Asylum law and policy in the European Union

• Autor(a) principal: Vaz, Joana Inês dos Santos
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.6/6548

The process of establishment of a Common European Asylum System (CEAS) in the European Union began in 1999, with the entering into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam. Nevertheless, facing the increasing numbers of people claiming asylum in the European Union every day, instead of a common and consistent EU response, we’ve seen the adoption of a set unilateral measures that can harm important developments of the EU integration process. This research project seeks to draw some conclusions on asylum law and policy in the European Union, or at least contribute to the debate on the future of a common asylum system in the European Union, given its main failures and opportunities. It attempts to answer how refugees’ protection in the European Union is affected by the European decision-making process and, at the same time, how this decision-making process creates legal dilemmas within the framework of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS). However, it does not focus exclusively on what is the CEAS, nor in its limitations thus far. It intends to go further and examine the main opportunities and challenges facing the European Union in the construction of its common asylum law and policy, stressing the progress already made and the constraints of the debate. It does so through the comparative analysis of primary sources, such as legislation and official documents from various bodies of the EU and from the UNHCR, and secondary sources, such as studies and research articles from relevant scholars and relevant documentation launched by non-governmental organizations (ECRE, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International). With resource to empirical evidence and legislative documents launched in the context of the current refugee crisis, this study intends to provide a humble, but up-to-date contribution to the literature on refugees, asylum and EU governance research.