Unblocking the Lifeline of Talent. CEPS Policy Brief No. 306, 6 December 2013

Against the background of looming demographic decline, the departure of the baby-boom generation from European labour markets and growing economic competitiveness from emerging economies, this CEPS Policy Brief, published jointly with the Bertelsmann Stiftung, looks into the potential benefits of increased intra-EU labour mobility. The authors examine the ‘German case’ on EU labour mobility, digging below the surface of the aggregate data. They offer proposals on how to foster a European fair deal on talent, one that would benefit the EU as a whole. The paper concludes with policy recommendations on how to increase the potential benefits of the freedom of movement for both individual EU citizens and for the EU as a whole.

Stigmatisation of EU mobile citizens: a ticking time bomb for the European project. EPC Commentary, 24 January 2014

The 2013 European Year of Citizens was profoundly marked by escalating attacks against one of the EU’s major achievement for EU citizens: freedom of movement. In April 2013, Home Affairs Ministers from Austria, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK were party to a letter claiming that “a significant number of new immigrants draw social assistance in the host countries, frequently without genuine entitlement, burdening host societies’ social welfare systems”. This letter laid the groundwork for a “battle plan”, presented by David Cameron in November, which aimed to make the free movement of persons “less free” and put forward the idea of capping “EU migration”. Furthermore, in December, the German conservative Christian Social Union (CSU) took up a similar petty political discourse. After the end of the transitional period for Romania and Bulgaria on 1 January 2014, the debate continues with Chuka Umunna (British Labour Party) proposing to restrict the freedom of movement to highly skilled EU citizens and to citizens in possession of a firm job offer. Alongside this, the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel announced the formation of a committee to investigate “poverty migration” in Germany. This wave of resentment has been more recently followed by the UK Prime Minister David Cameron, expressing his intention to re-negotiate EU law in order to be able to withdraw child benefits from EU citizens working in the UK, citing Polish citizens working in the UK as an example. Seeing this as a stigmatisation of the Polish population, the Polish foreign minister, Radosław Sikorski, qualified Cameron’s discourse as “unacceptable”. The debate over limiting freedom of movement has continuously escalated and reached a worrying level. With the EP elections approaching in May 2014, this debate is likely to become worse.

Citizenship in post-awakening Tunisia: power shifts and conflicting perceptions

With the passing of its new Constitution, Tunisia is rightly celebrated as the Arab state that has advanced the most in strengthening democratic rights provisions. The Constitution formally enshrines the progress Tunisia has made especially on women’s rights; the rights of expression and assembly; freedom of the press; the rights of political parties; and the formal recognition of social and economic rights. However, the Constitution does not definitively resolve tensions between individual and religious rights. In order to maintain consensus between the differing opinions in Tunisia, the document remains ambivalent on the state’s precise role in protecting the ‘sacred’. Tunisia has made much progress, but the Constitution is likely to perpetuate rather than close debates over different concepts of rights.

Internet “Freedom” in Turkey. EPC Commentary, 2 March 2015

From the Introduction. Fundamental rights and freedoms in Turkey have been in decline for the last few years, including internet freedom, with Turkey hardly meeting the EU’s Human Rights Guidelines on Freedom of Expression.

No Move without Free Movement: The EU-Swiss controversy over quotas for free movement of persons. CEPS Policy Brief No. 331, 23 April 2015

The focus of this Policy Brief is the Swiss referendum of 2014 against ‘mass immigration’ in Switzerland. It identifies the challenges that a quota on EU citizens’ free movement rights to Switzerland would pose to EU-Swiss relations, considering: i) the value of freedom of movement in the EU and its indivisibility from the internal market and other economic freedoms; ii) the specificity of the EU legal system following the Lisbon Treaty that established democratic and judicial accountability mechanisms; iii) the lack of supranational judicial oversight of the EU-Switzerland agreements framework; and iv) the existence of the so-called guillotine mechanism, according to which the termination of the Free Movement Agreement would entail the automatic termination of the other agreements with the EU. The authors set out a number of options and consider their implications for EU-Swiss relations.

