n short, our “emergency” response has become a self-fulfilling prophecy as arrivals grow, fatalities rise and the smuggling business gets stronger. If border controls were scrutinised in the same way as other publicly funded areas, this abysmal failure would be triggering serious political debate. But instead, governments are going further, with fences, patrols and even military vessels, supposedly deployed to destroy the smugglers’ boats pre-emptively, while refusing any sharing of responsibility over refugees or any common approach to migration. Einstein’s definition of madness comes to mind: Europe is doing the same thing over and over, each time hoping for a different result.