Labour Migration in the European Union: The Policy-Making Process 3030361845, 9783030361846

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Labour Migration in the European Union The Policy-Making Process

Gönül Oğuz

Labour Migration in the European Union

Gönül O˘guz

Labour Migration in the European Union The Policy-Making Process

Gönül O˘guz Giresun University Giresun, Turkey

ISBN 978-3-030-36184-6 ISBN 978-3-030-36185-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: Maram_shutterstock.com This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Preface

Interconnected global economy refers to free movement of goods, capital, technology and knowledge. Apart from this, there is also free flow of labour. In 2018, the EU celebrated the 50th anniversary of the founding regulation on the free movement of workers. It entails the abolition of any discrimination based on nationality as regards employment, remuneration and other conditions of work and employment. The European labour markets integration is currently beginning to develop a mechanism to enhance solidarity and responsibility in the EUwide. The ultimate objective is to stimulate economic integration and thus welfare-enhancing, with significant distributional effects. For the economic aspects of European integration, the case is strong, although labour market is characterized by wider political objectives, pointing to the complementary element in it. The increasing level of labour mobility is a sign of the added advantage of making a valuable contribution to the EU’s economic development in the long term. It is not that simple. As part of this integration strategy, the European institutional policy-making in labour migration remains controversial. The policy-makers still argue over which actors have the most decision–making powers and responsibilities for the formal and informal arenas of migration policy-making and scholars still argue over how to explain the multiple influences on labour migration policy process. For example, the costs of importing labour force from the neighbour countries, a component of current controversies (i.e., unskilled labour), may be intimidatingly high. v

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Regarding the similar issues raised in the political literature focusing domestic level politics, a multitude of actors are taken into consideration. Migration decision making is a much more supranational process, although polices work at two different levels from the national to the supranational level. In fact, the singular noun “dual executive”—in which power is vested—has covered a set of supranational organs and the member states. Recognizing that labour mobility has covered several separate, though related, issues have been multi-faced in their sources, characteristics and consequences and, resolution works best involving the multinational level policy process within the context of the EU. While admitting that policy process at the EU level is subject to a wide range of differentiated instruments and procedures, a set of fundamental trends are emerging and evolving realities of the European polity. The underlying trend in this research is that national governments’ involvement in taking binding decision increases complexity. The scholars are always challenged by the fact that an increasing speed of the co-decision procedure and the application of majority rule, thereby at the level of governmental policy in migration area present risks for the national interests in the post-Lisbon period. Whether or not this complexity continues to mark the debate in the EU-wide in the light of recent migration developments usually deploys a habit of “wait and see” attitude by the member states. The book aims to reap better understanding of the EU’s formal labour migration policy-making procedures in the institutional setting and the member states’ manoeuvre in this process. The book identifies and examines the central issues of labour migration by contending the EU policy-making can be fruitfully studied using general tools of migration policy-making at the national and the EU level. In the analysis of the EU policy-making, they include formal institutions of the European Commission, the Council of Ministers, the European Parliament (EP) and the European Court of Justice (ECJ), as first set of actors. The member states are the second set of actors that are considered in this study. Most importantly, the original idea behind the book comes from Lawrence Saez, who sadly passed away before few months of publication of this book, whose question of who makes migration decision in Europe immediately grabbed my attention. My sincere thanks are owned to him

PREFACE

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who made this book possible. Thanks also to the staff of School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Andrea Cornwall and Mark Laffey, for giving me the opportunity to undertake a postdoctoral research. Finally, my thanks go to Bayram Kaya who provided excellence advice. Giresun, Turkey

Gönül O˘guz

Contents

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1

Introduction: Labour Migration Policy-Making in the EU

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Theorizing the EU Policy-Making

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The European Policy Approach to the Labour Migration Problem

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Recent Trends in Labour Migration in the EU

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Policy Process in the European Union

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Institutional Decision-Making in the EU

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Labour Migration Policy-Making in the EU

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The EU as Efficient Polity in Migration: Conflict and Cooperation

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Conclusion: The Present Realities and the Future of the EU’s Labour Migration Policy Process

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CONTENTS

References

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Index

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Abbreviations

CAP CECs CEDEFOP CEE CEECs CFSP CJEU CoR COREPER DG EC ECJ EES EIB EP ESC ESM EU JHA OECD OMC SEA TFEU UKIPUK

Common Agricultural Policy Central European Countries European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training Central and Eastern Europe Central and Eastern European Countries Common Foreign and Security Policy Court of Justice for European Union Committee of Regions and Local Authorities Permanent Representatives Committee Directorate-General European Community European Court of Justice European Employment Strategy European Investment Bank European Parliament Economic and Social Committee European Single Market European Union Justice and Home Affairs Organization for Economic, Cooperation and Development Open Method Coordination Single European Act Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union Independent Party

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List of Figures

Fig. 3.1 Fig. 4.1

Fig. 4.2 Fig. 4.3 Fig. 4.4

Fig. 4.5 Fig. 4.6 Fig. 4.7

Fig. 4.8 Fig. 4.9 Fig. 4.10

Asylum application (Source Eurostat 2017) Outflow rate of nationals of working age (20–64), by country of citizenship, 2015 (Note Croation nationals are included from 2009 onwards. Source Eurostat data on emigration by age group and citizenship [2017a]) Increase in the number of mobile workers after enlargement (Source European Commission 2014a) Annual growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) in real terms, EU-28, 1996–2016 (Source Eurostat 2017b) Population pyramids, EU-28, 2016 and 2080 (% of total population) (Note Estimates, 2018 projections. Source Eurostat [2017b]) Employment rate of the age group 20–64, EU-28, 2002–2017(%) (Source Eurostat 2017b) Employment rate by sex, age group 20–64, 2007–2016 (%) (Source Eurostat 2017b) Labour force and employment trend by qualification, EU-28, 2008, 2017, 2025 (Source CEDEFOP [2016] Skills broadcast) Over-qualification rate, EU-28, 2002–2017 (Source Eurostat 2017b) Minimum wages in the EU member states, as of January 2019, in Euro per month (Source Eurostat 2019) Trends in happiness and life satisfaction levels, by country, 2011–2016 (Source Eurofound 2016)

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81 82 85

89 91 95

100 101 104 110

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LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 4.11 Fig. 5.1 Fig. 6.1 Fig. 6.2 Fig. 6.3 Fig. 8.1

Public unemployment spending % of GDP, 2015 (Source OECD 2017b) Decision-making process—the JHA agenda (Source Steve Peers 2010) The policy cycle (Source John McCormick 2017) Principal features of the EU’s legislative procedures (Source Neil Nugent 2010) GDP per capita income, 2017 (Source Eurostat 2017) Lines of conflict between and within levels of authority in the EU (Source Derek Beach, More powers for Brussels or renationalisation?, 2016)

112 140 156 162 167

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List of Tables

Table 2.1 Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table Table Table Table Table Table Table Table

5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 5.5 5.6 6.1 6.2

The new institutionalism Data on movers to another member state (2015) Youth (aged 15–24) employment and unemployment rates in the EU, US, Japan and Canada, 2017 The mode of governance The main characteristic of the community method The central elements of the negotiation process A summary of regulatory mode The European Union competences Justice and home affairs (migration and asylum policy) Institutional agenda-setting approaches Council voting weights in the EU and euro area

35 80 93 123 124 127 129 132 138 157 166

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction: Labour Migration Policy-Making in the EU

Introduction Mobility refers to excersing one of the four fundamental freedoms on which the European single market (ESM) has been built. As the Europeans recognise the importance of mobility and the value of freedom lof movement associated with it, most of them, do not have a real conviction, nor any plan to exercise the right in practice in the future (Ricceri 2011: 259). Attempts to understand these movements and policy-making in particular in the EU have often relied upon the regulatory framework with the resulting policies. Such policies adopted by the authorities of the area, are concerned about encouraging these movements or more commonly towards attempting to control or to reduce them. While this book is aimed at objectively exploring the dynamics of actors in migration policy-making, it is useful to examine the effects of policy and changes in policy, and assess the political consequences of labour movement in Europe. This in turn means to attempt to look at the effects of policy and changes in policy. Generally, it is agreed that mobility and migration constitute complex phenomena, and their analysis proves increasingly to be interdisciplinary (Borjas et al. 1997: 73) multilevel governance, with a multitude of actors operating in the policy areana. The multilevel governance of migration is a concept that embraces a very wide span of institutional developments and institutions within which shifts in competencies and power occur. The degree to which this complexity, interdisciplinary approaches © The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_1

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for deeper understanding of external constraints (regulations, laws, market demands, international events, and security threats etc.) can or ought to be employed. The significant bottom-up perspective is that the specific member states’ governments (as well as civil society actors) are provided an insight about the EU policy and policy-making process. Rather than dwell on the distinction between the different levels of government in migration policy-making processes, it is probably better to focus on a concrete competences of institutional actors and the member states. Analysing the contemporary EU policy-making as a political system, the classical approach to the EU institutions touches upon attention to their functions, competences and relationship with each other and the member states. The proposed overall question is that which actors are more powerful in labour migration policy-making process. Although there are different set of actors influencing policy-process, this study is restricted to the institutional players, and to a lesser extent, the member states.

Labour Mobilityin the EU The terms “immigrant” and “migrant” are taken to refer to any kind of movement of people which is not occasional, whatever the length, nature and cause of that movement. Second-and third-generation migrants are often still perceived as migrants themselves, even if they are born in the host country and have no link whatsoever with the parents’ country of origin (Henry and Pastore 2014: 1). In the literature, there is no clear differentiation between the terms “mobility” and “migration”. In some cases, they are even used synonymously. Nevertheless, the two terms should be differentiated as follows. The spatial (interregional) mobility of workers is, in general, any movement of labour from one region to another. The spatial movement of labour together with a simultaneous change of residence is migration. Thus, “migration” has the connotation of permanence. If the spatial movement of labour does not involve a change of residence, it entails commuting (Hönekopp and Werner 2000: 2). In short, “labour mobility” is taken literally to mean any change that diversifies one’s employment situation within certain geographical location. The main objective of any labour migration policy is to facilitate the matching of supply and demand in the labour market: i.e. to ensure that there is a qualified pool of workers available in the market to match any job vacancy opening by employers without incurring too high transaction

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costs. This labour migration policy objective has to be reconciled with the main objective of labour market policies, which is to make the best use of human capital available in the country (and by virtue of the EU preference principle, in the whole EU), including human capital arriving from third countries outside the labour migration schemes. Their human capital profile needs to be systematically researched and developed for the sake of labour market efficiency. So labour migration policy and labour market policy are deeply interrelated, and cannot be defined independently from one another (Martín and Venturini 2015: 6). This legacy of the labour mobility principle traces back to the early years of the 1950s. At a time, the primary impetus of the European Economic Community (EEC) after World War II was, in political sense, to reconstruct Europe which would remain at peace, under democratic control, and free from any re-emergence of dictatorships. For the sake of economic integration, at the very least, the interests of many parties have worked together in this long road, while the clash of opposing national interests has been never evaporated. The post Europe necessitated cooperation between the former enemies (in the case of Germeny and France), although the political climate was not much credible. The first step towards consensus building was the creation of the common governmental institutions by the Treaty of Rome (1957). Undoubtedly, this inititation intended to reconcile differencies in the economic shephere and, in general, evoide the worst of all “political failures” that could not happen again Since then, the scale and the salience of labour migration has drawn scholarly attention. Rather, focus was differences over the fundamentals of policy in the European Community (EC). The precise origin of labour mobility in the literature is rooted in the late 1970s. Prior to this date, statements of aims and objectives by the pioneers of the economic community did not touch upon obstacles to the free movement of people because there appeared far less diversified and heterogeneous landscape. One of the resulting pictures of the early stages of the formation of the Community policy was concerning the formation of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which in the 1960s was the clash between France and West Germany. The influence of background conditions appeared to be larger, as Germany was an agriculturalimporting country and drawbacks for the creation of an internal free market was the highest prices (i.e., cereals). The opportunities for decisive action by the political actors appeared to be somewhat more limited pointing to a “patchwork” of actors, priorities and instruments, and more

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importantly, a lack of institutional settings or inefficient functioning institutions. It was a burden upon the founding member of the EC those of whome agricultural producers that placed German imports from the third countries with their own exports. The successful establishment was the CAP to the extent of which turned out was helpful for integration. This was when consensus—that built on the existence of the CAP—was a result of a shared recognition that cooperation in public policy was fruitful. This brief remark on the CAP serves to demonstrate the clash of interests on the EU’s economic policy-making. Over the last two decades, a common policy on borders, migration and asylum has been created amongs the EU member states. An important development of kind was the completion of the internal market by 1993, targeting the freeing labour force across the member states. Indeed, labour mobility has, economically, become one of the cornostones of the European integration process, despite the complicated political dynamics. Article 45 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) defined the free movement of labour as a fundamental principle of the Treaty. This freedom is developed by the EU secondary legislation and the case law of the Court of Justice for European Union (CJEU). The EU citizens are now qualified for look for a job work in another member state, without needing a work permit, reside there for that purpose and stay there, even after employment is finished. These entitlements must be understood that the Union citizens enjoy equal treatment with nationals regarding employment, working conditions, and all other social and tax advantages in which they have certain types of health and social security coverage transferred to the host country. This arrangement also applicable to the non-EU countries (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Norway) that are eligible for the principle of free movement of workers in the European Economic Area under the EU social security coordination rules. Hence, the scope and the depth of policy-making in the area of migration have increased immensely. The problem of course is how to satisfy all the increased number of the member states with regard to labour migration, given more diversified and heterogeneous landscape in the late 2000s. Labour mobility from EU-13 (the countries which joined the EU between 2004 and 2013 and Croatia) to the EU aggregate continues to prevail over south-north flows. In particularly, there has been a boost in intra mobility. This was the result of a sharp fall due the crisis continued until 2011. Outflow of workers from the southern European countries is on the rise due to the

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impact of the crisis on intra-mobility. In spite of this, labour mobility is low. Figures from the Office of National Statistics in the UK suggest that the number of eastern European nationals working in Britain fell by 5%. The total number of the EU labour force rose by 101,000 in 2017 to 2.3 million. In 2016, these workers were accounted for just over 50% of the increase in employment, but has now fallen to 25%. As a mater of fact, the number of people working in Britain from western EU countries is at significantly slower pace, although figures continued to rise in 2017. This downward trend perhaps provide fresh evidence that a “Brexodus” is under way (Guardian 2018). The decision of the Britans taken by the referendum will stand as a dramatic turn-around in European cooperation. It will also have a seriously decrease European mobility. For example, approximately 1 million Poles working in the UK will have to return or to accept to have to work under less agreeable labour conditions compared to natives. But the same applies to the approximately 1 million Brits, living in Ireland, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Germany. The Brexit decision will have an impact on non- British EU citizens living in the UK and on Britons living in an EU country outside the UK. That impact will be substantial and the migration flows from EU countries to the UK and the other way around will diminish. As migration has been a win-win for all parties concerned, the new situation is a lose-lose (Ritzen et al. 2017: 45). Broadly speaking, these rules are applied without undue difficulty in the EU wide. Gradually, they have become better understood and observed with the rapid expansion of the EU to include 10 Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs) and later post-Brexit issue. These wrangles seem to spoil somewhat the image of the concept of free movement of labour. In this sense, the issue of labour movement has become politically controversial due to wide income disparities in enlarged EU resulted in economic and social problems. The free movement principle has led large migrant flows from low-income countries in the East to higher income countries in the West. This raised the question of who benefits and loses from free movement of labour. Here, the national governments need to be convinenced that they would benefit mobility in ways that the principle could both otherwise exist. Frankly, these developments relate to the EU’s internal institutions in the process of widening and deepening. In an attempt to prevent acceleration adverse effect of labour mobility, European policy makers have

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become very causes in their behaviour to the extent of which their reaction reflected in the institutional settings. This is despite the governments wanted to have free movement of labour in connection with completing the single market. That’s why free movement of labour—one of the founding principles of the EU—look set to become so important in the debate about its future enlargement. The significant research question are which actors—rather than which migration issues—are important in specific contexts and under what circumstances and preferences in formal process of decision-making for labour migration field.

Policy-Making in the EU Context In the EU system, the legislative decision-making in the EU does not only relate to governments, but a variety of institutions and actors. The relevant actors in legislative system are described as groups (farmers, cooperations, workers, labour unions, the media, interests or lobby groups and political parties within the EP etc.) that pursue the cross-national policies with shared interests. The conflicting policy interests exist within multiple sub communities at both the national and the EU level. More specifically, the relations between the local officials (both elected and bureaucratic) and their constituencies have also been found to significantly shape local immigration policy, with an important role assigned to partizanship (Filomeno 2017: 105). The importance of mobilizations of local immigration helping organisations and their engagement with local governments is often valued by studies. To many observer, the EU has unique institutions from relatively strong and independent decision-making powers point of view. The Commission takes the leads, in particular. As agenda setter, it engages with locked in stokeholders, experts, and agencies. Therefore, this is not least because the Commission develops regulation. The Commission is clearly involved in the EU policy process from start to finish. But contrary to popular belief, the Commission is not an EU legislator. It does not make European law—that is the function of the EU’s Council and the EP (usually acting together) (Egeberg 2004: 132). But this is not to say other institutions are unimportant, far from that. Sharing the responsibility in a multi-level system governance, the EP and the Council of Ministers have become an integral part of joint decision-making (co-legislate) in which the ECJ has marginal role. The example of an element of the policymaking that shapes the EU governance is the fact that most justice and

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other policy areas, such as competition, single market, environmental policy are equally important. Hence, there exists a classical summary of the EU policy process – the Commission proposes, the European Parliament advises, and the Council of Ministers decides (Andersen et al. 2001: 21) and the ECJ ruling on conflicts. Decision-making is complex, since it derives primarily from the horizontal and the vertical separation of powers. There is clearly a separate judiciary; the CJEU, which includes the ECJ and the (European) General Court (EGC), in conjunction with the national systems. But the executive and legislative functions of the EU are mix responsibilities. The Council and the EP share the legislative function. The task of being the EU’s executive—that is holding responsibility for ensuring the EU policy is carried out properly—is chiefly performed by the Commission (at times in collaboration with regulatory agencies), with the Court is also given powers to rule in case of alleged non-compliance with EU policy by member states, a role that has been enhanced by the Treaty on Stability, Coordination an Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union (TSCG) (Drachenberg and Brianson 2016: 201). In the context of the EU, the way in which decisions are taken is associated with the major institutions that try to influence policy. The formal rules may reflect the actual distribution of power among, for example the directorate-general within the Commission. Whithin whole system, the regional and national policy interests pursued by the member states. From theoretical point of view, the role of the Commission is to pursue a greater integration, while in the area of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) in which migration issues fall and national approaches are defended in the Council, which has a reputation for being somewhat conservative and restrictive in its approach. A pro-integration manifested within the responsibilities of the EP, although xenophobic political parties at the EU level are gaining ground to push back integration in migration field. This difference of approaches are exacerbated by the conservative nature of bureaucracies are keen to preserve established procedures. For the governments of the member states are prepared to risk (inability’s to meet public expectations), alternatively portray the EU as the solution to problems and the source of problems. Faced with the migration challenge, some authors have, therefore, analysed the role of bureaucracies, claiming that core executives (i.e., ministers) are powerful in this policy process than any other civil servants. The executives are at the heart of decision-making mechanism in institutional

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arena in which the national governments are able to upload preferences in the area of immigration integration. Others focussing on the role of representative assemblies elected by the mass public suggests that the EU’s normative power can be limited by the influential presence of senior government officials and their significance of power, are arguably most evident in some countries (i.e., by a new Germany hegemony), which may be dangerous. Others have argued that the effect of migration legislation can not be understood without paying systematic attention to the role of member states in uploading domestic preferences to the European level. Indeed, it is hard to ignore constantly growing activism at the top level of member states’ involvement in labour migration policy-making. In the EU executive power, the member states as a second set of actors responsible for implementing the EU legislation through their own bureacracies in a set up supranational organs. They have been delegated important competences in the formulation and the enactment of the EU policy. Yet, the institutional developments and the member states’ compliance with the policy process are inherently supranational and intergovernmental governance nature, which has been described as a dual executive. At the very lowest level, the courts as arbiters of the legality of a policy can spurr legislative efforts at the national level to influence major reforms, as considered by those whose work emanated from the legal tradition. Here it is useful to take theorists into consideration of their analyses of political parties endorse the argument that, in daily policy-making process, there are few signs that parties become more important. The argument is that, while there have been slight increase in the power of the member states via the principle of subsidiary at the lower level, the political parties as actors in power have ability to transform electoral mandates into policies and solely based on this, are regarded as the driving force behind legislation. There are others who are engaged in lobbying in the EU argue that the interest groups are influential actors in EU policy-making, often make their presence felt behind the scenes at different times. Although status and influence of many organized interest are set out in the treaties, their involvement in public policy development are far less clear. And yet others whose analysis involves in the specific economic interest groups conclude that the impact of organized interests, who provide a wealth of information to the EU policy-makers and add depth to a legislative process are profound. In pursuing specific economic interest, their growing presence

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in policy-making is found, perhaps reflecting the interests of capitals, specific firms and multinationals. This brief description of the role of political actors suggests that the authoritative competences in Europe are exercised across multiple levels of government, At the European level, national governments and supranational actors share authority, and the institutions in which they operate have intermeshing competences (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 305). Although a variety of actors influence policy making, focus by the scholarly literature on executive politics has been on two set of actors: the EU institutions and the member states as supranational organs or executives.

Research Questions and Considerations Many scholars agree that question of who makes migration decision has become a salient and contentious issue on the top of public, political, to a lesser extent, media agenda in Europe (Zincone 2011a; Mulcahy 2011; Lahav 2004; Galgoczi and Leschke 2012; van der Brug et al. 2015). More importantly, efforts to “Europeanize” immigration policy unveil a major dilemma now being addressed by policy-makers and scholars alike: the “liberal paradox” (Lahav 2004; Rosamond 2004). Surely, the EU enhances labour mobility, with the creation of ESM. The question is how far its institutional architecture, together the member states’ position permits such mobility. Still, idea that Union’s institutions should able to control policy process is plainly challenging. Considering the conditions that the national government policy may help deal with the issues arising from free movement of labour is a question mark. As claimed, the immigration issue has been politicized in the EU (Lahav 2004; van der Brug et al. 2015). In order to understand process by which the issue of immigration is politicized, it is important to go through the chronicles of regulatory framework. The process of establishing freedom of movement for all nationals of the member states in the EU traces back to the 1957 Treaty of Rome inspired by Monnet’s frontier-free Europe. This was the first realization of a Single-Market Europe, namely the ESM that would comprise an area without internal frontiers. This process was finalized with signing of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, which is known as TFEU, resting on the success of a harmonized immigration policy. The Schengen Agreement, which first went into effect in 1995, abolished many of the EU’s internal borders between Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain. For the

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first time, a new provision in the TFEU was created in the Treaty of Lisbon, dealing expressly with the labour immigration policy. As a result, interconnected global economy refers to free movement of goods, capital, technology and knowledge. Apart from this, there is also free flow of labour. In 2018, the EU celebrated the 50th anniversary of the founding regulation on the free movement of workers. It entails the abolition of any discrimination based on nationality as regards employment, remuneration and other conditions of work and employment. While the process of encouraging labour migration by the European Commission continues, some countries (i.e., Greece and Italy) have already avoided the legal and the societal integration of those migrants already present in their territories. As migration literature suggests, there is a greater resistance for demographic pressure and economic demand that made an opening up the European labour markets unavoidable, implying that Europe’s migration dilemma has reached a critical juncture. Although these legislative developments are most often viewed positively in economic terms, they consist of a number of different elements, some of which are more equivocal and others of which are downright negatives. As this story unfolds, the complexity of immigration debates points to the fact that emphasis is ironically placed on maximizing border control formalities within Europe. The available evidence suggests that what makes the issue of labour mobility more sensitive is based on the ideological ground, the rise of nationalism, racism and xenophobia in Europe. In the face of migration crisis, the rise of the populist far-right has swept through Europe in the last few years, where European elections in many European countries (France, the Netherlands, Austria, the Czech Republic and Germany) were set to continue the upheaval of the political order. Snatching euroscepticism and anti-immigration sentiment, populist right-wing parties have managed to attract voters from across the political spectrum. The discourse has promoting negative values, sometimes behind antiEuropean slogans, when youth unemployment is, especially, widespread. Therefore, the labour market test is often waived for occupations which are deemed to be shortage (Holtslag et al. 2013). The Eurosceptic parties across Europe have boosted their representation, especially on the Europe’s budget austerity that has made the immigration issue more acute. The European policy-makers are forced to deal with, on the one hand, the reality of the increasing agitation of their indigenous public, on

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the other, foreign labour. Facing a growing threat from the UK Independent Party in November 2014, former Prime Minister, David Cameron’s attempt to introduce measures to tighten access to in-work benefits exemplifies the current restrictive policy on labour migration. Cameron set out a number of proposals, aiming to reduce the number of workers exercising their free movement right to live and work in Britain originated from the East. A critical test of the EU longevity lies in its resolution by the European politicians that, in part, constitutes my policy recommendation of this study. A highly politicised topic, the labour migration policy process touches on nerves reaching to the very core of the state of play of the EU’s approach to globally managed policy issues. The question it seeks to address is whether the immigration policies are driven by the external forces, invoking issues of cooperation with the third countries, such as irregular migration, human trafficking, asylum seekers; all matters which the member states have international obligations for cooperation and related instruments for combating human smuggling and trafficking, in particular. A question arises as to whether countries outside the European region can be vital partners, if so, how much powers can be assigned to the external partners to take part in the migration policy process. What would be the implications for such co-operation. It is therefore contributed to a new policy on the legal migration which corresponds with the Commission’s Labour Mobility Package of 2015, to the extent of which a series of long-term economic and demographic challenges may supposedly be eased by importing highly-skilled labour, with the result of to ensure sustainable growth of the EU economy (European Commission 2015). This packadge may suggest that governance of the immigration policy-making is shifting from European arena to the new international actors and a shared management of the European border, and may have important implications for the EU policy-making in legal migration. This inquiry on the labour migration decision-making in Europe has its earliest intellectual origins in the East-West migration following the enlargements of 2004 and 2007. Regarding the 2004 enlargement, most EU countries imposed temporary labour market restrictions on workers from the eight CEECs, with the exception of the UK, Republic of Ireland and Sweden. The restrictions placed in 2007 upon migrants from more recent accession countries came to an end from 1 January 2014. An unexpected surge in migrants—majority from Poland—from those states to the UK caused for concern. The transitional arrangements in the

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enlarged EU would inevitably have caused conflicts with previous bilateral agreements between the old member states (the EU-15) and the former candidate countries of the CEE. At that time, it was widely debated about whether such arrangements would adequately take into account the benefits of larger markets, possibilities for outsourcing and cheaper labour. Indeed, the potential outcomes of liberalized migration were fears and scepticism in the EU member states and optimism in the Eastern European countries. At the same time the European Commission considered these arrangements were of greater value in relation to economic support for higher growth. Even so, these arrangements are complex and not correctly applied in the same way in all member states. Arguably, whole process can be viewed as a blow to make a clear commitment that will presumably be an important organising principle for the labour migration policy decisions in the medium or long term. Hence, debate overall disadvantages of the free movement of labour that has created contention between the member states. The enlargement of 2004 has led to large income differentials within the EU, with average wages between three and four times higher in the EU-15 than new accession countries. In the event of enlargement, the successive governments in the UK have, for instance, come under growing pressure to limit immigration from Europe. In response to public concerns about the impact of immigration on jobs and local services, Cameron intended permanently to reduce the number of European immigrants coming to Britain. Having won the 2015 election, Cameron committed to negotiate the proposals for restricting labour migration and other European leaders followed suit. Obviously, labour migration was a key issue on our membership of the EU, in his attempts to negotiate a new deal for Britain ahead of the July 2016 referendum. While other European governments have looked upon the principle of free movement as an outstanding issue, several are supporting the idea and adamant that the benefit rules for labour flows should be revised. Those advocating strengthening the founding principle, some national governments (i.e., the German Government) have showed enthusiasm to consider these issues. Given that, the national government policy may help to deal with issues arising from the principle of labour mobility in Europe. To the extent, labour migration is pushing down wages due to the increase in labour supply is combined with the complexicity of deepening

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and widening process. Some member states are especially and particularly anxious about the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the Schengen zone. Both countries have already formed opposition in the Council, although the Commission called for meeting the technical requirements upon their accessions in 2012. And though difficult to prove definitively, many have felt that large migrant flows from the low-income countries in the East to higher income countries in the West, income disparities will cause the socio-economic problems. This controversy has even led to veto by some member states in the Council (notably, France, Germany, Finland, and the Netherlands). It is also worth noting that the political controversy over the Schengen accession is partly relates to the mismanagement of judicial corruption or the influence of organised crime in law enforcement in these countries which has deteriorated the situation. Understanding the migration policy-making is possible by examining the link between public opinion and policy, simply implying what European say and think, and what policy makers do. A study by Beutin et al. (2006) showed that immigration is highly salient and has consistently ranked in the top five “most important issues”, as selected by the British public. That’s why, the policy-makers in the UK were under public pressure to tightly control migration immigration was tightly controlled from 1982 to 1997. But migration policy was selectively liberalised to counter the external and the interest group pressures from 1997 to 2004. Other studies consider that the public perception of migration as a central theme (Beutin et al. 2006; Allen 2016) pointing to a striking increase in public attention to migration in the case of recent migration crisis. The images for drown Aylan baby lying on the Turkish peach sparked global sympathy over the fate of migrants in 2015 and consequently the EU national governments’ position on policy was a strong response to the public mood. There is now growing constraints on the policy-makers to respond the public demands for immigrations restriction. And yet the EU continues to be the major locus of common problem solving in Europe and it generates an increasing legislative output. In successive rounds of treaty revisions, European politicians have tried (and often failed) to simplify the policy-making and thus enhance the effectiveness of the EU legislation (Finke 2012). In this regard, the most recent attempt is the Lisbon Treaty of 2009 which had been negotiated with a view ‘to enhanching the efficiency and democratic legitimacy of the Union and to improving the coherence of its action’, as stated inits preamble (Lisbon Treaty, 2009). The 2004 and 2007 enlargements of

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the Union to 27 members, and the Eurozone to 17 members in 2011, made what the Treaty envisaged inevitable (Dinan and Persson 2016: 29). While debate on success of enlargement remains to be explored, it is still disputable whether the EU has accomplished the labour migration policymaking in Europe. There should be no doubts, though considering the EU as an efficient organization. For many, the benchmark for judging labour migration policy process in the EU is the degree of intergovernmentalism that has arguably seen as a resurgent since the Lisbon Treaty, Although its communitarisation of policy-making is generally regarded a remarkable achievement, the intergovernmental arrangements is still applicable to the most dynamic areas of the European migration policy. On a more fundamental level, there has been longstanding ‘vertical’ tensions between the EU institutions and the national governments. The focus is the degree of harmonisation in context of the free movement of labour. At the same time, “horizjkontal” conflicts that have emerged suggest that the member states are sharply divided over a growing divergence of the national interests and a deficit of trust in the enlarged EU and in turn its effect on the mobility. It is sensible to conclude that the policies are directed towards controlling and excluding, rather than enabling immigration to Europe. It is equally important to note that freeing labour mobility within a heterogeneous economic and political union has been progressively introduced in the EU’s 2020 Strategy. A very legislative role of the EU is at a test in light of the economic and the political priorities included in this renewed agenda. According to a European Commission report in 2014 entitled Matching Economic Migration with Labour Market Needs in Europe, ‘the global economic crisis of 2008 and its aftermath represent a difficult period in which to assess the changes in integration and migration policies that would enable the EU countries to cope with future skills needs in light of current demographic trends’. Since the establishment of the ESM of 1986, the EU policy has aimed at removing barriers, as well as creating greater transparency in the labour market. This is despite of fact that more and more member states have gradually removed barriers for intra- EU labour mobility as a result of improving Union’s legal framework. Many studies claim that the EU’ prime goal is now under jeopardy, since the economic crisis of 2008 has changed the intra-EU labour mobility-inconsistence with the nature of the principle of the ESM. The different regulatory framework coexists to the extent of which four members states (namely Germany, Netherlands and Sweden and the UK) are

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in favour of cutting the EU budget at the expense of the less EU countries and regions for a cohesion policy, which is the key instrument for creating economic activity (i.e., employment). Hence, the Union’s capacity for a legitimate, coherent and policy on labour immigration remains to be a key topic covered in this book. Overall, these are presumably real problems that impede the dynamic of free movement and thus require the policy-makers to make radical/logical decisions to resolve them. Obviously, the relevant political and institutional dynamics play their part in this process. As Steunenberg and Selck (2006) pointed out, the institutional setting of the EU has an impact on the outcome. The different legislative procedures established by the member states within the context of the treaties matter and are likely to have an impact on the outcome. The way in which these legislative processes affect the outcome and the reason for the member states’ position—agreement and opposition- in the process is questionable, and the reason given the different and the opposing interests operate in the decision-making mechanism.

