ABSTRACT
Theoretical lenses that are relevant and applicable to irregular migration abound, as discussed earlier in this book. This chapter retraces the volume’s broad, multidisciplinary, and holistic theoretical framework – focusing on migrants, states, and their local populations – in the light of the many empirical elements that have been included in the previous chapters. Rather than performing theory testing as commonly understood in experimental settings, it revisits the theories outlined in Chapter 2 in a broad and discursive manner, assessing them with real-world Italian and Australian examples and gauging their limitations and level of complementarity with other theories. As a result, the chapter emphasises the usefulness of theoretical eclecticism (both intradisciplinary and multidisciplinary eclecticism, therefore encompassing international relations, migration studies, and other social sciences) to pursue a more comprehensive understanding of irregular migration. This, in turn, may support analytical eclecticism and, with it, a more grounded migratory foreign policy formulation process.
