14 November 2023
Offshoring Asylum the Italian Way
On 6 November 2023, the Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and the Prime Minister of Albania Edi Rama announced the signing of the Agreement for Strengthening of Collaboration in the Field of Migration. The agreement proposes a relocation of asylum seekers who are rescued at sea by Italian vessels to two centres that would be built in Albania and could host up to 3’000 people. This is part of a broader trend whereby European governments seek to move asylum procedures outside of their territory. At the same time, the agreement contains some innovations compared to previous proposals. Indeed, this move has been hailed as a “model and example for other collaboration agreements of this kind” by the Italian Prime Minister. This article contends that this is unlikely to be the case: the legality and feasibility of offshoring asylum procedures remain dubious at best. Continue reading >>
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24 January 2020
Mean cities: the dark side of urban citizenship
Stadtluft macht frei, or city air makes you free, was a proverb in the Middle Ages. It referred to a legal principle according to which runaway serfs were to become free after living one year in a city. Today, many scholars suggest that urban citizenship still has powerful emancipatory effects. Continue reading >>
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