Academic Literature on Labour Migration Policy Process There is substantial literature on the migration and migration policies (Ruhs 2008; Zincone 2011a; Carrera et al. 2011; Ruhs and Anderson 2012; Roos 2015; Martin et al. 2015; Kahmann 2015; Fetzer 2016; Hansen 2016; Filomeno 2017). An extensive literature has focused on the most important facts and circumstances of foreign labour, and an increasing number of immigrants in the future (Adnett 1996; Favell and Gedes 2000; Keely 2001; Dummett 2001). A focus is on economic and social performance of those workers regarding skill match and their integration into European labour markets—a policy challenge of growing importance (Abeelen 2007; Tijdens and Klaveren 2012). However, there is very little evidence in the literature on internal and external forces for the policymaking mechanisms within European context. The persistent gaps in the identifying the most influential actors in migration policy-making provide the basis for this study. Therefore, findings of these studies are frequently viewed as incomplete and inconsistent, as far as the governance of labour movement is concerned. Earlier analysis of migration data shows that the period of the 1960– 1970 coincided with mass migration program that was managed by the

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guest-worker scheme (Brown 1988; CEC [Commission of the European Communities] 1989; Gallie 1994). Studies summarized the latest information on both stocks and flows of migrants in Europe, focusing specifically on arrivals from the developing countries. In this particular period, studies did not take account into skill mismatch for migrant workers, but rather issues of immigrants’ earnings and wages, and remittances for returning migrants. These studies emphasized on “brain drain” and musculinity issues in which the phrase “migrants and their families” was a code for “male migrants and their wives and children.” Aral (1997) and Akgündüz (2008) analysed a set of possible explanatory factors of large numbers of Turkish workers to the Western European countries, mainly to Germany, to fill the demand for cheap labour in a booming post-war economy. This literature continued in the 1980s, with important contributions, among others, by Chiswick (1978), Borjas (1985) and Freeman (1986), but slightly different nature of migration policy became more related and relevant issues were launched: the national government policy intervention in the immigrants’ assimilation process to accelerate this process was the key to this. Later, the integration of migrants and its effects on the labour market drew attention of many scholars of whom, for instance, Cliffton (2007) provided a valuable work on an overview of the situation of immigrants in the EU by focusing on the process of their integration and its impact on the labour market. Greve (2011) in his Labour Migration and Labour Market Integration: Causes and Challenges improved this framework, with the most important EU policies of assimilation in receiving countries. The empirical basis for two facts; immigrant earnings grow rapidly, as they assimilate into western societies. In reviewing the literature, it is important to recognise that the time period of 1990s covered by studies (Chiswick 1991; Gallie 1994) is highly relevant as the impacts of migration on the European labour market outcomes are already beginning to born fruits. This owned liberalized policy. The adoption of the new measures (i.e., the European Single Act of 1986) improved the situation in social policy context, guaranteeing the free movement of labour was set in by 1992 by the TFEU. In the light of new environment, research began to include socioeconomic rights and the construction of integrated labour markets, but did not cause a dramatic shift in thinking about who migrated (Baldwin et al. 1997; Dustmann et al. 2003). As a result, studies attempted to place the patterns and the trends of labour migration into a coherent framework. These two studies

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by Fassmann and Hintermann (1998), and Fassmann and Munz (2002) are important for their details of generating a positive impact on labour markets for the period concerned. After years of retrenchment, towards a comprehensive approach was possible. For a long time ago, studies that turned their attention to flexible labour markets in which workers could move freely, now claimed that should be more efficient, modern and accessible to all European citizens. Castles (2006) gave two main reasons: first, the imperatives of economic liberalization and globalization on the basis of securing flexibility; second, demographic shifts, with increasing dependence on migrants, which could lead to the social changes. Since 2004, there has been an EU-wide approach to the admission of migrant workers. Understanding the international migration, researchers now took into account many different types of migration including, temporary, returning migration, highskilledand low-skilled workers, legal migration, asylum seekers (Biffl 2001; Archick and Kim 2008; Dustmann et al. 2003; Carrera 2005; Stalker 2002). In the enlarged European context, these issues were more deeply debated in the following years. Most analyses of enlargement impacts of migration are well placed to assess the effects across the labour markets over time. Kancs (2011) studied the impact of migration policy liberalisation on labour migration in an enlarged EU and, especially examined the direction, size and the dynamics of potential labour migration after the end of the transitional measures. Focused on static models. Dustmann et al. (2003) found the negative short-term impacts of migration and the positive effects on overall native unemployment on labour market outcomes fornatives by, presumably, overlooking interactions between different markets. This was followed by additional research by Messina (2007) and Lahav (2004), who concluded that immigrants and natives were not perfect substitutes and that the effect of immigration was mainly borne by existing immigrants through lower wages. Boeri and Brucker (2000) estimated the causal impact and clamed that any restrictions on mobility from the Eastern enlargement would depend on the capacity of the country concerned to fulfil the necessary requirements. No matter how these scholars view the impact of labour flows, findings from a wide range of studies in a variety of countries do not provide a consistent guide to delineate the policy. The political significance of how such flows is that they are governed in the EU, let alone the impact of immigrants on the native labour market outcomes. It should also be noted that studies

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that looked at the earlier period, when levels of labour movement were relatively low, generally found little impact on wages and employment. Additionally, transitional measures were fully justifyable, as long as labour market integration between the old and new member states was to be achieved gradually. Recent advances in this area of research markthe new recruitment approaches that adopted in the post-enlargement period. In fact, these new approaches already studied by Salt (1992) pointed to fact that globalization was producing an increasing diversity of flows and the Western European countries were now engaged in migration systems that were growing in size and complexity. Employers and some governments were prepared to extend their search for skills to a global level, while other governments were keen to promote labour exports in return for remittances and savings. This new situation in Europe was further addressed by Zimmermann (2005) as an attractive strategy to execute a selective immigrationpolicy to attract the highly qualified workers needed in innovative industries. Putting forward the question of whether one could talk of the globalisation of migration flows, Tapinos and Delaunay (2000) expressed their views as the increasing diversity of migrants’ nationalities and the migration channels used, as well as the growing proportion of movements of temporary and skilled workers in total migration flows, does show that migration is now taking place in the context of economic globalisation.

Crucial to understanding the impact of globalization of migration flows at door, Carrera et al. (2011) has shown that the EU’s capacity for a legitimate, coherent and migrants’ rights compliant policy on labour immigration is now more than ever at a test in light of the political priorities set in the EU’s 2020 Strategy and the effects of the revolutions and war in North African states. To this end, Lahav’s analysis (2004) immigration norms has provided a significant contribution to later works in this field, arguing that increasingly progress in European integration required reinvention of borders that could solely be understood by reviewing norms and attitudes—coexisted in the European societies—that underpin immigration policy. Menz’s (2015) shed some light on this complexity. Accordingly, the overall goal is to constructentry channels for economic migrants with no real regard to humanitarian considerations or indeed the

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well-documented deleterious consequences of aggressive labour recruitment, such as “brain drain” phases. Despite these proposed solutions, studies have typically paid too little attention to the challenges towards ensuring a global rights-based approach to migration. Studies that cover more recent time periods—from 2010 onwards— are likely to provide a closer indication of currentmigration impacts to both changes in the volume and composition of migrant flows over time. Such flows are examined in the East-West context. In the event of flood of migrants from the East, emphasis tend to placeon differences between high-skilledand low-skilled workers, displacement effects on low-skilled workers are more frequently the case. The literature consistently suggests that economic migration and its effect is likely to be the greatest for the low skilled (Bale 2008; Dumont 2014; Krause and Rinne 2017). In this respect, a new migration policy corresponds with the Commission’s Action Plan on the integration and the reforms in the context of “Blue Card” scheme for highly skilled workers from outside the EU. Much of migration policy is about how significantly the EU has sorted out deep-seated differences in rules, standards and practices that attracted scholarly attention. Whereas this is by no means the only theoretical approach informing studies on the EU labour migration legislation. It is certainly a very limited and influential one, although variations of the research questions above resulted in a substantial number of scholarly works accounting for the gradual development of insitutional decisionmaking in the area of labour migration policy. While the existence literature is concerned with the interpretation policy outcome of migration development, academic work is inclusive of understanding of migration policy in general, because it now undeniably forms an importance of the member state governments in the face of crisis. The guidance of the 2009 Lisbon Treaty has, to some extent, clarified the allocation of responsibilities of institutional actors. Even so, this insight may no longer viable. There is a well-established theoretical literature in support of this point. As Princen (2009) established in a path-breaking study, variation in the positions of supranational actors (i.e., the Commission and the EP) and the perception of the member states of desirability are closely related to a description of the policy demand (inputs). For this purpose, the earlier review has selected those scholarly works that focus specifically on analysing strengthening the links between supranational and national level of governance. von Bogdandy (2006) contributed to the debate of “grand legislation”, which entails involvement

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of the Commission, the Council and, usually, the EP. While adopting rather abstract conceptual framework, the study draws upon the Commission’s closer alignment with the national governments in rule-making. A Study by Benz (2004) reveals that the national governments haveuntil now made great and successfull efforts to participate the European policymaking. But before then, they lacked adequate procedures to influence or control behaviour of their own in negotiations, which is, as suggested, consistent with the notion of accountability. Similarly, Mauer focused on the research of systematic features of the national political systems as key elements for conceptualizing the changes of political systems during the process of interaction, cooperation and integration between the various forms of collective entities within realm of the EU (Maurer 2002: 52). In slighly different manner, Trenz and Eder (2004) has developed an analytical model that constitutes the institutional dynamics of expanding in the JHA field, slowing harmonizing the member states’ individual security policies by creating area of justice, freedom and rights. A particular attention is paid to work of Wallace, who evaluated the EU politics and policy. Wallace’s evaluation in 2004 came up with conclusion of the crucial role of the EU government. In the absent of a European government, governance a fuzzier concept, has emerged as an apparently more malleable term for addressing the way in which the EU operates (Wallace 2003: 4). This review of governance has been selected by other scholarly works that focus specifically on an analysis of diffusing a range of political processes through which the policy agendas have found their translation in the legislation adopted. Lately, the academic literature has paid extensive attention to complexity of policy-process at the EU level, suggesting that European migration governance is complex, involving multiple actors and institutions, operating at different levels, and with different objectives; and different types of migration are regulated by different policy regimes (Somer 2012: 30). As claimed by Benz (2004), the complexity of multi-level governance has its virtues, but also its vices. From a theoretical point of view, the differentiated structures promise that there will be a sufficient consideration of citizens’ interests regarding European, national, regional and local concerns (Benz 2004: 86). Indeed, these are few indications that one can witness a complex set of actors structured according to levels (local, national and international) in the literatue review. A multitude of actors is taken into consideration for a detailed understanding of policy process. Examining executive decision-making actors, a focus by political scientists

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is generally on the parliaments on the national level. No less important, the relative powers of the ministers, who address special interest across the whole government or their potential in formal procedures is subject of academic work. An emphasis by others is given to the political commitments of civil servants in the modern day of buracracies. There has been a systematic analysis of strength of the interest groups in the legislative process. Given the most recent analysis carried out to examine the incoherencies characterising the EU’s labour immigration policies, a widely discussed reason for the growing of support for new labour immigration policies has been advanced. To illustrate this viewpoint, Castles (2004) gave three reasons for policy failure; factors arising from the social dynamics of the migratory process; factors linked to globalization and the North-South divide; and factors arising within political systems. Castles concluded that the migration policies might be more successful if they were explicitly linked to long-term political agendas concerned with trade, development and conflict prevention. Castles’s analysis has taken great strides to understand the current EU’s policy on immigration (and asylum), but again failed to elaborate the EU’s policy process and recent migration data resulted from the post-enlarged Europe. One solution that Menz (2015) offered to overcome this situation is that a rapid elaboration of a comprehensive framework of the EU’s directives spanning most types and categories of immigration that remains to be attracted a significant interest on the part of individuals or bodies of empirical research. Especially, the current migration crises, as well as postenlargement labour floods are required to provide a much more sophisticated understanding of theoretical approaches of why and how and by whom the EU policies are shaped, directed and occasionally determined changes in recent labour movement. To date there has been little evidence in the literature of a statistically significant. The inherent complexity of phenomenon, which impacts Europeans labour markets in many different ways, calls for a variety of responses. Yet, the policies of supranational bodies, the most notably the Commission and the member states may have some success in preventing policymaking and effectively managing immigrationand integration. The key questions addressed by this study include what interests (i.e., national, European, ideological) would motivate the member states to support labour mobility. To what extent, has the economic crisis led the national governments to follow restrictive policies on mobility? On what basis

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would some member states cooperate and others would converge? How can liberal democracies reconcile efforts to control labour mobility, with those to promote open borders? To what extent does the triumph of global forces makes the free movement of labour inevitable? And what would be mobility of workers (liberal or restrictive), if any, in the posteconomic crisis? The member states and the EU’s response to a new situation, with a free movement of labour, closely and empirically are combined with the institutional development and the developing norms that are cause for particular concern for this study.

Structure and Scope of This Book By now it is clear that polices works at many different levels, from the local community to the national level, combined with the multinational level within the context of the EU. Analysing the labour migration policymaking is primarily finding out how institutional actors and the member states have interacted with each other and influence the outcome and whether or not the process of seeking common solution is easy or difficult, conflictual or cooperation. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate which factors are most influential in EU’s policy-making for labour migration, with a particular focus on the post-enlargement labour flows. A multitude of actors is taken into consideration for a detailed understanding of policy process. An analysis of both institutional and the political actors is essential, because all these factors may affect the supply and demand for legal and, to some extent, international labour. As the legislative powers of actors change, so do labour flows, pointing to the significance of this change. A more detailed analysis of the structure and composition of the EU institutions is, therefore, essential in order to comprehend the labour migration policy-making in the EU. The main objective of each of this book is to underlie two main points in an integrated fashion. Firstly, this book highlights the basic characteristics of these actors in the light of institutions and the member states, in particularly underlying their theoretically defined powers. Secondly, it foceses on the observations in the recent literature in relations to the role of these actors in the EU’s labour migration policy-making process. These two main objectives will shed some light on the main characteristics of each of these players with reference to the recent developments in the free movement of labour and cover the role of institutions within different theoretical explanations. The book pays particular attention to

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works of scholars who have produced policy evaluations to support the distinction of policy competences of different actors. Following this introduction, therefore, the prompting of the book is organized into eight additional chapters: • Chapter 2,“Theorizing EU Policy-Making” represents into more detail, the most common theoretical approaches, explaining the governance of immigration policy in the EU. It addresses the notion of new institutionalism through three governance approaches; historical institutionalism, rational choice institutionalism and social institutionalism, and by tracing their emergence over time. The second section presents the concept of multi-level governance as another application of the study of labour migration governance at the European level. • Chapter 3, “The European Policy Approach to the Labour Migration Problem”, on the basis of the existing literature, surveys historically the EU’s evolving applicable rules and policies since the 1960s. Hence, aspects of the internal and the external factors policy influencing historical policy-making are highlighted. Special attention is paid to the EU’s global approach to migration and mobility. The chapter makes sense of why the EU, partner countries and migrants should establish closer relationship for common good. • Chapter 4, “Recent Trends in Labour Migration”, examines the issue of potential barriers to cross-border mobility, both at EU level and at the level of individual countries. Focus is on the obstacles for regulation matters for the national policy-making because the EU frames possibilities for some policies to be developed rather than the policies of labour flows. The chapter explores how these obstacles have been associated with the changing pattern of labour migration. • Chapter 5, “Policy Process in the European Union” reviews four main policy-making frameworks, as such, and more with capturing fundamental features; their variation, specific forms and dynamics of policy-making in relation to the labour migration issues, following taking up debate about mode of governmance. • Chapter 6, “Institutional Decision-Making in the EU”, touches upon an explanation of how the contemporary system of legislative decision-making works at the EU level. • Chapter 7,“Labour Migration Policy-Making in the EU”, offers a multitude of institutional actors into consideration and which forces, and mechanisms prevent or obstruct change in the labour migration

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policies and their decision makings, and which ones stimulate, inspire or even impose changes. • Chapter 8.“The EU as Efficient Polity in Migration: Conflict and Cooperation” is based on the assumption that holds the political realities exist only by the political actors’ agreement and therefore are essentially contestable and challenging, when seeking common solutions for the labour mobility problems. • Chapter 9 offers concluding remarks.

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Egeberg, M. (2004). The European Commission. In M. Cini (Ed.), European Union politics (pp. 131–147). Oxford University Press. European Commission. (2015). Better regulation for better results—An EU agenda (COM(2015) 215). Brussels. https://ec.europa.eu/smartregulation/better_regulation/documents/com_2015_215_en.pdf. Fassmann, H., & Hintermann, C. (1998). Potential East-West migration, demographic structure, motives and intentions. Czech Sociological Review, 6(1), 59– 72. Fassmann, H., & Munz, R. (2002). EU enlargement and future East-West migration. In F. Laczko (Ed.), New challenges for migration policy in Central and Eastern Europe (pp. 59–86). Asser Press. Favell, A., & Geddes, A. (2000). Immigration and European integration: New opportunities for transnational political mobilization. In R. Koopmans & P. Statham (Eds.), Challenging immigration and ethnic relations politics: Comparative European perspectives. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fetzer, J. S. (2016). Open borders and international migration policy, the effects of unrestricted immigration in the United States, France, and Ireland. Palgrave Macmillan. Filomeno, F. A. (2017). Politics of citizenships and migration. Palgrave Macmillan. Finke, D., Konig, T., Proksch, S.-O., & Tsebelis, G. (2012). Reforming the European Union: Realising the impossible. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Freeman, G. P. (1986). Migration and the political economy of the welfare state. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 485, 51–63. Galgoczi, B., & Leschke, J. (2012). Intra-EU labour migration after eastern enlargement and during the crisis (Working Papers). European Trade Union Institute. Gallie, D. (1994). Patterns of skill change: Upskilling, deskilling, or polarization? In R. Penn, M. Rose, & J. Rubbery (Eds.), Skills and occupational change. Oxford University Press. Greve, B. (2011). Labour migration and labour market integration: Causes and challenges. In E. Carmel, A. Cerami, & T. Papadopoulos (Eds.), Migration and welfare in the new Europe. The Policy Press. Guardian. (2018, February 21). Number of Eastern EU nationals in UK workforce falls by 5%. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/feb/21/ number-of-western-eu-nationals-in-uk-workforce-falls-by-5-percent. Hansen, P. (2016). The European Union’s external labour migration policy; rationale, objectives, approaches and results 1999–2014 (OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers, No. 185). Paris: OECD. http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1787/5jlwxbxflc0r-en. Henry, G., & Pastore, F. (2014, April). The governance of migration, mobility and asylum in the EU: A contentious laboratory (Governable Imagining Europe, International Institutional Affairs, No. 5).

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Hönekopp, E., & Werner, H. (2000, January). Is the EU’s labour market threatened by a wave of immigration? Eastern enlargement. Intereconomics, 35(1), 3–8. Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Multi-level governance in the European Union. In B. F. Nelson & Stubb, A. (Eds.), The European Union, readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 281–311). Palgrave Macmillan. Holtslag, J. W., Kremer, M., & Schrijvers, E. (2013). Making migration work, the future of labour migration in the European Union. Amsterdam University Press. Kahmann, M. (2015). The politics of migrants irregularity. In M. Bernaciak (Ed.), Market expansion and social dumping in Europe. Routledge Advances in European Politics. Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group. Kancs, D. A. (2011, June). Labour migration in the enlarged EU: A new economic geography approach. Journal of Economic Policy Reform, 14(2), 171– 188. Keely, C. B. (2001). Replacement migration: The wave of the future? [Special issue 2]. International Migration, 39(6), 103–110. Krause, A., & Rinne, U. (2017). European labour market integration: What the experts think. International Journal of Manpower, 38(7), 954–974. Lahav, G. (2004). Immigration and politics in the new Europe. Cambridge University Press. Martín, I., & Venturini, I. (2015). A comprehensive labour market approach to EU labour migration policy, Migration Policy Centre, EU. http://ec.europa. eu/transparency/regexpert/index.cfm?do=groupDetail.groupDetailDoc&id= 19245&no=1. European Migration Institute. Martin, I., Bartolomeo, A. D., de Bruycker, P., Renaudiere, G., Salamonska, ´ J., & Venturini, A. (2015). Exploring new avenues for legislation for labour migration to the European Union. Directorate General for Internal Policies Policy Department C: Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, European Parliament. Maurer, A. (2002). Parlamentarische Demokratie in der Europaischen Union: Der Beitrag des Europaischen Parlaments und der nationalen Parlamente. BadenBaden: Nomos. Menz, G. (2015). Framing the matter differently: The political dynamics of European Union labour migration policymaking. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28(4), 554–570. Messina, A. M. (2007). The logics and politics of post-WWII migration to Western Europe. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Mulcahy, S. (2011). Europe’s migrant policies, illusions of integration. Palgrave Macmillan. Princen, S. (2009). Agenda setting in the EU. Palgrave Macmillan. Ricceri, M. (2011). Labour mobility in Europe: The challenge of the “liquid” society. In C. Larsen, R. Hasberg, A. Schmid, M. Bittner, & F. Clement

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(Eds.), Measuring geographical mobility in regional labour market monitoring. State of the Art and Perspectives. Rainer Hampp Verlag. Ritzen, J., Kahanec, M., & Haas, J. (2017). EU mobility. Economics Policy Paper Series. The IZA Institute of Labour Economics. Roos, C. (2015). EU politics on labour migration: Inclusion versus admission. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28(4), 536–553. Rosamond, B. (2004). New theories of European integration. In M. Cini (Ed.), European Union politics (pp. 109–131). Oxford University Press. Ruhs, M. (2008, February). Economic research and labour immigration policy. Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 24(3), 404–427. Ruhs, M., & Anderson, B. (2012). Reliance on migrant labour: Inevitability or policy choice? Journal of Poverty and Social Justice, 20(1), 23–30. De Somer, M. (2012). Trends and gaps in the academic literature on EU labour migration policies (CEPS Paper in Liberty and Security in Europe, No. 50/December). Salt, J. (1992). Migration processes among the highly skilled in Europe. International Migration Review, Sage Journals. Stalker, P. (2002). Migration trends and migration policy in Europe. International Migration, 40(5), 151–179. Steunenberg, B., & Selck, T. (2006). Testing procedural models of EU legislative decision-making. In R. Thomson (Ed.), European Union decides (pp. 54–85). Cambridge University Press. Tapinos, G., & Delaunay, G. (2000). Can one really talk of the globalisation of migration flows? In OECD Globalisation, migration and development. Paris: OECD. Tijdens, K., & Klaveren, M. (2012). A skill mismatch for migrant workers? Evidence from wage indicator survey data. In B. Galgoczi, J. Leschke, & A. Watt (Eds.), EU labour migration in troubled times. Ashgate. Trenz, H.-J., & Eder, K. (2004, February). The democratizing dynamics of a European public sphere. European Journal of Social Theory, 7 (1): 5–25. van der Brug, W., D’Amato, G., Ruedin, D., & Berkhout, J. (2015). The politicisation of migration. Routledge. von Bogdandy, A. (2006). Constitutional principles. In A. von Bogdandy & J. Bast (Eds.), Principles of European constitutional law (pp. 3–52). Oxford: Hart. Wallace, H. (2003). Contrasting images of European governance. In Beate Kohler-Koch (Ed.), Linking EU and national governance (pp. 1–9). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Zimmermann, K. (2005, December). European labour mobility: Challenges and potentials. De Economist, 153(4, Spring), 425–450. Zincone, G. (2011a). Conclusion: Comparing the making of migration policies, dynamics of actors and context. In G. Zincone, R. Penninx, & M. Borkekt (Eds.), Migration policymaking in Europe (pp. 247–291). IMICOE Research. Amsterdam University Press.

CHAPTER 2

Theorizing the EU Policy-Making

Introduction When assessing and conceptualizing the general nature of the integration process, in particular the organizational nature of the EU, there is a wide range of different approaches that focus on the EU as a political system. A variety of these approaches derives from the multi-dimensional character of the European integration. The reasons for these approaches are complicated and cast some light on the institutional aspects of policy-making. A considerable overlap exists between these approaches, while they diverge in some important ways. Here, focus is largely restricted to approaches and other concepts applied in the study of the EU governance. From the theoretical viewpoint, attention is necessarily restricted to examining labour migration policy process.

