West African migration through North Africa to Europe

Centuries ago, West African migration to the Maghreb states was based only on the trans-Saharan trade in basic commodities. In the 21st century however, the wave and frequency of West Africans migrating to the Maghreb states via the trans-Saharan route, and via Turkey in order to reach the European Union (EU) has been out of the scope of trade, making it the main form of migration from the continent in recent times. The aim of my Master Thesis is to ascertain the causes, course and effects of West African migration to the EU via North Africa and Turkey. The method that I used is secondary source analysis of books, articles and journals. Research shows that political instability, civil conflicts, unemployment and poverty, porous borders in Africa and globalization are some of the factors provoking West African emigration abroad. In fact for most migrants and refugees, the passage to the Maghreb and to the EU is riddled with dangerous and life-threatening situations at various stages of their lengthy journey. Patterns/routes of West African migration to Europe (mostly irregular migration) is characterized with life threatening situation and death of migrants in the Trans-Saharan and Trans-Mediterranean routes to North Africa and to Europe. West African migration to Europe is beneficial to both the sending and receiving countries socio-economically via increasing labor supply and productivity for the latter, and increasing remittances, and hopefully also contributing to development in the former. However, brain-drain in sending countries and socio-economic threat and insecurity in destination countries are other negative consequences. Keywords: West African Migration, Refugee, Brain-drain and brain-gain, Irregular and Transit Migration, Migration and Development, Migration Management.