum claim. A country which builds walls or legalizes pushbacks can thus theoretically avoid having to shoulder migration claims. The new EU Pact on Migration and Asylum signed last December aims to shift the imbalance by requiring countries to either accept migrants or pay, yet certain countries have already said they will reject the pact.

The EU has found it difficult to "depart for the crisis mode of 2015 and switch to a reactive mode," said Hahn. The crisis mode makes it easier to legitimize putting up fences instead of implementing policies that would make the situation more manageable, she added. As the EU hurtles toward parliamentary elections this June, it would be safe to bet that its fences will only keep getting longer and higher.

Also read: Fences and cemetery guards to stop migrants in Ventimiglia