Background: Approaches and Concepts Applied in the Study of EU Policy Process Until now, the study of the theories of public policy-making was largely neglected. They have recently remarkably become the main features of the EU studies. This was all the more true because, for the first time, the Treaty of Rome established the principle of free movement of people. From the early years of the 1950s, the transformation of power from the member states to the EU is evident in terms of policy making competence. Anyone can sense that the EEC has moved forward with advances © The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_2

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in cooperation. There is no question that the member states show enthusiasm towards integration. Since then, the Union is, arguably, dominating a major source of policy output in Europe. Given that, it is important to comprehend how policy is made in the European context. Studies on the EU governance have predominantly focused on theories of politics and decision-making in an intergovernmental context, highlighting governance as a political phenomenon that requires clarification. In the period of 1970s–1980s, the EC studies featured worthless to focus on. The period concerned prejudged as sue generis phenomenon by the political scientists and the scholars of International Relations (IR). Much work had done upon intergovernmental functioning of the EC, it certainly had the potential for progressing. The general spirit was the failure of the integration theory. The intense period of the economic crises followed the oil shock of 1973. This reflected on the speed and extent of integration process encountered with the accession of the UK, Ireland and Denmark in 1973 that questioned the distribution of budgetary responsibilities of the EC policies. One aspect of this development was lack of progress in institutional-building at the European level, which led to less theorizing integration process in general. In brief, the period witnessed the existence of the national forms of governance, as it was not possible to create supranational institutions. The 1980s witnessed the apparent revival in the European integration, mainly due to the creation of the SEA of 1986. While recognizing that each of institutional functions had its own rules and law making procedures, which the EC must preserve, there was no reason why the member states should not open up their internal markets to the citizens of their counterparts. Once initiated, the implementation of the common market was to give rise to the policy competence of its institutions in the policymaking rules. Through the implementation, it is indispensable starting point that the supranational rules inspire scholars to come up with new ideas about the institutional functioning of the EU. These scholars have touched upon reasonable grounds to ease market rigidities derived from a set of regulatory institutions widespread in the EU. Given that, it is not hard to evaluate exactly where regulatory complexity exists in almost all sectoral level. Certainly, process can be made and far more information can be exchanged between stakeholders. Majone argued that the creation of the single market would result in uneven distribution of resources and give way to the regulatory governance system that is sweeping across the EU

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member states. Thus, the term “regulatory state” is taken up by Majone (1994), who is intended to include a spectrum of approaches. As Majone implies, advances in capitalist economy have transferred the features of regulatory states, which are differentiated from the positive interventionist states. As a result, the greater role is assigned to the national governments to redistribute resources in the form of welfare state. Understandably, the aim of interference is to reform labour market deficiency in the case of regulatory state. From this perspective, it seemed quite likely that a tremendous boost would be given to regulate the European single market owing to the welfare function associated with the post-war state. The decision to create a common market reflects motivations for triggering a regulatory form of policy-making. Surely, one conclusion of Majone’s ideas is that the experience of the creation of the single market has created support for the regulatory state. But not everyone support the view of the important steps in the process of regulating single market. The model of deregulation has increasingly taken place as a result of market perfection in European labour markets. The economic interests are often standing features for governments‘ intervention. The literature on governance suggests that the traditional method of public regulation, intervention, and legislation are being displaced and that authority is becoming dispersed amongst a variety of actors. The state retains a key role in governance, but its role is being reformulated and, arguably, residualized. The EU is thought of as a very interesting ad pertinent laboratory for the exploration of these trends, a point taken up by the literature on multi-level governance (Rosamond 2004: 119). As this proceeds, the EU gradually turn into “protective Union”, due to the inability of the member states to embrace changes in the context of a new multi-level governance arrangement. While the intergovernmental approach of decision making has now been obsolete, where by institutional change coexists, different immigration scholars often make reference to this change. This dynamic of multi-level governance was largely absent in the intergovernmental account prior to creation of the common market. The main trigger was, of course, the creation of the spillover concept. Regarding the European integration, a substantial revival in academic interest is evidenced in the 1990s. Irrespective of its very economic scope, the institutional developments proved to be a success for maximising the efficient policy-making as a result of treaty revisions proceeded at the Maastricht European Council in 1992. While the EC was taking shape in the form

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of neofunctionalism, a great spillover potential in the socio-economic and political domains became a reality. In the process of European integration, it is important to develop a view of treaty revisions, as often regarded big history making decisions. Move from intergovernmental manner to supranational policy-making in the area of technical regulation and economic governance is gradual one and in the process of more analysis. This has been conducted in different areas of the EU activity, as suggested by scholars of the multi-level governance school. Over the last decade, there is a growing tendency of the EU scholars to conceptualize the policy network analysis. It is much unclear whether the concept means the institutional interactions. Kasim (1994) argues that the policy network approach distances itself from such interaction, which is the main characteristic of the EU policy process. Whereas Peterson (2004) touches upon the multi-actor character of the EU policy mirrors regulatory, unstable and flexible features. In a similar vein, arena for theorizing has opened up by Peterson and Bomberg (1999) in the name of policy network analysis. A significant decision-making material is beginning to be used in the European political mainstream. The core of the EU policymaking sheds some light on the complex decision-making situations. The policy network analysis featured, by Peterson and Bomberg is associated with, what is called the “multiple stakeholding actors”. This is one of the key concepts in theorizing European integration viewed virtually as politics of influence. The use of this ideology is now well established in the field of European integration. It is also viewed as mutual dependence in the circumstances of which power is dispersed. For Richardson (2001), the concept of policy network is adjustable and compliancy with divisions, and tangles in which policy-making is intermingled, while pointing to the multiple stakeholder relations. A much stronger interest in policy outcomes by the political actors is often the case when they involve in policy network analysis. This illustrates a dilemma inherited in national politics with an emphasis placed upon liaison among different entities (government departments, pressure groups, political parties etc.). In a sense, networks necessitate exchange of resources between the members of various organizations and agencies. There might be much more rule-bound interactions between the institutions enshrined in constitutions. Hence, a much stronger European identity that is assumed to be the specific relations of mutual dependency among the actors in different sectors.

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To the extent that the scholars point to the role for the theories of policy analysis, an empirical question begs continuing research on the different sort of theory in the face of different level of action. The core argument is that level of action including super-systemic, systemic and sectoral, which are embedded in various relevant integration process. This claim is important, if often overlooked. The analysis is so much about different variables in which scholars interested operates in the EU arena. In the post enlargement period, many classical models of labour economics would certainly posit that an immigration-caused expansion of the labour pool would both increase the unemployment rate of natives and reduce their average wages (Fetzer 2016: 22). Hence, the EU action on labour migration marks employment of diverse and multiplicity of the instruments. The question of implication for their impacts on the labour migration and effectiveness has drawn scholarly attention. A slightly different take on this question is to look upon the EU as trends that are changing the ways in which governance is delivered in modern complex societies. Nonetheless, in the absence of broad material on migration policymaking in the EU, it is often suggested that considerable level of theoretical work would be needed to overcome this weaknesses. For some in the late 1990s, the world of “grand integration theory” was growing intellectual stale. The essence of oversight procedures with reference to diverse and multiplicity of the instruments is that they determine the extent of labour mobility and thus prove profound implications for the common market. This is to say, the policies emerge from the policy-making process concerning the institutional change and the resource dependencies and each level is associated with different theoretical tools. This situation can be explained by the super-systematic level in the context of IR theories and the systematic level of analysis points to the new institutionalist theories. On this point, the EU is a process and an organization in nature that in itself raises complexity. No single theory can explain the EU as a process and an organization. This necessitates to study of different sets of conceptual and theoretical tools. Supposedly, all students of European integration—first and foremost—those working on the EU—question applicability of policy network approach, while admitting that no other theories are capable of explaining the national governance in form of multi-actor character. The EU decision-making is already the most complex process ever created by the both deepening and widening process and it is going to become even more so.

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New Institutionalism Essentially, new institutionalism has rooted in an idea that actions of the political actors shape policy-making and thus its decisiveness lies in determining decisional outcomes. In order to influence policy-making procedure, new institutionalism broadly delineates the role and the responsibilities and fuses a variety of formal and informal course of actions, practices, relationships, committees, customs and norms. Historically, the rise of institutionalist analysis of the EU did not develop in isolation, but reflected a gradual and widespread reintroduction of institutions into a large body of theories (such as Pluralism, Marxism, and neo-realism), in which institutions had been either absent or considered phenomenal, reflection of deeper causal factors or processes such as the distribution of power in domestic societies or in the international system. By contrast with these institution-free account of politics, which dominated much of the political science between the 1950s and 1970s, three primary “institutionalisms” developed during the course of the 1980s and early 1990s, each with a distinct definition of institutions and a distinct account of how they “matter” in the study of politics (Pollack 2010: 21). As a consequence of prevalence of institutional developments in the 2000s, the EU now displays a wide, varied, and in many respect highly, complex set of policy processes. Hence, new institutionalism has revolved beyond traditional structure of government, especially influence of societal groups in the policy-making process. One thing that was new about this reassertation of institutionalism was that institutions were not just defined as the formal organizations that the old institutionalism had recognized—such as parliaments, executives, and judicial courts—but extended to categorize informal patterns of structured interactions between groups as institutions themselves. These structured interactions were institutions in the sense that they constrained or shaped group behaviour (Bach and George 2006: 24). In short, the main difference between the “old” and “new” institutionalism is that former is lacked in analysing the formal powers and structures decision-making institutions. A great deal has changed in policy terms since the humble beginning of the EU integration. The new institutionalism asserted itselves over behaviouralism that prevailed over political science in the 1960s and 1970s. The formal institutional analysis and politics were challenged by the behavioural approaches, which faded away in due course, in spite of

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Table 2.1 The new institutionalism Rational choice institutionalism Historical institutionalism Sociological institutionalism

The changing relative power of institutions The long-term effects of institutions The role of the culture or persuasion and communication action

Source Hall and Taylor (1996)

this glowing period. Although rationalism and behaviouralism are inspiring concepts in social and political science circle, they have become under attack by the emergence of new institutionalism since 1980s. Beyond a core shared interest in institutions, Hall and Taylor (1996) spread out these principles into broad sphere. They identified three analytical approaches, in which core features are briefly given (Table 2.1). As the table suggests above, explaining and understanding of these three analytical approaches, differ widely in the supranational- intergovernmental dichotomy, but they share common purpose in the sense that the EU commentators ask how power is exercised and which institutions most influence the policy-making process and how. To that extent, they ask for reasons and causes of legislation act. The approaches in the study of domestic and comparative politics have asked these sort of questions concerning the EU governance/politics gave way to the new institutionalism. The EU is without question the most densely institutionalised international organization in the world, with a welter of intergovernmental and supranational institutions, and a rapidly growing body of primary and secondary legislation, the so-called acquis communautaire (Pollock 2004: 137). And importance of institutions is considered to be vital in the EU governance mode. Basically, among more far reaching ideas relating to the debate, the argument presented by new institutionalist is that the formal institutions are viewed as biased mechanism in which decisions are made. Therefore, the attainment of neutral arena is a difficult task to the extent of which some societal groups have unrestricted access to the political process at the expense of others because of the nature of formal structure of institutions and rules. Given that, new institutionalists remain hopeful—the EU can achieve to establish the self-ruling political actors in institutional matters.

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Rational Choice Institutionalism The bulk of the literature is confined to the studies of supranational organizations in terms of delegating powers from the member states to the supranational level and less so, on the effect of these organizations to shape the process of European integration. But even in this relatively narrow field, and in spite of the considerable number of test hypothesis on rational choice theory, most scholars accept that the national governments conduct the whole affair of delegating of power with the utmost discretion. For critics, type of functions may produce intriguing results, but it relies too much on unrealistic assumptions regarding governments’ attempt to reduce democratic deficit on a day-to-day basis. A rationalist perspective emphasizes actors’ preferences over temporal qualities of mandates, decisional rules and policy, which are informed by desire to maximize some material outcome, and highlights contestation and choice surrounding political time. Political time is a resource that can be used; it is instrumental and consequential. Rationalist approaches emphasize that temporal institutions act as opportunities and constraints on actors’ strategies, affecting both when and how to act (Goetz and Meyer-Sahling 2009: 190). To put it simply, the rational choice institutionalism deals with shape, channel and constraint of the rational actions of political actors by institutions. An emphasis is placed on the limitations that formal institutional structures dignifies actors at both national and the EU level. Here, the behaviour of political actors matter. In this sense, it is important to identify the parameters that are set by the fact that they are acting within a specific framework of rules. For example, activities of the interest groups reflect procedures that prevail for the passage of the legislation that effects them. The access point that are available to them in that process and the previous relationships that they have established with the key decision makers. In the case of the EU, whether interest groups chose to try to influence legislation through the national governments or through the Commission and the EP would reflect: • the relative openness to those groups of the national government actors compared with the supranational actors; • the extent to which the process was intergovernmental (e.g. what decisions rules applied within Council of Ministers);

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• what role of the EP had in the final decision (Bach and George 2006: 24). Originally, the rational choice institutionalism began with the effort by the American political scientist to understand the origins and effects of US Congressional institutions on legislative behaviour and policy outcomes. By contrast with the early rational-choice models of US legislative behaviour, which depicted legislative politics as a series of simplemajority votes among Congressional representatives, institutionalists, such as Kenneth Shepsle (1979, 1986) argued that Congressional institutions, and in particular the committee system, could shape legislative outcomes and make those outcomes durable in the face of subsequent challenges. Congressional institutions, in this view, could produce “structure-induced equilimrium”, by ruling some alternatives as permissible or impermissible, and by structuring the voting power and the veto power of various actors in the decision-making process (Pollack 2010: 21). By inventing the concept of “equilibrium institutions”, Shepsle and others are especially interested in the ways in which actors choose to manipulate institutions in order to secure mutual gains. The changing relative powers of institutions persist over time is due to such manipulations. As claimed by the rational choice institutionalists, the art of holding of a degree of autonomy from the national governments by the supranational actors has come a long way in the EU. They have contributed a considerably level of input to the policy process. Applying what is known as principle-agent theory, rational choice institutionalists pointed to the difficulties of principles (the national governments) in keeping a check on the activities of their agents (the central institutions). As such; • as the range of delegated tasks increased, so the difficulties of monitoring what he agents were doing would increase; • as the number of principle increased with successive enlargement of membership, so the agend could play off the preferences of the coalition of principals against the attempts of their principles to restrain them; • as the QMV expanded, so the constraints on the Commission in constructing a winning coalition in support of its proposals were reduced (Bach and George 2006: 24).

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The propensity is that the scholarly literature on executive politics has focused on two separate categories, addressing the member states or supranational organs as executives. In the EU, the executive power is endowed the member states, which are instructed to implement legislation through their own bureaucracies. With regard to formulation and enactment of the EU policy, important competences have been transformed to a set of supranational organs as part of a dual executive. In line with new institutionalist argument, the national decisionmaking is dominated by the insider group operating whole spectrum of the formal institutions. Some societal groups are privileged than others because they have better access to the decision makers. Such groups are insider groups over try to influence the EU policy in relation to the Commission. Whatever their type, non-institutional actors seek to shape the EU decision-making through lobbying. Virtually all groups include their strategies a focused effort to influence the key EU institutions. Although the Council is the most powerful institution, it is not usually the key target of most groups. Most lobbyists worth their salt will seek to nurture relations with the Commission. It is, after all, the institution which most often initiate policy and drafts proposals (Watson and Shackleton 2003: 98). The Commission as a supranational institution is the easy target for the opportunities in order to obtain access to the decision-makers. Decision-making is likely to be at its lowest when a proposal is in a policy area still under construction, when it is highly contested when it creates difficulties of principle for members of the Council and/or EP, when it is not subject to the dictates of timetable, and when the QMV cannot be used (Nugent 2010: 303). Where the unanimity applied in the Council it would be more important to lobby at the national level because one vote against a proposal could block it; but where the QMV applied the potential influence of the Commission would be greater making it a more attractive target for lobbying. In areas where the powers of the EP extended under the Single European Act, the TEU, and the Treaty of Amsterdam (Bach and George 2006: 25), the activities of outside actors in relation to the EP is far more visible and often more powerful—than those directed to the Commission (Watson and Shackleton 2003: 98) in policy sectors. But it goes beyond that, the activities of the institutions in general tend not to be wholly the outcome of a rational model of decision-making.

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Historical Institutionalism Basically, historical institutionalism is self-explanatory to the extent of which it is closely related to institutions and the rules or conventions issued by the formal organizations. Historical institutionlists are interested in how institutional choices have the long-term effects. Institutions are designed for particular purposes concerning particular sets of circumstances. They are assigned tasks in the process acquire interests and ongoing agendas. If institutions interact with one another in a decision-making process then patterns that are constitutionally prescribed or evolved in the early lifetime of the institutions concerned may “lock in” and also become ongoing. This “log in” means a “path-dependent” logic may set in. The ongoing nature of institutional interests (their continuing agendas and their preference for self-preservation) means that institutions become robust and may well outlive their creators. This also means that institutions may have an impact that their creators could not have foreseen, not least because they survive to confront new circumstances and new challenges. But these new challenges are met through the prism provided by pre-existing institutions (Bosamond 2004: 115), assuming there is a limitation of a series of possible action and policy choice. Throughout the history of the EU, the scholars have debated the casual role of intergovernmental actors in policy making. Then clearly, correspond with Moravscik’s theory of liberal intergovernmentalism, their analyses attempt to reveal the nature of historical decisions, in particularly treaty revisions since the early days of the EU. This theory relies on the idea of a two-level game to describe how governments’ preferences emerge in the context of domestic politics and are the foundations for intergovernmental bargaining within the European level institutions. One piece of work produced by Hooghe and Marks (2003) argued thatat the end of the century the EU looked less and less like a system of cooperating nation-states and more like a “domestic” political system, albeit with some rather unique characteristics (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 281). Perhaps, the most sophisticated presentation of this strand of historical thinking, Pierson (2000) suggested that after decision had been taken it would be likely to produce unanticipated and unintended outcomes. This might be because of a simple failure to think through the implications, but it might be for one or both of two other reasons (Pierson 1998: 41).

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Simplifying this perception considerably, firstly it can be said that a critique of the intergovernmental analyses gives priority to the national governments may shift time to time. In post-war Europe of 1950–1960s, the labour migration policy was based on the guest-worker scheme, allowing mass migration, no matter whether those migrants were equipped with better skilled. In the end of 1980s, the national governments pursued selective labour migration policies with the introduction of the SEA, implying rational response to the labour market circumstances. Secondly, preferences may be varied, depending on the government ideology in power. For instance, the UK Conservative government opposed the social legislation as part of the Social Chapter protocol so vehemently in December 1989, while Labour Party in 1997, with the greatest ever electoral victory made a radical change by adopting the social legislation. The changing priorities of the national governments may have important implications for a particular policy in demand. Historical institutionalism has been used most particularly to show that taking of the decisions at one point in time constraints the behaviour and policy options of decision-makers at future points of time. Decision-taking is seen to make for a path dependency which, enough possible to be disturbed in certain circumstances does make for a persistence and endurability of institutional and policy choices. It is seen as making also for an increase in the independence and power of the supranational institutions, which are usually delegated responsibilities for seeing to the application of EU decisions—this increase being one of the unintended consequences of EU decision-making that historical institutionalists make much of it (Nugent 2010: 438). It is understandable that in the wake of any (migration) crises, there is always demand for reshaping or redesigning political institutions by the policy entrepreneurs, in order to respond the need of public alike. In choosing to take the lead in the management of crisis, the actors are expect to set the institutional agendas. It has proved much easier to comprehend that the national governments are not always in a position to constrain or control the process of integration, as historical institutionalists argued. The most obvious constraint on the capacity of a national government to determine outcomes in the EU is the decision rule of the QMV in the Council is the decision rule of qualified voting in the Council for a range of issues from the internal market to trade, research policy, and the environment (Hooghe and Marks: 286). They can range from the rule of a constitutional order

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or the standard operating procedures of a bureaucracy to the conventions governing trade union behaviour or bank-firm relations (Hall and Taylor 1996: 938). Limits on individual national government control are often the case, when preferences of national government changes. It is not always easier to change the outcome due to institutionalisation of the policy sector. As Bach and George claimed, the initial policy choice is primarily based on the pattern of behaviour of the member states and thus leading to path dependence. Once the legislation act is in place that is very resistance to change, but limited powers assigned to the member states for such changes. There is no doubt that the Council passes laws and thus fulfils these functions by reference to formal rules laid down in the treaties and its internal rules of procedure. These formal rules have been supplemented over the years by informal conventions and rules of game that govern the work of the Council, the Precedency, and the Secretariat, as well as their relations with the Commission and the EP (Peterson and Shackleton 2002: 66). The voting rules in the Council suggest that it is not possible to change decision once it is made. The issues fall into the national interests of the member states often cause for conflict in the formulation of the draft proposal initiated by the Commission. Within the context of historical institutionalism, the contributions to this theory has made to describe the weight of historic change on institutional developments do not disguise its explanatory shortcomings. Consciousness of these limits has simultaneously produced new research, such as theories of “incremental change” (Thelen 2004: 25). Though it is continued, the theoretical approaches in historical sense have increased an impressive amount in a remarkably compressed period of time. Ranging across a number of policy areas though, a considerable level of progress has been made in the creation of single market, especially removing obstacle to mobility (i.e., goods, services and persons) because of the existence of such approaches.

Sociological Institutionalism Literally, sociological institutionalism means cultural forms and practices. Mostly, it relinquishes the rational approach to the study of politics, but strongly defends cultural practices. When applied to the EU, sociological institutionalism is concerned with examination of the attitudes motivations and behaviour of people working for the EU institutions, despite of

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its under-used of three branches of new institutionalism. Insofaras, the EU integration can best be understood with reference to social institutionalism that has compounded with constructivist approaches. This account is associated with institutional and individual identities, roles and values, which are especially constructed. Defined in this way, sociological institutionalism contrast with rationalist explanation on how institutions are formed and developed. For the rational choice institutionalists, institutions are developed by rational actors to meet particular ends efficiently, such as reducing transition costs. For sociological institutionalists, institutions are often created and developed because they contribute to social legitimacy rather than efficiency. In some cases, this may mean that the formal goals of an organization are overridden by these broader social goals. It may not be in the instrumental interests of national governments to enhance the EP’s powers, but the need to enhance the democratic legitimacy of the EU provided powerful logic of appropriateness (Bach and George 2006: 29). Much of this literature on strategic calculation focuses on the rather different angle of social institutionalism from the constructivist perspective, which quickly responds to the European integration process. Focus is on the social embeddedness of temporal structures. The level involvement of individuals and collectivists in the decision-making depends on the symbolic values. Yet, the extent to which they are able to pursue their interests effectively varies enormously across time and policy sector. The decision to provide orientation towards policy reflects actors’ views, choices, perceptions and discourses. The relative important of outcome necessarily exhibits not only ideas and principles, but deeply embedded values and norms. Hall and Taylor (1996) made out two forms of social institutionalism, which are not identical to new institutionalism. First, their account of exposition for the term institution is significantly broad inclusive of “symbol system”, cognitive scripts, frame of meaning and guiding human action’. This version of definition is a sharp contrast with traditionally defined notions and culture. Secondly, the self-images and identities of social actors derive from the social life circumstances and, thus create the institutional forms and images, and signs. In other words, social institutionalism generates a distinct approach so as to the relationship between institutions and individual action takes place in the form of “strategic calculation”.

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Finally, the concern of sociological institutionalists is the normative culture that emerges, for example in different DGs within the Commission, as Rosamond pointed out. This approach can inform understanding to the extent of which migration policy conforms to establish an interstate interaction based on norms of exchange between the envoys of the member states. Preferences of political actors in the EU labour migration politics, which is usually explained by rational choice and sociological institutionalism. Obviously, it is an issue area within the EU immigration politics that has seen significant challenges to agreement on a common policy. The member states are generally ambivalent about the EU policy in migration area.

Multi-level Governance (MLG) The concept of MLG has become focus of interest in relation to European integration. The deepening of European integration has provoked fundamental changes in political authority. Such changes tend to constrain the sovereign power of individual nation-states and their policymaking capacity. As a result, two different kind of political order has emerged. Firstly, the state-centric governance assumes that actors share the decision-making competencies at different levels. These competences are not increasingly monopolized in the national domain. The state sovereignty is retained or even strengthened through the EU governance system. Therefore, the EU integration does not challenge the autonomy of the individual national governments. The interest and relative power of the national governments can influence the policy outcome, while little independent effect can be found via the supranational actors, such as the Commission and the Council. Secondly, authority and policy-making influence are shared out among the multiples levels of government. This implies that the European integration is a polity-creating process consisted of subnational, national and supranational elements of governance. What is emerged is that the collective decision-making mechanism between the national and European governments. In this model, the role of EP, the Commission and the ECJ decision making is increased at the expense of the national governments. As far as the MLG is concerned, labour migration governance is shaped by the interplay between different levels of political authority.

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Basically, the MLG is collaborative and networked forms of policymaking. It has strong antecedents in neofunctionalism, but it is less concerned with explaining the process of European integration and more with explaining the nature of the EU that has emerged from the process (Bach and George 2006: 33).This points to a picture of the EU policy process consisting a several tiers of authority (the European, the national, and the subnational) But the idea of the MLG goes beyond this. It also emphasizes fluidity between theses ties, so that policy actors may move between different levels of action (Bosamond 2004: 120), implying that dispersion of authority unevenly across policy areas. Rather than thinking about the extent to which Europe has become “integrated”, it is helpful to explore how lack of authority has become more dispersed since the late 1950s. There has been a general devolution of the decision-making competence in most West European countries, while there has been a drift of authority from the national to the European level. At the same time, the national governments remain important sites of authority. It is not by chance that the subnational actors including cities, regions and provinces can easily access to the EU decision-making processes. These actors have called for the establishment of a direct link with others through building the national coalitions. It is important to highlight that the process of integration is far more complex and varied than the simple transfer of sovereignty from the member states to the supranational level. Most of these riddles had largely been coincided with a more general trend in politics during the 1980s. This move was accompanied by the sweeping changes in governance—something that many called the emergence of a different mode of policy-making. The emergency of the MLG traces back to the beginning of the 1990s, which gave away a new perspective for analysing the EU politics. Prior to this, the sketchy conceptualization of the integration debate often led to the complaint by many scholars. The member states fiercely reacted to the supranational actors, such the Commission and the EP. One dimension to the changes, raised since the mid-1990s, relates to a series of constraints by the supranational actors, pointing to the room for manoeuvre by the member states. By importing new values and beliefs, and new ways of doing things into the labour migration policy framework, these new actors have pushed new measures. This process has not been easy one and is often resisted by social groups. This is how powers and responsibilities are allocated between institutions. For example, the Commission has the right to initiate legislation and set the agenda. Yet, it is undeniable that the

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recent treaty revisions increased the legislative powers of the EP that can constraint the member states, while the Court through its court ruling. Since 1990s, the treaty developments, and to some extent, enlargement of 2004 and 2007 have intensified debate about the implications of integration with reference to authority and autonomy of the national governments within the EU. In other words, the process of deepening and widening has much into this. Inevitably, these developments have intensified scope and depth of policy-making at both the national and the European level. This claim represents a direct challenge to theories, most notably Moravscik’s (1993) liberal intergovernmentalism, which is in turn directly challenged by the idea of the MLG. What is clear is that the EU governance occurs simultaneously at multiple levels of government, thus giving rise to the MLG as a descriptive term for what the EU offers. In theory, and at least sometimes in practice, power is distributed between the EU, national, regional, and local levels according to the principle of subsidiarity: that is the Union as a whole legislates only in areas where policy problems cannot be solved at lower levels of government. To portray the EU as a multi-level system of governance is to assume that actors representing different levels of government are independent. They thus “network” with each other to design, implement, and enforce EU rules (Peterson 2004: 126). As a consequence, rather particular, a system of multi-level governance and unstable policy network in migration policy may be defined as “diversity of competing interests” across the member states. On the basis of the MLG, the national governments are closely associated with the subranational actors to act, as they are now minor player in policy process. Thus, it held that the MLG has to be read as implying an EU polity. Competences of the member states would have to be implied a polity in the policy-making in favour of all actors involve in decision making, where power and influence are exercised at multiple levels of government. As the EU weakens, the national state executive becomes an extremely important actors.

Conclusion From the early years of the EEC established academic focus was on the integration process. The incremental process by which the EU constructed has produced a supranational- intergovernmental dichotomy has broaden the study of the EU beyond the traditional international relations

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debate. Undoubtedly, scholars have been inspired by debates between this dichotomy. As the EU evolved, the political system has gain momentum. With the evolving process continues, new voices have come forward to look upon the EU as a political system. There are huge body of theories covering European integration. The status of the EU as a polity is obligated to convey consistent and useful policy output in demand. A slightly different take on this demand is to think about the EU in terms of challenges faced with new developments in different policy areas. Yet, influence of the EU as a polity has much to do with creating opportunities for its institutions in relation to the supranational level. The question of the institutional form of the EU is effective in policy process requires further policy analysis. If the EU governance embraces extreme challenges, it is because its delivery of policies in a complex area of labour migration. As the theoretical approaches suggested, the EU as a polity still works to deliver contemporary systems in terms of resolving the specific controversies, such as labour mobility. At the same time, rational choice institutionalism, historical institutionalism and sociological institutionalism have emerged as three types of new institutionalism. There is no clear distinction between them. Rather, they reinforce one another. Surely, the rational choice institutionalists are interested in examining the meaningful responses of actors to the institutional rules in the context of neofunctionalism and liberal intergovernmentalism. And historical institutionalism and sociological institutionalism tend to employ in their analysis of an ideal political system values and norms that are culturally important for the actors institutional relationship over time. The interpretations of these values and norm are accurate to the extent to which the scholarly literature on new institutionalism has tended to view the actors as interest seeking individuals with regard to their interests, their aims and their objectives within the existence of the EU structure. Taking into account the available literature, it is important to develop a view of the MLG as part of a political system. Instead of being explicitly challenged, the EU featured as multi-level polity, with the actions of national and subnational actors. Even after its establishment since 1950s, the MLG has revolved around the idea that authority of national governments have faded away significantly. Developments in the EU governance suggest that the national and the EU governments cannot act unilaterally. Consequently, state-like European institutions have gained power, as this authority is shifted upwards. Such shift reflects differences in national and

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European level of governance, since authority has distributed among variety of private and public agents. In brief, these changes in the extent and the nature of the treaty frameworks now characterise the EU as complex, variable and uneven patterns of policy-making.

References Bache, I., & George, S. (2006). Politics in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bosamond, B. (2004). New theories of European integration. In M. Cini (Ed.), European Union politics (pp. 109–131). Oxford University Press. Fetzer, J. S. (2016). Open borders and international migration policy, the effects of unrestricted immigration in the United States, France, and Ireland. Palgrave Macmillan. Goetz, K. H., & Meyer-Sahling, J.-H. (2009). Political time in the EU: Dimensions, perspectives, theories. Journal of European Public Policy, 16(2), 180– 201. Hall, P. A., & Taylor, R. C. R. (1996). Political science and the three new institutionalisms. Political Studies, 44(5), 936–957. https://doi.org/10.1111/j. 1467-9248.1996.tb00343.x. Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Multi-level governance in the European Union. In B. F. Nelson & Stubb, A. (Eds.), The European Union, readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 281–311). Palgrave Macmillan. Kasim, H. (1994). Policy networks and European Union policy making: A skeptical view. West European Politics, 17 (4), 12–27. Majone, G. (1994). The rise of regulatory state in Europe. West European Politics, 17 (3), 77–101. Moravcsik, A. (1993, December). Preferences and power in the European Community: A liberal intergovernmentalist approach. Journal of Common Market Studies, 31(4). Nugent, N. (2010). The government and politics of the European Union. Palgrave Macmillan. Peterson, J. (2004). Policy networks. In A. Wiener & T. Diez (Eds.), European integration theory (pp. 117–135). Oxford University Press. Peterson, J., & Bomberg, E. (1999). Decision-making in the European Union. Basingstoke: Macmillan. Peterson, J., & Shackleton, M. (2002). The institutions of the European Union. Oxford University Press. Pierson, P. (1998). Irresistible forces, immovable objects: Post-industrial welfare states confront permanent austerity. Journal of European Public Policy, 5(4), 539–560.

