The Migration Initiatives encouraged by the Local and Regional Networks and their effects in the Euromed Cooperation

Abstract

Since the migration and refugee crisis of 2015, local and regional authorities (LRA) are networking to increase their incidence in the migratory policy-making. Still, it is not clear if these collaborative platforms are having a concrete impact in terms of external migratory policies with a Mediterranean regional view. To contribute to this analysis, this study presents a policy framework, based on six outstanding migration initiatives led by selected local regional networks (LRN). The objective is to identify the effects of this cooperative relation in terms of transnational policies in the euro-Mediterranean context for the period 2015–2021. The first part of the article displays the European migratory priorities in the region involving LRA. The second identifies the outstanding initiatives led by some LRN and develops a frame policy analysis accordingly. This section outlines the challenge of sustainability; the limits of multilevel governance and the absence of southern Mediterranean engagement. The multi-sectoral approach, which makes use of decentralized institutions and programs, has become a new tool for these emerging lobbies. The third part addresses the narrative of these networks when it comes to migration confirming the existence of a building Mediterranean focus of interest of the LRN.

1 The Euro-Mediterranean context of the Migration Networking

Migration policies in the Mediterranean region were confronted with major crises that substantially and simultaneously affect all dimensions of migration strategies. A fundamental change was brought about by the migration crisis of 2015 with the increasing number of refugees caused due to conflicts in the Mediterranean region. From that point on, mobility management required new parameters of response following the request by citizens. Public opinion demanded different solutions to a human drama of the first magnitude. The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has made the extreme situation even more relevant for those on the frontline of migration movements.

As a response to this situation, which transcends national management boundaries, the multilateral context provides global answers and instruments for regional consensus that could facilitate legal migration. The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration (GCM) launched in September 2018 sent a powerful political message: migration and refugee matters have become key issues squarely on the international agenda with a proposed framework to advance the recognition and guarantee of migrants’ rights.¹ The commitment of all governments opens the door to a greater involvement of the regional and local institutions in the governance of migration. Local authorities, among other stakeholders, were included and actively contributed to the global migration agenda.² Some of these local entities are the United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), Metropolis, Eurocities, Intercultural Cities, the UNESCO International Coalition of Inclusive and Sustainable Cities (ICCAR), and the UN-Habitat.

When it comes to a regional level, the refugee and migration crisis highlights the shortcomings of the EU’s own capacity to provide an effective and coordinated response to migration in terms of asylum management. The New Pact for Migration and Asylum launched by the EU in September 2020 puts forward its vision related to this complex policy area.³ The priorities of the external dimension actions, outlined by this New Pact, expressed the importance of building economic opportunities and addressing the root causes of irregular migration. It also takes into account tackling migratory issues from an inclusive and social dimension standpoint, and not from a securitization perspective.⁴ At the same time, local and regional bodies started to highlight the inefficiency of the measures adopted by the EU linked to migration. Specifically, the fact that further joint instruments were absent at the European level, including an appropriate distribution mechanism to relocate migrants.⁵

Twenty-five years after the Barcelona Process, policies in the North and South of the Mediterranean basin have deployed similar strategies when confronted with the reality that mobility is a trend. The EU has strengthened its cooperation with MENA states on migration, security, and development and has drawn on its external migration policy as a method of ‘region-building’ set to reconfigure a broader EU Mediterranean Neighbourhood (Fakhoury, 2021).⁶

Nowadays, in European relations with the Mediterranean, the balance of a partnership for mobility is non-existent. The governmental approach has not provided an effective answer, and migrations continue to present an unresolved issue. The Renewed Partnership with the Southern Neighbourhood (a New Agenda for the Mediterranean) proposed by the European Commission in 2021,⁷ underlined the challenges of forced displacement and irregular migration and the need to facilitate safe and legal pathways for migration and mobility. However, this basic approach of easing restrictions on legal migration seeks to improve control through more effective return and readmission arrangements (Moran, 2021).⁸

Nevertheless, this new agenda recognizes the need for a more coordinated and enhanced policy where all stakeholders are involved, including the private sector, civil society, the city, and other local entities.⁹ Regional authorities have welcomed the migration and mobility component of the new Agenda for the Mediterranean and call for greater involvement of local and regional authorities.¹⁰ These authorities express a clear demand for EU cooperation on migration with third countries, in particular its Southern neighbours, against the instrumentalization of the EU’s external development funds for migration control. At the same time, they express their readiness to facilitate dialogue and cooperation with local and regional authorities in migrants’ countries of origin and transit countries.¹¹

