Sanktioner eller incitament? - Om EU:s möjligheter att få dess medlemsstater att agera enligt de gemensamma reglerna

Abstract: How does the European Union ensure member state compliance? And why doesn?t it seem to function on the area of the Common European Asylum Politics? Several reports have the past few years alerted the European Union of possible violations of the rights of refugees in Greece, violations that are in direct conflict with several key regulations and directives, such as the Dublin Regulation. The European Commission has on two occasions initiated infringement proceedings against Greece on this matter, but the issues has not yet been resolved. Using the theory of principal-supervisor-agent as an analytical tool, and Greece as a case study, this thesis aims at explaining the EU's enforcement strategies in post-decisional compliance politics and why it doesn?t seem to be working on the area of asylum. I argue that the EU fails in its attempts to make its member states comply because of the too restrictive use of sanctions, combined with the lack of incitements for making member states comply in this area.