| Summary: | Abstract Drawing on interviews conducted in Brussels, Dakar and Accra between September 2017–March 2018, this paper discusses the responses of domestic policy actors to the EU’s migration policy proposals in the two West African countries of Senegal and Ghana. EU-African cooperation in migration is mediated by the domestic context that the EU’s migration agenda is ‘received’ in, and the preferences and responses of policy communities in the countries that are the intended recipients of the EU’s governance approach. While existing studies have examined preference formation on the part of European actors in the EU’s external migration agenda, the preferences and agency of African actors and how these shape the EU’s external migration governance remain under-examined. Looking primarily at domestic contestation in the area of returns and readmission, this paper demonstrates that the preferences of policy actors in the receiving country are formed in a shifting domestic context and have an impact in determining the ability of the EU to achieve its aims and preferred governance strategy. In addition, it is shown that organisational and bureaucratic dynamics can influence cooperation outcomes.
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