Equal Yet Inequitable: EU’s Relocation System of Shared Responsibility

... In opposing the EU mandatory quota system, Eastern Europe was criticized for failing to deal with the refugee crisis and was accused of avoiding responsibility for refugees' relocation (Bejan, 2016). Western Europe succumbed to clichés that branded the eastern post-socialist countries as racist and xenophobic (Bejan, 2017b), even if no empirical research sustains the hypothesis that the East is more culturally intolerant than the West. Little consideration was given to the factors that might contribute to reservations, such as the structural differences within the EU and the unequal decision-making power among member states. ...

... Recent papers, however, have argued against the equal distribution of such quotas. In proposing the concept of differing egalitarianism to account for the economic, social, cultural, and political differences among member states, Bejan (2016;2017b; recommended additional measures for determining the economic performance of a state, including the Genuine Progress Indicator, the Genuine Savings Indicator, and the GDP Purchasing Power Parity. This would adjust the economic measures to have greater weight for wealthier states and lower weight for economically disadvantaged states. ...

... This would adjust the economic measures to have greater weight for wealthier states and lower weight for economically disadvantaged states. Bejan (2017b; additionally proposed replacing the incentive indicator with socio-political measures, such as national integration schemes, political economy regimes, and the willingness of member states to host refugees. ...

... The idea was to harmonize a policy of commonly sharing responsibility for processing asylum applications and protecting refugees in accordance with states' capacity of absorbing people (Bovens, Chatkupt & Smead, 2011). Most ideas proposed the development of a system of mathematically equalizing the capacity to absorb and distribute asylum seekers in-between EU states (Bejan, 2017c;Bejan, 2016). Mathias Czaika (2005) recommended the development of a refugee burden index that equally weighs indicators reflective of economic, socio-demographic and sociopolitical dimensions: GDP per capita for economic capacity, population density for demographics, ethnic composition/ fractionalisation for socio-political acceptance and efficiency of governmental institutions for politico-institutional performance. ...

... Less consideration, however, was paid to the structural, unequitable differences existent within the Union and to the already structured socio-political referential frames inherited from differentially structured state-positionalities. Assuming that the Eastern States regard themselves as unequal decision-making players at the EU table, they might show reluctance in equally sharing responsibility for relocation (Bejan, 2017c). Assuming that the Northern states would constitute the primary option for asylum seekers if their preferences were considered, the relocation scheme could tacitly disburden many of the wealthier, Northern countries. ...

... What the EU deems equal, equitable, and overall fair for all, does not practically translate into equal, equitable and fair for all. Building on previous work, which reasoned that ambiguous definitions of equality induce unclear interpretations of responsibility-sharing efforts (Bejan, 2016;Bejan, 2017a;Bejan, 2017c), this paper proceeds by discussing considerations of the idea of solidarity in relation to understandings of shared responsibility. 4 Examples of procedural issues brought into discussion by Hungary and Slovakia included the two-years frame as elongating provisional understandings of time; the absence of an unanimity vote on the decisions; the legislative inadequacy of Article 78(3) of the TFEU in empowering the Council to adopt the decisions; the lack of national parliamentary veto on the matter; or the foreseeable influx of irregular entries within the front-line states (Bejan, 2017a). ...