Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.31297/hkju.18.2.3
External and Internal Effects of How Austria Has Handled the Refugee Crisis
Benedikt Speer
; Professor and Programme Director of Public Management, School of Management, Carinthia University of Applied Sciences, Austria
Abstract
Austria was hit especially hard by the refugee crisis of 2015, with the population reacting negatively to the influx of migrants and asylum-seekers. New “border management”, the closure of the Western Balkans route, and police as well as military missions to neighbouring countries were the external measures put into place by the Austrian government. At the same time the integration policy has been further regulated with a number of political and legislative actions. Political measures include the Fifty-Point Plan for Integration (November 2015), the Asylum Summit (January 2016) and the new “For Austria” government programme (January 2017). These became the basis for the Integration Law, the Federal Law Prohibiting the Concealment of the Face in Public, the Law on Integration into the Labour Market, and the Law Concerning the Modification of the Rules Relating to Foreigners (all introduced in June 2017). While the number of refugees has sharply decreased, the legal initiatives putting demands on migrants and threatening them with sanctions have thus notably increased – an attitude that persists and even has been further reinforced after the elections of 2017 and the formation of the new ÖVP-FPÖ coalition government.
Keywords
refugee crisis; migration; integration
Hrčak ID:
201716
URI
Publication date:
19.6.2018.
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