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Pierson, P. (2000). Three worlds of welfare state research. Comparative Political Studies. Sage Journals. Pollack, M. A. (2010). Theorizing EU policy-making. In H. Wallace & A. R. Young (Eds.), Policy-making in the European Union (pp. 15–24). New European Union Series. Oxford University Press. Pollock, M. (2004). The new institutionalisms and European integration. In A. Wiener & T. Diez (Eds.), European integration theory (pp. 137–155). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Richardson, J. (2001). Policy-making in the EU: Interests, ideas and garbage cases of primeval soup. In J. Richardson (Ed.), European Union: Power and policy making. London: Routledge. Rosamond, B. (2004). New theories of European integration. In M. Cini (Ed.), European Union politics (pp. 109–131). Oxford University Press. Shepsle, K. A. (1979, February). Institutional arrangements and equilibrium in multidimensional voting models. American Journal of Political Science, 23(1), 27–59. Shepsle, K. A. (1986). Institutional equilibrium and equilibrium institutions. In Political science: The science of politics (Vol. 51). Thelen, K. (2004). How institutions evolve. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Watson, R., & Shackleton, M. (2003). Organized interests and lobbying in the EU. In E. Bomberg & A. Stubb (Eds.), The EU: How does it work? (pp. 88– 107). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

CHAPTER 3

The European Policy Approach to the Labour Migration Problem

Introduction The free movement of people is a founding principle of the European integration, set out by the Treaty of Rome and is now part of internal market. The Treaty regulates rules relates to the economically active persons, such as employed persons or jobseekers under the principle of free movement of persons. Subsequent treaties have advanced free market principles. In particularly, Article 45 of the TFEU acknowledges the principle of free movement of workers. Hence, the EU is endowed with laying down the conditions and volume of admission governing entry into and legal residence in a member state, concerning family reunification of the third-country nationals, who seek work in a member states. The EU nationals or regular immigrants are liable for a uniform level of rights and obligations. These measures have not only provided motives for economic integration, but a strong political dimension to the social imperatives that had dominated the labour migration policy-making to date.

Legal Background: The EU Applicable Rules The Principle of Free Movement of Labour The free movement of people is a founding principle of the European integration. The Treaty of Rome provided the basis of four basic principles; free movement of labour, capital, goods and services. This legacy © The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_3

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was inspired by the member states, ‘to promote throughout the EC a harmonious development of economic activities, a continuous and balanced expansion, an increase in stability, an accelerated raising of the standard of living and closer relations between the States belonging to it’. Free movement rights consist of entering and moving about within the territory of another member state. The EU nationals have the right to stay and work, and live in another member states under certain conditions. The free movement of labour has been in force since 1968 for workers and their families from the six founding countries of Germany, France, the Netherland, Luxembourg, Belgium and Italy and also for the UK, Ireland and Denmark since 1973, after enlargement of the EC. The Greek workers that have enjoyed freedom of movement since 1987 and Portuguese, and Spanish workers since 1993 following a transition period. With enlargement to include Austria, Sweden and Finland in 1995, full free movement of labour was granted immediately for these countries (Tassinopoulos et al. 1998: 45). This freedom also applies to Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein within the context of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA) on the basis of the Agreement creating the European Economic Area and the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons (AFMP) (with the Swiss Federation). So, free movement of labour is guaranteed for these three former EFTA countries. In the light of founding treaties, free movement of labour has become one of the cornerstones of the European integration with the unwanted implications. Whatever the negative effects of mobility, it is useful and important to understand the institutional role to move forward in labour mobility. In this sense, the Commission would take responsibility to remove these regulations stood on the way so that the effect of distorting competition would not be felt across the European mainland. This meant that the free movement of labour was necessary to be installed in the early years of the Community. There was an obvious functional necessity for efficient cross-border movement to the extent of which the European citizens could seek and take up work in another member state (Tassinopoulos et al. 1998: 45). Perhaps it should be point out here that the right of free movement was initially intended for the economically active population: workers who were able to support themselves in the destination country. However, the texts of the founding treaties of the EEC, as well as the implementation of secondary legislation, left room for interpretation. For years, European

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citizens have actively tested the boundaries of free mobility by challenging national administrative decisions in the ECJ which has played a fundamental role in widening the scope of free movement since the 1970s. The rulings of the court since that time have gradually shifted policy from protecting primarily free movement of workers to the free movement of persons. In numerous individual cases, the court ruled that a member state of the EEC could not deny entry to or deport a citizen of another EEC state on the basis of personal conduct unless that conduct would warrant equally punitive action if it were undertaken by a citizen of the former state (Koikkalainen 2011: 1). The Introduction of Free Movement as Part of the Internal Market A common market implies unimpeded movement for goods, services, capital and labour that is being striven for with European integration. Any regulation that hinders freedom to move in such sense would be eliminated in the run (Tassinopoulos et al. 1998: 45). The pace of change was gathering slowly, when the process was accelerated by the introduction of the SEA in 1986. The Act made considerable changes to the decision-making mechanism in the Council. It introduced the principle of the Qualified Majority Voting (QMV). For the first time, obstacles to mobility would be removed by 1993. The rights of free movement of labour is applicable to both employees and the self-employed while freedom of establishment makes it possible for the EU citizens to access, reside and start up an activity in another member state. The form taken by the single market programme gave an extra twist to free movement now encompassed economically non-active persons (i.e., students and pensioners). In particularly, a new regulation was forged to include the mutual recognition of qualifications. The need for creating internal market was all the greater because the EC was so clearly in a historical transition. When the need was so great and pressing, the right to free movement was given to students, pensioners, and unemployed, as well as for their families. At this early stage, expanding freedom of movement from workers to citizens was a fruitful outcome. Apart from workers in industry, the very definition of “worker” was gradually expanded to include in seasonal or short-term employment and apprenticeship placements in member states.

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The Notion of an European Citizenship At the heart of the contribution of the EU institutions to the labour legislation lies in the Maastricht Treaty, which is known as the Treaty Functioning on European Union (TFEU), signed in 1992. The Treaty created the notion of an European citizenship, which was given substance by freedom of movement of people. Free movement is closely linked to European citizenship. Article 45 of the TFEU makes it clear that the principle of free movement of workers is a fundamental right for the European citizens. This right initially applied to economically active persons (i.e., employed persons and jobseekers). In a similar vein, Articles 79 and 80 provide legal basis for labour mobility. Specifically, Article 79 states that ‘[measures on migration taken at the European level] do not affect the right of Member States to determine volumes of admission of third-country nationals coming from third countries to their territory in order to seek work, whether employed or self-employed’. Viewed in this light, the institutional role of the EU is clarified by Article 78(3) of the TFEU that gives the Council right to take the provisional measures in the event of a sudden inflow of the third-country nationals. The Treaty also provided the greater use of the QMV in the Council. Built on compromise, a remarkable step forward was taken towards the institutional development in which each member state takes part. Under the Consultation procedure, the Council takes the view of EP. A further big step on the road of European integration was the strengthening powers of the existing institutions, namely the EP, through the introduction of the new co-decision procedure. Further to the institutional aspect of development of this freedom, the ECJ embarked on extensive case law in this area. It shed some lights on the right to free movement of jobseekers, confirming impediments to free movement and issued consistently a wide interpretation of definition of “worker”. Obviously, mobility rights fall under the jurisprudence of the Court. In many of its essential aspects, the TFEU created the notion of nondiscrimination in the area of employment. Article 79(5) makes it clear that migrants are allowed to access to the European labour markets for the purpose of employment. This provision must be viewed in the context of a general principles of non-discrimination for other nationalities enshrined in Article 18 and Article 21(2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. The Charter gives the right to free movement to

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the European citizens, which is now legally binding. Article 45 confirms the principle of freedom of movement incorporated into the Charter. Finally, the impact of the TFEU on the labour migration policy process is considerable. First of all, the Treaty stimulated the intergovernmental cooperation in the field of Justice and Home Affairs (JHA) as part of the process in building the single market and thus enhancing European integration. A key set of priorities in the JHA was to facilitate the geographical mobility across the member states. While these measures provided a strong economic dimension to the political imperatives, the Treaty provisions on cooperation in the field of the JHA set out the conditions of which certain areas would fall under the common interests of the member states, such as condition of entry and movement by national of third countries (i.e., family reunion and access to employment). A Single External Border As the process of encouraging migration continued, easing travel restrictions for the non-EU nationals became a crucial task for the EU. Thus, an emphasis was placed on reducing border control formalities within Europe. Prior to the so-called “borderless” internal market, the principle of free movement of labour gained a new dimension with the introduction of Schengen Agreement of 1985, when five member states (Germany, Belgium, France, Luxembourg, Netherlands) signed the Agreement on the basis of intergovernmental cooperation. The Schengen arrangement came into force in 1990, as the signatory states abolished their internal border control and travel credentials were only required at the external borders of Schengen area. Hence, the third country nationals have the right to a short stay within this area. The Schengen Agreement and the 1990 Convention implementing the Schengen Agreement, were formally codified in EU law by the Schengen Protocol of the Treaty of Amsterdam. In addition to providing the common rules on people entering the Schengen area, and internal frontier-control free travel, the Schengen-related measures provide for enhanced police and judicial cooperation, and complement the single market, through giving tangible reality to the four freedoms that are the cornerstone of European integration (Gatto 2016). Over time, the Schengen Area has progressively grown to 26 member countries. As a result, a single external border was established in a uniform manner.

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As far as one can see from 2010 onwards, the difficult political context in which migration policies operate is created by the global economic crisis, although the Schengen Agreements is viewed as the EU’s major accomplishment. Face with the migration crises, the Agreement caused for controversy, however. This is because the high volume of migrants seeking entry into Europe and thus putting the free movement principle at risk. To a greater extend, the Schengen free zone, where labour mobility is facilitated has been threatened, so far. This is also because the border checks are often minimal in the 24-nation Schengen zone due to the passport-free travel is allowed. Clearly, failure to resolve the migration crisis endangers some of the benefits of single market in which Schengen’s free movement of workers pave the way. The implications of this reality, together with the contemporary challenges facing Europe’s external borders, have placed significant stress on free movement. Greece’s recent border security travails and concern on the part of some member states that Bulgaria and Romania will become porous entry points into the EU once they join the Schengen area are ready examples of such challenges. In addition, the recent uprisings in North Africa and the subsequent arrival of migrants from conflictembroiled countries to Italy and Malta have fuelled the debate surrounding free mobility, and have led some governments to question the fairness of a system that allows countries situated at the external boundaries of Europe to bear the brunt of border-control responsibilities (Koikkalainen 2011: 8). Again, the implications of this fact, combined with other challenges facing the Europe’s external borders, may endanger the very nature of free movement. Nevertheless, the Schengen area is considered one of the great achievements of the EU, although its current challenges remain. For many European citizens, passport-free travel is one of the EU’s most important and recognisable accomplishments. A potential reform of Schengen should take into account a number of legal, substantive and economic concerns (Gatto 2016). It is, then, in the sense that the Schengen Agreement gives rise to mixed feelings: it is a visionary project for the formation of a united space for the citizens of Europe, a space without frontiers or border controls. This project does not come without cost: the lack of control on internal borders of the Schengen member states has been compensated for by stricter controls on external borders and by the expansion of various policing methods. Increased control makes it more difficult for

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citizens not of Schengen or EU member states to cross external boundaries of Schengen Area. The Schengen legislation must, therefore, be used wisely so as to avoid unnecessary restrictions on the movement of persons between countries. Unwise use of this legislation may lead to a new division of the continent, the creation of a new “paper curtain”. This must be avoided, by creating a seamless, cheap and efficient visa-issuing system which is easily accessible and affordable to the citizens of those countries not belonging to the EU (Kupiszewski 2003: 9).

Institutional Developments Brought About by the Lisbon Treaty The institutional reforms have now reached a stage in which labour migration policy process gained more legal ground. The Lisbon Treaty, which entered into force in December 2009 recognized the institutional aspect of free movement of labour. For the first time, intra-EU labour mobility was enhanced with the introduction of co-decision and the QMV on regular immigration and a new legal basis for integration measures. To put differently, the Treaty introduced the QMV on migration and asylum in the Council, which is the most impressive institutional achievement, as required previously, unanimous voting requirement was eased in the Council. The adoption of acts by the Council now requires the approval of 55% of member states (16) (72% if the act has not been proposed by the Commission), which must represent at least 65% of the EU’s population (currently approximately 328.6 million of a total 505.5 million). To limit the possibility of larger states joining together to stop proposals, a blocking coalition must include at least four member states representing at least 35% of the EU’s overall population. In cases where not all member states participate in voting (e.g., acts adopted only by euro area or Schengen member states, or within enhanced cooperation), the qualified majority is calculated only on the basis of the participating member states (European Parliament 2014). As long as the Treaty establishes a clear distinction between the EU and the national competences, this shift in voting system can be workable. It is within the legacy of Lisbon Treaty that the predominance of governmental actors, such as the European Commission has been most noticeable, where the significant increase in supranationalism has been most pointed. For many years, its role and management in policy-making has been contested in migration as controversial policy domain. The

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Commission is thus gaining more influence and importance, partially facilitated by institutional changes in the Lisbon Treaty, but mainly due to astute policy entrepreneurship in facilitating consensus. Framing problems in a fashion that maximizes potential agreement by the member state governments facilitates political agreement regarding potentially divisive policy proposals (Menz 2015: 554). In order to remove barriers on the European level and to influence economic policy, not only willingness of the member states are needed, but also a strong hand of the Commission—that is capacity of the effects of migration flows are felt in the EU labour markets. For other institutional reforms, the ordinary legislative procedure is applied in a sense that the EP as a co-legislator has an equal footing with the Council for the irregular and the regular immigration policies. The ECJ has now full jurisdiction in the field of immigration. The Treaty also simplified the definition of some basic principles for the development of common migration policies (solidarity and respect for human rights etc.). With regard to the third country nationals, the Lisbon Treaty clarifies competences for legal migration. This institutional setting is understandable in any new EU policy initiative in the migration field. Thus, efforts in the late 2000s led to increase economic and political cooperation. One obvious indication of this is the Lisbon Treaty that provided conditions for regulate the condition of entry and stay of the third country nationals, specifically the conditions to obtain visas. These efforts cannot be safeguarded without maintaining the national interests of the member states that tent to hold the exclusive competence to determine the volume of admissions to their labour markets. It is merely complicated the already difficult discussion that lies ahead that make it even harder to eliminate obstacles for labour mobility.

Recent Legal Developments Concerning Free Movement of Labour The free movement of workers enshrined in the TFEU was supplemented in March 2016 by the European Commission proposed a targeted revision of the rules on posted workers. This revision constituted as part of the 1996 Directive 96/71/EC on economic and labour market conditions concerning with fairness of competition between companies and efficacy working conditions of posted workers. This is to say, the Commission’s proposal introduced the main changes to the 1996 Directive are

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included application of mandatory rules on remuneration in a host member state and conditions for the cross-border agencies hiring out workers. In its proposal, the Commission clarified reasons for action and the policy choices. Several other EU legislative instruments have been adopted to handle admissions and conditions to the extent of which different categories of the third country nationals can move to an EU member state for work or education. In this sense, the directive 2004/38 dated 29th April 2004 established the applicable measures. Accordingly, the EU citizen has the right to travel freely across the member states. They are not demanded entry visa and can live there for three months without showing any documents. This directive set out conditions of the categories of people, who can settle freely, particularly workers with or without a job and their families beyond three months. The EU nationals have a permanent right to stay in a host member state following legally lived for a continuous five year period. In essence, little systematic attention is paid to the transferability of social security rights of the EU citizens, although some measures are taken to ensure social security entitlements. The Regulation 1408/71 dated 14th June 1971 and 883/2004 dated 30th April 2004 exemplifies these. The generous benefits are provided with the exception of social and medical assistance, which can be retained for the EU nationals only. These benefits are included sickness, maternity leave, old age, professional accidents, unemployment benefit and family allowance. In order to stimulate further labour market integration, more extensive legal developments related to the European Network of Employment Services (EURES) concerning workers’ access to mobility services. This is the Regulation (EU) No 2016/589 of the EP and of the Council of 13 April 2016. At its core, the aim was to boost the EURES job portal and availability of jobs vacancies advertised in relevant journals and web sides. This dynamics may address the issue of frailty information exchange on labour mobility within the EU. It may thus encourage more Europeans to move and reside in another member state. Ultimately, the EU might end up as little more than a glorified free movement area. Further improvement of free movement for Europeans was seen in the adoption of the Regulation (EU) No 2016/1191 on 6 July 2016 by the EP and the Council. This regulation streamlined the complexity of public documents within the manoeuvre of the EU institutions. In March 2016, the principle piece of legislation for labour mobility was already established by the EP. In this regard, freedom of movement of workers was confirmed by

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these institutions in the Decision (EU) 2016/344 on launching a European Platform to trigger cooperation in tackling undeclared work. Further to the EU’s jurisdiction of facts, the definition of EU citizens both inactive EU nationals and job-seekers as well as those who claim social benefits has been given more emphasis by extensive case law. An important Court ruling of 14 June 2016 in case C-308/14 established conditions that are applicable to Directive 2004/38/EC, for the entitlement of social benefits for those who have a right to reside lawfully in a host member state. More changes are obvious. For example, on 30 June 2016, the Court ruling followed as ‘a child and, in consequence, the (third-country national) parent having sole custody of that child enjoy a right of residence in the host member state by virtue of EU law on free movement of workers, where the other parent who is a Union citizen and has worked in that the member state has ceased to reside in that the member state before the children education there’. The significance of these rulings is that the Court has classified two types of persons for those who are not economically active and those access to social benefits and are entitled to such benefits on the condition that they have worked in a host member state. Whilst labour market integration can only be achieved by the legislative revisions built upon founding treaties and the member states’ collaborative actions for well-functioning labour market by their very nature they represent obstacles to mobility. It is important to ensure smooth implementation of any EU-wide labour migration scheme and articulation between international migration and intra-EU mobility of EU nationals. They are indeed perfect substitutes in the labour market and for employers, It is necessary then to develop, as a complementary measure, the modalities of implementation of the EU preference, both for EU nationals of other member states and for third-country nationals legally residing on a permanent basis in respective member state; this includes family reunification beneficiaries, refugees and former labour migrants. However, that would pose a major policy challenge, to the extent that the implementation of a EU-wide labour market test does not seem feasible under the current fragmentation of the EU labour market and in particular of the under EU public employment services (Martin and Venturini 2015: 3). Nonetheless, these legal developments of kind are vital for exchanging information, creating knowledge and capacity, and acting together in a closer cross-border cooperation with the purpose of fighting undeclared work more effectively and efficiently.

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Policy Developments The shaping of the migration policy of all EU member states is proved to be a difficult task because of its nature of politically sensitivity. It goes to the heart of their history, as in post-war colonial immigration to France and Commonwealth immigration to the UK, in particular. The economic development and the notions of the national identity, sovereignty and autonomy are keys to this. Therefore, the government policies which directed towards migratory movements reflected on the growing importance and changing function of immigrant labour in West Europe. Immediately after the World War II, Switzerland, the UK, France and West Germany—when its industry got under way again after the 1949 Currency Reform—recruited foreign workers. By the mid-fifties, special labour shortages were appearing, first in agriculture and building. It was then that recruitment of foreign workers was started (Castles and Kosack 1997: 69). Then in the 1950s, when Europe was beginning to recover from the devastation of World War II and experiencing a period of intense economic growth, labour mobility was again encouraged. Because the lack of skilled workers was seen as a threat to the economy, freedom of movement of qualified industrial workers was included in the treaties founding the EEC, the predecessor of the current European Union, in 1957. Over 8 million work permits were issued to foreigners in Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and West Germany (the original six members of the EEC) during the guest-worker period of 1958 to 1972. One-third of the foreign workers came from within the EEC; mainly from Italy, which was lagging behind in industrialization and suffered from high unemployment (Koikkalainen 2011: 2). Obviously, most of the request for international migration derived from the structural necessity for the Western European capitalism. Of particular concern was this under the circumstances of stagnant domestic labour force potential and the long term growth trend of economy. The oil crisis that started in 1973 put an end to the open-doors policy regarding migrant workers, who were welcomed when the economy needed them but were expected to leave when times were hard. To the surprise of the host nations, however, most of the guest workers had come to stay. Many of these migrants had invited their families to join them in the destination countries, making family ties a more prominent cause for legal migration into Europe than active labour recruitment (Koikkalainen

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2011: 2). Following the oil crisis, an extremely restrictive policy was followed in order to try and prevent high level of migrants (i.e., family entry and long-term settlement) to the European mainland. Specifically, moving to the South or the Mediterranean Europe, the period between the mid-1970s and the end of the 1980s witnessed a series of far-reaching political and economic changes. Greece (in 1981) and Spain and Portugal (1986) acceded to the EC, joining Italy—hitherto the only southern member—and thereby advancing their process of economic integration with North-West Europe. These countries also underwent deep political transformations, bringing their systems out of rightwing authoritarianism and closer to Western liberal democracy (King and Okolski 2018: 18). In particularly, the analysis of the Italian case suggests a transitory phenomenon of migration policy on the abandoning the use of the intergovernmental method. Italy is a relative late-comer among immigration countries. Inflows started after the 1973–1974 oil shock, when the UK, Germany, and, in particular, neighbouring France closed their borders. Flows were therefore partially diverted towards Southern Europe. Italy was then mostly considered to be a transit country; yet, the 1981 census revealed an unexpectedly ‘high’ number of foreign residents (210,937), mainly of Italian origin. The first big flows, however, date from later, between 1984 and 1989, when approximately 700–800,000 people entered the country. Of these, it is estimated that 300–350,000 entered or remained in Italy without a valid residence permit. It should be noted that relevant policies aimed at regulating inflows and the legal treatment of foreigners as potential immigrants started only in the late 1980s, while the fundamental features of the legal framework on the acquisition and loss of nationality—however they changed over time—date far back, to the period immediately following the unification of the country (Zincone 2006: 3). Given the multitude of national models of integration policies in existence, in particular, the Italian case demonstrated that the EU changed over time and is thus efficient, where it urgently undergoes reform process in order to minimize internal incoherencies in migration area. Given that, the outcome of national migration policy and law-making have had, in turn, profound implications for the multicultural shape of many of the EU’s cities and regions. While the individual migration policies have remained as diverse as the history of those countries would suggest, a complex but steady process of the EU co-operation has taken place from the 1980s: first on freedom of movement of the EU citizens within

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the EU, then in relation to non-EU citizens on issues of migration, integration and partnership with countries of origin have reached the agenda (Moraes 2003: 116). The introduction of the single market in the mid1980s has casted no doubts whether the member states could have prevented the growing demand of cross-border mobility, instead facilitated tremendously labour market. As many claimed, Europe had not seen anything quite like migration flows, with the removal of internal borders. Beginning in the early 1980s, the political efficiency implied wellfunctioning of its institutions for migration policy process, with the transformation EC. Indeed, Spain and Portugal in the 1980s would paved the way for the complete incorporation of both countries into the major international structures of Europe and the West, as well as the normalization of Portugal and Spain’s relations with their European partners. Portugal and Spain have become important players in Europe. At the domestic level, Portugal and Spain undertook deep processes of institutional, social, and cultural reforms. Hence, from a political standpoint EU integration has been an unmitigated success, as both countries have consolidated their democratic regimes and institutions. The two processes—European integration and democratisation—are thoroughly intertwined (Royo 2007: 20). While admitting accession of Spain and Portugal diversificated migration flows—workers from the southern Europe moved north—their inclusion generated inadequate and inefficient legislative outlook. Spain and Portugal had to go a long way to strengthen their democratic reforms and institutions. The lessons from both experiences are crucial for the EU as efficient polity. For both countries, especially in the case of Portugal since the instability and uncertainties surrounding the failed revolutionary attempt of the 1970s, the precariousness of their democratisation process affected the institutional policy process of the EU in labour migration field. Having said that, the notion of incrementalism has been compounded by the key role of the JHA cooperation. During the period of 1957– 1985, migration cooperation remained outside the EU’s structures. With the signing of Schengen Agreement, this situation was changed. Some crucial steps of the European migration policy cooperation were taken somewhat hand in hand with the European integration development, but gradually, and in an accelerating pace since the 1980’s. As the starting point of European cooperation on the issue, it was only in 1999 that the EU initiated to work towards a common immigration policy. A significant development has been inclusion of the migration policy in the JHA

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cooperation. Apart from the free movement of citizens, the cross-border including guaranteeing fundamental rights, the fight against terrorism and organized crime, and asylum and immigration matters have become the under the responsibility of the JHA. In the context of security, the strengthening the institutional framework for mobility has become prominent issue beyond the national concerns. Seeking a permanent solution to the European borders, a decade of deliberations and negotiations on the content of the EU treaties, most of which were focused on trying to balance the institutional and the policy process efficiency. Securing internal borders for Europeans with stressing on guidelines is seen as one import way to develop a holistic approach to migration. The multiannual programmes adopted included Tampere (1999), Hague (2004) and Stockholm illustrated the area of freedom, security and justice (AFSJ) accomplished, so far. Obviously, these treaty changes were clear measurements for securing internal borders for Europeans that appeared to be one dimension of labour mobility in this period. Further to these aspects of policy developments on preservation of national sovereignty, the Commission’s report of March 2014 entitled ‘an open and secure Europe: making it happen’ was regarded as a successor what was already set out for communication on the future agenda for the AFSJ. Security issues were also raised on the European Council’s conclusions of 26 and 27 June 2014 entitled as the ‘strategic guidelines for legislative and operational planning within the area of freedom, security and justice’ for the 2014–2020 period, in accordance with Article 68 TFEU. There were clear benefits from issuing such guidelines, with respect to transposing, implementing and consolidating the existing legal instruments and measures. It may now fair to claim that the issue of security seems to act as one of the determinant fact for labour migration, while the degree of Europeanization of specific issues tend to affect migration policy-making. A general point is to make is that, as the world-economy has shifted and restructured, calling increasing number of workers to core regions, tensions have mounted over the immigrants presence in the core from the late twentieth century onwards. These flows have both demographic and perceived effects that challenge the identities of core nations. These radicalized perceptions have been instituted and reinforced by borders drawn to divide both land and people. In the contemporary world-system these radicalizations are amplified by the perception of immigrants as criminals

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taking advantage and corrupting the well-being of what are perceived to be national economies. The event of 9/11 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States of America drew attention to many things familiar to the anti-immigrant movement: to the permeability of its borders, an insecure feeling about the intensions of foreign citizens and cultures, a fear of foreign takeover, a fear of social deterioration brought on by foreign citizens and cultures (Bandhauer 2010: 214). These developments were considered as stumbling forwards of European integration, in fact a major problem in itself, underlying the concept of incrementalism. Quite apart from these security measures, the cornerstone of the institutional framework for labour migration touched upon the EU’s enlargement. In the early 1990s, it appeared that the East-West flows started would a prevalent component of European migration. Seen from the West European perspective, that new trend was nearly obvious and expected, in view of the gradual lifting, since 1989, of major barriers that in the past prevented great numbers of the CEEE Europeans from moving to the West. That expectation found strong support in the experience of a number of East-West emigration episodes, which have taken place since the post-Stalinist thaw of the mid-1950s. According that experience, whenever the opportunities allowed. A massive mobilization of people ready to emigrate took place, and almost instantly the number of emigrants from the East multiplied (Okolski 2005). It should also be noted thatmew migration has been shaped by 28 years of policy choice: the liberalisation of labour markets, the free flows of capital, the Single European Act, the Maastricht Treaty and the eastward expansion of the EU. It may no longer be assumed that labour is sedentary. Electronic communications provide migrants with information about available routes and work opportunities. Travel has also become cheaper and more accessible. Migrant networks provide home communities with information on work, accomodation and immigration rules (Cliffton 2007: 13). Such a Europe can, in its economic and political strength, be admirable as an international organisation. In the first place, a single policy acts came into existence in the event of enlargement and changes in the market situation resulting from changes in consumer demand, rapid technological and structural change in all aspects of production and marketing. The crucial point is that policy process engaged a wider range of participants, each with different demands, needs and interests. The policy-making forms have been accompanied by these changes in the decision-making in line

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with the constant adjustment. The core presumption is that the institutional actors and the member states in the system make efforts to influence policy decisions in ways that are favourable to their interests. This is the sheer necessity to respond to change. This common legal and policy framework have stipulated different rules and regulations for labour mobility into and inside the EU’s territory of the EU nationals (European citizens), as well as the third country nationals. Often, the plausible strategy is to encourage the treaty arrangements. Such arrangements have been under frequent review. As intra-EU labour mobility has increased with successive waves of the EU enlargement since the 1980s, the industrial relations research has focused on the ways in which these flows have impacted upon the national wage system and the employment regulation of the receiving states. In such accounts, labour migration typically appears as a challenge or threat to the labour market institutions and regulations in the highwage destination countries. The loss of sovereign control over borders in the EU international market and the questioning of the territorial principle of labour law by European jurisdiction are often seen as fundamental to these issues (Kahmann 2015: 61). A complication of the EU enlargement of 2004 has been the sense of its effectiveness to stimulate labour flows to the extent of which the migration policy exposed deep differences among the member states with respect to labour market outcome of migrants. The consequences of the EU enlargement for the international labour migration depend on the legal conditions for international labour movement. If the citizens of the candidate countries are allowed to work in all the EU countries immediately after joining, then it is likely that the first years of EU eastward enlargement will see the significant East-West labour flows. Especially Germany and Austria fear remarkable labour migration (Paas et al. 2003: 65). Prior to the eastern enlargement, immigration was not perceived as such a significant threat in these countries, as opposed to in France, for example, where a fictional character named the “Polish Plumber“ was used to fuel fears on how skilled French workers were soon to be replaced by a flood of Eastern Europeans willing to work for less (Koikkalainen 2011: 6). Given that, migration policies of the EU have become selective, with the emphasis on migrants’ skills rather than admission in the postenlargement period of 2004. In June 2016, the Commission published

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a new legal migration package, which includes an Action Plan on Integration of third country nationals and a proposal for a revision of the EU Blue Card Directive for highly qualified workers; negotiations between the EP and the Council are expected to begin soon. Measures included in the New Skills Agenda for Europe are also relevant for third-country nationals and should support their integration. The Commission was therefore keen to portray the Blue Card directive as a proactive tool in competing for the “best brains” and skilfully linked liberalized labour migration to economic growth and competitiveness (Menz 2015: 553). Currently, a variety of tools are at the disposal, ranging from managing migration through dialogue and partnerships with the non-member countries to modernising the blue card scheme for highly educated persons from outside the EU. Skill composition seems an increasingly important factor in European debates about labour migration policy. With the population declining in many EU member states, the EU will need highly skilled labour force. Hence, labour mobility has an important role to play if the EU is to achieve its ambitions, internally and globally, particularly in view of the 2020 targets in the areas of employment and competitiveness. A dynamic labour market that is unfettered by national boundaries and where labour and skills are allocated more efficiently is important for companies’ ability to grow and invest, not least in light of the increasing competition from other regions of the world (Barslund and Busse 2016: 11). The development of a single market for services acts as a trigger for specialisation and innovation, technological, institutional, and organizational advances and improvements in the industrial countries over the last few decades, as well as their policies on trade and foreign investment, have had enormous success in channelling global income flows in the direction of the advanced economies. The resulting increased in the per capita income gap between the rich and poor countries is becoming increasingly more apparent to the people of the developing countries. Along with demographic forces, this will continue to fuel migratory pressure and illegal immigration in the years to come. Trying to stop or control these pressure puts the authorities of the destination counties conflict with one of the most powerful market forces. Chances of success are slim and any partial success is likely to come at a high cost (Djajie 2001: 158).

