European liberal policies towards Syrian refugees: providing dignity as well as security?

One of the world’s most chaotic and devastating civil war has been sustained since March 2011 in Syria. This Syrian Crisis has transformed much more complex, unpredictable and atrocity in this region than the guess of the states. Different conflicting actors, intervening states (and also their different interest/motivations) and also unprepared international society led to dead end or cul-de-sac for this sudden crisis. At the same time, Syrian refugee crisis appeared for neighbor and European states on the agenda. None of these states had prepared for this kind of migration and number of community. 1951 Geneva Refugee Convention is the main legal document that is relating to define refugee, their rights and obligations of states. Nonetheless, some of exceptional clauses (geographical exception clause of the Turkey), some of European states domestic policies and their domestic policy pressures and Civil War which became more desperate view in the time; these conditions force to the international society and the states to create new process and legal structure for this crisis. EU – Turkey refugee deal and agreement can be eventual consequence in this process. In fact, it is continuing process. As well as, is this process legalized enough yet? In other words, how much is it legalized or which is stage in this process? All of these questions are still waiting to be answered. Some summits, official and unofficial meetings and works for drafting have already been made since the beginning period of the crisis but these attempts and initiatives are seem to be questionable for the effectiveness. Could these developments be creating fragmentation in international law?

As a research field, European foreign policy (EFP) is defined as the study of how certain European states manage their foreign policy responsibilities, whether individually, through coordinated national foreign policies, or through EU policies and institutions. EFP effectively comprises at least three major research fields: traditional foreign policy analysis (FPA) or comparative foreign policy (CFP); theories of international relations (IR) or international cooperation; and the study of European integration. The critical link between these fields involves the growing role of the EU as a major reference point for “Europe,” so much so that it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish EU foreign policy from European foreign policy. There are two major phases in the emergence of EFP as a research field: the first recognition of European foreign policy cooperation and some very limited conceptual innovation; and the period surrounding the advent of the Single European Act, which placed European foreign policy cooperation on a new institutional path that resulted in the reforms under the Treaty on European Union. The study of EFP expanded considerably following the negotiation of the Maastricht Treaty on European Union (TEU) of 1991. Several major empirical themes within these periods, which has persisted to the present-day EFP research agenda, include the status of EFP political influence relative to other global actors, particularly the US; a seeming disconnect between EFP procedures and substance; tensions between the economic/trade and political/security dimensions of EFP; and the relative inputs of European states versus EU institutional actors, particularly the European Commission.

Overt and Covert: Institutionalization in Europe

One of the significant competences of the European Court of Justice is to issue a preliminary ruling on an issue which has been referred to this Court by the national courts of the EU Member States. In this procedure, the national courts are provided the necessary explanation on the applicable EU law, either through by interpreting some legal provisions or by assessing the validity of a legal act adopted by the EU institutions. The preliminary ruling of the Court of Justice is binding for the national court which referred the issue to the Court. The decision is also binding for all national courts which have jurisdiction to decide on legal remedies in this matter. On the other hand, the effect of the preliminary ruling on other national courts is not quite clear. In other words, there is a dilemma as to whether the preliminary ruling on a disputed issue posed in one proceeding is binding for all other courts, which have not been actually involved in this particular proceeding. As for the temporal effect of a preliminary ruling, there is a general rule that the Court's preliminary ruling has a retroactive effect. However, in some situation, the Court of Justice may limit the retroactive effect of its rulings if their ex tunc application is incompatible with the principle of legal certainty.

This study examines how the contemporary European policy debate addresses the further development of the quality of teacher educators. A classification framework based on the literature on professionalism was used to compare European and Member State policy actions and measures on the quality of teacher educators through an analysis of seven European policy documents and a questionnaire completed by key policy-makers in 16 European countries. The findings show that European Union policy documents pay limited attention to the quality of teacher educators. However, the professionalism of teacher educators receives more policy attention at the level of individual Member States. Most of these policies are part of general policies for higher education teachers, while the initiative lies with governments and teacher education institutes. The role of the professionals themselves in developing policies to strengthen their professionalism seems very limited.

