The migrant crisis is driving a wedge between Eastern and Western Europe. With the inflow of thousands of migrants and refugees arriving by train at German stations, officials and leaders on the eastern side of Europe are becoming more vocal. They are actively criticizing Angela Merkel’s open-door policy and the EU proposal of a binding quota system to distribute 120,000 asylum seekers among EU nations. On September 22 the vast majority of EU interior ministers agreed to relocate 120,000 refugees and migrants from Italy, Hungary and Greece across the bloc. As expected, a few Eastern European countries – Hungary, Romania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia – voted against the plan. A Northern European country, Finland, abstained.

The predominant rhetoric floating around the communities in Eastern Europe is that of assimilation. Strangely though, the focus is not necessarily on the cultural and social integration of the other, but rather on their own position within the European Union. They can’t seem to understand how law-abiding nations, such as Germany, unilaterally suspend EU rules for migrants and refugees from outside Europe while they, as EU members, are always obliged to follow the rule of law. Traian Ungureanu, a Romanian MEP, wrote in an article: “Paradoxically, the East is the large unassimilated novelty of Europe’s history.” (“O istorie unita sau doua viteze?”, Revista 22, August 18, 2015) Reviving postwar memories of the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe, Mr Ungureanu adds that the West still sees the East through Russian eyes, and if there is no reunification of European history, there will be frustration and ignorance on both sides of Europe. Many Eastern Europeans feel that the West ignores them, whereas the West lambasts the East’s unwillingness to do more “burden sharing” for a unified Europe.

This frustration may be giving rise to a defense mechanism that manifests itself as an opposition of many Eastern Europeans against the hundreds of thousands of migrants pouring into their neighbourhoods. According to Sigmund Freud, a defense mechanism is an unconscious coping strategy to allay anxiety or a negative emotional experience. Displacement may be the default defense mechanism of many Eastern Europeans. Their frustration with the West is displaced and thus satisfied by focusing on a substitute object – one that is less powerful and more under their control – in this case migrants or refugees. Hungary has just finished building a barbed wire fence along its border with Serbia, defended by its armed forces. Its plan to set up a fence also along the Croatian and Romanian borders could soon become reality. Not to mention the new laws according to which anyone caught damaging or crossing the borders illegally will face jail time. In a recent public opinion poll released by the Republikon Institute, only 19 percent of Hungarians believe that “it is the duty of Hungary to accept migrants.” In unison with Hungary, Slovakia is welcoming only white and Christian migrants. Poland has softened its rhetoric by agreeing to the recent relocation plan, although 70 percent of Poles oppose a mandatory quota system. The Czech Republic is equally reluctant, as is Romania. They all agree that there needs to be a common EU asylum policy, but until it is determined, they only want to accept refugees on a voluntary basis.

The lower-than-average GDP of these nations also prompts a self-protection response. The truth is that the East’s pulse is slower than the West’s. The per capita GDP of Eastern European countries in 2014 was half or less than that of the West’s. This concern is compounded by the lack of integration of the Roma community in Eastern Europe. As Ivan Krastev writes in The New York Times (“Eastern Europe’s Compassion Deficit”, September 8, 2015), “The failed integration of the Roma also contributes to this compassion deficit. Eastern Europeans fear foreigners because they mistrust the capacity of the state to integrate the ‘others’ already in their midst.”

One thing can hardly be argued against: there are indeed demographic and economic benefits to immigration. However, this is not the main target of Eastern Europe’s criticism. At the moment their priority is to oppose the suspension of many EU asylum rules. The Dublin Regulation – under which the first EU country the asylum seeker enters is also the one responsible for examining his application – is only a background buzz. The EU currently has a complete lack of any sort of structured migration strategy. Words of criticism have also come from Horst Seehofer, the premier of Bavaria, directed not only towards the EU, but also his own country, Germany. “There is no order”, he says, “there is no system, and in a country governed by the rule of law, that is a cause for concern.”

E. H. Carr, a 20th century scholar of international affairs, noted that clashes of interests between nation-states are the reality in international politics. This is exactly the reality in Europe today. Politics based solely on a sense of moral rectitude, without considering the interests of all parties involved, does not seem to work. It is not only Eastern Europeans building fences at their borders. Germany is also introducing temporary border controls, and Austria, Netherlands and Denmark are following suit. As long as there is no cooperation or sense of order, the conflict of interests with regards to immigration will continue to drive an even deeper wedge between East and West. And the long process of the reunification of Europe may well come to a halt.