European Union Political Theories in Times of Crisis. The Cases of Economic and Monetary Union and of the European Union Migration and Asylum Policy

In the last decades, the EU has been analysed by many scholars through diff erent theoretical perspectives. In this context, the 2008 fi nancial crisis has provoked diff erent EU policy crises which have in turn led to a reassessment of the theoretical frameworks needed to analyse them. Th is paper seeks to contribute to this reassessment, taking the EMU and the European migration and asylum policy as case studies to investigate to what extent these regimes have suff ered internal policy crises via the application of two theoretical perspectives: neo-functionalism and neo-institutionalism. On the one hand, under the neo-institutionalism approach, institutions constrain political actors in a norm-based way. According to this perspective, migration and asylum policy change during the crisis may be explained by European institutional constraints on the Member States. On the other hand, neo-functionalism may be used to investigate the EMU Europeanization policy process in which EU Member States’ cooperation has reinforced the process of integration in this policy domain. In addition, due to the recent developments in European asylum cooperation, many important questions arise about the nature of the legal measures within the criteria of internal security. Th is paper tries to shed light on the problématique of asylum and migration policy-making process by looking at an innovative theoretical framework based on the cost/benefi t and public goods theories.