ABSTRACT
Confronted with an unknown health problem, the first reaction of member states was to close borders. Although this is a normal response to a security threat, it introduced abnormality in a core principle of European integration: freedom of movement. By securitising the COVID-19 health threat, member states opened the door for exceptional measures that severely impacted some European citizens’ rights. In this chapter we tested the conformity of those measures with the European and international norms. We were also interested in seeing if broad citizens’ acceptance of the restrictions represented a shift in the way they perceive the importance of freedom of movement. Our findings suggest that although some measures were justified, not all of them pass the necessity, proportionality or non-discrimination tests. Regarding citizens’ value of freedom of movement, we did not find evidence of a significant change, which led us to conclude that the acceptance of the restrictions was circumstantial, resulting from a sense of vulnerability and the belief that restrictions were an important step to slow the spread of the virus.