The deployment of these policies has led many public and civil society actors to feel increasingly more legitimized to contribute to this, until now, state-handled field of action. Before 2020, regions and cities held the main responsibility for arrival and integration. This is reflected in the border regions in the South of the EU, which are under greater pressure from migratory flows in the Mediterranean. The lack of an effective and equitable response by states to the crisis meant that regional and local authorities faced the need to innovate in the management of migratory flows that directly affected them.¹²

The traditional focus on nation-state migration management has shifted to an interest in the empowerment of non-state actors as policymakers. Local actors, such as cities, have drawn growing attention from international organizations who are in search of transnational partners beyond European borders (Lacroix & Desille, 2018).¹³ To be more effective, the action of regional and local authorities has been coordinated with other actors, which in turn created sub-actors of governance: the networks of regions and cities (LRN). In the frame of the Mediterranean migration, regional and local actors have become part of the agenda of existing networks that embrace the issue of migration. The emergence of these networks is evidence of their ability to confront the migration challenge and bring the opportunity to the EU instruments to include them as relevant actors for the external dimension of the EU migration agenda.

2 Migration Network Typology Frame and Euromed Cooperation

There is a collective understanding among researchers who state how, in the last two decades, territorial Networks have emerged as key actors in the governance of globalization, linking local actors across nation-states as well as with supranational governance institutions (Lacroix & Desille, 2018).¹⁴ Despite the lack of systematic studies into the scope and impact of governance networks, those have become a common and increasingly important governance mechanism at the local, regional, and transnational levels. In fact, they provide a new paradigm for understanding the emerging forms of multilateral action and pluricentric governance (Torfing & Sørensen, 2014).¹⁵ This networking trend is linked to the process of globalization and the consolidation of external actions of LRAs, which in this context we can define as territorial diplomacy, including diverse formulations (para-diplomacy, local and regional diplomacy, and decentralized diplomacy among others) (Wassenberg, 2020).¹⁶ This cooperation to bring together regions from different countries to build a shared vision has been encouraged by the EU through the cross-border, transnational, and interregional cooperation of its regional policies.¹⁷

The partnership between Europe and its neighbours in the Southern and Eastern part of the Mediterranean region during the last twenty years facilitates the implementation of large-scale international projects involving territorial actors. A great number of local and regional initiatives have been contributing to creating a consolidated network for the deployment of territorial cooperation (cross-border, transnational, and lately macro-regional cooperation). This dense network of LRAs in cooperation with public administrations is firmly engaged in strengthening joint cross-border and transnational activities in many policy areas (sustainable use of water and agricultural resources, climate change, strategic urban planning, local economic development, tourism, education, and culture) (Noferini, 2021).¹⁸ Macro-regionalization processes and multi-level governance in the region offer a joint framework that fosters synergies and complementarities among already existing initiatives, programs, and governance structures.¹⁹ Such “relational networking” is constructing functional spaces of action that do not need to be locally connected: the networking can be built around a challenge or a physical border. In this context, LRAs are asked to participate in collaborative transnational models characterized by the presence of supranational, national, regional, and other local actors (Noferini, 2021).²⁰

We know little about how these territorial networks participate to migration governance and how these alliances are operating in terms of Mediterranean cooperation (Zapata-Barrero, 2020a, b).²¹ To contribute to this analysis, this work presents a policy framework, based on six outstanding migration initiatives led by a selected LRN. These initiatives are relevant because they transnationally address different aspects of the Euro-Mediterranean agenda previously described.

• United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG)

• MedCites

• Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions (CPMR)

• Assembly of European Regions (AER) Intercultural Regions Network

• EUROCITIES. Solidarity Cities

• Cities and Regions for Integration of Migrants

The frame analysis methodology²² helps us to better identify the policy problems and solutions proposed. Therefore, these migration networks are at the very beginning of their policy-making process in terms of external dimension, and they face a dynamic and interactive process that can be integrated into the frame analysis.²³ Our interest is not to establish a typology, but to identify their political agenda, and in a similar fashion, the progressive establishment of common strategic representations.²⁴

Following previous research (Caponio, 2019),²⁵ we are taking into account the relevance of the interaction factors in the elaboration of their collaborative strategies. In our approach, this has been done through a functional (networking) and multilevel (vertical and horizontal) perspective. On the other hand, the analyses of the Mediterranean agenda (policy actions) and the fields of action (multisector) allow us to identify tendencies in the policy interest of this research, the euromediterranean context (Table 6.1).