Citizenship in the discourse of Egyptian political parties. EUSpring Working Paper No. 6, June 2015 [also Citizenship Report no. 3]

The concept of citizenship is one of the most complicated in political and social sciences. Its long process of historical development makes dealing with it particularly complicated. Citizenship is by nature a multi-dimensional concept: there is a legal citizenship, referring first to the equal legal status of individuals, for instance the equality between men and women. Legal citizenship also refers to a political dimension, the right to start and/or join political parties, or political participation more broadly. Thirdly, it has a religious dimension relating to the right of all religious groups to equally and freely practice their religious customs and rituals. Finally, legal citizenship possesses a socio-economic dimension related to the non-marginalisation of different social categories, for instance women. All of these dimensions, far from being purely objects of legal texts and codifications, are emerging as an arena of political struggle within the Egyptian society. Citizenship as a concept has its roots in European history and, more specifically, the emergence of the nation state in Europe and the ensuing economic and social developments in these societies. These social developments and the rise of the nation state have worked in parallel, fostering the notion of an individual citizen bestowed with rights and obligations. This gradual interaction was very different from what happened in the context of the Arab world. The emerging of the nation state in Egypt was an outcome of modernisation efforts from the top-down; it coercively redesigned the social structure, by eliminating or weakening some social classes in favour of others. These efforts have had an impact on the state-society relation at least in two respects. First, on the overlapping relation between some social classes and the state, and second, on the ability of some social groups to self-organise, define and raise their demands. This study identifies how different political parties in Egypt envision the multi-dimensional concept of citizenship. We focus on the following elements: Nature of the state (identity, nature of the regime) Liberties and rights (election laws, political party laws, etc.) Right to gather and organise (syndicates, associations, etc.) Freedom of expression and speech (right to protest, sit in, strike, etc.) Public and individual liberties (freedom of belief, personal issues, etc.) Rights of marginalised groups (women, minorities, etc.)

Did Egypt's Parliamentary Election just trump citizens’ rights? Arab Citizenship Review No. 12, 19 November 2015

Since the Muslim Brotherhood rule was toppled in July 2013, the regime of President Abd al-Fattah al-Sisi has strived to consolidate his one-man rule; he painted the political opposition and civil society as traitors and foreign agents and exploited the fight against terrorism to suppress freedom of expression, justify a crackdown on the press, eclipse justice in courtrooms, throw thousands in prison, and tighten his grip on police forces. The regime has postponed parliamentary elections for some time, while it marginalised and weakened the non-Islamist political parties that helped Sisi take power. He did so by promoting electoral lists with candidates who are loyal to the president, to ensure control over the new assembly and by obstructing any political alliance that could form an opposition. At the same time, the security apparatus has been given free rein to control the public sphere and engineer the electoral process. This may ultimately lead to a parliament that includes no advocates for rights and liberties, which is particularly significant since the incoming assembly will review the huge amount of legislation that President Sisi has issued in the absence of a parliament. In addition, shortly before elections, President Sisi raised questions about the constitution, calling for it to be amended to reduce the powers of the parliament and increase those of the president. It is thus clear that Sisi seeks not only to consolidate his regime, without political opposition, but to free his rule of any effective oversight from society or parliament.

On the Road to Democracy? Political Liberalization in Myanmar. Asia Policy Brief 2014/01, January 2014

Myanmar’s liberalizing reforms initiated by President Thein Sein after taking office in March 2011 are raising high hopes of peace and democracy in the country. Progress, after nearly three years, has however been uneven: there have been positive developments in the area of press freedom, with regard to political prisoners and in dealing with the political opposition. At the same time the dialogue with ethnic groups has stagnated and ethnic and religious violence has escalated. This Asia Policy Brief critically assesses the reform policy and weighs up the chances of democratization of the long-time military regime.

spotlight europe #2012/04, June 2012: Can mobility offset unemployment?

Almost a quarter of the young people in the EU are unemployed. And once again it is the crisis-ridden states that have been hit hardest. But in other countries such as France, Sweden, and Luxembourg, younger members of the workforce, far more than their older counterparts, are also finding it difficult to get a job. Freedom of movement within the EU could help to provide them with new opportunities. All that is needed is the right kind of support.

Authorisations under EU internal market rules. Research Paper in Law, 05/2013

From the Introduction. That the requirement of a prior authorisation, as a precondition for the exercise of any economic activity, may restrict the freedom of establishment and the free provision of services is a truism. If an authorisation is required in the Member State where establishment is to take place or the service is to be offered (host Member State), then operators who lack such authorisation are in no right to proceed to the projected activity. Therefore, as soon as it is being accepted that the EU internal market rules are not only about discriminatory measures, but also cover mere restrictions, it comes as no surprise that national authorisation systems come to be scrutinized under the Internal Market rules.