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Global Approach to Migration and Mobility In the last decade, the EU has made major steps towards building a truly comprehensive migration policy, based on the common political principles and solidarity. In 2011, the Commission established a general framework for the EU’s relations with the third countries. Such framework is socalled the ‘Global Approach to Migration and Mobility’ (GAMM), which is the overarching framework of the EU’s external migration and asylum policy since 2005. This framework defines how the EU conducts its policy dialogues and cooperation with non-EU countries. It clearly defined priorities and embedded in the EU’s overall external action (i.e., development cooperation). The GAMM is an example of international cooperation at its best—taking account of the interests and objectives of all involved: EU, partner countries and migrants themselves. The agenda is balanced and comprehensive, aimed at four equally important objectives: • better organising legal migration, and fostering well-managed mobility; • preventing and combatting irregular migration, and eradicating trafficking in human beings; • maximising the development impact of migration and mobility; • promoting international protection, and enhancing the external dimension of asylum; • The respect of human rights is a cross-cutting priority for this policy framework (European Commission 2018). In this light, the Communication ‘Maximising the Development Impact of Migration’ of 21 May 2013 identified proposals on how the EU could adopt a more ambitious approach in this area under both the GAMM and the EU’s development policy, the Agenda for Change. It proposed a broadened approach, which gave greater attention to SouthSouth flows, effective integration of migration into national development and poverty reduction plans as well as the inclusion of refugees and other displaced persons in long-term development planning. The main orientations of the Communication were endorsed through Council Conclusions adopted on 23 September 2013 (European Commission 2018). In this crucial regard, a sustainable and credible policy approach to the management of migration requires addressing the issue of irregular

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migration. The EU is currently tackling the issue through specific measures targeting employers, who hire undeclared migrant workers and by seeking to set up a humane and effective return policy, in line with the Charter of Fundamental Rights. It is also targeting human trafficking networks and smugglers who take advantage of undocumented persons. As part of implementation of the GAMM, several political instruments are available to the third countries and other stakeholders (most notably, civil society or international organisations). They included bilateral and regional policy dialogues, and action plans, legal instruments (i.e., visa facilitation and readmission agreements), operational support and capacity building, together with programme and project support. The main instrumental activities in responding to the migration crisis has been the project support, strengthening agreements with an effort to reduce irregular migration. For example, in the period 2004–2013, 400 migrationrelated projects (EUR 1 billion) were supported through the EU-funding scheme by the European Commission (European Commission 2018). Amongst the most beneficiaries of these projects were youth immigrants. The other dimension of the EU’s external policy is to combat irregular immigration, pointing to an effective return policy. There should be sensible measures consisting with fundamental rights. The Mobility Partnerships (MP) and the Common Agendas for Migration and Mobility (CAMM) are characterised by comprehensive, enhanced and tailormade dialogue, and cooperation with the partner countries within the context of the most important bilateral cooperation frameworks. Apart from these, a set of targets, commitments and package of specific support measures have been used as the main instruments to manage and monitor migration policies by the EU and its interested member states. As claimed, there needs to be advanced policy activities related to mobility issues. For appropriate visa issues, motives for facilitating return and readmission of irregular migrants exemplify these. The external configurations of the EU’s labour immigration policy have been substantiated by bilateral agreements between the individual member states and the specific third-countries, as well as those agreements concluded by the EU. Examples include the employment related provisions of the association and Euro- Mediterranean agreements which the EU has concluded with countries such as Turkey, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, etc., and which add another layer of complexity to the EU legal framework on labour immigration (Carrera et al. 2011: 25). This approach is quite comprehensive with the creation of four pillars including

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regular immigration and mobility, irregular immigration and trafficking in human beings, international protection and asylum policy, and maximising the impact of migration and mobility on development. It may reflect a cross-cutting issue in relation to the human rights of migrants are a cross-cutting issue. Regarding regional dialogue processes, the principle partners in coordination with the EU are the Africa-EU Partnership on Migration, Mobility and Employment and the Rabat Process, the Prague Process, and the Eastern Partnership panel on Migration and Asylum, the migration dialogue with Latin America, and dialogue with countries along the Silkroute, including in the framework of the Budapest Process. Obviously, priority of immediate southern and eastern neighbourhood has become particularly acute in terms of geographical balance. As the migration crisis has deepened the European integration project, issues such as migratory routes and countries of origin, and transit of strategic interest to the EU have valued, so far. That said, a clear and well implemented framework for legal pathways to entrance in the EU (both through an efficient asylum and visa system) will reduce push factors towards irregular stay and entry, contributing to enhance security of European borders as well as safety of migratory flows (European Commission 2015: 3). The European Agenda on Migration two years on: Achievements and lessons learnt The European Agenda on Migration proposed immediate measures to cope with the 2015 crisis including actions to ensure that the existing EU rules are applied correctly and fully. The Agenda also set out a comprehensive approach addressing all aspects of migration based on the four areas of (1) irregular migration, (2) border management, (3) asylum policy and (4) legal migration as key for delivering an effective and sustainable EU migration policy, and laid out a number of key actions for each of these areas (European Commission 2017: 6). A particular point to make is that the 2015 European Migration Agenda is viewed as the new EU policy agenda setting priorities and instruments to guide the EU cooperation with the third countries for several issues including on migration, borders and asylum. Envisaging their accomplishment would be as absurd as denying that the national governments have already chosen to exercise different path toward integration. There is a variance in the EU’s approaches to labour migration, between immigrants’ access to rights and their access to admission, that lies at the heart of the EU’s common approach to labour migration. It shows that

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the EU legislation is much more binding on labour migrants’ rights as residents than on common admission conditions. This pattern is revealed by a comparison of the negotiations that led to the EU’s so-called “Blue Card” directive of 2009 and the single permit and rights directive of 2011 (Roos 2015: 540). At the supranational level, the Commission’s December 2015 proposal for a regulation establishing a European Border and Coast Guard, the proposal for a regulation on a targeted modification of the SBC and the upcoming revision of the Dublin Regulation could provide means to reinforce the security of external borders, while preserving free movement and complying with international protection obligations. On 4 March, the Commission presented a roadmap, targeting December 2016 for ending exceptional measures (Gatto 2016). Undoubtedly, agreements between the EU and the third countries present the specific policy, which stimulate migration flows. The perception of migration as temporary gives the EU competent to take measures in collaboration with the third countries. This points to the readmission of their nationals, who fall short of fulfilling the conditions for entry into, or presence or residence in a member state. Despite these sort of policies, many governments have struggled to reduce levels of immigration to those that would presumably be deemed to be acceptable to the mass public (i.e., to very low levels). This is, in turn, is likely to contribute to perceptions of lack of legitimacy and responsiveness of governments institutions (Tonkiss 2013: 83). The times when the individual member states cannot fight irregular migration, venerable notion of state sovereignty and to suggest that it is being transformed under the new reality of international population movements. It is all news that states are becoming interdependent and face more and more international constraints on domestic policies. Global trends in international transportation, technologies, weapons, and the structure of global economy have eroded earlier notions of sovereignty. What is unique about international migration, however, is that it changes the very composition of a country’s population and therefore, potentially, domestic policies (Weiner 1995: 130). It is also claimed that governments themselves provide incentives for stimulating these situations. Such incentives, as well as support for measures are provided by the EU alongside economic, social

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and political policy development of the member states. The aim is to facilitate the integration of legally resident third-country nationals into European labour market. The provision for the harmonisation of national laws and regulations is left to the competences of the member states. Clearly, the EU’s motives for supporting irregular migration is significant. The migration crisis in the Mediterranean has put the spotlight on immediate needs. But it has also revealed much about the structural limitations of the EU migration policy and the tools at its disposal. This is an opportunity for the EU to face up to the need to strike the right balance in its migration policy and send a clear message to its citizens that migration can be better managed collectively by all EU actors. As Buonanno rightly claimed, what is unique about the migration crisis is that, anatomy of the migration crisis has tended to depend the European integration project and exposed unbridgeable differences among the member states. A steady increase in asylum application from the 2011 onwards presents a “perfect storm”, at the same time highlights “solidarity” and “burden-sharing” (see Fig. 3.1). Irregular migration and its detrimental effects of regular migration has become a test of the EU’s principle of free movement of labour, as well as an AFSJ policies. As already noted, the combination of a rising number of asylum-seekers and migrants, security concerns and fragile economic recovery has put 1400 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 0

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Fig. 3.1 Asylum application (Source Eurostat 2017)

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the Schengen area under stress and called into question its functioning and development. Currently, seven out of 26 Schengen countries have temporarily reintroduced border controls. In February 2016, the Council adopted a recommendation requesting Greece to address serious deficiencies in the application of the Schengen acquis, within three months, under threat of suspension from Schengen for up to two years, as provided for under Article 26 of the Schengen Borders Code (SBC) (Gatto 2016). With different histories and circumstances of various countries, character and intensity of this phenomena has, in turn, varied throughout the European integration. In the last decade, tightening of the immigration laws has become particular acute in continental Europe because of pressure from the popular outcry and the political parties of the extreme right. The result is mostly a rapid acceleration of violent crimes against the racial minorities. With the vast numbers asylum-seekers residing in the European countries, predominantly in Greece and Italy today, these governments will be tempted to engage in future regularization, which is of obvious concern to other member states who do not want to be responsible for absorbing further migrants into their economies and societies (Buonanno 2017: 113). The UK, being major colonial power struggle to deal with asylum applications and thus public hostility towards migration. The UK has not been the only European country in which racism has infected sections of the public and put pressure upon the politicians; nor has it been the only European country in which politicians, journalists, and members of the public have manifested hostility towards immigrants and asylum seekers and accepted hysterical estimates of their members (Dummett 2001: 137). Particularly, Germany, Belgium, France and the Netherlands have history of admitting and integrating the third-country nationals from their colonies. It is important to ensure smooth implementation of any EU-wide labour migration scheme and articulation between international migration and intra-EU mobility of EU nationals. They are indeed perfect substitutes in the labour market and for employers, It is necessary then to develop, as a complementary measure, the modalities of implementation of the EU preference, both for EU nationals of other member states and for third-country nationals legally residing on a permanent basis in respective member state; this includes family reunification beneficiaries, refugees and former labour migrants. However, that would pose a major policy challenge, to the extent that the implementation of a EU-wide labour

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market test does not seem feasible under the current fragmentation of the EU labour market and in particular of the under EU public employment services (Martin and Venturini 2016: 3). The essence of oversight policy improvement is that the EU develops legislation. The rules for Legal Migration Fitness Check, which was launched by the Commission in September 2016 exemplifies this. This initiative may be a test for the EU for its assessment of relevance, coherence, effectiveness and efficiency of its policies of kind. As for the nonEU nationals legislation, its other legal migration tools are included the Family reunification Directive (2003/86/EC), the Long-Term Residents Directive (2003/109/EC), the original EU Blue Card Directive (2009/50/EC) and the Single Permit Directive (2011/98/EU). As a matter of fact, all assessments and projections point to a significant need for migrant labour force for the whole EU in the coming years and decades. It cannot do so either for: family reunification beneficiaries (who are entitled to come to Europe because of their family ties, not their qualifications); asylum beneficiaries (entitled because of persecution or conflict in their countries of origin, regardless of their skills and qualifications); or even foreign students (self-selected by the investment it requires from them and their families). The lack of legal migration channels clearly encourages irregular migration, since regularisation of irregular migrants remains the main way to access the EU labour market for reasons of employment (Martín and Venturini 2015: 6). Any strategy to fight irregular migration necessitates the legal labour migration mechanisms into the EU as a component of kind. Under these circumstances, it seems that migration will remain a defining issue for the EU for years to come. The past and ongoing efforts in the different fields outlined above, including management of the external border, will have to continue, as a migration risk and the need for saving lives are still there. In addition and in parallel to fully applying all the existing rules and delivering the necessary contributions to joint actions and funds, for the Union to fully deliver on the European Agenda on Migration, it is now necessary to intensify efforts in four priority areas: setting the right legal framework to make the Common European Asylum System future-proof, enhancing legal pathways to replace irregular migration, increasing the effectiveness of returns to shift resources to those who need them and working with priority countries and organisations to better manage migration together (European Commission 2017: 6). Such reasoning reflects a more general conclusion about the nature of the

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labour migration policies in the post enlargement period, while admitting that a renewed impetus for promoting geographical mobility at EU level is the case. In essence, the labour market situation is often wrecked at national level by concerns over the negative effects of migrant inflows to the European labour markets. Worst still, labour mobility deteriorated during the crisis for the EU migrant workers relative to the native-born workers. Nevertheless, the EU is a still safe haven for migrants. As long as it remains an attraction of destination for migrants, there will be a signal to be sent to the policy-makers to come up with the rational-decision making.

Conclusion The EU institutions continues to be the major locus of labour migration policy-making in Europe and generate an increasing legislative output. In successive rounds of treaty revisions, the actors have tried to simply the migration policy process and thus enhance the effectiveness of the legislative framework. The most recent attempt in this kind was the Lisbon Treaty, which has expanded both the supranational and the intergovernmental features of the institutions. Parallel to this, there has been a radical change in the roles and authority base of central EU institutions policymaking. A real question is that a forward-looking and a comprehensive European immigration policy can be erected in the existence of these legislative changes. In principle at least, it is possible to emphasis a wide range of institutional reforms brought by the Lisbon Treaty. At one end of the spectrum is a qualitative leap into power sharing between the Council and the EP with respect to the introduction of co-decision, in particular, the role of central institutions are strengthened and the EU’s policy-making competences are extended, and the Council does not retain all power. And new rules for the QMV on regular immigration are set out making intention of the member states to affect less likely outcome, while unanimous voting requirement was eliminated in most policy areas. If, as seems quite possible, this new legal basis for integration measures will help to speed up decision-making in the labour migration and the Treaty distinguishes difference between the EU and the national competences, if this changed position in voting system can be workable.

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For a long time, the principle of free movement of labour has been under increasing scrutiny of the EU legislative instruments. The transferability of social security rights of Union citizens, in particular has been under increasing activity of the ECJ in terms of its judicial activism. The bottom line is that a legal and political union requires balance between regular and irregular migrant rights in terms of their activities in the European labour markets. For the later, admission and condition, most of time, has proved to be naturally hard to be handled by the current legal instruments, as it stands today, although almost all member states acknowledge obligations to comply with rules and regulations. Here, quite from the ECJ, other institutions (i.e., European Commission) have general orientation towards promoting the European integration tent to prevail. Historically, the migratory movements and the government policies have become growing importance given changing function of immigrant labour in West Europe. This is to say, the growth of the East-West labour flows following the enlargement 2004 have added a new dimension to the EU labour migration policy. This episode is supposedly regarded as a prevalent component of European migration. Since at least 2000s, a comprehensive labour market approach to the EU labour migration policy requires to\respond to the economic needs for migrants, especially the Commission’s new legal migration package deals touching upon skills of migrants. The challenges posed by an insecure feeling about intensions of foreign citizens and cultures may not integrate, in a comprehensive way, all the third-country nationals accessing European labour markets, including family reunification beneficiaries and asylum-seekers. Unsurprisingly, the EU continues to support irregular migration. In the last decade, building a truly comprehensive migration policy has necessitated the common political principles and solidarity in the face of current migration crisis. In this regard, the GAMM has been strengthened the EU’s external dimension of migration policy, in its relation with the third-countries. Although the GAMM represents an example of international cooperation with major partner countries, with the objectives being defined as, among others, better organising legal migration and well-managed mobility, scope and capacity of this new approach depends on the collaboration and solidarity of the partner countries. Another dimension of the EU’s external policy is based on the MP and the CAMM, which are considered as the most important bilateral

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cooperation frameworks. Given these positive developments—while having far-reaching consequences for the EU’s general institutional architecture—the most prominent area of the EU policy-making, such as migrant returns, border management and asylum policy will likely become areas of supranational competence for the foreseeable future, unless further measures are not taken.

References Bandhauer, C. A. (2010). The post-9/11 anti-immigrant movement. In T.-A. Jones & E. Mielants (Eds.), Mass migration in the world-system, past, present and future (pp. 204–223). Paradigm Publishers. Barslund, M., & Busse, M. (2016). Labour mobility in the EU, addressing challenges and ensuring “fair mobility” (CEPS, Special Report, No. 139/July). Buonanno, L. (2017). The European migration crisis. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), The European Union in crisis (pp. 100–130). London: Palgrave. Carrera, S., Atger, A. F., Guild, E., & Kostakopoulou, D. (2011, April 5). Labour immigration policy in the EU: A renewed agenda for Europe 2020, thinking ahead for Europe (CEPS Policy Brief, No. 240). Castles, S., & Kosack, G. (1997). The function of labour immigration in Western European capitalism. In R. Cohen & Z. Layton-Henry (Eds.), The politics and migration (pp. 62–80). International Library of Studies on Migration. An Elgar Reference Collection. Cliffton, M. (2007, January–February). Managing new migration, new local government network. In E. Hönekopp & H. Werner (Eds.), Is the EU’s labour market threatened by a wave of immigration? (pp. 3–5). Intereconomics. Djajie, S. (2001). Illegal immigration trends, policies and economic effects. In S. Djajie (Ed.), International migration, trends, policies and economic impact, contemporary economic policy issues (pp. 137–161). Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group. Dummett, M. (2001). Immigration and refugees. Thinking in Action. Routledge. European Commission. (2015, May 13). A European Agenda on Migration, Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. COM(2015) 240 final. https://ec.europa.eu/anti-trafficking/ sites/antitrafficking/files/communication_on_the_european_agenda_on_ migration_en.pdf. European Commission. (2017, September 27). Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions on the Delivery of the

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European Agenda on Migration. Brussels. COM(2017) 558 final. https:// ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/sites/homeaffairs/files/what-we-do/policies/ european-agendamigration/20170927_communication_on_the_delivery_of_ the_eam_en.pdf. European Commission. (2018). Global approach to migration and mobility. https://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/legalmigration_en. European Parliament. (2014). Changed rules for qualified majority voting in the Council of the EU, at a Glance. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/ etudes/ATAG/2014/545697/EPRS_ATA%282014%29545697_REV1_EN. pdf. Eurostat. (2017). Annual growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) in real terms, EU-28, 1996–2016 (%) statistics explained. European Commission. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statisticsexplained/index.php?title= File:Annual_growth_rate_of_gross_domestic_product_(GDP)_in_real_terms,_ EU28,_1996%E2%80%932016_(%25)_RYB17.png&oldid=338466. Gatto, A. (2016, March). Challenges to the Schengen area. European Parliamentary Research Service, at a Glance (PE 579.073). Kahmann, M. (2015). The politics of migrants irregularity. In M. Bernaciak (Ed.), Market expansion and social dumping in Europe. Routledge Advances in European Politics. Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group. King, R., & Okolski, M. (2018). Diverse, fragile and fragmented: The new map of European integration. Central and Eastern European Migration Review, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.17467/ceemr.2018.18. Koikkalainen, S. (2011, April 21). Free movement in Europe: Past and present. Migration Policy Institute. https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/ free-movement-europe-past-and-present. Kupiszewski, M. (2003). Consequences of EU enlargement for freedom of movement between council of Europe member states (Central European Forum for Migration Research, CEFMR Working Paper 1/2003). http://www.cefmr. pan.pl/docs/cefmr_wp_2003-01.pdf. Martin, I., & Venturini, A. (2016). A comprehensive labour market approach to the EU labour migration policy, Migration Policy Centre, EUI. Martín, I., & Venturini, I. (2015). A comprehensive labour market approach to EU labour migration policy, Migration Policy Centre, EU. http://ec.europa. eu/transparency/regexpert/index.cfm?do=groupDetail.groupDetailDoc&id= 19245&no=1. European Migration Institute. Menz, G. (2015). Framing the matter differently: The political dynamics of European Union labour migration policymaking. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28(4), 554–570. Moraes, C. (2003). The politics of European Union migration policy. In S. Spencer (Ed.), Managing opportunity conflict and challenge: The political quarterly (pp. 116–131). Blackwell.

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Okolski, M. (2005). New migration movements in Central and Eastern Europe. In D. Joly (Ed.), International migration in the new millennium (pp. 36–55). Ashgate. Paas, T., Eamets, R., Masso, J., & Rõõm, M. (2003). Labour market flexibility and migration in the Baltic states: Macro evidences (University of Tartu Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, No. 16). Roos, C. (2015). EU politics on labour migration: Inclusion versus admission. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28(4), 536–553. Royo, S. (2007). Lessons from Spain and Portugal in the European Union after 20 years (Dans Pôle Sud, 2007/1 (26)), pp. 19–45. Tassinopoulos, A., Werner, H., & Kristensen, S. (1998). Mobility and migration of labour in the European Union and their specific implications for young people (CEDEFOP). Tonkiss, K. (2013). Migration and identity in a post-national world. Global Ethics Series. Palgrave Macmillan. Weiner, M. (1995). The global migration crisis, challenge to states and too human rights. Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers. Zincone, G. (2006). Italian immigrants and immigration policy-making: structures, actors and practices (IMISCOE Working Paper).

CHAPTER 4

Recent Trends in Labour Migration in the EU

Introduction Although the freeing of the internal market is supported by all the member states, trends in the European labour markets point to differentiation, flexibility and closer co-operation, as treaties envisaged. On the other hand, a socio-economic unity by a common accord is also an excellent issue for the political actors to move forward labour mobility across the member states. While ostensibly a project to complete the single market, what needs most is that to resort to different formal and informal strategies by the EU policy-makers to reconcile the different approaches to social issues. In this regard, the policy reforms of labour mobility are to be lasting significance for European integration. This is despite of a slow shift towards more coherence labour market coherence provisions to the extent of which the member states are unwilling to follow a uniform social policy, as evolution reveals. More broadly, problem lies in the initial variation in both intention and achievement. In retrospect at least, the political implications of free movement of labour is clear. An unrestricted fashion in terms of mobility brings economic prosperity and welfare in social policy aspect. In this vein, differences should be eliminated so that manpower volume can be mobilized. This may seem modest changes, but a socially desirable labour market will bring benefits for the member states, implying submerge national differences in a united Europe is yet to be happened.

© The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_4

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Data on Labour Flows In May 2004, accession of 10 new member states, which joined the EU (Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia) radically changed the dynamic of intra-EU labour mobility; it had not been seen as operating in an area where there were very large, persistent, structural differences in wage levels. Given these disparities, there was clearly a possibility of much larger intra-EU flows than had previously been the case. Indeed, the impact of accession on intra-EU migration flows was large and sustained, with substantial increases in migration to all the major economies of the existing EU, in particular the UK and Ireland. The main drivers were economic, the vast majority of migrants moved to work, attracted by either higher wages or greater job opportunities. In 2007, Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU; this too led to a significant increase in flows, although this time Spain and Italy were major destination countries (Portes 2015: 2). According to the Commission figures (2016), 11.3 million EU-28 movers of working age (20–64 years) were living in the EU member state other than their country of citizenship. This equates to 3.7% of the total working age population across the EU. Extent of mobility is summarised in Table 4.1. In 2016, the total number of mobile citizens, who was economically active living in the EU-28 increased by 6%. Slightly over 9 million EU citizens of working age were living in an EU country other than their Table 4.1 Data on movers to another member state (2015) Extent

Type of mobility

11.3 million

Long-term’ EU-28 movers of working age (20–64 years) living in EU-28 … as share of the total working age population in the EU-28 Active EU-28 movers (employed or looking for work) Cross-border EU-28 workers (20–64 years) in 2015 Annual flow of working age EU-28 and EFTA movers who moved in 2014 … as a share of the total working age population living in the EU-28 and EFTA Movers who returned to their country of citizenship in 2014

3.7% 8.5 million 1.3 million 1.1 million 0.4% 0.6 million

Note The annual flow of movers does not include return mobility Source European Commission (2016a)

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own. Figure 4.1 summarises situation regarding outflow rates in the EU28. Most of the EU-13 countries (refers to the 13 member states that have joined the EU between 2004 and 2013 and Croatia) have the highest proportion of outflow nationals leaving the country. With more than 1.1% Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Estonia and Ireland have the highest proportion of citizens of working-age leaving their country for another EU country, followed by Croatia around 1%. Their outflow rates range from three to six times higher than the EU-15 and 0.3% of working age people. A significant outflow rate is also observed in Poland. At the other end of the spectrum, the large outflows in total numbers from the UK, Germany, Italy and Spain are all below the EU aggregate. As intra-EU labour mobility has increased with the successive waves of the EU enlargements, the industrial relations research has focused on the ways in which these flows have impacted upon the national wage systems and the employment regulations of the receiving states. In such accounts, labour migration typically appears as a challenge or threat to the

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labour market institutions and the regulations in the high-wage destination countries. The loss of sovereign control over borders in the EU international market and the questioning of the territorial principle of labour law by European jurisdiction are often seen as fundamental to these issues (Kahmann 2015: 61). Figure 4.2 clearly shows that the intra-EU labour mobility is closely associated with the 2004 and 2007 enlargements of the EU, as an upward trend recoded. The number of mobile workers rose considerably in the period of 2004–2007, when the membership of CEECs occurred. In recent years, a shift from “East-West” to “South-North” mobility is evident. This is because the economic developments had an observable effect on the movements within the EU-28. The large numbers of inflows into the Western and Northern European countries from the EU13 countries followed accession of the latter to the EU in 2004. The 2008 economic crisis, however, profoundly impacted the EU, albeit to varying degrees for each of its member states. This in turn impacted mobility flows, increasing in-flows from the Southern countries of EU15 to the North. In other words, countries like Italy and Spain, themselves still important countries of destination for the new EU-13 members, also became important countries of outflow, with larger numbers

2013

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Fig. 4.2 Increase in the number of mobile workers after enlargement (Source European Commission 2014a)

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of people leaving, supplementing numbers of inflows towards Northern Europe (European Commission 2018: 44). To elaborate this point further, the impact of the crisis on the intraEU mobility is caused for concern for policy makers. From 2009 to 2010 mobility was decreased by 41% compared with the years 2007– 2008. An upward flows in the post-enlargement years from 2004 to 2008 was observed, but mobility was reversed, when a considerable number of workers returned home in the first years of the economic crisis. This drop is linked to a sharp fall in labour demand, especially for low and mediumskilled workers. There was also a progressive reduction in the mobility rate of workers from the CEECs. Compared with 2009–2010, intra-EU labour mobility was picked up by 22% in the second phase from 2011 to 2012. This recovery is mainly explained by growing outflows from the member states with high unemployment level. These countries were Greece, Spain, Ireland, Hungary and Latvia that faced with the highest increase in labour outflows to other EU countries. From the national interest perspective, these patterns of immigration are shaped by government policy which attempts to control immigration flows. At its simplest, this can be seen as an attempt to balance two conflicting objectives. On the one hand governments welcome immigrants as a valuable labour force, either as workers whose skills are in short supply, or as unskilled workers who are prepared to do some of the jobs that native workers shun. On the other hand they also try to dissuade immigrants if they believe they will bring social and political problems and they usually restrict immigration on the grounds of preserving “national identity” or maintaining social stability (Stalker 2002: 152). Despite the overriding self-interests, the development connection with migration nonetheless arises. Ultimately, concern to contain the extent of migrant arrival can only partially be realized through imposition of border controls and sanctions against apprehended irregular migrants and their employers. Even the most draconian attempts to erect barriers to entry are never fully effective. Economic development in the region of origin, notably economic development that results in job creation and wage increments, does diminish migration pressures (Lucas 2005: 295), although the member states tend to unwelcome the labour mobility in their borders. Moreover, advanced industrial economies are considered to be able to sustain their development and growth only with internal migration (Brown 1988: 5). On option available to the policy-makers is to increase temporary migration.

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The EU member states continue to have a say about the immigration of the non-EU workers is inherent in this proposed system of temporary immigration. The quota that they determine for this scheme only has direct consequences for their own employment market and economy (Abeelen 2007: 35).

Obstacles to Mobility Downturn in the Logic of the Internal Market Studies confirm that the principle of free movement of labour is suffered the loss of catalyst by the serious consequences of the migration crisis and it needs a new impetus for economic development, as well as political credibility (see Barslund and Busse 2016; Fries-Tersch et al. 2017). Labour mobility is closely associated with building of the internal market. The objective is to stimulate economic integration and, thus welfare-enhancing, with significant distributional effects. From the economic aspects of the European integration, the case is strong. Not only that, it is seen complementary with its wider political objectives. The European Commission figures (2017a) revealed a sharp drop in GDP by 4.4% in real terms resulted from the global financial and economic crisis on the EU-28’s economic output in 2009 (see Fig. 4.3). The considerable impact felt in the EU-wide forced the member states to review their macroeconomic policies. Output fell by 0.5% in 2012, despite of economic recovery was observed in 2010 and picked up in 2011. A successive period of growth in real GDP was witnessed from 2013 to 2016, with an declining trend recorded in 2015 (2.2) and 2016 (1.9%). In addition to these figures, a survey conducted by the Commission in 2011 pointed to the weakening of political and social support to the integration of the markets of Europe. For example, 63% European citizens felt that the internal market flooded their country with cheap labour; 53% believed it had worsened working conditions, implying that the legal framework of the free movement of people was flawed. This worsening economic situation is a mirror of labour migration. Theoretically, employment level is one of the determinants of labour mobility. Data from the Eurostat confirms that the number of people that employed aged 20–64 were 214.8 million in the EU-28 in 2016. Prior to the global economic crisis, the employment level was remarkable higher than any other periods—peaked in the EU-28 at 70.3% in

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Fig. 4.3 Annual growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) in real terms, EU-28, 1996–2016 (Source Eurostat 2017b)

2008. In following few years (2009–2013), there was a sharp drop in the employment rate fell by 1.3% in 2009 and fell again in 2013 due to the impact of the crisis. A general trend of a negative effect on employment was evident during this period. The extensive loss of jobs in most countries, notably Ireland, Greece, Spain, Latvia and Lithuania was particular recorded. Although labour market developments between 2006 and 2016 were generally bumpy, the increasing rates in employment (for persons aged 20–64) were observed from 2014 onwards, reaching 71.1% in 2016. The higher employment level stands on the way of mobility, in spite of this increase in the recent years.

