1 THE SCHENGEN AGREEMENTS AND THE EMERGENCE OF A NEW MIGRATION REGIME IN EUROPE AN INTERPRETATION SIMONE PAOLI (UNIVERSITY OF PADUA) DRAFT, NOT TO BE QUOTED WITHOUT AUTHOR’S PERMISSION INTRODUCTION STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES OF THREE INTERPRETATIONS The present paper aims at providing an interpretation of the origins of the Schengen Area through the analysis of the Italian case. In particular, on the basis of unpublished documents of the archives of the European Union in Florence and Brussels, French archives, including the French National Archives in Paris and the French Diplomatic Archives in Nantes and Italian archives, including the Central Archive of State, the Historical Archives of the Chamber of Deputies, the Historical Archives of the Senate and the Historical Archives of the Bettino Craxi Foundation in Rome, it intends to answer three distinct but closely intertwined questions: what were the main reasons why, between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s, a group of member states of the European Community (EC) agreed to abolish internal border controls while, simultaneously, transferring them to external borders? why did they decide to act outside the framework of the EC? why did they resolve to initially exclude the Southern members of the Community? In literature three main interpretations of the origins of Schengen were offered. The mainstream way of thinking about the emergence of Schengen is provided by Andrew Moravcsik, professor of politics and director of the European Union Program at the Princeton University. In his “economistic” perspective, Schengen emerged because «the French government, concerned that German standards were blocking imports, and the German government, concerned that France would close its borders because of balance of payments difficulties, successfully pressed for a bilateral Franco-German arrangement to simplify and eventually eliminate border