Solidarity in Crisis: Assessing EU Member States' Motives for their Failure to Act in Solidarity during the EU Asylum System Crisis

The concept of solidarity has been receiving growing attention from scholars in a wide range of disciplines. While this trend coincides with widespread unsuccessful attempts to achieve solidarity in the real world, the failure of solidarity as such remains a relatively unexplored topic. In the case of the so-called EU migration crisis, the fact that EU member states failed to fulfil their commitment to solidarity is now regarded as established wisdom. But as we try to come to terms with failing solidarity in the EU we are faced with a number of important questions: are all instances of failing solidarity equally morally reprehensible? Are some motivations for resorting to unsolidaristic measures more valid than others? What claims have an effective countervailing force against the commitment to act in solidarity? In this paper I aim to address these questions by offering a conceptualisation of the failure to act in solidarity and assessing common arguments advanced in defence of unsolidaristic actions. More specifically, I discuss the failure of EU member states to comply with their commitment to solidarity and ask in what cases (if any) their defence of unsolidaristic measures is sound. I proceed in two steps. Firstly, I show how the conceptual distinction between justification, excuse, and exemption can help us make sense of the motives behind failing solidarity. Subsequently, I offer a typology of the arguments advanced by EU member states in defence of their failure to act in solidarity and I determine whether any of these is acceptable and why. The paper undertakes a novel exercise in non-compliance theory with specific reference to the crisis of the Common European Asylum System. By tackling non-compliance with normative ideals and engaging with its justifications, this work establishes yet another channel through which normative theories of solidarity can fruitfully dialogue with and inform empirical research.