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What emerges as another impact of the global economic crisis is the employability of graduates. As already mentioned, increasing youth employability is an integral part of the ET 2020 strategy to enhance employability as a whole through education and training in order to meet current and future labour market challenges. The target is that, 82% of recent young graduates should be in employment by 2020. The employment rate of recent graduates in the EU-28 rose unevenly from 76.5% in 2002 (the start of the time series available for this indicator) to 82.0% in 2008. The impact of the global financial and economic crisis was felt in labour markets, dropping to 75.4% in 2013. Hence, the rate fell, as did the overall employment rate, but it started to increase again, reaching 78.2% by 2016. Compared with 2015, the employment rate of recent graduates in the EU-28 rose by 1.3 percentage points in 2016 (European Commission 2017a: 98). This outlook entails expectations to undertake further major reforms and thus monitor better contribution to education and training to the transition to employment, and in turn labour flows. A collective response by the EU to its growing economic crisis is mainly initiated by the Commission to develop an approach on European Agenda on Migration. Opening up new legal migration channels to respond to economic needs for labour is one of four priorities of the Commission for its upcoming European Agenda on Migration. Jean-Claude Juncker’s new team of Commissioners in office since November 2014 has already initiated a new policy on legal migration. This was later acknowledged as European Agenda on Migration adopted in May 2015. The main objective was to maintain Europe as “an attractive destination for migrants.” The Commission’s proposed guideline is the reflection of some ideas for action to explore the framework of the current review of the European Agenda on Migration include (i) definition of the EU labour migration policy as an integral part of the EU labour market policy; (ii) a comprehensive labour market vision of EU economic migration regime; (iii) international labour matching mechanism and (iv) recognition of diplomas of the thirdcountry nationals. The agenda acknowledged the idea of setting up EUwide relocation and resettlement schemes of the asylum policy. This is because the EU’s external migration policy formally consists of the home affairs policy priorities, together with development cooperation policies.

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Prospect of Declining Population For too long, assumption has been made that the demographic changes makes labour mobility unable to run smoothly. Demographers have so long ago sounded warning bells that the population ageing process may result in a decline in the population size of the European nations. The combination of ageing and absolute decline results from a history of below-replacement fertility plus a continuous increase in life expectancy. In the absence of major demographic catastrophes (wars, large-scale epidemics, etc.), absolute population decline is a natural and unavoidable consequence of the population ageing process. In these countries, fertility has not been stabilized around a replacement level of two-children per women, as was generally expected in the 1970s and 1980s. European fertility levels seem to have fallen permanently much below this critical level. Their ‘post-transtional’ development has kept their fertility much below replacement levels (Behar 2006: 24). This is to say, a new “baby boom” is not probable, as things stand out now. The EU is also facing a series of long-term economic and demographic challenges. Its population is ageing, while its economy is increasingly dependent on highly-skilled jobs. The EU’s working age population will, without migration, be declined by 17.5 million in the next decade. Migration will increasingly be an important way to enhance the sustainability of our welfare system and to ensure sustainable growth of the EU economy. This is why, even if the case for legal migration will always be difficult at a time of high unemployment and social change, it is important to have in place a clear and rigorous common system, which reflects the EU interest, including by maintaining Europe as an attractive destination for migrants (European Commission 2015b: 25). Notwithstanding, there is an increasing evidence of a demographic decline and a process of replacement in all EU countries. Today, contemporary treatments of the European labour markets often begin with the almost de rigueur reference to the demise of population. According to Eurostat projections, the number of very elderly persons will be substantially increased in the EU-28 with a progressively ageing population. What is striking is that there will be significant increase in the share of those aged 80 years and over in the total EU-28 population, from 5.4% in 2016 to 12.7% by 2080 (from 27.3 million in 2016 to 66.1 million in 2080). The projected changes in the composition of the EU-28’s population suggest that:

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i. insignificant population growth, as the already low number of births is projected to continue; ii. the dependent population will increase between 2016 and 2080 as a result of shrinking the working-age population–further burden on those of working-age; iii. the proportion of elderly persons will increase to a greater level, indicating the ageing of the EU’s population due to the lower mortality rates; iv. the number of centenarian women will substantially be higher than the number of centenarian men. On a Europe-wide scale, greying population is a turning point, adding different dimension to the European labour markets in the short run. This is clearly what Alejandro Macarron, Managing Director of Demographic Renaissance, meant; when he said “slowly” and “expected”. The demographic challenge is more pronounced in some countries than others. Even when migration is factored in, some EU-28 countries are seeing their overall populations shrink, and population growth is slowing across the bloc as a whole. Unless current trends change, Europe is expected to be the only continent on Earth whose population will shrink by 2050 (Macarrón 2016: 2). The average population of the EU-28 increased each and every year between 1961 and 2010. After falling by 282 thousand inhabitants in 2011 (which may be attributed to the revision of population statistics for Germany following the 2011 census), an upward pattern of population growth resumed and by 2015 there were 509.4 million inhabitants living in the EU-28. The average population of the EU-28 rose by 97.7 million inhabitants between 1961 and 2015, equivalent to an average increase of 0.4% per annum. Figure 4.4 shows these changes in the EU-28’s population structure. Clearly, these figures indicate a growing shift in age structure towards an increasing number of old people in the EU. The decreasing trend is particularly marked in some countries, in terms of timing and scale of changes. The situation of Italy is clearly the worst, due to very low fertility and labour force participation. Ageing processes and their negative labour market consequences are also fairly advanced in Belgium, Bulgaria and Hungary. On the other hand, a relatively good situation with respect to a combination of various support ratios can so far be observed in Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Portugal, Ireland and the Slovak Republic; in the first four countries mainly due to the high economic activity rates,

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Man(2016)

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Man(2080)

Fig. 4.4 Population pyramids, EU-28, 2016 and 2080 (% of total population) (Note Estimates, 2018 projections. Source Eurostat [2017b])

while in the latter two—to the young population structures (Bijak et al. 2007: 5). Given that, the key challenge lies not only in sustainability of pension schemes across the EU member states as a result of demographic change, but in the European labour markets. It is the most probably that the European countries will face a decrease in working age population and increase in old age dependency ratio in the coming decades. The Commission (2014a) study or the European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training (CEDEFOP) country forecasts show that decline of working age population could discourage sustainable economic growth in some countries, as a consequence of the labour force reduction in the long run. The only remedy to these problems is to enhance mobility and increase the labour market participation or the employment rates. This is immediate and frequently discussed solutions among the European policy makers. The increase in labour mobility is deeply concerned for the local communities and masks a reality of significant shortcomings, as it is the important theme for the UK’s referendum to leave the EU.

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An EU-level labour migration policy is necessary in this framework. This policy should be aiming to complement the EES by facilitating accession of the international migrant workers to the EU labour markets to fill the gaps in intra-EU labour and skills supply. To achieve that objective, any policy approach should fully integrate not only third-country nationals entering the EU for employment purposes, but also those others arriving for family, asylum, education or other purposes; as a matter of fact, there is evidence that some migrants enter the EU through non-labour migration channels precisely because of the lack of legal labour migration possibilities, but with the main aim and motivation of accessing the labour market (i.e., they are de facto if not de iure labour migrants) (Martín and Venturini 2015: 8). Employers can use migrant networks to control and regulate the flow of labour. Recruitment through migrant networks is thought to be a common practice among employers with a migrant workforce. Companies with a demand for a flexible workforce may make use of employment agencies to help find suitable workers (Ruhs and Anderson 2011: 74). As the current picture suggests, the advancement of population ageing and its negative economic and labour market effects in Europe should not be underestimated and undervalued by the policy-makers. The question of how Europe reverse its demographic decline is the main concerned. This specific question of increasing the ratio of economically active to inactive population is today what prominently debated in the EU-wide, addressing the issues of importing workers from the third countries to compensate labour shortages in the European labour markets. It is generally accepted that the imported labour force will be major implications for prosperity, living standards and relations between generations deriving from the unparalleled demographic changes. What remains to be seen is that capacity of the member states meeting challenges of a shrinking workforce and an ageing population awaiting to be addressed by the policymakers. To this end, additional policies for tackling the labour market shortages should be kept open mind on the need for a younger migrant labour to replenish its labour force in the long run. Labour Market Participation The labour force has been facing compelling changes in its character and volume, especially the since SEA of 1986. The working age population has grown, for instance women have stepped into the work place. At

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the same time, the unemployment structure has become an underlying issue. The sweeping changes are the growth of information and communication technologies. The new form of industry and business with a major restructuring exemplify this. There has been substantial economic growth in relatively high-skilled, knowledge-intensive sectors and occupations. Regularly, direct effect of this cultivation is suggestive of part-time or temporary basis. In the last two decades, demand for skilled labour has become a prominent issue as a consequence of redundant workers. All these are manifested in the European social model, pointing to a wellbalanced system should be benefiting all Europeans. Geographical mobility can function as an adjustment mechanism, which makes a better match between labour demand and supply both across and within countries. A more balanced redistribution of the population across regional and the European labour markets represent more to show for decades of work and hugely ambitious rhetoric economically. The Lisbon criteria confirmed the overall employment rate target (70%), the target for females (60%) and older person employment rates (50%). Figure 4.5 presents a general picture of the current employment situation in all member states, showing progress made and how far they are from the Lisbon objectives. 2020 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 62

64

66

68 Europe 2020 target

70

72

74

76

78

Employment rate

Fig. 4.5 Employment rate of the age group 20–64, EU-28, 2002–2017(%) (Source Eurostat 2017b)

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As many believed, Europe’s competitiveness and productivity will strengthen a sustainable social market economy in the short or medium term. In this regard, the Europe 2020 strategy, which was adopted by the European Council on 17 June 2010, is regarded as the successor to the Lisbon strategy. Focused is on promoting a growth pact as an EU’s common agenda for this decade. It is expected that the structural weaknesses in labour market will be overcomed by a smart, sustainable and inclusive economy. The Europe 2020 strategy envisaged and targeted to have at least 75% of people aged 20–64 in employment by 2020. As a result, the overall employment rate in the EU reached 72.2% in 2017. If the employment rate keeps increasing at the pace recorded since 2013, the Europe 2020 target would be within reach. The set target of the Europe 2020 is only be achieved with average annual growth of almost 1.0 percentage in each of the coming four years. Additionally, the CEDEFOD (2016) projections suggest that employment in concrete numbers, the EU-28 member states, together with non-Norway, Iceland and Switzerland, will only reach pre-crisis level in 2019 and then will continue to grow. However, growth is likely to be stifled by the demographic trends and thus labour market will be characterised by much slower growth in the labour force. In short, in the 2020–2030 period, expected growth will be slower than in the pre-crisis period. A special interest is to foster the successful integration of young people into the labour market, assuming that obstacles persist in many member states. The youth unemployment rate is related to the number of unemployed 15–24 year-olds as a percentage of the youth labour force. One way of illustrating this problem is to consider their relative unemployment rate. There has been a tendency for a decline in the labour market participation rate of the under 25 years of old reflecting growth of full-time schooling and training. According to Eurostat data in 2017, unemployment, youth total (% of total labour force ages 15–24) in EU was reported at 16.85%. In comparison to the other industrialised countries, such as the US, Canada and Japan, unemployment among the young people is considerably higher. Worst still, the unemployment rates in a small number of countries such as Greece, and Italy stood out with the highest rates for young people aged 15–24, just over 25% (see Table 4.2). Taking only a snapshot of labour market at a time that obstacles to mobility have not removed yet raises some cause for concern. For some observers, unemployment among the young people may have important consequences for society unless adequate measures are taken. As it is pointed out, failure

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Table 4.2 Youth (aged 15–24) employment and unemployment rates in the EU, US, Japan and Canada, 2017

EU-28 US Canada Japan

93

Employment rate in %

Unemployment rate in %

35.18 50.42 56.43 45.34

16.85 9.22 11.63 4.65

Source OECD Labour force statistics (2017a)

will cause frustration among the young people. Others would suggest that discrimination in labour market situation that is related to employment contract (temporary, fixed term or part-time) is up surging. It is likely that those of less educated and less productive will be driven out of labour market. This will likely to result in higher level of unemployment. These aspects imply that a series of mismatch of jobs and an implication of high unemployment rates in certain groups closely mirror those of discrepancies to be resolved by the policy-makers. Data from the Eurostat reveals that the EU employment rate of the foreign-born migrants accounted for 67% compared with 73% for the native-born population in 2017. Migrants living in the EU member states are almost twice as likely to be unemployed than the national citizens. Data on migrant integration also found that around 14.8% of migrants in EU-28 were unemployed. This is 8.7% of national citizens. Among the EU’s migrant population, 10.2% (one in 10) of the EU citizens living in another member state were unemployed, by comparison to 18.9% (two in 10) of jobless non-EU migrants. More importantly, foreign-born persons accounted for 9.4% of the EU-27 population in 2010 and their socioeconomic situation was less favorable than for the native-born persons. Moreover, young immigrants have ended up in part-time and temporary employment more often than native-born youth. In most member states, the foreign-born workforce was working in the public administration was considerable low, in comparison to the native-born. In 2011, 51.2 nativeborn labour force (25%) worked within the public administration, such as defence, education, health and social work. This was compared to 4.9 million foreign-born residents (18.9%) who were working in the same economic activities. These recent trends have highlighted the need for sound policies to protect youth being as the most vulnerable. As a policy measure, Social Action Programme initiated by the Commission has

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targeted for promoting full and better employment. Even so, unemployment of foreign youth seems a prominent feature of the European labour markets and is likely to persist for some time. Therefore, the policy focus in recent years is integration of migrants which has increasingly become a key area. It points to measures to prepare immigrants and their descendants so that they may become more active participants in labour markets. This is of special concern for youth immigrants, who are vulnerable to the effects of unstable economic cycles in the labour market. Data from the European Commission (2009, 2011) and the OECD (2012) shows that the impact of the economic crisis on unemployment is more pronounced for migrants than for the native-born in the majority of the EU countries. Accordingly, the foreign-born unemployment rate increased by four percentage points between 2008 and 2011 compared with 2.5 points for the native-born and has only recently stabilized in some OECD countries. Immigrants tend to work in the most precarious sectors of national economies and have been hardest-hit by the downturn. In the Western European countries, the influx of foreign labour is not really a “brain drain” from the developing areas of the world. Most of these immigrants join the unskilled-labour market. This happens even when these European countries face a high level of unemployment in the unskilled-workers’ market. It could be due to the fact that even after considering the possibility of being unemployed and the cost of migration, the potential migrants from the Asian and African countries find it lucrative to move because the unemployment benefits are higher than their earned wages in the home country (Basu 2004: 85). The Commission is currently working with the member states on identifying the remaining barriers for accession to the public sector employment for the nonnationals, with a view of identifying, a clear shared criteria for reserved posts in order to limit the existing restrictions, in the light of the case law of the ECJ. One of feature of the employment outlook at the EU level is the employment rate for women continues to be below the rate of men since 2007, although women’s full integration into the economy is the fetching target for equity and efficiency point of view. The equity aspect implies that labour market participation of women will improve their relative economic position. It will also increase overall economic efficiency and improve development potentials of the country (Tansel 2002: 7). Gender differences are closely related to differences in levels of participation

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in education or educational attainment and different economic structures or industrial specialisation. Apart from this, frequently recognised reason is that family responsibilities (i.e., caring for children and other family members) that prevents women from engaging higher levels of economic activities. A further analysis of employment rates highlights a considerable, though narrowing, gender gap in the EU-28 (see Fig. 4.6). In 2006, the employment rate for men was 15.7 percentage points higher than for women, but this had narrowed to 11.5 percentage points by 2016. A particularly strong contraction in this gap (−1.6 percentage points) was observed in 2009, at the peak of the global economic crisis. Thereafter the gap continued to narrow alongside the fall in the overall employment rate, reaching 11.6 percentage points by 2014, after which it remained stable. By 2016, the employment rate for women had reached 65.3%, 2.5 percentage points above its pre-crisis high of 62.8% in 2008. For men the rate in 2016 was 76.8% and so remained below its 2008 pre-crisis high of 77.8%, but above the Europe 2020 target (European Commission 2017b: 95). Since a significant proportion of these migrants are women, their successful integration in the labour market is another important prerequisite for tackling these challenges adequately. Understanding the causes 78 76 74 72 70 68 66 64 62 2007

2008

2009

2010 Male

2011

2012 Female

2013

2014

2015

2016

Total

Fig. 4.6 Employment rate by sex, age group 20–64, 2007–2016 (%) (Source Eurostat 2017b)

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and effects of migration in an enlarged EU is a precondition for designing effective migration policies in Europe and thus a precondition for reaching the Lisbon targets as well as the key objectives of the European Employment Strategy and the Social Agenda (Kahanec and Zimmermann 2009: 2). All these outstanding problems, as they stand, necessitate a real mechanism to resolve them. At European level, the EU continues to support labour mobility—for example, through the upgrade of the EURES programme and its web-based platform. The EURES is playing an increasing role in encouraging job-matching across borders and coordination between national employment services. In cooperation with EURES, special agreements were signed by the German government with Spain (as well as other member states) to attract young EU workers to Germany (European Commission 2014b: 56). Employers can use migrant networks to control and regulate the flow of labour. Recruitment through migrant networks is thought to be a common practice among employers with a migrant workforce. Companies with a demand for a flexible workforce may make use of employment agencies to help find suitable workers (Ruhs and Anderson 2011: 74). The fact that countries in the EU continue to have a say about the immigration of non-EU workers is inherent in this proposed system of temporary immigration. The quota that they determine for this scheme only has direct consequences for their own employment market and the economy (Abeelen 2007: 35). The member states have followed comprehensive approaches to combat high unemployment. The emphasis is placed on the aim of balancing more flexibility and employment security at its heart, albeit varying degrees among the member states. Upgrading performance of the member states may be always a right recipe for employment, but the fulfilment of the specific components of flexicurity is less conclusive. Firstly, the labour market segregation persists. This is a significant problem for most member states. They have a higher tail of divergences. It is in this spirit, that development of a systematic policy based on specific aspect of labour market regulation is essential to overcome such divergences. Secondly, there is a country-specific challenges in the context of both as a share of GDP and per worker. From an economic integration perspective, upgrading GDP is a key component of the active labour market policy. Thirdly, the inhibition of social security reform (i.e., pension reforms) highlights the necessity of coordination between rules for occupational and supplementary pension provisions under different legislative

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regimes at both the national and the transnational levels. Fourthly, the magnitude of the participation of workers in lifelong learning is limited. Policies are addressing increasing attendance, for example adult training provision, which remains to be patchy can mitigate labour market participation. Skills The main objective of any migration policy is to facilitate matching of supply and demand in the labour market, because of ensuring that there is a qualified pool of workers available in the market to match any job vacancy opening by employers without incurring too high transaction costs. This labour migration policy objective has to be reconciled with the main objective of labour market policies, which is to make the best use of human capital available in the country (and by virtue of the EU preference principle, in the whole EU), including human capital arriving from third countries outside the labour migration schemes. Their human capital profile needs to be systematically researched and developed for the sake of labour market efficiency (Guild 2011: 218). The immediate insight from this viewpoint is that the labour migration policy and the labour market policy are inseparable and can only be defined together. Historically, most international labour migration within the EU has been relatively unqualified manual workers, not professional. Language skills (or lack of them) clearly inhibited mobility of professional workers, whereas a supervisor or team leader, with some knowledge of local language, can meet the language requirements for unskilled workers (Grahl and Teague 1992: 520). In the mid-1970s, many of these western countries became disillusioned with the unskilled workers due to the industrial crisis, and professional workers dominated these reduced flows. With the industrial slowdown and technical change in the Northern European countries, the need for less qualified labour has fallen and limited relations between labour markets in different EC countries have been weakened as a result (Ingham and Ingham 2004: 507). Instead of filling the skill requirements from domestic workers, companies are currently looking for foreign nationals to compensate shortages. However, the importing labour force is not immutable: it is an inherently dynamic phenomenon that can create pitfall in the sustaining steady manpower exchange, especially for a lack of information and the gaps in cross-recognition of qualifications in different countries. A key insight of this strategy is that relying

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on foreign workers as snapshots of the labour market may lead to the fallacious policy conclusions for tackling the skill mismatch. Various scholars carried out a large body of work suggest that unskilled labour force is an inescapable phenomenon in the EU and is yet to be remedied (see Grahl and Teague 1992; Ingham and Ingham 2004; Dobson and Sennikova 2007: 124; Fled 2005: 658). Conclusions of the Council meetings in Brussels, 9 December 2016 called for the member states to make use of the tools announced under the New Skills Agenda for Europe. The objective is to address the assessment, validation, and recognition of qualifications and skills of third-county nationals. Europe is competing with other economies to attract workers with the skills it needs. Changes in the skills required by the EU between 2012 and 2025 are expected to show a sharp increase in the share of jobs employing higher-educated labour (by 23%). Shortages have already been seen in key sectors such as science, technology, engineering and healthcare. Europe needs to build up its own skills base and equip people for inclusion in today’s labour market (European Commission 2015a: 25). One continuing labour market trend since 2008 is that employment has flourished in the professional, scientific and technical activities and the administrative sector, while it slowed down in the construction, agriculture and manufacturing sectors. Surely, most affect group by this decline is low skilled workers. Argument that is best supported is that of a polarization of skill experiences between classes. The already skill differentials between intermediary and the non-skilled manual class appear to have been accentuated in the 1990s. Those that already had relatively high levels of skill witnessed an increase in their skill levels, while those with low levels of skill saw their skills stagnate. The growth of the service sector has clearly been one of the structural factors that have contributed to this. Its public sector has been a major source of the growth of the service class, while the expansion of its private sector has been associated with the presence of a particularly large and exceptionally low-skilled category of non-skilled manual work. The polarization of skills is also closely associated with technological change. Those that have been in a position to use advanced technology in their work have been their skills increase; those that have not had this possibility have been much more likely to see their skills remain unchanged (Gallie 1994: 75). Although the current difficult labour market situation in many EU countries makes it challenging to explain the need for labour migration,

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it nonetheless seems clear that one important way in which enterprises will be able to maintain and develop their human capital and therefore their level of activity in the future is through the recruitment of skills from abroad (Dumont 2014: 8). The Lisbon European Council meeting in 2000 set the target for creating ‘the most competitive and dynamic knowledge based economy, sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion’. Creating a European labour market with inter-country labour mobility seen as a way to achieve these objectives by combating skill and other labour shortages, reducing the unemployment and offsetting the effects of a declining working age population (Dobson and Sennikova 2007: 124). As a matter of fact, assesing this role requires strong and focused action at the European level to promote not only mobility but also the skills (Fled 2005: 658). Skill shortages persistently present obstacles in an increasing number of sectors, such as health and elderly care engineering. The human capital theory assumes that a well-functioning labour market hinges largely on matching the labour force’s skills and qualifications. That is said, one key obstacle required more radical solution is skills mismatches in the labour market. Commonly, high and persistent mismatches are characterised by stiff for employers, workers and society at large. This is in spite of some skills mismatch is inevitable. It is largely associated with technological and demographic changes, which persist as challenges in the EU. That’s why one of the key components of the Europe 2020 strategy is matching educational outcomes in accordance with the labour market needs; it is launched to achieve higher level of employment among those aged 20–64 to at least 75%. Somewhat less benign outcome of the economic crisis has reinforced the need to better understand future skills shortages, which are likely to be case in the EU. The improved growth of employment presents an “occasion of premature celebration” because this improvement is reflected by many, being much less proactive in the issues relating to the quality of workforce. Rather it is a unique opportunity to push member states to come up with further structural reforms, with a particular emphasis on development and more integrated employment and training policies (Oguz 2009: 108). In order to overcome the skill shortages, a new Labour Mobility Package as an initiative on skills was introduced by the Commission in 2015. It is still a question mark whether such an initiative will fully match the needs. There is a casual relationship between education and skills which encourage the European decision-makers to come up with new ideas for

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such policies, as claimed by the human capital theory. Hence, education is significant factor in quality of workforce. Reported Eurostat data in 2017, the share of tertiary educational attainment was below 20% in southern or eastern regions of the EU. More specifically, in several regions from Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Greece, Italy, Hungary, Portugal, Romania and Slovakia, as well as overseas regions of France and Spain, the level of tertiary educational attainment was relatively low (at least 20%). This situation is generally ascribed by the necessity of vocational education, which may lead to professional qualifications. Worse still, labour supply goes beyond demand for all qualification types. This is particularly true for high for the low- and medium-level qualifications. The most recent forecasts from the CEDEFOP, suggest that the demand for a skilled labour force will not diminish in the future. Unlikely, demand will continue to grow. Accordingly, 13 million jobs entailing high educational attainment will be created between 2017 and 2025 (see Fig. 4.7). At the same time, low-qualified jobs will fall off by Labour force (skills supply)

Employment trends (skills demand)

250 250

200

200 150 150 100

100

50

50

0

0 2008

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2020

2008 2025

2017

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Low-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 1 and 2)

Low-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 1 and 2)

Medium-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 3 and 4)

Medium-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 3 and 4)

High-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 5 and 6)

High-level qualificaƟons(ISCED 1997 levels 5 and 6)

Fig. 4.7 Labour force and employment trend by qualification, EU-28, 2008, 2017, 2025 (Source CEDEFOP [2016] Skills broadcast)

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almost 6 million. In Central European Countries (CECs), young people have a more advantageous situation in the labour market—probably as a result of practice-based vocational training. Since professional experience and references play key roles in improving people’s prospects in the labour market, measures to improve young people’s situation in the labour market should target the vocational training system (Brenke 2007: 455). The EU must continue to offer protection to those in need. It must also recognise that the skills needed for a vibrant economy cannot always immediately be found inside the EU labour market or will take time to develop. Migrants who have been legally admitted by the member states should not be faced with reluctance and obstruction—they should be given every assistance to integrate in their new communities. This should be seen as central to the values Europeans should be proud of and should project to partners worldwide (Dummett 2001: 137). The real challenge to the decision-makers comes with overqualification, implying a worker has a level of skill or education higher than is required for a particular job. There are discrepancies between educational attainment levels and occupations, so-called “vertical” skills mismatches. In this regard, trends in the over-qualification rate in the EU from 2002 to 2017 are striking (see Fig. 4.8). The costs and risks of taking on a job below the qualification level are clearly very high. There are 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 18

19

20

21 Men

22 Total

23

24

25

Women

Fig. 4.8 Over-qualification rate, EU-28, 2002–2017 (Source Eurostat 2017b)

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many reasons why people may have to take on a job below their qualification level. Young workers are at higher risk of being overqualified for their jobs because they are more likely to have had a higher education than prime-age and older workers. Women also tend to be more overqualified than men. This might be because women in general have higher qualification levels. Another reason may be that they are more likely to take over childcare responsibilities and so are more willing to accept jobs that do not match their education but allowing for a more flexible work-care balance. Women also face “glass ceiling” effects, as they continue to be less likely to be promoted even though they are more likely to be highly educated (Eurostat 2017b). A few theoretically based assumption aim to explain why migrants are more prone to be over-qualified. Migrant workers who arrived in the host country an adult age indeed are more likely to be characterized by over-education. Indeed, first and second generation migrants and ethnic minorities are propone to labour market discrimination and this in turn increase the likelihood of over-qualification (Tijdens and Klaveren 2012: 104). The main problem of high-skilled workers in some countries is a limited number of skilled jobs available in the economy. High-skilled workers may decide to migrate in order to find a job more in accordance with their qualification, even if job vulnerability is higher. They are ready to accept jobs with more vulnerable characteristics than what they would have found in their origin countries, if these jobs are more related to the real qualification of the workers (Bazillier and Boboc 2016: 1150). An appropriate labour market management framework will need to create a scope to fill the skills gap in more productive areas, with more innovative forecasting and monitoring of future skills needs. As a matter of fact that, the enlargements in 2004 and 2007 have given an opportunity for workers to fill vacancies, at the same time, to find the skilled workers employers needed. Building such a framework is paramount to overcome skill shortages in European labour markets. There is a propensity that workers from the East entering the EU-15 labour markets, are relatively well-educated, although the steep rise of movements from the Eastern Europe caused for concern that they will take high profile jobs. Unlike the expectation, most of workers tent to head for low-paid and low-productivity jobs. In retrospect, the EU governments were tentatively wary about opening their labour markets during the transitional periods (with the exception of the UK, Sweden and Ireland), because of migratory flows from the new accession countries. Even if increases

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in flows are not economically feasible, they are undoubtedly making the largest contribution to the European labour market. However, the notion of discrimination applies to the low skilled, disabled people together with migrant workers from the third-countries. In this regard, for most countries, immigration of foreign skilled workers is normally both a symptom and a cause economic restructuring. Even at this level choices must be made between policies which favour permanent settler migration and those that encourage temporary contract migration (Findlay and Gould 1989: 6). On the whole, new measures to improve the skill level of young people are not enough, although recent some positive trends in place. Wages Many classical models of labour economics would certainly posit that an immigration-caused expansion of the labour pool would both increase the unemployment rate of natives and reduce their average wages (Fetzer 2016: 22). As suggested by migration theories, free movement of labour can lead to large flows of people from low income to high income regions. The result is downward pressure on wages in migration receiving countries, when it becomes legally permissible to allow large net flows of workers from low wage countries. Simply, increase in the supply of labour will cause a fall in wages of native-born workers. For political reasons, the national governments tent to take precaution to create barriers to labour mobility for this outcry, when unskilled foreign workers substitute for the native labour force. Consideration should be given to increase the wage differential between the member states. The benchmark for judging the labour market performance in the EU is the degree of wage differential that has seen a resurgent since Lisbon Treaty. The focus is the degree of harmonisation in the light of labour mobility. This is “horizontal” conflicts that have emerged with the eastern enlargement. A deficit of trust in the enlarged EU and in turn its effect on the mobility is this divergence, which is often viewed as the East–West conflict over free movement. Debate over disadvantages of free movement of labour has created contention between the member states. The enlargement of 2004 has led to large income differentials within the EU, with average wages between three and four times higher in the EU-15 than new accession countries. The starkest example is the UK, where successive governments have come under growing pressure to limit immigration from Europe. Facing a growing threat from the UK Independent Party (UKIP) and

