It’s difficult to pick up a newspaper lately without seeing at least one article about migration to Europe. While political crises in the Middle East and Africa have led to a huge spike in asylum-seekers arriving in Southern Europe in the past year or less, there has been a general pattern of increasing immigration to this region for over a decade. This paper aims to explain changes in immigration policy in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Greece since 1990 by focusing on the influence of domestic politics, pressure from the European Union, and economic performance on policymaking.