The next Meeting of Migration Experiences with the theme “Between the norm and practice: deciding asylum in Portugal and Italy” will be held on June 3, between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. in room A202 of Building 4 of Iscte - Knowledge and Innovation.

Speaker:
Marco Lemonte - PhD candidate at the Universitá degli Studi di Macerata and visiting researcher at CIES-Iscte.

Commentary:
Emellin de Oliveira - Researcher at CEDIS-NOVA School of Law & Executive Coordinator of the NOVA Asylum Policy Lab.

SUMMARY

The implementation of the Common European Asylum System aims to harmonize asylum policies between the Member States of the European Union. However, significant variations in national decision-making processes persist, influenced by specific institutional structures and administrative practices. This study analyzes the asylum systems of Portugal and Italy comparatively, highlighting how different institutional arrangements shape the discretion of agents and impact the consistency of decisions to grant international protection. Using the theoretical framework of Street-Level Bureaucracy (Lipsky, 1980) and approaches from organizational sociology, this research investigates how factors such as organizational structure, institutional culture and political pressures impact the practices of front-line professionals. The methodology includes document analysis, semi-structured interviews and participant observation in asylum decision-making centers in both countries. The results show that, despite a common regulatory framework in the European Union, the daily practices of the agents are significantly influenced by the national institutional contexts, resulting in different trajectories in the implementation of the asylum system. In Portugal, the centralization promoted by AIMA seeks to standardize procedures and reduce decision-making variability. In Italy, the decentralization of the “Commissioni Territoriali” maintains a diversity of practices, reflecting regional and local particularities, as well as contingency factors. The study aims to contribute to understanding the institutional dynamics that influence the implementation of asylum policies in Europe, highlighting the challenges of national specificities in the quest for greater harmonization of the Common European Asylum System.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

Marco Lemonte is a PhD candidate in Global Studies. Justice, Rights, Politics at the Università degli Studi di Macerata, where he is researching the implementation of the Common European Asylum System, focusing on bureaucratic practices and decision-making processes in different national contexts. The research is funded by the Ministero dell'Università e della Ricerca (DM 351/2022). She is currently on a research stay at CIES-Iscte, in Lisbon, with the aim of comparing the institutional models of Portugal and Italy, analyzing how European standards are translated into concrete administrative practices. Her research interests include asylum policies, street-level bureaucracy and migratory governance in the European Union.