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Will Kymlicka's new book focuses on the global and regional diffusion of liberal multiculturalism, a concept that he has defended as an ideal in his earlier work. In his view, culture is a primary ...

At the 1999 Tampere summit, EU member states committed themselves to developing a comprehensive immigration and asylum policy. Although directives harmonizing border controls or anti-discrimination instruments have been adopted, it remains an incomplete and complex European policy area. This article seeks to explain the timing, form and content of this new domain. It combines the insights of March and Olsen's "garbage can' model with a sociological approach that emphasizes power competition among actors in the same field. Diverse actors have seized upon EU opportunities. Law and order officials in charge of migration control seeking to gain autonomy in intergovernmental settings linked their action to the single market and transnational crime. NGOs providing expertise to Commission units seeking competence in non-economic areas jumped on the "social exclusion' bandwagon by proposing anti-discrimination legislation. These developments - superimposed on policies regarding free movement of workers and servic...

This article examines the texts and jurisprudence of European institutions such as the Council of Europe and the European Union regarding foreigners (third country nationals in the case of the EU) and their incorporation by courts and administrations in France, Germany, and the Netherlands. The evidence suggests that both the European Court of Human Rights and the European Court of Justice had a limited legal basis and unclear competence to rule in the area of foreigners’ rights. Notwithstanding, when they did, their rulings were partially taken into account. This required a number of conditions such as a positive attitude towards international law and a litigation strategy on the part of migrant aid groups.