Managing immigration in the European Union between nationalist egoism and cosmopolitan temptations

La gestione dell’immigrazione di massa nell’Unione europea tra egoismi nazionalisti e tentazioni cosmopolitiche

Abstract

The article aims at arguing that the EU mass migration policy is largely built on a national sovereignty-based paradigm. The central
claim is that the EU has not taken advantages from the cosmopolitan theories that contributed to the development of the EU as transnational political project. To develop the argument, the article is divided into two parts with the first part (para. 2) providing a theoretical framework on the opposing views of the sovereignty-based model of managing migration and the cosmopolitan one. The second part (paras 3 and 4) is designed to put to the test the regulatory framework of the EU immigration policy in light of the cosmopolitan approach. Consequently, the article focuses on the most challenging issues raised by the definition of supranational rules designed to assign responsibilities among States on the management of mass migration.

Keywords: Immigration; European Union Common Asylum System; Nationalism; Cosmopolitanism; Fundamental Rights.