Centre for Fundamental Rights - Hertie School

Shoutout to our Postdoctoral Researcher, Silvia Steininger, who will deliver the opening keynote of this year's Asylum Policy Forum 2025 in Schwerte on 5 December. Human Rights are under immense pressure, and as Europe marks 75 years of its Human Rights Convention, the systematic restriction of migrants' and refugees' fundamental rights begs the question: 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗵𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗲 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝗿𝗲𝗳𝘂𝗴𝗲𝗲𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝗚𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗘𝘂𝗿𝗼𝗽𝗲? This question forms the central theme of this year's Forum, where Silvia will open the discussion with her address. 🔹75 Years of the ECHR – Historical and Legal Context and Outlook 🔹19:30 CET - Evangelical Conference Center Haus Villigst Learn more about the program via the flyer. 👇

On Wednesday, we welcomed members of our Student Advisory Board to our internal research seminar. Following a presentation by our adjunct lecturer, Dr. Ilyas Saliba, on shrinking civic spaces in the WANA region, we engaged in a discussion with our teams and Board members. Really enjoyed the energy and curiosity in the room ✨

How are digital and algorithmic systems reshaping migration and asylum governance in Europe? We are delighted to launch a new blog symposium on Algorithmic Fairness for Asylum Seekers and Refugees, edited by Cathryn Costello and Mirko Djukovic. The symposium emerged from the AFAR research project at the Centre for Fundamental Rights - Hertie School, funded by the VolkswagenStiftung through its “Challenges for Europe” programme. AFAR brings together scholars from across Europe to examine how digital and algorithmic systems are transforming asylum and refugee governance—from biometric technologies at borders to automated decision-making, digital evidence, and the expanding influence of AI in administrative practice. What began as an inquiry into “newtech” in refugee status determination soon grew into a broader exploration of fairness: procedural, distributive, allocative, and firmly grounded in fundamental rights. Over the coming days, contributors will unpack key themes of the project: 🔹 the rise of biometric technologies and their fundamental-rights implications 🔹 transparency deficits and the struggle to understand “black box” systems in migration governance 🔹 the legal and political complexity of the EU’s emerging AI and data framework 🔹 the limits of automation in asylum decision-making 🔹 public perceptions of fairness and how “smart borders” shape them 🔹 the political economy of digital borders and the growing role of private tech actors. The symposium reflects four years of collaborative research—mapping new technologies, analysing their legality, studying fairness perceptions, and assessing how AI systems interact with human-rights-based governance. We look forward to the debate! 👉 Follow along on Verfassungsblog over the next days. https://lnkd.in/dGrm2iTk

Today, we announce the launch of the Algorithmic Fairness for Asylum Seekers and Refugees (AFAR) Project Symposium on Verfassungsblog. The series brings together key findings from the AFAR Project, hosted at the Hertie School's Centre for Fundamental Rights, alongside wider reflections on what automation and algorithmic decision-making mean for governance, accountability, and fundamental rights. The Symposium emerges from the AFAR Conference, held at the Hertie School in Berlin on 18–19 September, which convened researchers, policymakers, and civil society to interrogate this theme. One new blog post will be published every day throughout the Symposium. Co-convened by Prof. Cathryn Costello and Dr. Mirko Djukovic, the Symposium and the AFAR Project are made possible with the support of the VolkswagenStiftung under its Challenges for Europe programme. 👉 Daily posts ahead. Follow along here: https://lnkd.in/dGrm2iTk

📣 Başak Çalı's article, ‘Framing climate remedies in European human rights law: It is all about trust – in European democracies’, written for our special issue The Frames of European Human Rights, has been published online and open access in The International Journal of Human Rights : https://lnkd.in/eid-MMNx ✨ In this article, Başak examines the remedies proposed by the Court to address climate-related harms in its first rulings on climate change. She argues that, in these rulings, the remedies were shaped by the trust the Court placed in the judgment of governments, parliaments, and domestic courts of European states. With Başak’s article, all contributions to our special issue have now been published. This will be followed by our introductory article, co-authored with Başak and Jens Theilen, and all articles will appear together in one of the first issues of the International Journal of Human Rights in 2026 ⏳ All other contributions are also open access and can be reached here: Vandita K., ‘Seriously ill migrants in European human rights: framing global inequalities’: https://lnkd.in/eJ6ShJhV Nurbanu Hayır, ‘Non-member migrants in spaceless zones: the spatial membership frame of embassies and consulates in the European Court of Human Rights’: https://lnkd.in/eX9VbDTG Corina Heri, ‘Mattering in the Anthropocene: the ECtHR’s domesticating framing of climate change’: https://lnkd.in/e5juPt6B Daniel R. Quiroga-Villamarín, PhD, ‘An Histoire Juridique Commune? Historiographical frames in European and Inter-American human rights narratives’: https://lnkd.in/ezuQRA-a Esra Demir-Gürsel, ‘The shifting frames of the Council of Europe: from totalitarianism to authoritarianism, from populism to democratic backsliding’: https://lnkd.in/e7kfAcAq Centre for Fundamental Rights - Hertie School #FramesProject