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committed to reducing net migration from “tens to hundreds of thousands”, in November 2014, David Cameron set out a number of proposals intended to reduce the number of Europeans exercising their free movement right to live and work in Britain, including measures to tighten access to in-work benefits for the EU citizens. Having won the 2015 election, Cameron is committed to negotiate these proposals with other European leaders ahead of a referendum on British membership in 2017. While other European governments have made clear that the principle of free movement cannot be undone, several are sympathetic to the idea that the benefit rules should be revised. The German Government in particular has expressed a willingness to consider these issues (Hampshire 2015: 540). There are considerable wages differences between the member states (see Fig. 4.9). Measuring mobility levels depends very much on the higher wages. A strong upward pressure on wages is closely associated with the labour shortages that the member states experience, while the higher wages can trigger inflationary pressures. Free movement of labour can be explained by rising wages that creates the additional demand for labour and higher wages can easily attract more labour. To that extent, then, labour migration is pushing down wages due to the increase in labour 2200 2000 1800 1600 1400 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 Ireland

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Greece

Lithuania

Poland

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0

Fig. 4.9 Minimum wages in the EU member states, as of January 2019, in Euro per month (Source Eurostat 2019)

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supply that is combined with complexity of deepening and widening process. Some member states are particularly anxious about the accession of Bulgaria and Romania to the Schengen zone. No matter, the Commission report of meeting the technical requirements for accession in 2012, Bulgaria and Romania formed opposition in the Council. And though difficult to prove definitively, many have felt that large migrant flows from low-income countries in the East to higher income countries in the WestWide income disparities will cause both economic and social problems. This controversy has even led to veto by some members including France, Germany, Finland, and the Netherlands. Additionally, the political controversy over the Schengen accession is refection of mismanagement of judicial corruption or the influence of organised crime in law enforcement, which has even deteriorated the situation. What seems to be the driving force behind the sectoral approach taken by the EU policies in this area is the idea that the desirability of highly skilled individuals instigates a “global competition for talent”, and therefore requires the adoption of good conditions for these migrants to encourage them to move to the EU (instead of somewhere else). Conversely, lower-skilled migrants are thought of as readily available in large numbers, and thus do not necessarily need to be attracted through the creation of good conditions. Rather to the contrary, migrants ascribed to this framework are more easily associated with perceived security risks, such as the endangering of states’ social security systems or the undermining of wages and working conditions in their host countries (Guild 2005: 218). There are constraints for these lower-skilled workers to the extent of which they do not have access to the policy programmes, with the aim of promoting social settlement and integration. It is reasonable to claim that the EU labour migration policy should be flexible enough to respond to the EU labour market needs and to match the kind of work permit granted to migrant workers to those needs, discriminating between temporary and permanent labour market needs. So temporary permits granted to highly-qualified workers (such as the Blue Card) to meet long-term highly-skilled labour needs in the EU do not seem efficient; simultaneously, the EU labour migration toolbox should include flexible and temporary contracts for seasonal and temporary employment to adapt to seasonal work or peaks in labour demand (Martín and Venturini 2015: 5). Despite the overriding self-interests, the development connection with migration nonetheless arises. Ultimately, concern to contain the extent of

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migrant arrival can only partially be realized through imposition of border controls and sanctions against apprehended irregular migrants and their employers. Even the most draconian attempts to erect barriers to entry are never fully effective. Economic development in the region of origin, notably economic development that results in job creation and wage increments, does diminish migration pressures (Lucas 2005: 295). The member states are constrained in their attempts to control migration by the relations they maintain with other states in the international political system. For instance, any country contemplating the expulsion of foreign nationals or forbidding their entry will have to consider not only its international image but also its foreign relations with the aliens’ country (Lim 1992: 139). Harmonization Problem From early on, the EU set down a standard by which the member states agreed to ‘adopt such measures in the field of social security are necessary to provide freedom of movement of workers’. It was assumed that the creation of such standards would reduce the potential threat of discrimination in welfare benefits. Further to this development, the removal of existing barriers by striking barriers to national laws outlined in the Treaty on European Union was set as an explicit of the Community; the raising standards of living and quality of life, economic and social cohesion and solidarity among the member states (Kvist 2004: 304). The obstacles that inhibit the free flow of labour in the EU that broadly promotes open borders, free markets, and liberal standards raise fundamental questions about the viability and character of regional integration, cooperation, and globalization at larger. These are mainly questions of institutional convergence (Lahav 2004: 6). While new standards are necessary for facilitating labour flows in the EU, the social provisions of the treaties in the light of harmonization will inevitably force the member states to remove discriminatory practices of their national social policies at the expense of other EU citizens. Generally, two approaches are adopted on the question of whether harmonization is necessary. There are those who argues that ex ante harmonization is unnecessary, since it will happen on its own accord though market competition. This approach accepts that different social security systems reflect different preferences and competences of the various economies which can not be reconciled without endangering other

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objectives of the economic policy. Therefore, it favours market-orientation solution. The second argues that, left to the market, the differences in social provisions among the member states will converge, but downwards. Therefore, only ex ante harmonization can safeguard the social rights won by workers in the economically more advanced member states. Alternatively, countries with low social standards will gain ‘unfair’ competition advantages (Hix 1999: 262). One can question whether the EU should be characterized as migration simply because of historically drawn borders, or whether Europeanization and integration of the labour market implicitly mean that national borders are, in reality, and to a much higher degree relevant. A high degree of integration of the labour market in Europe simultaneously increases and decreases the likelihood of migration. Integration makes mobility easier, but it is also reduces the push factor to be mobile, according to a utility- maximizing logic (Greve 2011: 98). Realistically, pan-European chauvinism is on the rise. What is propelling is that the drive towards a European entity is moving forward. Initially limited to a few countries at the EU level, this was ensuring a basic conflict of capital within and between different EC countries at the earlier stage of integration. Therefore, the EU should work towards Europeanization of immigration policies to secure national interests. A conflict between national and European interests may be avoidable, but it is likely the former will prevail. Contrary to widespread belief, treaty changes are not necessary for new measures to ensure that the labour mobility functions better in the EU. There are constructive ways to improve the conditions of migration and the outcome of labour mobility among countries. “Constructive” does not mean purely insisting on the status quo and the inherited body of labour law and social security coordination. It means ensuring fairness for all: those living in old and new member states, home and host countries, job-seekers as well as employers (Andor 2017: 6). The construction of mandatory integration programmes in some countries usually indicates a fear of diversity no matter how much the proponents seeks to justify these projects as for the benefits to the whole of the Union, evidence of diversity (Guild 2005: 110). Hence, the most pressing matter is external effects of differences among the social policies of the member states. It could be assumed that any disparity might distort labour market in terms of competition pattern and resources allocation. The preferences of the member states can

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be changed as a result of domestic changes (i.e., economic shift), which may call into question their compliance. If individual states are unable to deal with the social policy challenges effectively and efficiently on their own, and if integration can not be advanced in uniform manner, they are unwilling to delegate and pool national competences. In this sense, very notion of harmonization becomes irrelevant. Everyone in the EU—EU citizen or not—is protected by law from discrimination at work or in access to work on the grounds of racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief and from discrimination in education, social protection and access to goods and services on the grounds of racial or ethnic origin. Enforcement of these rights needs to be ensured by the member states and early agreement is needed on the Commission proposal to complete the anti-discrimination framework on the grounds of inter alia religion. Fighting discrimination and promoting a positive approach to diversity, as well as combating racism, xenophobia and in particular hate speech, both through the implementation of relevant EU rules and national legislation and through targeted policy measures, are and should be an integral part of effective integration policies. Launch projects under different EU funds promoting: participation in political, social and cultural life and sports; social inclusion through education, training and youth; preventing and combating discrimination, gender-based violence, racism and xenophobia, including hate crime and hate speech, and fostering better understanding between communities, including religious communities (European Commission 2016b: 10). This could provide an opportunity for the EP and the Council continue to work towards the adoption of the anti-discrimination directive. A particular point to make is that a demand for a high number of seasonal workers from outside the EU is often the case for the most member states, when the EU faces increasing labour shortages. Acknowledging this problem, the Council and the EP adopted the seasonal workers directive in 2014, which set out the conditions under which the nonEU nationals may enter and stay in the EU. This piece of legislation acts as harmonization of admission rules across the member states, when the problem arises as the non-EU seasonal workers stay irregularly in the EU, as well as poor working conditions of the non-EU seasonal workers. One fruitful outcome of these legislative developments is selection of the skilful workforce. In June 2016, the Commission proposed to reform the blue card directive to attract more talented immigrants that the European economy needed desperately. The new rules would introduce

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changes such as more flexibility for job mobility across different member states. In July 2017, the EU ambassadors agreed on a mandate for negotiations on the draft directive. In September 2017, the presidency started negotiations with the EP on the basis of this mandate. The negotiations are currently ongoing (European Council 2019a). Unlike the expectations, the current directive concerning the highly qualified workers has proved insufficient. Only a limited number of highly skilled worker permits have been issued. In fact, the EU blue card directive was adopted in 2009 to make it easier for highly qualified workers outside the EU to migrate to a member state. The objective was to tackle labour and skills shortages and to make the EU more competitive by attracting highly qualified workers. A process of policy has been at work in the areas of harmonising legislation and operational action at the European level. A prima example of the success of this process is related to the security-related aspects of migration policy. This included border management, the fight against irregular migration and the short-term visa policy, together with aspects of return policies. Like much else that it does, the EU stumbled on to the abolition of internal border controls, so called “flanking measures”. Realising that different standards pose barriers to the single market, there is a demand for creation of a single external European border. In this regard, the roles and the operational capabilities of the EU external border agency and the European Agency for the Management of Operational Cooperation at the External Borders of member states of the European Union, which were created in 2004 were strengthened. Other harmonisation of laws and standards are included directives on short-term visas, irregular migration and return. Given that, Europe Flagship initiative, adopted in November 2014, pushed the EU’s unemployment problem closer towards a safe tipping point, which could eventually become a point of the investment plan. It is estimated that over the period 2014–2020, funds under this plan will provide support for the direct creation of almost 600,000 new jobs, help up to 2.3 million people find employment, including self-employment and 10 million unemployed people improve their chances of finding a job (Eurostat Yearbook 2017b). If these occur, the currently widespread euroscepticism about the structural reforms to nurture the economic recovery as a basis for sustainable growth will likely mostly fade away. Indeed, the EU has been caught up in the consequences of improving the quality of life and creating social standards which will in turn facilitate labour movement throughout the Union. The steps that have been

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taken, so far, are not reached the satisfactory level, since the Tampere European Council declaration, however. At present, most member states are unwilling to abandon individual national policies. This held especially for decision to open up their labour markets for skilled and low-skilled labour, with usually resulting in different conclusions by different member states. In all likelihood, legislative reforms aim to meet the current and projected demand for skilled labour. For the UK, substantial legislative rules to restrict labour migrants to work and settle down are removed. A major step ahead was the issuing guiding principles. Such rules are in accordance with the different demographic and the social structures of each member states, with the combination of their specific needs for social expenditure, in particular. Thus, much of the attention surrounding the labour migration issues has focused on level of economic development of each member state leading them to display different standards of performance. In an Eurofound survey that carried out in 2016, the findings for the EU member states regarding life satisfaction, employment status, education, income, and household composition revealed interesting differences in country patterns. This implies that they have simply different capacity to respond to the migratory pressure (Fig. 4.10). 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Denmark Finland Luxembourg Austria Sweden Netherlands Ireland United Kingdom Malta Belgium Germany Poland France EU28 Portugal Spain Slovenia Estonia Cyprus Hungary Slovakia Romania Lithuania Italy Latvia Czech Republic CroaƟa Bulgaria Greece

0

Happiness

Life saƟsfacƟon

Fig. 4.10 Trends in happiness and life satisfaction levels, by country, 2011– 2016 (Source Eurofound 2016)

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What seems to be the driving force behind the sectoral approach is the idea that the desirability of highly skilled individuals instigates a “global competition for talent”, and therefore requires the adoption of good conditions for these migrants to encourage them to move to the EU (instead of somewhere else). Conversely, lower-skilled migrants are thought of as readily available in large numbers, and thus do not necessarily need to be attracted through the creation of good conditions. Rather to the contrary, migrants ascribed to this framework are more easily associated with perceived security risks, such as the endangering of states’ social security systems or the undermining of wages and working conditions in their host countries (see also Guild 2005). As a result, these lower skilled workers are made subject to constraints that are aimed at ensuring that their stay is of a temporary nature, and—accordingly—are prevented from taking part in any policy programmes aimed at promoting social settlement and integration (Guild 2011: 218). The migration crisis in the Mediterranean has put the spotlight on immediate needs. It has revealed much about the structural limitations of the EU migration policy and the tools at its disposal. This is an opportunity for the EU to face up to the need to strike the right balance in its migration policy and send a clear message to citizens that migration can be better managed collectively by all EU actors (Euro Access 2019: 1). As an example of current conditions and problems, Fig. 4.11 shows how much the member states spend on unemployment as active labour market policies. Massive differences in spending on unemployment are remarkable. The highest expenditure was recorded in Belgium and Spain (over 3%), while Germany, Luxembourg, Portugal, Netherlands, France, Italy, Finland and Ireland having lower level of spending (between 1 and 2.5%). The lowest spending on unemployment is observed in Austria, Slovenia, Sweden, Check Republic, Latvia, Hungary, Slovakia, Estonia and the UK (under 1%). These differences causes the major problem for the EU’s output legitimacy, as the labour market divergencies desire a greater coherent action in terms of harmonization. Despite the fact that the different EU member states annually spend considerable budgets on an active labour market policy, there is still a lot of uncertainty about the relative effectiveness (and cost-effectiveness) of the different active instruments. Then again, even if one would have acquired certainty in this matter, it probably still would not directly lead to a great revolution in the practice of active labour market policy. After all, policy choices are still driven by different motives, as pointed out by

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3.5 3 2.5 2 1.5 1

0

Denmark Chile Turkey Japan Korea Israel United Kingdom Estonia Norway New Zealand Slovak Republic United States Sweden Hungary Latvia Canada Czech Republic Australia Slovenia Switzerland Iceland DECD - Total Australia Germany Luxembourg Portugal Netherlands France Italy Finland Ireland Spain Belgium

0.5

Fig. 4.11 2017b)

Public unemployment spending % of GDP, 2015 (Source OECD

Vanderpoorten (2014). First and foremost, there are political considerations. The policy makers for instance very strongly and firmly believe in the effectiveness of vocational training for job-seekers, whereas somewhat more nuanced conclusions can be drawn about this on the basis of scientific evaluation literature. Another important determinant in policy choices is the fact that there are strong forces aiming at the preservation of the status quo: abolishing or even adapting existing measures often involves a number of parties concerned who may lose something and who will object, even when their loss does not outweigh the benefit for society when abolishing a less effective measure (Vanderpoorten 2014: 4). The EU labour market is slowly evolving from a constellation of 28 separate national labour markets (which remain largely segmented in terms of regulation of work conditions and salaries) into a single EU labour market. This single market is being created by free movement of labour within the EU and EU-wide employment policy frameworks: in particular the EES and its different policy instruments developed over the last few years (Martín and Venturini 2015: 5). Additional advances in European employment strategy could even lead to a “borderless” internal market.

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Conclusion The evolution of free movement is closely associated with the development of the internal market, given the fact that the economic case is strong in principle. That is said, labour mobility is complementary to the economic aspects of European integration, with wider political objectives. Despite of slowing down intra-EU migration, particularly to some member states (i.e., the UK and Germany) as a result of economic crises, mobility remains significant. The post-enlargement period, linked to intra-EU labour mobility is becoming as important a driver for the economic and the political of the European integration. While concerns about the impact of free movement in some countries have made it a major political issue, there are real difficulties that have impeded the dynamic of free movement. The development of the EU-28 unemployment rates for young people during the most recent 3-year period is due to the impact of the global economic crisis. Having fallen to a low point in 2007 or 2008, a rapid increase in EU-28 unemployment rates for young people was recorded, but successive increases were recorded up until 2013. These latest rates prevails at a higher level at present. The best way to accomplish this is by grappling with the changes regarding improve jobs security for the EU workers in the changing global economy. The present blackout gives insight that the EU faces difficulty to undergo more changes for youth integration, while active ageing taking hold. With an ageing population, policy attention has focused on the contribution migration can make to both sustainability of welfare system and growth of the EU economy. An increasing evidence of a demographic decline and a process of replacement in all EU member states goes in hand and hand. The policy initiatives linked to population ageing extend beyond the domain of the member states measures should not be underestimated and undervalued by the policy-makers, given its negative economic and labour market effects in Europe. An innovative employment strategy will probably need to be developed further to allow investment on physical and human resources. Such a strategy should be promoting knowledge and skills, coupled with ensuring an entrepreneurial environment, as specified earlier objectives. Afterall, the overall approach insists as one of the employment strategies. At the same time, the labour market activity and employment rates in many countries seem to be improving, as they come out of recession. The

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policy-makers are called upon to introduce more measures for the socially disadvantage people (women and foreign workers etc.) who suffered most as result of high unemployment. This is because the youth immigrants have a particularly high risk of unemployment, even if they have similar formal qualifications with natives. What is major concern is skill shortages and skill mismatch that hang over the policy-makers, as it currently stand. This is more relevant with the recent economic crisis which unable people with the right skills to find work under the circumstances of the mass job destruction and sectoral restructuring. While skill shortages and gaps experienced with most member states, many Europeans are over-skilled and trapped in low quality jobs. In addition to the determinants of workers’ current skill mismatch status, over-qualification is the real challenge for the decisionmakers’ capacity to engage in continued skill development in intellectually challenging jobs. Labour migration can be a contentious issue, with wage differential informed by reality that foreign workers bid down wages. This is especially true in discussions of the Eastern enlargement and the economic impacts of migration—a complex issue with many strands. With the EU explanation to 28 (27 post Brexit), a relatively new economic area with quite significant wage differentials caused for concerns over the negative effects of migrant inflows to the labour market. Because this new area created a stronger economic pressure for labour migration. This is in line with migration theories; bigger wage differential triggers a stronger economic incentive for labour to move, which results in more significant labour migration. Harmonization process has its origin of the founding treaties that set down a standard to the extent of which the member states are expected to adopt measures in the field of social policy. This will make freedom of movement of workers possible. There is no doubt that the creation of such standards would eliminate discrimination in welfare benefits and thus boost labour mobility. The removal of existing barriers to mobility is already envisaged by the Maastricht Treaty with the aim of raising standards of living and quality of life, economic and social cohesion and solidarity among the member states. As a general rule, it is possible for the member states to extend more national social policies to other EU citizens, given the social provisions of the treaties. As the reform process

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speeds up, the EU is beginning to face with the consequences of improving the quality of life and creating social standards which will in turn facilitate the labour movement across the EU. Overall, the EU policies are targeted to facilitate free movement. The top priority of the EU institution especially the Commission, as well as the member states is to boost labour mobility. A major efforts to encourage mobility are assigned to the member states, but they falls short for doing so, in spite of the most of them experience shortages of skill labour. The propensity is that migrants are at a disadvantage in the labour market compared to the native born population. For example, publicly funded language courses for youth immigrants as one of the mobility incentives are very limited and policy measures in this area are relatively rare. Yet, offering working age population generous financial incentives to take up a job in another region or in another country is unpredictable measure. It is essential to improve the design of the EU funding to address labour mobility as one of the active labour market policies—that tend to have a fairly modest impact on the enhancing mobility.

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CHAPTER 5

Policy Process in the European Union

Introduction Recently scholarly focused is the EU as efficient polity in the labour migration field (see Dinan and Persson 2016). The generous consensus has come with the significant level of common problem solving of the EU as a result of its increasing legislative output, which so far has generally involved successive round of treaty revisions. That’s why, advances in the EU governance are closely related to the policy-making process. Still, the popular image of the EU is its bureaucratic juggernaut should not be exaggerated. This is due to its seemingly continuous capacity to make new laws and regulations. It is less than impressive record in many policy fields and its limited accountability. At the same time, it is reasonable that the conflicting policy interests exist within the multiple subcommunities at both the EU and the national level.

Mode of Governance In the context of the EU, the way in which decisions are taken is associated with the major institutions (e.i., the EP) that try to influence policy. The formal rules may reflect the actual distribution of power among, for example the directorate-general (DGs) within the Commission. And the regional and the national policy interests are pursued by the member states. The relevant actors in the EU’s legislative system are described

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as groups that pursue the cross-national policies with the shared interests (farmers, co-operations, workers, labour unions and political parties within the EP etc.). Most scholars who adopt the theoretical language of policy-making agree that there is meaningful distinction between different characteristics of mode of governance. Far-reaching integration can only be occur, when such characteristics work in harmony at different policy-making levels. In order to give more theoretical guidance, it is useful to briefly sketch the main characteristics of the European modes of governance as shown in Table 5.1. Clearly, the EU policy-making takes place at multinational level. A variety of actors including governments, political parties, the media, lobbies, and individual government institutions involve in the process. On these bases, polices are adopted and pursued out throughout the different stages. Within every policy community, there are multiple subcommunities within their own separate and often conflicting policy interests, and this is no less true at the EU level than at the national level; the European policy is influenced by the major institutions (such as the Commission, the EP and the ECJ). The directorate-general within the Commission, the regional and national policy interests pursued by the member states, and the cross-national policies pursued by groups with shared interests, such as environmental lobby, farmers, co-operations, workers, labour union, and parties, within the EP (McCormick 2017: 104). An underlying feature of this mode is its complexity.

Patterns of Policy-Making in the EU The vertical separation of powers touches upon sovereignty and thus creates tension between the member states, as well as inherent in the fluidity of the multilevel system. In the context of the EU there are of course further complications: on the on one hand, the debate continues about where to striking the balance between EU policy powers and those of the member states; and, on the other hand, the EU policy making takes place increasingly in the shadow of globalization. These two issues make it harder to separate out the EU processes within states and across the global system. This policy-makers in the EU member states continually face choices about which policy purpose and they have to manage connections—both political and practical—among these different for a (Wallace and Wallace 2007: 350). The success of the EU is such that is attracting

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Table 5.1 The mode of governance Hierarchy

Negotiation

Competition

Cooperation

Conflict

Analysing decision-making is primarily finding out how different actors influence the EU laws and policies. The legislative powers of the EU have dispersed among the institution those of the Commission, the European Court of Justice, the Council of Ministers and the EP. Hierarchy is the key in decisions at European level and is often put into practice in the member states, following decisions are taken jointly The mode of governance is permeated by the diverging interests of institutional actors operating in the whole EU-system. The actors are lined up in a negotiated order. Every legislative act is subject to the extensive negotiation, which is followed by the process of policy-making and implementation. In many policy fields, the policy objectives are exercised merely through negotiations ensuing the first decisions and then the procedures of implementation. The relationships between a wide variety of actors both in the vertical and the horizontal direction and between the public and the private or non-governmental actors constitute the negotiations structure. This nature of relationships brings about a multi-level and multi-actor system of governance Actor alignments correlate significantly. This alignment are mostly likely due to the creation of the single market as a core project of European integration. The logic is to establish competitive relationships between the economic actors and the member states as a mode of governance. It is inevitable that these competitive mechanisms produce mutual adaptation and policy convergence among the member states in the context of harmonization European mode of governance is conceived as a cooperation, which plays a major and increasingly important role in the EU-system. Assumption that the states are rational and thus consider public good, the actors are willing to transform policy responsibility to this governance system in terms of shared norms and objectives. There are complementary interests for the scope of cooperation. It is within the framework of free-will of the actors in making their policy-choices, they confront divergent policy options and strategies. The independent of lengthy procedures of formal decision-making makes the whole system workable. Inevitably, cooperation provides platform in which the actors quickly adapt policy-making in the face of changing circumstances and needs, and demands European governance permeates conflict in the competition of propositions to improve the operating performance of the EU. Since cooperation is based on voluntarism, conflict is primarily applied in those cases where the EU misses formal competences and where actors do not deploy professional skills for cooperation. A certain degree of joint action is seen irrational. Conflict arises, when the member states have nothing converge on and thus bypassing the inclination of them to transfer powers to the EU

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interest from the scholars. Broad policy-making patterns are identified by Helen Wallace and Christine Reh (2015) as follow. The Community Method When the Community was established in the 1950s a single and relatively simple policy-making system was provided for the treaties. In the words of what for many years was a much-used maxim, the essence of the system was that ‘the Commission proposes, the Parliament advises [on a restrictive range of matters], the Council decides [almost invariably by unanimity], and [laws are made] the Court of adjudicates’. This system, which came to be known as the Community method, was designed on the one hand to try and avoid what was seen to be the paralysing effects of the intergovernmental decision-making arrangements of organisations such as the Council of Europe and the OEEC whilst on the other hand ensuring that national governments had the ultimate control of final decisiontaking (Nugent 2010: 294). When full legislative procedure is required, the community method becomes in operation. Table 5.2 summarises the main characteristic of the community method. In the first place, the mode of the Community method is assigned to the Commission within the context of delegated role. The Commission has a legal duty in policy design, policy brokering, policy execution and external representation. With the problem on the horizon and complex Table 5.2 The main characteristic of the community method • A strong role for the European Commission, in particular through its monopoly on the right of the initiative but also because it brokers policy compromises and supervises policy extension • A powerful role for the Council of Ministers, which engage in strategic bargaining and often engineers package deals • A potent role for the EP in most legislative matters and (with the exception of agricultural spending) on budgetary questions • An important role for the ECJ in reinforcing the legal authority of the Community regime • The monitoring of policy implementation by committees of national officials which are chaired by the Commission, via the so-called “comitology” procedure • Openness to lobbies and interest groups that seek to influence EU policy which provide expertise crucial to the design of effective policy solutions Source Stubb et al. (2003)

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context, of 28 national political systems, policy-making entails empowering the Commission over extensive responsibilities, including policy making powers, managing the EU finances, supervision of ‘front-line’ policy implementation, committee system (comitology), the guardian of the legal framework, external representative and negotiator, mediator and conciliator, promoter of the general interest. The mode of communication changes from arguing to bargaining, and government representatives take the lead because they, and not the Commission, are considered to be in a better position to make judgements of questions of social and political accountability (Jachtenfuchs and Kohler-Koch 2004: 105). Within the context of output, the underlying issue is the resisting immediate political needs and demands. In accordance with the historical developments within the EU political system examined in Chapter 3, the changing demands and needs have led to the evolvement of the Community method over years. A clear indication of this is, firstly, the power of the EP in which the treaty reforms has, since the mid-1980s, substantially extended the role and the responsibilities of the EP. The initial role of the EP in consultative nature has turned into what is now called the co-decision making in the Council. Under the community method, the decision-making procedure now engages a Commission-Council and EP triangle. Secondly, this newly evolved community method produces a form of supranational governance in which more responsibilities are given to the Council to take decisions by the QMV, which has been extended for the most areas of legislative decision-making. Thirdly, the final jurisdiction in legal matters is left to the EU’s courts. In the light of rapidly institutional evolvement, the classical community method can be looked upon as a system that demonstrates these features. The EP usually uses joint decision powers with the Council under the ordinary legislative procedure. From the outset, the EP is an effective colegislator with the Council. This was gradually introduced, first through the co-operation procedure and then through the co-decision procedure in the SEA (Bach and George 2006: 301). This implied, before any final decision can be made, the EP must be consulted. The Council has to wait for the EP until its view is known, if not, the ECJ will rule legislation invalid. While the EU’s future, especially in advance of radical enlargement is very much blurred, there is no denying that other institutions, notably the ECJ are arguably successful experiment in policy making. It is the

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responsibility of the ECJ to ensure that the law is observed in the interpretation and application of the Treaties establishing the European Communities and of the provisions laid down by the competent Community institutions. To enable it to carry out task, the Court has wide jurisdiction to hear various types of action and to give preliminary rulings (Bach and George 2006: 301). There is no doubt that the ECJ has final jurisdiction over all legislations. This is especially true for adjudicating interinstitutional disputes and disputes about the division of powers between the institutions and the member states. It is charged to ensure that there is an uniform interpretation and application of the EU law with the primary rulings. Obviously, migration is, among others, a typical policy area in which the Court plays a supreme role. Although the ECJ as supranational actor may solve problems of any negligence, the policy outcome is determined by how far the Council is empowered in the EU. This is typically done through bargaining and package deals. As a matter of fact, a complex interdependence between the EU and the national policy-making means that a lot of the EU governance relies on the Council as a policy and law maker. The Council excises important responsibilities in the key activities of mediation and consensusbuilding and executive tasks (foreign policy declaration issued). At the top of the EU’s institutional architecture stands the European Council constituted of national leaders, which brings together the biggest political leaders of the member countries, plus the Commission President and the European Council’s own president. The European Council emerged in the 1970s as a crisis-management mechanism, the crisis at the time being the severe economic challenges facing European countries and the institutional sclerosis besetting then European Community. More recently, the European Council have reverted to crisis-management mode, this time dealing with the protracted Eurozone crisis (Dinan 2017: 31). In the event of the ESM in the late 1980s, the European Council gained credits over the decision-making mechanism. Its overseeing role in other areas, such as budget, enlargement and treaty revisions is valued. Since then, the European Council has become a common place for the EU’s negotiation process. In a way, it testifies to the importance of negotiation process of which dominating characteristics in the EU is summarised in Table 5.3. An effective migration policy-process requires a leadership. Whether this leaves the EU institutions better of is still unclear. What is obvious is that the endorsement of the institutional leaders for any decision. In such

