Date: 14th-15th June 2012
Where: Centre for EU-Russia Studies/Euro College, University of Tartu, Estonia
The issue of minorities and minority rights in the context of EU eastern enlargement is a well studied and documented topic. But it is also one that continues to offer great scope for ongoing and new research tying into broad institutional, policy and social developments within Europe. In the past, attention has been predominately placed on minority rights in the framework of the EU’s external dimension, however, following the expansion of the EU in 2004/2007 as well as the ongoing EU enlargement agenda, the internal dynamics of minority affairs have come to the foreground. The inclusion of references to minorities in the Lisbon Treaty, the foundation of the EU’s Fundamental Rights Agency, the migration of large minority groups such as the Roma, ongoing debates over minority language use, education and other aspects of social and cultural inclusion, are only some of the issues that inform minority and minority rights affairs within the EU at local, regional, state and EU-wide levels. At the same time, the external dimension of minority affairs continues to play an active role in formulating EU attitudes and policy towards states not only in its own neighbourhood but globally. However, the effectiveness of the EU to act as a guarantor of minority, and fundamental rights in general, has come under increasing pressure due to the recent collapse in EU economic status and its failure to adequately deal with minority issues within its own borders. This poses many questions for the EU’s rights based agenda and highlights that related issues such as minorities and minority rights are likely to remain problematic for the EU and its member states well into the future.
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