Associate Doctoral Candidate Benedikt Behlert
Law/Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV)
Do human rights set standards for administrative procedures?
Much attention, in both, media and academia, has been paid to the human rights situation of forced migrants. Do they have a right to enter a potential host State when arriving at its borders? Which substantive rights do they enjoy once they have entered the territory of a host State? What is the relationship between human rights law and refugee law? These are only a few questions that have been examined in this context on a large scale. A related, but much less examined question is what procedural protection they enjoy in the asylum procedure.
When forced migrants arrive for example in Germany, they are required to register with the German authorities immediately. From this moment on, they are subject to an administrative procedure, the asylum procedure, in which the German Federal Office for Migration and Refugees determines whether they will be granted asylum, other forms of protection or whether they must leave Germany again.
Such asylum procedures are usually rather lengthy and highly human rights sensitive. Not only do asylum seekers face many constraints of their rights during the procedure, such as the right to liberty or the right to privacy; the decision that stands at its end has great, often even existential implications for their lives. But what does this sensitivity mean for the asylum procedure from a legal point of view?
To address this question, my PhD project analyses the effects that human rights have on administrative law. Specifically, it sounds out the potential of human rights law to enhance the standing of people subjected to administrative procedures through multi-level international legal research.
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Pierre Thielbörger
About Benedikt Behlert
Born in 1993, I attended the St. Ursula Gymnasium Dorsten from 2003 to 2012 and graduated with the Abitur. From 2012 to 2017, I studied law at Ruhr University Bochum (RUB) and since the beginning of 2018, I have been a PhD student at the Institute for International Law of Peace and Armed Conflict (IFHV) at RUB. My PhD project deals with the relationship of international human rights law and national adminsitrative law and the implications of this relationship for the asylum procedure.
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01/2018-12/2018 SYLFF PhD Scholarship 11/2016 RUB Student Award for the best thesis of the Law Faculty 09/2015-04/2016 Participation in Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition, German National 3rd Place, German National Best Oralist 3rd Place, Advanced Rounds Team in International Rounds in Washington, D.C., final ranking: 29th out of more than 550 10/2015-09/2017 Scholarship of the German National Scholarship Program
“The Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration – Hope for our Constitutive
Commitments?”, verfassungsblog, November 2018, https://verfassungsblog. de/the-global-compact-for-safe-orderly-and-regular-migration-hope-for-our-constitutive- commitments/
“Ausschluss von Familiennachzug ist völkerrechtlich großen Bedenken ausgesetzt.”,
Interview with Benedikt Behlert, migazin, January 2018, http://www.migazin. de/2018/01/24/interview-benedikt-behlert-ausschluss-familiennachzug/
„Aussetzung des Familiennachzugs - Ist es dem Völkerrecht wirklich so egal?“, verfassungsblog,
January 2018, http://verfassungsblog.de/aussetzung-des-familiennachzugs- ist-es-dem-voelkerrecht-wirklich-so-egal/
- Participation in Panel Discussion about the so-called “migration-crisis” in Germany and Europe, 30 years IFHV conference, Institute for Law of Peace and Armed Conflict, Ruhr University Bochum, November 2018
- Presentation on family reunification and international law at Germany’s largest conference on refugee and migration studies organized by Netzwerk Fluchtforschung, Katholische Universität Eichstätt, October 2018
- Participation in panel discussion on family reunification in German refugee law, organized by Initiative für Interkulturellen Kulturaustausch, Hannover, May 2018
I have always been passionate about motivating other people. In my hometown, I have been the musical director of a youth choir with more than 150 participants for three years. Furthermore, I was a coach of the 2017 Jessup Moot Court team at our faculty where I tried to pass on my passion for international law to younger students. As a member of the student refugee aid of the Ruhr University, it is important for me to help create a welcoming atmosphere for people fleeing to Germany. Together with my colleagues in the SYLFF Mikrokolleg on Forced Migration, I organize public discussions to raise awareness of the problems revolving around Forced Migration that we as young scholars are concerned with.