Table 6.1 Frame analyses approach

2.1 Interaction Factors: Multilevel Approach and Functional Orientation

One of the preliminary elements to take into consideration is how the migratory field is present in the network’s constituency (Table 6.2). When it comes to orientation, the network of Solidarity Cities is the only one that has been promoted exclusively to focus on migration work, and therefore, its ultimate purpose is to change current migratory policies. The second type of network is the one that promotes specific initiatives or platforms devoted to influencing migratory European policies. This is the case of the Cities and Regions for Integration of Migrants (an institutional initiative gathering networks and territorial organizations) and the European Intercultural Regional network promoted by ARE. The rest of the networks are developing their migratory initiatives mainly by searching for opportunities within European projects. This “functional orientation” of the LRN becomes a challenge to assuring the long-term sustainability of their initiatives; all the while, the generation of new network platforms devoted to migration can be considered the main instrument when it comes to consolidating current territorial synergies.

Table 6.2 Interaction factors

From a multilevel governance perspective, this incidence in policymaking must be understood in both a horizontal dimension (involving local governance and other public, private, and social actors) and a vertical dimension (with other levels of government) (Zapata-Barrero, 2017).²⁶ In analysed networks, the policy-making impact is limited due to the lack of a consistent multilevel frame of their governance structure (Table 6.2). The relations between the networks are established through horizontal communities of regional and local authorities, which are not benefiting from the synergies of the most-governmental frame because they are acting independently of each other. Social and public stakeholders have limited structural participation, which is mainly prevalent during a program or a project implementation. The weak involvement of other levels of government (vertical dimension) gets constrained in policymaking. Therefore, all these networks have developed their Mediterranean external policies mainly on their own. As has been deeply analysed by different studies in concrete cases of city networks, they are often regarded with enthusiasm and great expectations. Nonetheless, in terms of governance, it is not clear if and to what extent these networks will represent a venue for progressive dialogue and policy innovation on the politically sensitive migration issue (Caponio, 2019).²⁷

To understand how outstanding initiatives are handling the issue of migration, we must acknowledge the fact that they do not always bring together actors from both North and the South of the Mediterranean (Table 6.2). Many of them are structured around lobbying in European policies with a moderate impact on the Southern regions. The interest of these networks is based on their ability to influence European policies and programs; however, they do not yet provide opportunities to include actors based in the South. One of the causes of this aforementioned situation can be interpreted as the ineffective multilateral impact of the Euro-Mediterranean migration strategy.

Other serious challenges which remain to be addressed are asymmetric institutional capacities, heterogeneity of interests among networks, and the lack of coherence among territorial programs and initiatives. Firstly, in the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean, while the situation varies from country to country, the autonomy of LRAs is very limited. Secondly, there is no clear partnership with an external approach. Even though the North-South division that until now has characterized the governance of international migration, is slowly fading. In our times, all countries have become emigration and immigration focal points and the management policies seem not been longer a Northern issue. Migratory patterns, experiences, and policies are changing; which creates a need for North-South comparisons, especially at the local level. The subnational level is key in decision-making; however, they do not control immigration policies.

2.2 Mediterranean Policies: Multi-sectorial Approach and Euromed Agenda

The urban migratory agenda is key in the action policy of the analised LRA (Table 6.3). There is a real change in the agenda when it comes to outsourcing relations between cities and other actors since city networks that work on migration issues emphasize the increasing benefit of local experiences -which in turn links the Mediterranean dimension very clearly to the urban dimension- (Zapata-Barrero, 2020a, b).²⁸ Cities are then crucial agents for the implementation of the SDGs and must be regarded as such by the Euro-Mediterranean cooperation actors. There is a context to underline the benefits of supporting more regional and decentralized cooperation, multiplying partnerships, synergies, and building alliances between regional stakeholders to foster the exchange of knowledge and experience, identify and promote best practices, building upon the work of existing networks.²⁹

Table 6.3 Mediterranean policies

The World Organization of United Cities and Local Governments (CGLU) launched the Mediterranean Cities Migration Project (MC2CM). This project has been founded by EC in conjunction with ICMPD and UN-Habitat in 2015 and is currently in its second phase (2018–2022). The MC2CM project is a practical laboratory that allows cities to exchange their experiences and share good practices favoring the inclusion of migrants involving around twenty Euro-Mediterranean cities. One of the major overcoming aspects of this project is bringing the exchange of good practices for more effective urban migration policies. This also affects directly the Euromed urban agenda by implying effective cooperation between North and Southern cities.³⁰