Perceiving the 'refugee crisis' as a construct shaped, among others, by contemporary political cartooning, we examine how cartoonists have represented European attitudes towards refugees by focusing on the metaphorical representation of 'Europe' and the 'refugee.' Specifically, we identify the conceptual metaphors used to depict Europe and refugees, and how political cartoons framed the 'refugee crisis by applying Conceptual Metaphor Theory – CMT (cf. Lakoff and Johnson 1980) – and Critical Metaphor Analysis – CMA (cf. Charteris-Black 2004, Musolff 2012). Our analysis reveals that cartoonists re-frame the migration phenomenon according to the emphasis they put on: (a) Europe's role in the Syrian conflict; (b) Europe's policies concerning the reception of refugees in Europe; (c) the implications of Europe's policies for refugees; (d) implications of receiving refugees for Europe; and (e) refugees' expectations from Europe. Political cartoons thus serve as "perspectivisation devices" (Silaški 2012:216) that construct the 'refugee crisis' as 'the Syrian refugee crisis,' a 'humanitarian crisis,' a 'crisis of European governance,' and a 'European identity crisis,' reproducing dominant narratives around migration.

To the delight of Westphalian international law pluralists, recent decisions by national and regional courts have sharply challenged the authority of international organizations and tribunals. The U.S. Supreme Court, in Medellín (2008), rejected the power of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to stick its own provisional measures in the wheels of Texan criminal justice. In the famous Kadi case (2008), the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) challenged the applicability of Security Council anti-terrorism sanctions for their violation of European fundamental administrative justice rights. More recently (2014), the Italian Constitutional Court rejected the ICJ’s decision requiring Italy to respect the international customary law protection of Germany’s sovereign immunity from civil claims brought in Italian courts. Such national disobedience poses a challenge to the international constitutionalist ideal, by which state compliance with international law is assumed to promote human rights and the rule of law. But not all expressions of national disobedience to international law are homologous, and this paper will defend a kind of limited, “civil” disobedience to international law, where national fundamental rights, ultimately international in character, are at stake.

INTRODUCTION As Europe moves in the direction of absolute abolitionism, it is easy to miss the fact that these developments are fraught with tensions. The European policy on the abolition of the death penalty has come to be presented, above all, as a human rights issue. The drafting of the European Convention on Human Rights, key judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, and initiatives of the Council of Europe contribute to this policy. In 1989, this European policy was reinvigorated with the prospect of European enlargement and new members to the Council of Europe. Comprising key mechanisms to facilitate implementation, the policy reflects a uniform approach to the death penalty, one that is particularly European. ‘New’ European states, although pleased to be back in the fold of Europe, have expressed problems with this policy, and some proactively support a pro-death penalty stance that is largely ignored by the Council of Europe and European Union (EU) member states. This chapter critically examines these European transformations. It is organized in the following way. The chapter first sets out European policy on the abolition of the death penalty, providing a general survey of its mechanisms and procedures. Western European states have traditionally been afforded a margin of appreciation on certain human rights issues. This also applied to the imposition of the capital sentence. The position on the death penalty has reflected a certain unity on the matter.

