The paper investigates the driving forces for domestic policy-making in the field of asylum, in particular with regard to safe country of origin policies. Despite considerable progress in harmonizing asylum rules at the EU level, big differences in actual asylum policies prevail. It still does make a big difference for an asylum seeker whether he arrives in Italy or Germany. In the light of the envisaged Common European Asylum System, member states have undertaken several steps to make asylum policies across Europe more similar. These steps go beyond harmonization of rules and include, among others, also practical cooperation. The establishment of the European Asylum Support Office is only the most recent step in this regard. The paper focuses on asylum policy issues that have not been harmonized by EU legislation, namely safe country of origin policies. Any policy similarities across EU member states need to be explained by other factors than (just) the European one. The paper investigates whether cooperation between national asylum authorities determines safe country of origin policies in several EU member states. Four cases have been studied in detail, Luxembourg, the UK, Germany, and Malta. Based on in-depth interviews, the author discusses the policy-making process of safe country of origin policy and the role, if any, of European cooperation in that regard.