MedCites, which is comprised of 63 municipalities from the two shores of the Mediterranean, has progressively integrated urban strategic programs that involve cities and metropolitan areas. Specific projects have been launched allowing the sharing of experiences and capacity-building initiatives about migration management. Namely, the Tanger Accueil project³¹ aims to promote access for newcomers and migrants to guarantee their rights and services and facilitate their social integration. The bilateral approach of the project is having an effective Euromed potential due to the fact that is framed within the Mediterranean City to City Migration program implemented by ICMPD, funded by the European Union.

In terms of the topic approach (Table 6.3), alternative migration management should be underlined. Grassroots city networks reacted in response to the refugee crisis aim to receive and assist refugees and, crucially, guarantee their rights. While EU-supported networks have been driven by the integration agenda, the second ones responded to the national political limitations (Lacroix et al., 2020).³² Many municipalities in Europe have joined Solidarity Cities, launched in the framework of the Eurocities network.³³ In this context of tension, this new generation of city networks, usually integrating civil society movements, appears to face the new upcoming situation of dramatic human challenges presented around the Mediterranean. This is the case of the Palermo Charter Migration Process, a militant and critical voice advocating for alternative migration management and the campaigns like Sea to City. Nonetheless, they still lack connexions with Southern and Eastern Mediterranean cities.

A second element to take into account in terms of policy action (Table 6.3), is Raising awareness of the migration in the European territorial policies. The EU is the major context in which LRAs are collaborating. Some initiatives are aiming to have a clear incidence in the policymaking process, lobbying for more presence of the regions and, for what is relevant to this study, increasing relations with the Mediterranean agenda. The CPMRs (peripheral and maritime regions) set up a task force on migration management in 2015 that has devoted its efforts to highlighting the importance of multi-level governance and a multi-sectoral approach to migration management. They have also raised awareness of the need for regional action in all areas; including those in which they have either formal competence in the field as well as those where regional action is needed to implement EU and national objectives. As the main initiative, this network of peripheral regions around all of Europe is actively promoting the inclusion of migration in the policy cooperative agenda of the regional stakeholders, and the European project REGIN has been its main instrument. As of late, the aforementioned network opened new discourses through global debates that affected regions in Europe such as climate change.³⁴

Pluralism, inclusion, and recognition are emerging as drivers for building spaces addressing major social threats such as climate change, hate speech, conflict, disagreement, and xenophobia. The Intercultural Regions Network in 2019, promoted by the Assembly of European Regions (ARE),³⁵ serves as a support for regions to design, implement and evaluate diversity and inclusion strategies addressed to regional actors. Inspired by the Intercultural Cities Programme (ICC) of the Council of Europe, this Network aims to provide a platform for regions to share knowledge, resources, and experiences to promote intercultural integration at the regional level. There is a potential merging of interest in both CRPM and ARE, to create key crosscutting mechanisms to support partnerships and embedding regional intercultural strategies in clear relation to the intercultural dialogue agenda in the Region.

The Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) provides a political platform for European mayors and regional leaders to showcase positive examples of integration of migrants and refugees, share relevant information and promote diversity as an added value to building inclusive cities and ensuring social cohesion. The partners of this initiative promoted by the CoR are significant networks such as EuroCities, Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions, Assembly of European Regions, SHARE Network, and the Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions, and Cities.³⁶ Being acting in the EU framework, these networks are creating new platforms of structured collaboration in terms of trans-regional cooperation.

3 Networks as Catalysts of Migration Interest in the Mediterranean Region

Bearing in mind the relevance of the narrative in the policy-making process (Triandafyllidou & Fotiou, 1998)³⁷ once this policy frame has been identified in a second part, we analyse the discourses in the making of euromediterranean policies: what is intended and its implementation, especially through their specific projects.

Regarding the governance of the networks, even in the case of groups with divergent interests, they can present a stable narrative: a common history that defines key problems and proposes solutions that concern them (Torfing & Sørensen, 2014).³⁸ The emergence of a joint narrative of LRNs could be useful to demonstrate the network’s potential to play an increasingly key role in policymaking. What concerns us the most is if the analysed networks are disseminating policy models and good practices, through discourse creation and lobbying: are they developing a common understanding of emerging migratory policy problems? How far are they contributing to adjusting policies within a regional view? According to the narratives presented in the mission of their websites and brochures as well as through the initiatives developed by the analysed LRN, we can summarise three discursive areas around resources, solidarity, and externalization.

