Legal Framework for EU Immigration Policy

Abstract

The fundamentally revised and extended second edition of the ‘Commentary on EU Immigration and Asylum Law’ comprises four thematic introductions, which are written in the style of an advanced textbook and which are meant to help practitioners, doctoral students and academics who are not familiar with immigration and asylum law to orientate themselves in a highly complex and politically sensitive area of the law. The introduction into the ‘Legal Framework for EU Immigration Policy’ starts with general remarks on the evolution of immigration policy and the opt-outs for the UK, Ireland and Denmark. It continues with one of the most detailed and reliable analyses of the scope of Union competences under Article 79 TFEU, whose provisions serve as the legal bases for supranational legislation on immigration. On this basis, readers are introduced with overarching principles and objectives for lawmaking, including non-discrimination guarantees, abuse, the concept of migrant integration and the constitutional distinction between the free movement rights of Union citizens and the distinct guarantees for third-country nationals. The contribution concludes with a description of the international legal framework with an emphasis on the protection of private and family life under Article 8 ECHR and the significance of bi- and multilateral agreements for EU immigration policy.