Migration, Mobility and Human Rights at the Eastern Border of the European Union - Space of Freedom and Security

This edited collection of migration papers would like to emphasise the acute need for migration related study and research in Romania. At this time, migration and mobility are studied as minor subjects in Economics, Sociology, Political Sciences and European Studies only (mostly at post-graduate level). We consider that Romanian universities need more ‘migration studies’, while research should cover migration as a whole, migration and mobility being analysed from different points of view – social, economical, legal etc. Romania is part of the European Migration Space not only as a source of labourers for the European labour market, but also as source of quality research for the European scientific arena. Even a country located at the eastern border of the European Union, we consider Romania as part of the European area of freedom, security and justice, and therefore interested in solving correctly all challenges incurred by the complex phenomena of migration and workers’ mobility at the European level. The waves of illegal immigrants arriving continuously on the Spanish, Italian and Maltese shores, and the workers’ flows from the new Member States from Central and Eastern Europe following the 2004 accession, forced the EU officials and the whole Europe to open the debate on the economical and mostly social consequences of labour mobility. This study volume is our contribution to this important scientific debate. Starting with the spring of 2005, the Jean Monnet European Centre of Excellence and the School of High Comparative European Studies (SISEC), both within the West University of Timisoara, have proposed a series of events in order to raise the awareness of the Romanian scientific environment on this very sensitive issues: migration and mobility in the widen European Space. An annual international event to celebrate 9 May - The Europe Day was already a tradition for SISEC (an academic formula launched back in 1995 in order to prepare national experts in European affairs, offering academic post-graduate degrees in High European Studies). With the financial support from the Jean Monnet Programme (DG Education and Culture, European Commission), a first migration panel was organised in the framework of the international colloquium ‘Romania and the European Union in 2007’ held in Timisoara between 6 and 7 of May 2005 (panel Migration, Asylum and Human Rights at the Eastern Border of the European Union). Having in mind the positive welcoming of the migration related subjects during the 2005 colloquium, a second event was organised on 5 May 2006 in the framework of the European Year of Workers’ Mobility: the international colloquium Migration and Mobility: Assets and Challenges for the Enlargement of the European Union. In the same period, the Jean Monnet European Centre of Excellence, SISEC and The British Council in Bucharest have jointly edited two special issues of The Romanian Journal of European Studies, no.4/2005 and 5-6/2006, both dedicated to migration and mobility. Preliminary versions of many of the chapters of this volume were presented at the above mentioned international events. The papers were chosen according to their scientific quality, after an anonymously peer-review selection. The authors debate both theoretical issues and practical results of their research. They are renowned experts at international level, members of the academia, PhD students or experienced practitioners involved in the management of the migration flows at the governmental level. This volume was financed by the Jean Monnet Programme of the Directorate General Education and Culture, European Commission, throughout the Jean Monnet European Centre of Excellence (C03/0110) within the West University of Timisoara, Romania, and is dedicated to the European Year of Workers’ Mobility 2006. Timisoara, December 2006