ABSTRACT
The reception of refugees in the last two decades has become a major issue on the political agendas of developed countries. Approximately 80 per cent of refugees are welcomed in countries of the Global South, 10 per cent more than ten years ago, with Pakistan and Iran heading the list of receiving countries (UNHCR, Displacement, 2013). However, public opinion in the Global North tends to view asylum seekers as freeloaders on diminishing welfare provisions, whose applications require more stringent examination, and who should receive fewer benefits once they have been accepted. Even European Union documents refer to the need to ‘prevent the abuse of asylum applications that undermines the credibility of the system and constitutes an additional administrative and financial burden on Member States’. 1 On the other hand, armed conflict, persecutions of minorities, political instability and natural disasters have forced states to introduce new forms of international protection and new categories of beneficiaries, together with new rules for reception. 2 Among these, to be mentioned in particular is the provision of the Dublin conventions, which obliges asylum seekers to apply for asylum in the first safe country that they are able to enter.
