GMF - The German Marshall Fund of the United States - Strengthening Transatlantic Cooperation

When the Lisbon Treaty entered into force on December 1, the European Union took a large step toward establishing a common immigration policy. This is the dream - or the nightmare, depending on whom you ask - of many leaders in Europe. France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, has been one of the strongest proponents of this move, stating last year that "it would be illusory to imagine we could have 27 different national immigration policies." His wish has been granted.

The new treaty mandates the EU to adopt measures to manage immigration flows, ensure the fair treatment of legal non-EU migrants, and, importantly, enhance measures to combat illegal immigration and human trafficking (though individual countries would still determine the volume and makeup of the legal immigrant populations they admit).

Considering the less-than-enthusiastic public support for the Lisbon Treaty, one wonders how Europeans feel about policymakers in Brussels making decisions about a topic as controversial as immigration. The public opinion survey Transatlantic Trends: Immigration, released this month, gives the views of people in six European countries - Britain, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain - on whether decisions about immigration should be taken at the local, national, or EU level. Luckily for supporters of the Lisbon Treaty, large majorities in all continental European countries surveyed were in favour of the EU taking decisions about immigration policy.

The only outliers of the survey were the British, 53 percent of whom want immigration policy to be decided at the national level instead. No doubt sensing this preference, London has opted out of the EU's common immigration policy, though it can opt back in on individual pieces of legislation where it sees fit.

Continental Europeans' desire for immigration policy to be decided at the EU level does not appear to stem necessarily from frustration with their national governments. The survey found that 71 percent of Germans and 53 percent of the Dutch are satisfied with the way their governments are handling immigration, whereas 53 percent of Italians and 64 percent of the Spanish think that their governments are doing a poor job. Yet respondents in all four countries clearly support EU-level immigration management. In fact, those Germans who think that their government is doing a good job are actually more likely to say the EU should be making immigration policy decisions.

Moving forward, the real question will be how the Union formulates common policies, especially on more hot-button issues. One of the biggest tasks will be controlling illegal immigration, a power conferred on the EU by the Lisbon Treaty. Countries bordering the Mediterranean currently bear a large share of the illegal migration burden, with Spain and Italy each having an estimated one million illegal immigrants. These numbers have captured public attention, as have highly publicised stories of African "boat people" attempting to land on European shores in often-unseaworthy dinghies. Frequent reports of migrants drowning in the Mediterranean have transformed the topic of illegal immigration into a humanitarian issue as well.

Perhaps as a result of this connection, the French, Spanish, and Italian respondents clearly indicate that increasing development aid to poorer countries is the most effective means of reducing illegal immigration. Notably, they chose this option over reinforcing border controls as the best tool available. EU politicians should keep these southern European preferences in mind as they ramp up efforts to control illegal immigration; with more development aid, potential immigrants might decide to stay in their own countries rather than risking dangerous days at sea or clandestine life in post-Lisbon Treaty Europe.

This article was co-written with Zsolt Nyiri, director of Transatlantic Trends at the German Marshall Fund.