This article is devoted to finding the term that would be optimal for naming the procedural part of the European Union's policy in the field of the fight against criminality. The terms «EU policy in the field of the fight against criminality», «EU criminal policy», «EU law enforcement policy» are used to refer to a separate type of European Union policy. Adhering to the position of giving preference to the use of the term «policy in the field of the fight against criminality», it is seen that such a construction can be applied in the context of the European Union and, as we see, is in demand. However, it should be recognized that a significant number of European scholars use the term «criminal policy of the European Union». Thus, it is proposed to use the term «European Union policy in the field of the fight against criminality» as a generalized concept that better reflects its non-level, but namely complex structure and relatively independent but interconnected basic elements, parts, first of all, EU criminal policy and EU criminal procedure policy. Of course, we can talk about other parts of the European Union's policy in the field of the fight against criminality, in particular, criminology, but the primary interest in the study is its procedural component. There are various terminologies in the literature that define it. For example, the following options can be identified: 1) «EU policy in the field of judicial and law enforcement cooperation»; 2) «European Union Justice and Home Affairs Policy». The term «EU policy in the field of justitia and home affairs», which is as close as possible to the latter wording and also used; 3) «European Union policy on criminal procedure»; 4) «European justice policy». The most common term is «procedure». For example, «criminal procedure policy of the EU» and its interpretation. The words «procedure» and «process» are synonymous words. Accordingly, to denote the procedural part of the European Union's policy in the field of the fight against criminality, it is acceptable to use the term «criminal procedural policy of the European Union» as the optimal.

In recent years, the fields of political economy and economic sociology have seen the emergence of research focussed on the ‘political work’ of industries: industrial products can embed domestic policies and feelings of national belonging. This article analyses the way in which space industries materialise national expression among European states as examples of the tensions between Europeanisation and nationalism. Three roles that are endorsed by space industries are discussed. First, space industries act as a support to an idealtype of Europe, shared by the two institutional frames of European space policy: the European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Union (EU). Second, while the ESA and the EU maintain relationships characterised alternately by independency, division of labour, or competition, this bicephalic framework leads to the deployment of a European claim to sovereignty and autonomy on the international stage. Third, space industries affiliated with an ESA member state can also be turned into instruments of national leadership at the expense of European unity. While space industries remain overlooked in the literature on European policies, emphasising industries illustrates that ‘unity in diversity’, claimed in the will of Europeanisation by European institutions, reinvents itself through an industrial sector where nationalist strategies remain strong.

Syria: the neglected health crisis deepens

Looking Up, Down and Across: The ICTY's Place in the International Legal Order

In this Issue

To carry out Chinese investments in third countries under the Belt and Road Initiative, the China is currently concluding numerous cooperation agreements called Memorandums of Understanding with its objective States, including European Union Member States. These Memorandums of Understanding are international agreements, but not international treaties as such, which implies that these documents may not lead to rights and obligations under International Law. However, every Memorandum of Understanding signed between China and a European Member States should be interpreted in accordance with European Law. The problem is that Member States are presumably violating different instruments of this legal framework as well as the European Union Common Commercial Policy, which is an exclusive competence of this international organization, if we interpret that these cooperation agreements are masking free trade agreements. This paper aims to analyse this possible interpretation and its consequences for the European Union, as these agreements entail a weakening of the European trade and investment power and put the European Common Commercial Policy at crossroads.
 Received: 10 May 2021Accepted: 05 November 2021

The Syrian crisis is the most complex crisis (political, social, humanitarian, security) in the world, since World War II. In regards to the 1951 „Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees”, states have an obligation to provide refugees with a form of primary protection, which is not intended to replace asylum, but rather to provide an intermediate and immediate protection measure. At European level, for asylum seekers and refugees, there are several programs (developed by international institutions such as "UN for refugees" and "UNHCR") for integration into the host country during the temporary stay and return to the country of origin, when there are safety conditions. If this solution is not viable, they can opt for relocation to a third country. Effective management of the crisis created by the refugees flow requires the adoption of a common political agenda for European states to eliminate inequalities between states and focus on building viable economic strategies. Therefore, it is necessary to develop policies or strategies designed to provide refugees with a sense of security in the host country and their social assimilation, without being forced to give up their cultural identities. This article aims to analyse the strategies of the European states involved in this phenomenon, applied in the "Syrian refugee crisis". At the moment, the biggest part of the effort of counter-terrorism is focused on the criminal justice system. This means focusing almost exclusively on those who already intend to commit a crime and not on prevention. The legal repercussions can further encourage radicalization, which can degenerate later.