Protest poster at PEGIA demonstration( Patriotic Euopeans againt Islamisization of the West). Jens Meyer /Press Association. All rights reserved.Like the Eurozone crisis before it, Europe’s refugee crisis has forced the EU into a state of permanent emergency. Refugee flows into Europe continue to dominate the headlines, punctuated by regular emergency summits and hastily scrambled together dossiers. As with the Euro, the crisis is proving fiendishly difficult to resolve – every policy option has the potential to lead to political ruin. Last week the European Commission took another stab at resolving one aspect of the problem: the EU’s so-called ‘Dublin’ asylum system.
The Dublin system for managing asylum was originally introduced in the 1990s to ensure clarity over which member state was responsible for each asylum seeker that entered the EU. The need for clear rules became apparent with the introduction of the Schengen agreement that brought down border controls between most Western European countries. One core aspect of Dublin is that in general, other than in particular cases such as when an asylum seeker has a close family member in a member state, the first member state that an asylum seeker enters is responsible for their asylum application.
Over the years Dublin has worked relatively well for top destination countries of asylum seekers in northern Europe, which have had recourse to return some of their asylum seekers to the first EU member state they passed through. But – particularly in recent years as the refugee crisis has grown – countries on the southern periphery of the EU have borne the brunt of asylum applications. This is far removed from the professed principles of transnational solidarity and cooperation at the foundation of the EU project.
