Relocation as a solution to the EU migration crisis

1 Relocation as a Solution to the EU Migration Crisis Abstract Asylum law has traditionally been perceived as a sensitive area of state policy. For this very reason, for a long time, it was mostly excluded from the process of European integration. However, the development of the internal market and the removal of internal borders have ultimately necessitated some degree of harmonisation of asylum and migration policies amongst the Member States. Consequently, there have been several major increases in EU competence in the field of asylum and migration since the 1990s. This has eventually led to the creation of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS). Yet, a prolonged lack of political will to introduce a major reform of the CEAS and to duly implement the principle of solidarity has over the years resulted in serious systemic deficiencies. These defects, in particular the uneven distribution of responsibility between the Member States, have fully shown during the EU migration crisis. This far-reaching crisis has translated into several ad hoc solutions, including the use of an emergency EU competence to adopt temporary measures under Art. 78(3) SFEU (ex Art. 64(2) TEC), which had not been used until then. The adoption of two Council relocation decisions in September 2015 has raised numerous legal questions...