The Dublin Convention: Bad for Host Nations, Worse for Migrants

The calamitous earthquake that rocked Syria and Turkey killed over 46,000 people. As host to more Syrian asylum seekers than every other country combined, the disaster has thrust the refugee crisis back into the news. While more effective government could have limited some of the physical damage and casualties, the dire situation of asylum seekers in Turkey has multiplied the human cost beyond anything necessary. This tragedy should force policymakers to reflect and reassess the asylum policy status quo across the European Union.

Instead, many EU countries have resorted to increasingly convoluted schemes to prevent refugees reaching their soil. While violating the spirit of the law, countries of the EU have abdicated their responsibilities through regulation and hid behind the letter of international law such that asylum seekers, having faced untold perils and often fleeing persecution, are unable to pass through ports of entry by the nature of their asylum claim alone.

Whenever asylum seekers fleeing conflict or persecution leave their homes, often with barely more than the clothes on their backs, they resort to smugglers to cross borders irregularly. The danger they face at home cannot wait for years long visa processes or carefully laid plans. They must find someone to carry them to the nearest border at whatever price they can afford: boats, buses, and lorries carry asylum seekers as irregular migrants to something loosely resembling safety, skirting regular ports of entry. Most asylum seekers must resort to whatever means necessary to escape persecution and will go to the first “safe” third country inside of the European Union. Once they reach places like Spain, Italy, or Greece, policies such as the Dublin Regulation require that they apply for asylum upon arrival – stuck in the first safe country they could reach while fleeing.

Superficially, the Dublin Regulation pretends to be logical for asylum applicants. Someone flees her country for valid reasons, arrives in a safe country, and has no right to continue to any other member of the EU. Further inspection shows that requiring asylum seekers apply in the first safe country they arrive in reflects a cruel and willful misunderstanding of the forces that push the beleaguered from their homes and pull them to the possibility of a better life. This framework overlooks the disproportionate burden it places upon neighbors of conflict countries that have little to no influence over the forces pushing asylum seekers to their shores, suffering only from unlucky geography to sit near ailing states. In Europe, the Mediterranean nations bear the brunt of migration by virtue of their status as EU border states. Asylum seekers may not have any inclination to resettle in these countries, they may have skills, interests, or connections better suited to elsewhere; but the current regulation forces them to do so anyway solely because they present the nearest available option in a crisis.

A more rational and humane approach to the refugee resettlement and asylum process would benefit both asylum-seekers and their new hosts.

Consider an alternative where the right of center politicians that typically demagogue asylum seekers and border security instead embraced the role of the invisible hand in redistributing asylum seekers among the countries that most need them. Where the basic rules of supply and demand determine final locations, yielding superior outcomes for both asylum seekers and countries who plan to host them. Consider an EU with a new protocol that provides a grace period once asylum seekers enter the Schengen Zone, reducing the bottlenecks on the outlying countries and ensuring this new source of labor reaches the area of greatest opportunity and fit.

Germany alone faces an $85 billion annual economic loss from labor shortages. Many countries in Northern and Western Europe, like The Netherlands, Austria, and Denmark, face impending labor shortages of their own due to aging populations, not to mention pension and revenue overhangs. Refugees seeking a new life without fear of war or persecution will naturally seek the greatest safety and economic opportunity. While many critics in these countries claim that their ample public services cannot handle the new strain of all these asylum seekers, research shows that refugees actually use fewer health services than native citizens, and, more importantly, many of these countries face insolvent social services without an influx of new labor. A decreasing and aging tax base creates a looming future where tax revenue falls far short of outstanding obligations. Asylum seekers may be the only hope for future solvency. Under Chancellor Angela Merkel, Germany attempted to integrate over 1 million refugees. The German economy benefitted enormously and with 80% of young people reporting that they felt integrated into German society, despite fears stoked by the far-right Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party.

Opponents to a freedom of movement-based asylum system frequently say that allowing applicants to choose the application location will allow countries to race to the bottom in terms of incoming services, and many in Europe would say that the status quo allows for orderly processing. Anti-refugee activists also claim that they have no problem with upholding the basic human right of non-refoulment (the act of not pushing back an asylum seeker after she has arrived in a country,) if they enter the “right” way. But the “right” way involves applying through a potentially shuttered embassy, review backlogs, or pandemic slowdowns – slow processes and careful planning often not afforded to asylum seekers. If managed correctly, continued freedom of movement inside the EU would allow countries to resettle asylum seekers based on labor needs and continually rebalance incentives for sustainable economic growth rather than overwhelming the infrastructure in the border regions and turning local populations against migrants.

Admittedly, this model privileges economic imperatives while casting aside moral and legal obligations enshrined in international law, but the Dublin Convention already allows states to abdicate their moral responsibility. Regardless of the economic benefits, the EU long ago committed to resettling asylum seekers. Reactionary policymakers already insist they only want to ensure security, often tying increased funding for asylum seekers to increased border security, yet somehow the resettlement funds frequently fall by the wayside in the final budgets. The economic growth unleashed by these reforms should make the obligation more palatable to skeptics, if not downright celebrated.

The last decade under the Dublin Regulation has shown that the policy itself has failed to serve either the host nations of the EU or, more importantly, refugees fleeing to safety. EU policymakers must allow and encourage refugees to travel to the area of greatest opportunity before submitting the asylum applications. They will then land where the local economy most needs them, thriving as well as giving back to their new home. Existing policy creates bottlenecks based on geographic boundaries and limits the potential long-term outcomes for both the asylum seekers and their new homes. The only option available to asylum seekers fleeing for their lives cannot simply be the geographically nearest.