Changing Paradigms in the Traditional Dichotomy of Old and New Minorities (original) (raw)

Europe's Ethnic Mosaic - A Short Guide to Minority Rights In Europe

Europe's Ethnic Mosaic, 2008

Europe is an ethnic and cultural mosaic, not a melting pot. Some non-Europeans are wondering about so many states on such a relatively small continent. But under the stratum of national diversity there are further layers: regional identities strongly rooted in history, religious pluralism and a large number of ethnic or national minorities in almost every country. Distinct from the dominating national cultures, they wish to preserve their identity, cherish their traditions, use their languages in all spheres of life. For this purpose not only recognition is required, but a complete set of minority rights has to be ensured. After bitter experiences in history, marked by discrimination, exclusion and violence of all kind all over the last century, since the 1990ies the development minority rights in Europe entered in a new era. While the nation states are definitely acknowledging the necessity of modern forms of minority protection, international legal instruments with “soft law”- character have been adopted to set basic principles and minimum standards. Slowly the European community of states is moving towards the creation of a common legal space for national minorities. This short guide offers an introduction in Europe’s world of ethnic minorities and some of its major issues of ethnic conflict and minority discrimination. Then a brief assessment is given on the minority situation in some of its single states and an overview on the international conventions for the protection of national minorities, allowing a final judgement whether Europe is on the right track to safeguard its “ethnic mosaic” or not.

The Rights of Minorities in Europe

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2020

In the present scholarly paper, the author presents an overview of the current status of the rights of minorities in Europe. The analysis includes the historic perspective regarding human rights in general and the emergence of the concept of minority rights, as well as the mechanisms put in place at the European level for the protection of these rights. The main promoters of ethnic minority policies are the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe. The importance given to the subject of minority rights is highlighted through the very existence of the High Commissioner on National Minorities whose purpose is to identify and seek early resolution of ethnic tensions that might endanger peace, stability or friendly relations between OSCE participating States or within the OSCE region. In the last part, the author analyzes a specific European country Romania, in terms of its strives to protect the rights of minorities and the measures that should be implemented to continue to enhance the protection of these rights, as suggested by the latest report of the High Commissioner on National Minorities from 2019.

A Research Agenda for the Study of Migrants and Minorities in Europe

Migration and minority policy issues are now at the forefront of the political debate in Europe. Both issues denote a dynamic and rapidly changing set of sensitive political, economic and social questions that affect domestic and international policy-making. They have developed a distinctly European and EU dimension, and the parallel processes of EU constitution-making and enlargement have underscored the relevance of these issue areas. The current political context in Europe – between the first and second round of the EU's eastward enlargement and at a time when the whole notion of an EU constitution and future enlargement (in particular in the case of Turkey) have been called into question by the French and Dutch rejections of the Constitutional Treaty – makes discussion about minority and migration issues particularly relevant. This special issue places these issues in a set of research trends and tries to define a new research agenda. The terms 'migrant' and 'minority' share an underlying definitional impreci-sion that blurs the respective fields of study and policy-making as well as the linkages between the two. Moreover, some countries (e.g. the UK) explicitly refer to migrants as 'ethnic minorities', thereby adding to the confusion. This special issue adopts sufficiently broad definitions of 'migrants' and 'minori-ties' to facilitate dialogue beyond narrow specialized circles without, however, glossing over meaningful distinctions. Thus, the term 'ethnic minorities' can subsume a range of migrant groups, while the term 'national minority' is reserved for established minorities claiming minority rights (e.g. forms of

A Sociological View on The Impacts of Minority Rights in EU and Migration

Interdisciplinary journal of research and development, 2024

After the fall of communism in Albania, migration destinations occurred toward neighbouring states such as Italy, Greece, European countries (Germany, Switzerland, England, Belgium, etc) and also all over the world (US, Canada Australia, etc.). The flow of Albanian migration was expended in a huge amount from different social classes to other states. Because of different social, cultural, economic and political reasons, the migration flow can be identified as a complex migration phenomenon. Consequently, for these reasons, sometimes the Albanian migrants have been discriminated against. This research paper is going to be focused on the Albanian migrants and their minorities' rights in European states. Another aspect of this paper will be focused on the problem of the well of functions of minority rights causing the anomies to the social and personal identities of migrants.

KSI Transactions on K N O W L E D Minority Rights: Political principles and Legal codification (development of European minority protection system in the 90s)

The end of the Cold war came along with re-surgent (ethno)national and minority controversies within and among the states of CEE. The increasing focus on the issues of rights reflects the upward tendency towards their legal codification. The criticism against the minority protection system includes the following points: documents concerning minority protection have only political but no legal force, legal state obligations are too vaguely formulated , the group dimension is not sufficiently recognized. The legally entrenched norms and rights are but a part of a whole system, which covers also political principle, enforcement , and monitoring principles and political practices .

Minorities rights in European Union (EU)

The purpose of this overview is to highlight the developmenets in minorities rights in European Union (EU)before and after Treaty of Lisbon signed by 2007 .The scholarly literature overview is the main tools in this essay, since it may contribute to the overall understanding of minortities, peculiarities of their ethnic and social development.The study will also attempt to investigate the EU contirbute and achivemnets about the minorities situations and possible challenges that follow. Consequently, the following research questions has presented about the minority rights in Central and Eastern Europe been a success or a failure of the EU conditionality and the main importance’s of the Lisbon Treaty and post Lisbon treaty in promoting the minorities rights in the EU. In conclusion for promoting the minorities rights values on the EU the influence of the EU on the domestic policies of candidate states can be usefully divided into ‘active’ and ‘passive’ leverage, while ‘passive leverage’ outcomes from the desirability of EU membership and is not linked to any deliberate policies of the EU, ‘active leverage’ results from the cautious use of EU rules and conditionality but EU membership can be use as leverage. The EU and the United Nations should be at the forefront in ensuring minorities rights are equally practised to allmembers of the states under the organizations. This includes the adoption of multiculturalism and territorial autonomy to the minority groups within a given country.

Protection of minorities in the European context of human rights

Accommodation of cultural, linguistic and religious diversity has nowadays become one of the major challenges faced by virtually all European states. Relevant international standards are often referred to in debates on the issue. The paper discussed the substance of these standards