EU effects on migration policy

The 2015 refugee crisis clearly highlighted that the European asylum system is flawed and triggered a heated discussion on the functioning and appropriateness of the Dublin Regulation. The present research tries to account for differences in the implementation of the Dublin regime from its coming into force in 1997 until today, by testing the three possibly influencing factors 'misfit', administrative capacity and overall situation for Germany, Hungary and Italy. The comparative case study first ascertains that Germany implements the obligations to a medium to high degree, while Hungary presents a low and Italy a medium-low implementation record. The analysis of the single variables shows that the higher the compatibility between the national and the European asylum system at the moment of adhering to the Dublin system, the more diligently a country implements it. While no clear claims can be made if and how the administrative capacity of a state affects implementation, the economic situation does have an impact in the sense that a stronger overall state of the economy appears to have positive effects on implementation. The research is part of the general research framework of Europeanization and contributes to the scholarship on implementation. By shedding light on the factors leading to..