In this episode we talk with Constantin Hruschka, Senior Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute of Social Law and Social Policy in Munich, about the changes towards temporary protection in Germany since 2015. Doing this we draw historical lines back to earlier guest worker policies, the temporary protection of Bosnian and Kosovar refugees in the 1990s, as well as to important legal reforms such as the “asylum compromise” in 1992/1993 and the Immigration Act of 2004.
The point of departure of our conversation is the coalition agreement that the Scholz-government launched in the autumn of 2021. In its coalition agreement the government announced a “paradigm shift” in its asylum and residence policy. This self-declared “paradigm shift” includes the introduction of new legal pathways into a secure and durable residence in Germany for refugees and rejected asylum seekers. These pathways are mainly defined in terms of labour, self-sufficiency and language skills. Yet, this emphasis on new pathways to a durable future in Germany feeds into a legal landscape that since 2015 has increasingly framed protection as a temporary solution. In other words, refugees should only be protected for a limited time, and then they should return.
How then, might we understand the different logics that underpin German discourse on asylum and protection?
Further readings:
Hruschka, C and Rohmann, T. (2021). Excluded by crisis management? Legislative hyperactivity in post-2015 Germany. International Migration 00:1–13.
Nomos: https://www.nomos-shop.de/nomos/titel/genfer-fluechtlingskonvention-id-73947/
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