EU values as a shield and a sword in EU migration and asylum law

European Union values increasingly shape the EU’s migration and asylum governance, invoked both as a shield to protect migrants’ rights and as a sword to justify their restriction. This paper frames these two positions as protective and restrictive approaches to the same set of EU values. It identifies the legal ‘red lines’ that cannot be crossed without negating the essence of EU values and assesses the extent to which EU values and Article 2 TEU are capable of serving as enforceable legal standards in this field. The analysis of the protective approach shows that EU law provides migrants with a dense web of human rights. On the other hand, the restrictive approach illustrates how values are increasingly mobilized to justify migrants’ integration duties and stronger border controls against irregular migration. The paper concludes that the coexistence of both approaches is not in itself problematic provided it does not undermine the essence of the values concerned and leaves intact absolute rights such as non-refoulement and the right to life.