The European Union’s Response to the Refugee Movements from Ukraine: The End of the Solidarity Crisis?

This article explores whether triggering the ‘Temporary Protection’ Directive (TPD) to deal with the refugee movements from Ukraine has heralded the end of the solidarity crisis in the European Union’s asylum policy. It makes two major contributions to the literature: first, it shows how the mode of responsibility allocation in the Common European Asylum System by a costs-by-cause principle violates the EU’s solidarity principle, creating a continuous solidarity crisis that was exacerbated after the refugee influx of 2015/2016. Second, it demonstrates how, by invoking the TPD, the EU exhibits continuity in both eroding asylum cooperation and putting increasing emphasis on border controls focusing primarily on the externalisation and deflection of unwanted migration. The EU evades the dysfunctionalities in its asylum system by employing the temporary protection scheme, continuing a policy approach of more national discretion in terms of refugee protection while, at the same time, Member States’ policy preferences vis-à-vis non-Ukrainian protection-seekers have not changed. Taking into account the disproportionate distribution of responsibilities it has created among the Member States, the TPD decision has not ended the solidarity crisis in Europe’s asylum policy.