3.1 Resources

As an immediate result of being at the forefront of this situation, they have embraced a clear stand position in demanding more resources and financial instruments to make their inclusion programs more effective. This narrative links to the challenges, which derive from the reception and integration of migrant people (education, health, social services, housing…).

The Conference of Peripheral Maritime Regions (CPMR) has promoted a relevant policy action. This has been comprised of sending a letter urging the EU to adopt the EU budget and asking for sufficient financial and human resources to address the challenges posed by migration and asylum.³⁹

More recently, the Committee of Regions promoted a deep analysis of the territorial impact of migration on frontline regions and cities (Chmielewska et al., 2021).⁴⁰ This document identifies the need to provide innovative solutions for migration management by LRA, and, in particular, for the critical challenges that they are facing when it comes to social services (education, housing, and accommodation) and the positive narrative about the socio-economic gains from a local perspective.

As of now, LRAs have started to be central on both sides of the Mediterranean. One of the reasons is because in the South, for example, rural-urban migrations and urban growth are already generating a strong demand for housing, facilities, and urban services. While in the Northern and Eastern Mediterranean, the local and regional authorities are key players in the internal dimension of migrations related to common challenges as the management of non-accompanied minors (Noferini, 2021).⁴¹

Therefore, these demands have started to take into consideration some of Euromed’s challenges. Committee of Regions recalled the EU to allocate sufficient funds for LRAs to roll out their integration and inclusion policies while welcoming the proposal of providing financial support to third countries. These are countries of origin or transit countries that are ready to develop joint policies on migrants.⁴²

In this context, the LRNs appear asking to reinforce the role of the subnational actors and the potential engagement of the EU programs and financial instruments within the external dimension of the EU migration policy.⁴³ All these requests for more effective measures in EU funding are extremely relevant, considering that the networks are applying to these EU programs to implement their joint operations and projects. In this sense, the project-based funding used by the major part of the networks to implement their actions appears insufficient to financing long-term structural policies of inclusion. This is unable to support the objectives of networks’ narrative discourse in the long term.

3.2 Solidarity

On the other hand, the role of networks as mobilizers of pragmatic solidarity responses to deal with humanitarian crises has become clear. This narrative is no longer supported solely by organized civil society in a voluntary sense, as it is also supported by LRAs, and therefore includes a new and institutional approach. The Solidarity Cities network and the Palermo Migration Process are very representatives of this trend. The appearance of narratives linked to solidarity for better public goodwill also means a break with the binomial responsibility-solidarity (Aubarell & Geha, 2021).⁴⁴ During this time, many initiatives promoted at a local and regional level, are ensuring that the “refugee crisis” becomes an opportunity to empower local governments, both in the North and the Southern Mediterranean. At the European level the network’s mission, such as the Cities and Regions for Integration of Migrants initiative, includes the support of the integration of migrants and refugees, as well as the contribution to presenting a stronger narrative of solidarity and countering disinformation in this field.⁴⁵ This will be achieved by encouraging cooperation between smaller localities, cities, and regions. Some authors regard the narrative linked to cities of refuge, cities of transit, cities of sanctuary, cities of solidarity, and cultural cities as constituent parts of urban systems (regional cities) that, by themselves, build new specific ways of thinking about the Mediterranean (Zapata-Barrero, 2020a, b).⁴⁶

Nevertheless, these initiatives remain at the European level and there is a lack of Euro-Mediterranean discursive approach. We cannot contemplate a common framework build on solidarity through institutional collaboration around health, education, civil liberties, and mobility in the Southern Mediterranean (Aubarell & Geha, 2021). To overcome this situation, there is a clear need to support programs with structural incentives rather than piecemeal projects. The former programs entice local government entities to design, finance, and implement inclusive programs that take care of refugees and host communities as fellow human beings (El-Mikawy, 2020).⁴⁷ Job creation schemes for refugees and host communities designed to help Southern countries keep refugees and migrants from crossing the Mediterranean could be part of a new transnational scheme of possibilities with enhanced educational opportunities and social protection schemes.