The EU essential facilities doctrine. Research Papers in Law, 6/2006

Introduction. The essential facilities doctrine may be seen as the ‘extra weight’ which is put onto the balance, in order to give precedence to the maintenance of competition over the complete contractual freedom of undertakings controlling an important and unique facility. The main purpose of the doctrine is to impose upon such ‘dominant’ undertakings the duty to negotiate and/or give access to the facility, against a reasonable fee, to other undertakings, which cannot pursue their own activity (and therefore will perish) without access to such a facility. This very simple description of the content of the doctrine underlines its limitations: through the imposition of a duty to negotiate or contractual obligations, the rule tends to compensate for the weaknesses of the competitive structure of a market, which are due to the existence of some essential facility. In other words, the doctrine does not by itself provide a definitive solution to the lack of competition, but tends to contractually maintain or even create some competition.1 The doctrine of essential facilities originates in the US antitrust case law of the Circuit and District Courts, but has never been officially acknowledged by the Supreme Court. It has been further developed and hotly debated by scholars in the US, both from a legal and from an economic viewpoint. In the EU, the essential facilities doctrine was openly introduced by the Commission during the early 1990s, but has received only limited and indirect support by the Court of First Instance (the CFI) and the European Court of Justice (the ECJ). It also indirectly inspired the legislation concerning the deregulation of traditional ‘natural’ monopolies. The judicial origin of the doctrine, combined with the hesitant application by the appeal courts, both in the US and the EU, cast uncertainty not only on the precise scope of the doctrine, but also on the issue of its very existence. These questions receive a particular light within the EU context, where the doctrine is called upon to play a different role from its US counterpart. In order to address the above issues, we will first pretend that an EU essential facility doctrine does indeed exist and we shall try to identify the scope and content thereof, through its main applications (Section 1). Subsequently, we will try to answer the question whether such a doctrine should exist at all in the EU (Section 2).

Liberalising trade in services: creating new migration opportunities? Research Paper in Law, 1/2010

Introduction. It is quite uncommon to associate migration with the rules on services trade. Indeed, all economic definitions of services insist on their immaterial nature and on the increased possibility of trading them ‘virtually’ over networks or else, without any physical movement of the parties involved. Somehow this ‘immaterial’ nature of services reflects on their providers/recipients which seem to be ‘invisible’. Even though most services still require the physical contact of the provider with the recipient1 and, when provided over national borders, do entail migration, service providers and/or recipients are rarely thought of as ‘immigrants’. This may be due to the fact that they enter the foreign territory with a specific aim and, once this aim accomplished, move back to their state of origin; technically they only qualify as short term non-cyclical migrants and are of little interest to policy-makers. A second reason may be that both service providers and recipients are economically desirable: the former are typically highly skilled and trained professionals and the latter are well-off ‘visitors’, increasing consumption in the host state. The legal definition of services in Article 57 TFEU (ex Art. 50 EC) further nourishes this idea about service providers/recipients not being migrants: the relevant Treaty rules only apply when the provisions on free movement of workers and freedom of establishment – themselves clearly linked to migration – do not apply. This distinction has been fleshed up by the ECJ which has consistently held that the distinction between the rules on establishment, on the one hand, and the rules on services, on the other, lies on duration.2 Indeed, all EC manuals state four types of service provision falling under the EC Treaty: a) where the service provider moves to the recipient’s state, for a short period of time (longer stay would amount to establishment), b) where the service recipients themselves move to the state where the service is offered (eg for medical care, education, tourism etc), c) where both service providers and recipients move together in another member state (eg a tourist guide accompanying a group travelling abroad) and d) where the service itself is provided across the borders (typically through the use of ICTs). None of these situations would typically qualify as migration. The above ‘dissociation’ between services and migration has been gradually weakened in the recent years. Indeed, migration is increasingly connected to the transnational provision of services. This is the result of three kinds of factors: developments in the European Court of Justice’s (ECJ) case law; legislative initiatives in the EU; and the GATS. Each one of these is considered in some detail below. The aim of the analysis which follows is to show the extent to which (legislative and judicial) policies aimed at the free provision of services actively affect migration conditions within the EU. The EC rules on the provision of services primarily affect the movement of EU nationals. As it will be shown below, however, third country nationals (TCNs) may also claim the benefits of the rules on services, either as recipients thereof or as employees of some EC undertaking which is providing services in another member state (posted workers).

