Migration and Transnational Social Protection in (post) crisis Europe (MiTSoPro) is research project financed by an ERC Starting Grant awarded to Dr Jean-Michel Lafleur at the University of Liège. The aim of the project is to determine how accessible European welfare systems are to nationals and non-nationals by examining both social policies and diaspora policies. For diaspora policies research team analyze consular and diaspora policies of 40 EU and non-EU countries to build an index that compares the engagement of sending states towards nationals abroad in the area of social protection.

High rates of unemployment in Europe since the start of the 2008 financial crisis, coupled with changing migration trends, have led to a high number of EU and non-EU migrants asking for social protection. Governments across the EU have accordingly considered reducing migrants’ access to this support, despite the fact that they are increasingly at risk of poverty and exclusion. Migrants’ strategies to cope with health, unemployment, old age and other social risks are at the core of this project. The role of the BPI is to analyse diaspora and consular policies for Slovak citizens abroad and services provided by Slovakia as far as specific protection policies for nationals abroad are concerned.