Towards a Transnational Theory of Justice for the EU: A Non-domination Approach
Final Report Abstract
This research project critically examines how EU policies on welfare, migration, and EU citizenship generate systematic vulnerabilities that constrain individuals’ effective freedoms. By critically assessing different conceptions of freedom of movement and showing how current ones in the EU are often based on restricted and non-robust understandings of liberty, the study reveals how ostensibly neutral regulations create indirect economic and social constraints that perpetuate power asymmetries between nationals and migrants. Cases such as access to welfare rights after Brexit and post-Ukraine-war refugee protections demonstrate how policy designs-from waiting periods for accessing welfare benefits to quota-based asylum systems-subtly undermine the autonomous agency of both EU and non-EU citizens when they cross the EU’s internal and external borders. Less advantaged mobile EU citizens facing reduced social entitlements upon cross-border movement experience not merely a lack of resourced protection of their basic liberties but also a fundamental erosion of their ability to effectively exercise their right to transnational freedom of movement. Similarly, the EU’s refugee-quota policies prioritising economic efficiency over impartial asylum provision institutionalise contingent rights that fail to guarantee robust protection against persecution. These findings challenge both academics and policymakers to reconceptualise EU solidarity measures through institutional safeguards against systematic disadvantage vectors, particularly in crisis response frameworks. The project’s interdisciplinary methodology bridges political theory with policy analysis. By demonstrating how populist narratives reframe welfare access as a zero-sum competition, the research also provides tools to counteract exclusionary discourses while highlighting the importance of transnational justice principles. These contributions advance scholarly debates and offer actionable insights for creating an EU governance model where formal rights translate into effective freedoms for all mobile persons.
Publications
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EU immigration, Welfare Rights and Populism: A Normative Appraisal of Welfare Populism. Global Justice : Theory Practice Rhetoric, 12(02), 161-188.
Efthymiou, Dimitrios E.
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‘EU Citizenship for the few or the many?’, Online Workshop on Richard Bellamy’s A Republican Europe of States in December 2020
Efthymiou, D.E.
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6. Welfare Rights, Migration and Solidarity as a Rich Good. Migration, Stability and Solidarity, 129-154. Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG.
Efthymiou, Dimitrios
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‘Differentiated Integration for What?’ ECPR Online Joint Sessions in May 2021
Efthymiou, D.E.
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EU Citizenship for a European Republic of the Free and Equals or of States. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy, 25(4), 616-623.
Efthymiou, Dimitrios
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EU Citizens’ Access to Welfare Rights: How (not) to Think About Unreasonable Burdens?. Res Publica, 28(4), 613-633.
Efthymiou, Dimitrios E.
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The populist challenge to European Union legitimacy: Old wine in new bottles?. Journal of Social Philosophy, 54(4), 510-525.
Cozzaglio, Ilaria & Efthymiou, Dimitrios
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‘Are all populists against immigration? Distinguishing between ‘thick’ and ‘thin’ conceptions of populism,’ REDEM Workshop in Barcelona Pompeu Fabra, May 2022
Efthymiou, D.E.
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‘Ideal vs Realist Approaches to Migration: The Case Against their Convergence’, Leuven workshop on Migrant Workers and Rights in a Global Justice Perspective: between Ideal and Non-Ideal Theory, May 2022
Efthymiou, D.E.
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‘When should EU immigrants get the vote?’, REDEM Workshop at the University of Stockholm in June 2022
Efthymiou, D.E.
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Athens Colloquium in Political Philosophy. ‘Neo-Republican Accounts of the European Union and a friendly but alternative view,’ KAPODISTRIAKON UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS, in December 2023
Dimitrios E. Efthymiou
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‘Between Meeting Quotas and Following the Duty-Bound Heart’, EUI Migration Workshop in March 2023
Efthymiou, D.E.
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‘Meeting Market Quotas or Protecting Robustly? A Hard Dilemma for EU’s Refugee Policy’, The Braga Meetings on Ethics in June 2023
Efthymiou, D.E.
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Between meeting quotas and following the duty-bound heart: navigating the formidable dilemma of refugee protection in the EU. Comparative Migration Studies, 12(1).
Efthymiou, Dimitrios
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‘Between Meeting Quotas and Following the Duty-Bound Heart: Navigating the Formidable Dilemma of Refugee Protection,’ PSA Annual International Conference in Glasgow, March 2024
Efthymiou, D.E.
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‘Between ‘Meeting Refugee Quotas and Following the Duty- Bound Heart: From the Non-Ideal to the Ideal and Back.’ ECPR General Conference in Dublin, August 2024
Efthymiou, D. E.
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‘The European Socioeconomic Dilemma: A Tripartite Approach to Domestic and Global Inequalities through Migration Policy’, RSCAS 30th Anniversary ‘Joint Session of Workshops’, EUI in Florence, June 2024
Efthymiou, D.E.