Join us online for the last session of the Centre's Fall Colloquium: Liability for killing in war and why there is no 'Licence to Kill' 📅 3 December | 12:00–13:00 (CET) | Online via Zoom In his paper, Andrew Clapham (Geneva Graduate Institute) explains that it no longer makes sense to speak about a soldier's 'licence to kill' in wartime. The individual soldiers on the aggressor side can be considered liable for violations of human rights law, whereas combatants and civilians who lose their lives as a result of state aggression are victims of human rights violations. This online event marks the last session of the Fundamental Rights Research Colloquium under the "Human Rights in Times of War" cluster, co-convened by Dr Silvia Steininger and PhD Researcher Anastasiia Zhuravel. Learn more and register here: https://lnkd.in/d6vx99nk

Here is your final reminder to join us for this year's Distinguished Equality Lecture at the Hertie School, featuring Michael G. Hanchard (University of Pennsylvania). 📅 Thursday, 27 November ⏲️ 6:00 pm 📍 Henrik Enderlein Forum, Hertie School, Friedrichstraße 180 His talk will explore how contemporary democratic crises are rooted in long-standing inequalities related to class, caste, race, and patriarchy. Following the lecture, Hanchard will be joined by Yusuf Serunkuma (The Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg) for a discussion moderated by Violeta Moreno-Lax, Director of the Centre for Fundamental Rights and Wübben Stiftung Wissenschaft Foundation Professor of International Law. Secure your spot now: https://lnkd.in/d6cSM-Xa

𝗘𝗨 𝘀𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗶𝗻 𝗮𝘀𝘆𝗹𝘂𝗺 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗺𝗶𝗴𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗶𝘁 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲? Violeta Moreno-Lax, Wübben Foundation Professor of International Law and Director of the Centre for Fundamental Rights at the Hertie School, commented in 𝘓𝘦 𝘍𝘪𝘨𝘢𝘳𝘰 on the European Commission's first annual report on the implementation of the EU's New Pact on Asylum and Migration, set to apply from mid-2026. She warns that the proposed solidarity mechanism relies on a level of trust and cooperation among Member States that has been missing in the past, raising serious doubts about whether it can succeed where previous efforts have failed. 📖 Read more here: https://lnkd.in/drhq3Zxx

On Wednesday, MIA students from the Human Rights and Global Governance stream got a behind-the-scenes look at Amnesty International's Berlin offices. Beate Streicher, human rights officer for Policing & International Law, and Asia expert Theresa Bergmann shared the NGO's history, key achievements, and ongoing challenges, which set the stage for an open discussion among students on democracy in Germany, human rights advocacy in Iran, Gaza, and Afghanistan, and the realities of protecting human rights worldwide. Amnesty International Deutschland

Digital tools are reshaping how states assess asylum claims, yet their growing use raises major questions about fairness, transparency, and human rights. In the next Policy Brief for the Algorithmic Fairness for Asylum Seekers and Refugees (AFAR) Project hosted at the Centre for Fundamental Rights, researchers Dr William Hamilton Byrne and Professor Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen (MOBILE Centre of Excellence for Global Mobility Law, Københavns Universitet - University of Copenhagen) examine how states are increasingly relying on digital evidence in refugee status determination (RSD). The brief argues that a balanced, human rights–compliant framework is needed, one that regulates the extraction and use of digital evidence, strengthens accountability, and recognises the constructive role digital tools can play in supporting fairer asylum processes. The AFAR Project (2021–2025) is a Volkswagen Foundation-funded collaboration hosted by the Centre for Fundamental Rights, bringing together six European institutions to examine fairness in automated migration and asylum governance. Read the brief via the link in the comments. VolkswagenStiftung