The Development Of European Asylum And Refugee Policies

Since the early 1990 s,the steady influx of asylum-seekers to Western European countries has led to increasing coordination and cooperation among EU member states on refugee policy.As the process of European integration deepened,it became clear that cooperation between member states in this area was moving from purely intergovernmental cooperation to a common refugee policy at EU level.By the time the Amsterdam Treaty,which entered into force in 1999,transferred asylum and migration policy to the first pillar,migration and asylum policy gradually became one of the core areas of the integration enterprise.Since 2015,however,the influx of refugees from the Middle East and North Africa into Europe as a result of the war,the refugee crisis has directly linked the already fragile refugee asylum policy to the geopolitical situation around the EU on the one hand,and to the issue of identity and solidarity within the EU on the other.The outbreak of the new epidemic has added to the complexity and specificity of the refugee crisis,and the formation and operation of the EU’s refugee policy has been criticized by all countries for its complexity and rapid changes.Whether we can overcome the difficult situation,reach a common solution and repair the partially dysfunctional asylum system is testing the internal solidarity and decision-making mechanisms of Europe.