Contesting the Dublin Regulation: Refugees’ and Migrants’ Claims to Personhood and Rights in Germany

Abstract

This study demonstrates how an EU law, Dublin 111, affects a heterogeneous group of refugees and migrants in Germany who first enter the EU through States such as Italy, Spain, or Hungary. The Dublin regulation allows refugees (with the exception of refugees from Syria) solely to make asylum-claims in the EU country through which they first enter and where they are initially fingerprinted. Therefore, if authorities find asylum-seekers' fingerprints in the database and can thus confirm that they have been in another EU Member State, then according to the Dublin regulation, they can be deported to the first country. The study illustrates the ways in which many refugees and migrants in Germany negotiate the Dublin law in differentiated ways, which subsequently enables them to claim their rights to personhood and dignity. More specifically, this study interrogates how some refugees are affected by the Dublin legislation and how they negotiate this law. This group of refugees have varied status in Germanysome have claimed asylum, some fear imminent deportations, others have not claimed asylum within Germany, while there are others who are in the process of 'getting out of Dublin'. The study explores how these refugees with differing positions, status, and background negotiate their stay and personhood in Germany.

Supporting Searchers’ Desire for Emplacement in Berlin: Informal Practices in Defiance of an (Im)mobility Regime

“…Many refugees are threatened by deportation, since the Dublin agreement (first signed in 1990) states that people have to apply for asylum in the first EU member state they reach (Bhimji 2016). People in such situations try to not be visible to state institutions, and therefore they become dependent on informal housing and work possibilities, as the formal housing and working opportunities are always connected to making their own place of residence known to the state.…”

Migrants in the Mountains: Shifting Borders and Contested Crisis Experiences in Rural Germany

“…As thousands of people – stranded at Budapest’s train station and mistreated by police – marched towards the Austrian border on a Hungarian motorway, the Chancellors of Germany and Austria, Angela Merkel and Werner Fayman, allowed them to enter their two countries to apply for protection. The migration pressure on Greece and Hungary led to a partial suspension of the EU’s ordinary Dublin procedure, according to which the EU member state in which an asylum seeker first arrives is responsible for registration and the application process (Bhimji, 2016). Now, countries without external EU borders – mainly Germany, Sweden and Austria – admitted asylum seekers that had crossed other EU states.…”