Fence-Sitters No More: Southern and Central Eastern Member State’s Role in Deadlock of the CEAS Reform

Southern and Central Eastern Member States have traditionally been described as passive actors in EU policy-making. This is also true in the area of asylum. However, in the recent reform of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS), they have left their previous fence-sitting role and become policy-shapers (Southern Member States) and foot-draggers (CEE). Building on postfunctionalist and liberal intergovernmentalist accounts, this paper argues that this change of behaviour can be explained by increased salience of the issue both in Southern and CEE Member States. Thus, policy-makers adopted stronger positions at the EU level than before. In the bargaining dynamics, Northern Member States therefore had these positions more into account.