ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the legal instruments regulating migration within Africa and within the EU, their historical evolution, the contents of the free movement of people guarantees, and the methods of their implementation. It compares the framework of the intra-European and intra-African cross-border movement of persons. This comparison serves as a basis for some lessons for the legal framework regarding migration between Africa and Europe, especially against the background of the ongoing post-Cotonou negotiations, which are to shape the relationship between the ACP (Africa, Caribbean, Pacific) group of states and the European Union. On this basis, it advocates for an Afro-European integration scheme which would break with the prevailing identity narratives stigmatising migrants. Borrowing from the best practices in Africa and the EU, such a scheme – unlike the current Cotonou regime – should adapt a rule-based approach linking migration with trade, conferring individual rights enforceable in a court of law and encompassing lower-skilled and higher-skilled workers.