Immigration and free movement in an unusual electoral race: what implications for the next political cycle? EPC Policy Brief, 20 May 2014

Immigration and freedom of movement of EU citizens are among the main issues debated throughout the European Parliament election campaign and have some potential in determining who tomorrow’s EU leaders will be. This Policy Brief looks at how the two policies are debated at national level – in France, Germany and the UK – and at EU level between the ‘top candidates’ for European Commission Presidency – Jean-Claude Juncker (EPP), Ska Keller (Greens), Martin Schulz (PES) and Guy Verhofstadt (ALDE) – who have participated in several public debates. Two different campaigns have been unfolding in front of EU citizens’ eyes. The tense debate that can be identified at national level on these issues, is not transferred to the EU level, where immigration and free movement are less controversial topics. Furthermore, although participating in European elections, national parties present agendas responding exclusively to the economic and social challenges of their Member State, while the candidates for the Commission Presidency bring forward ‘more European’ programmes. Hence, several aspects need to be reflected upon: What will the consequences of this discontinuity be? How will this impact the future European agenda in terms of immigration and free movement? What institutional consequences will there be? Answering these questions is not a simple task, however, this paper aims to identify the parameters that need to be taken into account and the political landscape which will determine the future EU agenda in terms of immigration and free movement.

Belarus 2006. OSW Report, January 2007

The presidential election of 19 March 2006, which Alyaksandr Lukashenka won, played an important role in developing the dictatorial political regime in Belarus. In order to ensure Lukashenka's victory, the authorities employed repressive and undemocratic methods, which since then have become permanent elements of the political system in Belarus. They included legal and administrative measures to limit the citizens' freedom, arbitrary ways of applying these measures, actions by the state security institutions intended to intimidate the public, a large-scale state propaganda campaign, and restrictions on civil liberties and freedom of speech. The presidential election strengthened Alyaksandr Lukashenka's political position, as the president extended his rule by another five years to 2011. It also reinforced the repression apparatus, consolidated the ruling group and ensured that the democrats remained marginalised. This has ensured the stability of the Belarusian regime and preserved the country's specific political and economic system.This report aims to present the situation in Belarus since the presidential election in March 2006. Part I, devoted to the internal situation, is a description of the internal political scene, i.e. the ruling camp and the opposition. It also includes a section on the prevailing moods in Belarusian society. Another section presents the economic situation in Belarus and the government's economic policy.Part II examines the foreign relations of Belarus, and consists of two sections: the first describes the Belarusian government's relations with Russia, its single most important foreign partner, and the second its relations with Western countries, i.e. the EU member states and NATO countries. Finally, the last part contains predictions of future developments in Belarus.

Systemic crisis in Alexander Lukashenko's regime. OSW Commentary No. 66, 2011-10-28

Measures undertaken by the Belarusian government in the areas of the economy, internal affairs and foreign policy in recent months have proven increasingly ineffective. Despite the deteriorating macroeconomic situation, Minsk is not implementing the reforms necessary to combat the crisis and its activity is limited only to feigned actions and administrative regulations. As a result, the economic situation is worsening but the chances of obtaining external loans as support, for example from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), are decreasing. At the same time there is mounting fear among the regime of social unrest, therefore by raising salaries of the least well-off groups of citizens it is trying to compensate for the increased costs of living. On the other hand, the government is extending the scope of control over society and competences of enforcement bodies. Belarus’s room for manoeuvre in foreign policy has also been diminishing substantially. Despite the EU’s declared willingness to reach an agreement and its encouragement, Lukashenko is not ready to make concessions in the political sphere (e.g. to rehabilitate political prisoners), and this is hindering the normalisation of relations with the West. Minsk furthermore feels a mounting pressure from Moscow, making the Belarusian negotiating position ever weaker. The lack of freedom of manoeuvre in foreign policy, no possibility to maintain a costly economic model and the lack of support from the majority of society all prove that Alexander Lukashenko’s regime is in severe crisis. The system he established is no longer able to respond to current threats with adequate and effective strategies. This situation is challenging the regime’s stability and calls into question its viability in the longer term.