Fair Share: Modifications to the European Union’s Refugee Policies
In an interview with CNN, Professor Alexander Betts of Oxford University’s world-renowned Refugee Studies Centre stated that “refugees and displacement will be one of the defining issues of the 21st century.” He urged that the refugee crisis was a global challenge that required globally-minded policy and a new deal on responsibility sharing within Europe: “What we need is collective action.”
This was in 2015.
Now, eight years later, the refugee crisis – and the global response to the situation – have not improved. Between 2015 and 2021, the European Union received asylum applications from over 5 million non-EU individuals fleeing war, poverty, and other conflicts. With the emergence of the war between Russia and Ukraine, another 4.4 million displaced Ukrainians have entered Europe. Reactive policies presented by the European Union in response to this ongoing war – granting automatic residency, visas, and priority for housing to Ukrainians – have exposed an underlying prejudice in the refugee system that supposedly did not have the resources to provide for refugees from Africa and the Middle East.
A handful of countries – particularly Turkey, Germany, and Greece – are managing the brunt of the crisis, facing increasing pressures from the steady stream of refugees coming into their countries. Many other European countries are denying their responsibility to accept and protect these refugees. These countries must be held accountable and do their fair share to assuage the crisis.
Since the international community essentially operates under a system of anarchy – meaning without an overarching authority to enforce behavior – mandates would be difficult to implement effectively. We propose that an inducement be administered to encourage European countries to comply with reviewed standards, such as a refundable tax based on a threshold of refugees that needs to be welcomed in proportion to the country’s population.
Title: I really like your title, although you can probably make it more concise or more interesting to read? I do really like how to-the-point it is though.
Exigence/Thesis: I really like your intro body, especially since it connects many countries together. The data and dates also certainly make things feel more urgent and important. However, I would caution you about tackling a large body such as all of Europe over just focusing on only one, just because it would make your policy much more broad and encompassing. Also, who do you plan to have this targeted towards? The EU? The UN? I think you can probably add something about who you intent this to be for.
Hi Emmaunel!
1. I think your title works well and is reflective of the paper/thesis! I like how the first part is broad and then the second part focuses on the specifics of your paper.
2. I defiantly feel that the title and introduction responds to the issue and illustrated how important and pressing the issue is. To back up the evidence, I would add a direct quote from someone to tie it together and add an element of authority on the issue.
3. Yes the introduction sets up a clear claim and specifies what a solution could be. Your solution seems like it has multiple factors, so I would just make sure to specify them in the following paragraphs.
1.) I am a big fan of the title. I think it does a really good job of serving as an effective one phrase synopsis of your work and prepares readers for what exactly you are going to speak about. No suggestions.
2.) You identify very effectively how the refugee crisis can be seen as inequitable to certain parties. As you did within your Civic Issues Blog, I really like how you expose the prejudices faced against African and Middle East refugees who are currently not enjoying the same benefits as Ukrainian ones. That example certainly opens my eyes and gives me a new perspective regarding the inequitable and unfair nature of this situation. Also, providing statistics as you did reinforces the severity of the problem and I would recommend that you quantify some of the examples you cite as you continue your work. For most people, associating a number to a problem (for example stating how many immigrants are currently trying to infiltrate Turkey, Germany, and Greece) is something really helpful and establishes ethos to your argument.
3.) I like how you clearly identify that you will be recommending an inducement for nations willing to accept more refugees and also the way this will be achieved. Spelling out the system in which you would do this, through the refundable tax based on the threshold equation you provided, is very clear and a perfect aspect of your thesis. Good work.