Some of the networks are including intercultural dimensions as a part of their inclusive and integrative approach (MC2CM, MedCites, CPMR). The Intercultural Regions Network promoted by ARE includes interculturality as a part of the narrative linked to supporting recognition of diversity and positive interactions. Through two AMIF projects (Regin and EU Belong)⁴⁸ CPMR and ARE are investing in regional integration strategies with a multilevel and multi-stakeholder framework leading transnational exchanges. In the case of MC2CM interculturality at the local level has been included as a part of the exchange between cities on both sides of the Mediterranean from a social cohesion point of view.⁴⁹ As of now, however, these intercultural relations promoted by these networks, are still in their infancy and have not yet been able to exploit local and regional spaces as Euromed laboratories of innovative social ideas.⁵⁰

3.3 Externalisation

Finally, there are the internal and external dimensions of migration management, which are emerging as two sides of the same coin. Regional authorities have no legal competence in migration and asylum; however, they are networking by stressing their fundamental role in implementing several aspects and policies that are connected, directly or indirectly, to migration management. This situation will affect the vision of external migration policies because they will add value to the cooperation dynamics. Another relevant challenge faced by the networks when come to building on a shared external dimension is the weak presence of LRA from neighbourhood countries in terms of networks membership, as well as the fact that there is a lack of joint initiatives aiming to promote a regional strategy on migration beyond the EU scenario.

The general approach of the LRN is much more open to collaboration and dialogue between inclusion and citizenship policies than those of management and control. Networking and decentralized cooperation through the implementation of European programs start to bring new spaces of possibilities. A great example of this, in terms of European programs, is the AMIF program. In the frame of the transnational actions of the programme, AMIF projects are not foreseen to apply to non-European partners but, because this need exists and they are implicated, the program should provide a way to facilitate the inclusion of the regional and local authorities and actors involved, as the Shababuna project.⁵¹ There is the need to encourage operational frames of external cooperation when it comes to joint networks’ interests and the coordination between European programmes, financial instruments, and multilateral cooperation is decisive (i.e MC2CM initiative) and can be a key instrument to reinforce the external dimension of the EU migration policy.

Coming to the new areas of interest, the Mediterranean region is not only the home of the conflict, which induces migration and increases the numbers of refugees and displaced people, but it also faces serious global challenges as the critical environmental situation that will increase the displacement of people (El-Mikawy, 2020).⁵² Regarding climate change, we must look at solutions in the form of migration as an adaptation strategy and external cooperation to build resilience in vulnerable third countries. This is achieved by linking this to the contribution of regional authorities in localizing the Sustainable Development Goals. Said approach is developed by the CRPM, which is asking for partnerships with Southern neighbouring countries on the issue of climate resilience-related migration. Some networks are encouraging the debate about the potential role of regional and local authorities in the coordination with the new AMIF with the new NDICI-Global Europe Instrument (priority of climate and environment). This interesting approach is including actions led by regions in the field of development cooperation tackling root causes of migration. Some of these are linked to improving climate resilience (food security or water management) among others.⁵³

4 Conclusion

We have seen how a migratory crisis has opened the door to collaboration and networking between local and regional authorities. However, this territorial collaboration does not present a solid multilevel framework. One of the reasons is the low joint involvement of both areas, local and regional. The ARN also suffer from a lack of effective impact on state policies that continue to lead the management and control of migration policies. As a positive fact, we were able to observe how the dynamics of networking are related to the Mediterranean agenda and address issues of shared interest. Here we can highlight the urban agenda and inclusion. In this sense, a great difficulty observed is the lack of participation of Mediterranean actors from outside the European borders. In addition, we are seeing that difficulties with funds and projects are forcing the European retreat of new platforms and projects driven by this LRN. There is still to observe if the short-term projects where these networks are applying will become permanent platforms of collaboration. Despite the difficulties, the mobilization of these actors and their networks has led to the entry of a shared narrative on migration issues. The voice of local and regional authorities and their positions have been able to have a repercussion in current debates on migration (and in European regional institutions) through joint network actions. With a clear effect in terms of solidarity and refuge, two dimensions that are already part of the migration management. Some areas, like integration or interculturality, remain a difficult aspect to channel effectively at Euro-Mediterranean level. The emergence of global challenges such as climate change appears as an emerging field of interest in the LRN agenda in the Mediterranean. These global challenges, which affect common areas, are mobilizing networks to cooperate on both sides of the Mediterranean. Potential macro-regional and multilateral alliances beyond the European framework are an issue to be observed in the coming period.