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Table 5.3 The central elements of the negotiation process • The EU is characterized by diversity of negotiating contexts and occasions, with a continuous multilateral negotiation in the range of contexts and occasions generated by its internal and external development • The EU is characterized by diversity of actors and preferences, with a wide range of institutional, governmental, non-governmental and quasi-governmental participants in the ‘internal’ negotiation of its business • The EU demonstrates diversity of strategies, negotiation styles and communication. The range of negotiating behaviour between bargaining and problem-solving is a widely recognized analytical focus • The EU manifests diversity of outcomes: the product of negotiation processes is often difficult to pin down, and the need for ratification and implementation at different levels and in different institutional and cultural contexts is a pervasive concern of the negotiators Source O. Elgstrom and M. Smith (2000)

an agreement, for instance, treaties provide mechanisms by which budgetary power is shared between the EP and the Council under the multi-annual financial framework. The Commission President’s approval is sought subsequently. The dismissal of the Santer College in 1999 illustrates the powers of the EP to control and supervise the executive following the remits of standing committees of inquiry and investigation over alleged fact. As the EU makes all kind of decisions, leaders should act faster and more decisively before escalating crises of any kind. The ongoing response to the migration crisis is that the EU leaders are mostly operating in the European Council, using their negotiation skills at the best use. Whether effective leadership is key to migration crisis is open to question. Regulatory Mode Many regard the EU as a regulatory system. It has been well documented that migration policy has a strong regulatory emphasis (Cini 2002; Thomson 2011; Martín and Venturini 2015; Menz 2015; McCormick 2017), where the operation of market is governed by a comprehensive legislative body. The founding Treaty of Rome necessitated the removal of market rigidities stood on the way of economic integration. Not surprisingly, developments in domestic and international markets have forced the

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national economies to adjust and prosper, which would unable them to compete effectively. By the late 1980s, a growing body of research searched for an alternative policy mode, with the creation of the ESM. The logic was to remove barriers to free movement of goods, labour and services across the member states. During this period, the US took the lead for public regulation and private self-regulation and the Western European countries followed suit. This was a new approach to market management, which was in turn the reflection of a new approach to regulation. Research on the policymaking was stimulated by these changing environment. In policy term, the result was the rigid regulations for the European labour markets. The pressure to break out labour market problems and their implications, such as working conditions, consumer protection and environment that have prevented the member states to follow completely independent policies. Drawing on the EU as a regulatory state, it was there for an attempt to revive investment and economic growth, the national governments were forced to comply with rules and regulations coexisted in the single-market programme since the early the 1980s. Since then, there is a little sign of slowing down this regulatory framework due to demand and supply for it. In practice, the EU has adopted the regulatory regime within the framework of the single and internal market programme, which gave a tremendous boost to the European integration. The migration trends of the 1980s challenged existing explanatory frameworks within the context of negative integration. This prompted the EU to develop collective market-making regulation in order to meet with the international standards. Development of the collective market regulations, which in turn stimulated the development of alternative theories. Scharpf (1994) viewed the regulatory policy making as a form of negative integration, which is closely associated with neo-liberal bigotry. For Scharpf, what needs most to dismantle labour market failures is to set up a radical legal labour migration mechanism into the EU. Lately, this strategy has become a necessary component of any strategy to fight irregular migration. In structural context, market does not only consist of simple activities, also cover market movements, quite apart from the rules governing free movement of labour, and product specifications etc. Thus, the aim is to revive the employment policy in Europe that though partly regulated for its own intrinsic importance. By now it is clear that this regulatory mode is associated with development of single market with its impact on labour movement. To achieve

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this objective, any policy approach should fully integrate not only thirdcountry nationals entering the EU for employment purposes, but also those others arriving for family, asylum, education or other purposes; as a matter of fact, there is evidence that some migrants enter the EU through the non-labour migration channels precisely because of the lack of legal labour migration possibilities, but with the main aim and motivation of accessing the labour market (Martín and Venturini 2015: 4), and facilitation of their smooth labour market integration. The EU’s internal (and industrial) approach to regulation provides a wider conceptual framework for its interaction with the rest of the world. In practice, the Union has established closer relations with neighbouring countries in the form of enlargement and external trade. The main characteristics of the regulatory mode is summarised in Table 5.4. What is salient in this table is that, the Commission is the key player pushing the single market, to the extent of which its legislative proposal remains to be crucial for the setting the regulatory framework. The supply—that is produced by the Commission—is seen as providing the technical support for less contentious policy areas. Against this accepted role, it is a strategic calculation of the Commission’s supplying role, as claimed by the public choice theorists, robusting the EU regulatory power. This implies the expansion of the Commission’s own power at the same time. Table 5.4 A summary of regulatory mode • The Commission as the architect and defender of regulatory objectives and rules, increasingly by reference to economic criteria, and often working with the stakeholders and communities of experts • The Council as a forum (at both ministerial and official levels) for agreeing minimum standards and the direction of harmonization (mostly upwards towards higher standards), to be complemented by mutual recognition of national preferences and controls, operated differentially individual countries • The ECJ and the Court of First Instance as the means of ensuring that the rules are applied reasonably evenly, backed by the national courts for local application, and enabling individual stakeholders to have access to redress in case of non-application or discrimination • The EP as one of several means for prompting the consideration of non-economic factors (environment, regional, social and so forth), with increasing impact as its legislative powers have grown, but little leverage on the implementation of regulation Source H. Wallace and W. Wallace (2007)

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Beyond the sphere of the roles and responsibilities of the EU institutions, it can be observed changes on this regulatory mode as regards to a comprehensive labour market approach to the EU labour migration policy. For too long, the intensive experience in developing the single market is considerable. It appears to have been particularly successful in regulating the condition of entry and stay of the third country nationals (i.e., basically the conditions to obtain visas), but slender in dealing with the exclusive competence of the member states to determine the volume of admissions to their labour markets. This institutional setting is not always respected in any new EU initiative, as the Lisbon Treaty envisaged. The political limit to the EU policy mode is evident in the current piecemeal and in the category-specific approach to legal migration. In this sense, there is a protracted resistance by some member states to the Blue Card regime. This fragmentary approach can provide a part of the explanation for increasing resource within the EU to softer mode of governance in both functional and political sense. Useful through they may be as a means of drawing attention to problems that the Commission might otherwise have missed and complaints are not an entirely reliable measures. The system suffers at least four drawbacks. First, it is a hoc and unstructured. Second, many of the problems relating to a lack of relevant legal base are drawn to the attention of the Commission. Third, the number of complaints is influenced by the political culture of different member states and by their varied associations with the EU. The fact that a large number of complaints is registered in a particular member state may reflect a less problem with implementation than a high level of interests on the effect of the EU law. Finally, complaints are difficult to prioritize—they may not necessarily make about the most serious or the most urgent cases. Regarding its success or failure, the regulatory mode has been praised on the account of regulation that has, surely displaced the traditional community method as a predominant policy paradigm. Prior to 1980s, the traditional community method was unable to produce some instruments to decrease labour market rigidities. Since then, the European labour markets are slowly evolving by facilitating the free movement of labour. Here, emphasis is placed on the human resources strategies as one of the dimension of the common market. In particularly, the qualification profile of the third-country nationals entering the Union should be taken into consideration, when designing the EU-wide labour migration policies. Before that, there should be potential to enhance, for instance, through training

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and job counselling services. The aim is to fill the gaps in intra-EU labour and skills supply. From this perspective, the European Employment Strategy (EES) is complemented in relation to legislative or legal techniques, with the creation of the single market via labour movement. Distributional Mode The distributional mode is defined as periodic strategic bargains and the routines of regime, programme and project management. From this perspective, labour migration is one set of distributional issues which have persistently been highly politicized in the EU policy process. Not only has there been a shift in the length of time labour migrants spend abroad, but the nature, scale and direction of the migration flows have also changed dramatically, as shown in Chapter 4. The enlargements of the EU in 2004 and 2007 were influential in this respect. A growing economy and large wage gaps encouraged a large stream of workers to leave the new member states for the old. The EU’s open internal borders made it easy for them to return home or to move on to another member state (Holtslag et al. 2013: 2). These changes are causing dissensus among scholars and generating lively debate about how to analyse them. The integration of newcomers to the European labour markets has almost invariably been the occasion for disagreement and dispersal amongst the member states. As a matter of fact, there are always fierce discussions over the benefits of labour migration. The national markets are expected to welcome more new migrants under the EU’s policy of economic liberalisation. Holtslag et al. argued that the worldwide redistribution of labour means a large measure of uncertainty as to which occupations will be retained, relocated, or even replaced entirely, for example by it and other new technologies. Factors of this kind make it exceptionally difficult to predict the future demand for labour, making it a high-risk business to encourage labour migration (Holtslag et al. 2013: 2). This is despite the fact the flexible employment practices have seemingly entered into a marriage of convenience in the face of removal of transitional periods in the EU-wide. It is regarded as a persisting of a highly bickering issue in the EU, which has even became greatly entangled by the widening process. As many would claim, the distribution of competences in migration area would yield pessimism about the prospect of shared competences

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between the EU and the member states. Focus is the efficiency and efficacy of the external dimension of the Union’s migration policy. A variety of actors is associated with the possibilities of a comprehensive and coherent external approach. For the sake of the efficiency alone, the TFEU makes distinction between the division of competences (e.g. powers) between the EU and the member states (see Table 5.5). Therefore, it is not unlikely that this mode will remain to be complicated and deserve to be explored in more detail. Still, it is possible to disclose one sign of a new trend in the literature. In particular, there is increasing interest in spending on integration of youth immigrants into the European labour markets. As part of social policy, the European Social Fund focuses on employment, the development of human resources and the promotion of social integration. Subsequent decisions to fund internal policies were limited to providing partial support alongside national expenditures, but significantly introducing elements of conditionality as regards their utilization. Over time, the EU has developed funding mechanisms to support various external policies as a form of “collective goods” (Wallace and Wallace 2007: 347). Obviously, the most important funding mechanism lies in the Commission’s disposal through investing in human capital. The Commission as a regime manager announced the importance of the cohesion policy that is reflected in the fact that it accounts for more than 32% of the EU budget for 2014–2020—that is EUR 351.8 billion Table 5.5 The European Union competences • Exclusive competence where only the EU can act • Competences that are shared or parallel between the EU and its Member States where the Member States can act only if the EU has chosen not to. This article of the Treaty also lists certain competences that were previously regarded as parallel: research, technological development, space, development cooperation and humanitarian aid. However, the principle of pre-emption does not apply in these areas, in that Member States may continue to exercise their competences in parallel with the EU, even if the EU has exercised its own competences in these areas • The EU has competence to support, coordinate or supplement the actions of the Member States where the EU may not adopt legally binding acts that require those states to harmonise their laws and regulations Sources Treaty of Lisbon amending the Treaty on European Union and the Treaty establishing the European Community, signed at Lisbon, 13 December 2007 (2007/C 306/01)

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(3) (European Commission 2014: 12). However, the budget as a measure of impact of EU membership remains to be a major area of concern. The financial arrangement for both revenue and expenditure is a highly contentious issue. This is mainly due to the fact that the founding Treaty of Roma did not envisage the incremental involvement of the EU in sensitive policies that are said to be presented thread to the national interest of the member states. Theoretically, an integrated market is most desirable for economic interests (i.e. large businesses), who are in favour of a “relax” economic activities. The labour market situation aside, a growing competence of empowered actors at the regional and the municipal level of governance cannot be considered a multilevel governance model without making a reference to the principle of subsidiary that was introduced by the TFEU of 1992. This principle has promoted the strategic partnerships in which case, level of governance was clarified to the extent of which the Commission has now a strong link with the national governments. Under the Commission’s White Paper on European Governance in 2001, the principle of participation is defined as an open consultation process for the Union’s citizens. The civil society partners, particularly workers’ organizations are given chance to involve in policy formulation. The nongovernmental organizations (NGO) do not only act in accordance with legislation, but also in opposition to the EU laws and the judicial practices. Clearly, the EU’s partnership with cities across its member states setting benchmarks for the successful implementation at lower levels of governance. Because of multilevel governance nature, the dispersal of authority is uneven in different policy areas. Even so, a greater degree of flexibility in shaping the concrete measures taken at lower levels means a process of widening the options for initiating and developing policies in the field of immigration. Much of the explanation for why distributive mode is viewed in a different light among the member states: it is national responsibilities and they have limited budgetary resources. For budgetary decisions, unanimity rules are applied in the Council, with shadow of veto always present on the core employment spending decisions. In order to draw boundary of competences, Article 5 of the TFEU clarifies and addresses the tensions inherent in the fluidity of the multilevel system as

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Under the principle of subsidiarity, in areas which do not fall within its exclusive competence, the Union shall act only if and in so far as the objectives of the proposed action cannot be sufficiently achieved by the member states, either at central level and local level, but can rather, by reason of the scale or effect of the proposed action be better achieved at Union level. National Parliaments ensure compliance with the principles of subsidiarity.

The exercise of competence is regulated by the principle of subsidiary that gives the detailed description of allocation of competences between the Union and the member states. It seems, therefore, that a system of interlocking, yet not fully integrated, policies has evolved, both at the level of the EU and its member states. This includes flexibilities in the form of opt-outs, opt-ins and derogations for some EU member states, which have undermined the system’s fundamental founding principle of solidarity in a context of diverging priorities (Faure et al. 2015: 13). In the case of enlargement of 2004, the individual governments of the EU were in a position to decide themselves whether they wish to apply restrictions to workers from the CEECs. Restrictions on the free movement of workers applied to workers from the new accession countries of the CEE for a transitional period of up to 7 years after they joined the EU in 2004 and 2007. These restrictions are now lifted completely. Same conditions applied to restrict the free movement of workers from Croatia joined 1 July 2013. Concern over workers from Croatia was largely eliminated, when the European Commission in its report on 29 May 2015 concluded that the future potential flows of Croatian workers to other member states were likely to be small and unlikely to trigger the labour market disturbances. Remaining member states granted Croatian workers all free movement rights. For the current migration crisis, at the very least, Faure et al. (2015) identified three inter-related aspects of the EU system that have severely constrained its ability to deal effectively with migration challenges: • the layers of different competences across the EU and between the EU and its member states; • the conflicting objectives of the many different actors involved, which have led to the adoption of short-term approaches;

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• a fragmented system of financial instruments to fund activities. The membership of the EU challenges this domestic distribution of powers between the centre and the regions in Austria, Germany and Spain in several ways. Firstly, the deepening of the process of European integration, especially since the Maastricht and Amsterdam treaty reforms of 1992 and 1997, has led to an expansion in the competencies of the EU into areas of exclusive regional power. Secondly, EU incursions into the responsibilities of the regions limits the capacity of the regions to legislate in their own domains, even more so since they are obliged to implement and apply European legislation in these areas. Lastly, despite the fact that decisions taken within the framework of the EU are now an integral part of domestic policy, they still essentially remain the prerogative of the central state under its foreign policy domain (although see the recent changes to this circumstance in Germany below). Since it is the states themselves that are members of the EU and are signatories of the various treaties rather than the regions, it is therefore the central government that represents the whole state in its dealings with the EU institutions (McLeod 1999: 5). But notwithstanding the regional level of government has no free will to act and is bound by the European legislation, and seems unlikely to influence the policy process. Last, but not least, the increased focus on the real and perceived constraints placed by the EU integration on the regions within the nationstates coincided with the idea of regionalization. Germany demonstrates a good example of regional representation in European matters. The German Basic Law provide for a federal system of government with decentralisation of power to their constituent states (Länder), all enjoying sovereign and equal rights. The exclusive competencies of the German Länder include some significant public sector issues, such as research, and vocational training. In Germany, regions have long played crucial role in formulating and implementing public policy. In a similar vein to German Länder, the “historic regions” of Catalonia, Andalucia, Galicia and the Basque Country enjoy a number of powers and exclusive competencies. For instance, the Catalan statute of Autonomy specifies that Catalonia has exclusive responsibility for areas such as culture, transport within Catalonia, fisheries, and agriculture and even to maintain its own police force (McLeod 1999: 5). The trend of kind towards regionalization is a clear indication that these actors safeguard their ability to contribute to the EU

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policy-making process. With the possession of resources, political legitimacy and desire in their hands, an enactment of public policy to local and regional level is highly likely to become a reality. Intensive Transgovernmentalism Intensive transgovernmentalism approach illuminates connections between supranationalism and intergovernmentalism approaches to the study of migration. Researchers increasingly invoked structural explanations for how intergovernmentalism is characterised in relation to movement of individuals or groups of individuals. Given the evolution of labour migration policy process, cooperation takes places at many different levels, just like interaction between the relevant national policy-makers and the institutions in accordance with treaty framework. A real danger is to touch on the sensitive issue (i.e., sovereignty) in which all actions are reflection of individual wishes and preferences of the member states for market-making and market-regulating. Introducing supranationalism in migration alleviates this dilemma in migration research. In the half of the 1990s the EU began to become involved in a number of policy areas, where the governments of the member states felt that there was a need to have a policy approach that would fall somewhere between intergovernmental cooperation and the Common method. The former was thought to be too weak for some emerging policy areas whilst the latter was thought to infringe too much on national independence (Nugent 2010: 297). The problem associated with transferring power from the national decision-making institutions to the EU level is a reflection of the intergovernmental negotiations. Although the right to make detailed proposals gives the Commission certain formal powers to set the agenda, in the intergovernmental view the Commission does not determine the direction of which the EU moves. It is only helping the member states to agree on the details of what they have decided that they want to do anyway. Nor is the Commission always effective. It is not the only potential source of proposals, nor of package deals to facilitate compromise between different potential positions. Other actors are able to perform these functions, and often do so (Bach and George 2006: 265). Allinall, right to policy initiation is exclusive to the member states, as well as the Commission. With the benefit of hindsight the success of integration is understandable, as it seems that policy-making is passed through dichotomy

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between supranationalism and intergovernmentalism. The history of the EU integration process illustrates that intense policy cooperation takes place between the relevant national policy makers. A greater emphasis is placed on cooperation rather than law-making. Less treaty changes in institutional structure are the outcome of use of policy coordination. Such changes touche upon sensitive issues of state sovereignty. For instance, monetary and foreign policies remain outside the orthodox EU institutional framework. Traditionally, the member states are the main actors in both domains, while attention is paid to vigorous interaction between the national governments. Generally such interaction is characterized by intergovernmentalism. A common institutional blueprint cannot work without a common position and may require new reforms. As indicated in Chapter 3, on more legislative changes front, the EP’s equal law-making power with the Council was extended by the Treaty of Lisbon to include full legislative roles on the immigration-related issues (i.e., internal markets). Accordingly, the members of the EP (MEPs) were given the right to strike down the international agreements put it on an equal footing with the Council. Changes were also made to the jurisdiction of the ECJ—as regards immigration and asylum law—entailing the application of the Court’s normal jurisdiction. As expected, such changes would almost certainly lead to a significant increase in the Court’s role in this area, as compared to the previous rules. It should also be noted that the Commission’s power of initiative has undergone change and renewal. The scope of the initiatives in the AFSJ, which is taken by the Commission, is a key element in a dynamic of negotiations between the EP and the Council. Whether these newly empowered institutions can guarantee the interest of the immigrants and be best safeguarded, and that the expectations of European labour force are met are all matters of political will and skill. Studies suggest that these institutional changes—understood as more competences for the EU’s supranational institutions—have rarely led to the policy change in the AFSJ (Peers 2008; Ponzano et al. 2012; Trauner and Servent 2016). This is despite the fact that adopting to the new political and the institutional context in which the EU exists and acts today. And yet their influence on the immigration decision-making is blurred, and thus the question of who makes labour migration decisions becomes relevant. Therefore, the issue of how persuade the member states to take steps towards the consistent regulation of migration caused for concern. It appears that decisions are mostly undoubtedly intergovernmental. The

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development of new legislation tents to largely stifled. The erosion of “decisional supranationalism” is countered by a strong preservation of the national governments in the Council, as they dominate the decisionmaking mechanism. As a result, the limited policy prerogatives in the domain of immigration policy work against the deepening process. In a dynamic balance, all this has changed. Until recently, intensive intergovernmentalism has featured prominently in the policy process within the context of the JHA. Like foreign policy, the JHA was initially developed on a very cautious and tentative basis—in its case from the mid1980s—and also like foreign policy the sovereignty sensitivities associated with the policy area meant the Community method could not initially be used. However, through in its initial treaty appearance—as pillar three of the TFEU which was created as part of the Maastricht Treaty—it was based on firmly intergovernmental principles, pressures quickly built to make JHA more subject to the Community method. This dually occurred, with several JHA policy area—including immigration, visa, and asylum— brought into the EU’s first pillar by the Amsterdam Treaty, and then with what remained of the third pillar brought into the TFEU by the Lisbon Treaty. As Table 5.6 shows, remnants of intergovernmentalism still remain in the JHA area—with for example, the Commission not having sole legislative proposing rights in some spheres (the only policy area where this is so) and with unanimity still required in the Council for some types of decision (through, of course, it is not unique in this)—but, for the most part, JHA has been “communitarised” (Nugent 2010: 297). Assuming attracting and integrating migrants, the significant European level of governance has increasingly challenged an exclusive domain of the national authorities. Beyond the making of legislation in the JHA policy process is different again, with the Council dominating. This is because of intergovernmental nature of this policy area, which means not only that the unanimity principle prevails in the Council, but also the Commission does not have Table 5.6 Justice and home affairs (migration and asylum policy) Competence

Shared

Governance model

Mix of supervised delegation to the EU Presidency or Commission and coordination Commission, rotating Presidency and Member State

External presentation

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exclusive proposing rights and the EP is largely restricted to being consulted and being able to tender advise (Nugent 2010: 299). More specifically, it is important to draw on the Commission’s exclusive performance in agenda setting. It is the responsibility of the Commission to initiate and formulate policies. In such a setting, it has sole right to take part in the policy-making process. Without this initiation, task or/and the Commission’s proposal, law cannot be made. The act by neither the Council nor the Commission becomes irrelevant. For opening up the policy process, the Commission actually directs the EU’s move. In the formulation of legislative and budgetary proposal, the Commission is considered to be a better position. Whereas its agenda setting role is relatively marginal under the two intergovernmental pillars, namely, the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP) and the JHAs. Within the narrow framework, the overall direction of policy is again set by the European Council (see Fig. 5.1). Although the Council decides on the political priorities, it does not pass laws. The predominance of the Council in dealing with the complex or the sensitive issues is prominent. Such issues cannot be resolved at lower levels of intergovernmental cooperation. Traditionally, there is a tendency for votes to be unanimous in the Council implying decisions are taken by unanimity in a number of very specific areas. Because of the strategic interests and the defence implications, notably the CFSP, decisions in the Council take place under unanimity voting procedures. Within this process, the ECJ has no formal right to reach decisions. While Wallace and Wallace (2007) conceives the EU as a vertical separation of powers in relation to sovereignty that escalates tension between the member states and inherent in the fluidity of the multilevel system, the apparent complexity of policy process is emergence of new pattern of relationships between the origin and the destination countries. Broad policy-making patterns identified by Wallace and Reh (2015) suggests that the issue of the classic functions of government in the EU is rather vague. This is due to fact that the executive and legislative functions of the EU are difficult to separate. In the light of subsidiarity, the Open Method Coordination (OMC) offers a method of benchmarking best practices in a decentralised mode, when a strong legal basis is provided by the 2000 Lisbon European Council. Its rule helps to coordinate policies between the member states, with the ultimate aim of generating a new common European policy. Under

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INTERGOVERNMENTAL CONFERENCES Responsible for negotiating amendments to the EU treates.

EU TREATİES

Sets the paramters and legal basis of EU legislation.

EUROPEAN COMMISSION

EU JUSTICE AND HOME AFFAIRS COUNCIL

Proposes EU legislation and oversees implementation where competent.

Adopts EU legislation, sometimes in conjuction with Parliament.

EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT Consults on most JHA proposals. Co-decides legislation in limited aspects of migration control and civil law.

EUROPEAN COUNCIL Provides ‘guidance’ from heads of member states. Adopts EU treaties.

EU PRESIDENCY Chairs Council meetings and represents EU externally.

EU COMMITIEES & JHA WORKING PARTIES Responsible for negotiation between member states on legislative proposals and policy development.

Fig. 5.1 Decision-making process—the JHA agenda (Source Steve Peers 2010)

these forms of decision-making, an executive role is assigned to the member states. The most prominent feature for this rule is a flexibility for policy solutions that may enhances integration. One drawback is that the OMC gives way to voluntary and informal mode of intergovernmental cooperation in a variety of issues including employment, social protection, social inclusion, education, youth and training within the context of the EES. This calculated commitment may have temporarily averted a growing intergovernmentalism, as long as it gives latitude to the member states to coordinate these issues, which can be effectively managed at national level. While these acts have strengthened the executive functions of the Commission especially its role in monitoring and agenda-setting, the Lisbon Strategy increased the role of the national parliaments in legislative process. The member states are in a position to take decision on the draft

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proposal from the Commission in relation to its compatibility with the subsidiarity principle. It is so-called “watchdog” role of the national governments in an attempt to review the legality of the draft legislation. What meant by this “watchdog” is that the obligation of the member states to submit to the Commission and the Council annual report on their progress. Obviously, the EP is excluded from this task, while the ECJ plays a marginal role. Within this complex picture, there are plenty of opportunities for the member states concerning their commitments to shape the policy development. It may be right to assume that the Commission owes its existence and importance to the legislative process, and therefore can urge the member states to reform their policies to meet the European standards. Equally important, the greatest and most recent advances by the EP are in the area law-making. Prior to the SEA, the EP’s role was very limited. The EU laws (rather than Commission legislation) were processed via ‘consultation’. The EP could offer an opinion, but could not force the Commission or the Council to respond to this opinion. Aside from using delaying tactics (by failing to present its opinion), the EP has no formal mechanism of influencing legislation (Scully 2004: 170). The role of the EP in international agreements is also in weak consultative position. The EP performs less tangible functions in comparison to the Commission that increasingly undertakes external representation role. With respect to the shifting responsibilities, the buck is passed topdown from national governments to local governments, from public institution to the non-profit sector and even to the private sector. It is also passed bottom-up from national governments to the EU (Zincone 2011: 427). Since migration as part of multilevel policy issues, however, presents both opportunities and challenges, there is now new political opportunity for the sub-national levels of governance. Financial resources (as well as more indirect modes of support or incentives) are transformed to authorities at local level. Quite apart from the Blue Card scheme, emerging EU citizenship status illustrates challenges to exclusive national models of regulating migration. More civic rights are exercised through the social movements within a broader supra-national community. The implication of addressing immigration at different levels of governance is that the options for developing legislative initiatives would widen the labour markets. New opportunities for policy formation related to youth immigrants

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who have already entered the country and their position in the new society of settlement would generate new jobs linked to the respective territorial unit of governance. These tentative steps are signs of a constant struggle between national governments and the EU. The question of how much discretion the member states have in interpreting the EU directives remains to be unanswered.

Conclusion The EU policy process is not only carried out by the main institutions, but a variety of other actors involve in process in different stages and level of their intensity in such process changes accordingly. The multilevel level policy-making is key to the EU policy process in the labour migration field. Thus, a set of institutions and actors (political parties, the media, the interests or lobby groups etc.) take the tasks of the legislative policy process is conceived a new mode of governance. Within a such process, the national governments seem keen to become influential. The key to this is a principle resistance towards a further transfer of formal policymaking competences to the supranational level. Still, this dilemma informs a multilevel governance. Despite complicated political dynamics, there is a major reason to conclude that the EU institutions have gained a strong ground under the Community method. The nature of policy-making in the areas, where mass matters such as migration, the EU is efficient in the positive sense of the word. Having said that, a complication in the resolution of the European migration crisis has been the sense of a lack of coherence of the European migration policy resulted in periodic strategic bargains and the routines of regime, programme and project management, which naturally signals the distributional mode. In combination with the opaque regulatory mode, factors like the worldwide redistribution of labour is an indication of a large measure of uncertainty reflecting upon the European policy-making on regular migration and thus call for regulatory mode in place. What new pattern of relationships between origin and destination countries will emerge for the moment, remains uncertain. All of the member state governments and the EU’s supranational political institutions (the European Commission and the EP etc.) take in part in the legislative policy-making, although their powers and responsibilities vary accordingly. At the EU level, the political system is characterized by

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proliferation to the extent of which numerous agencies with diverse functions. In other words, non-state actors (trade unions, interest groups and NGO, etc.) tend to influence policy decisions. The multi-faced nature of the policy process and the host of differing sort of policy actors facilitate the politics of migration. In the background, there are always various levels of the system, namely European, national and sub-national level (local and regional government). The conflicting interests that normally characterise the national policy process operate at the EU level. While depending on the policy field, dominating the characteristics of process in the EU is diversity, including hierarchy, negotiation, conflict, cooperation, competition. Given that, the legislative process can hardly be efficient and productive in a sensitive area of labour migration. Recently treaty-based revision has led the new modes of governance that is now so-called the OMC as the main policy-making instrument. Literally, such governance pattern means benchmarking and best practice exchange between the member states. While focusing on the changes introduced in the Treaty of Lisbon, touching upon the long-standing controversy between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism, argument is here increasing policy-making authority at the EU level in the area of migration governance mirrors a stronger and more supranational Union. Apart from important benchmarks for the formulation of national policy making, success of the Blue Card for attracting highly skilled migrants indicates that the extent of desire of the national government to initiate legislation.

References Bache, I., & George, S. (2006). Politics in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cini, M. (2002). European Union politics. Oxford University Press. Dinan, D. (2017). Crisis in EU history. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), The European Union in crisis (pp. 16–33). The European Union Serious. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Dinan, D., & Persson, M. (2016). The political efficiency of the EU. In H. Zimmermann & A. Dur (Eds.), Key controversies in European integration (pp. 29– 63). The European Union Series. Macmillan Education. Elgstrom, O., & Smith, M. (2000). Introduction: Negotiation and policy-making in the European Union—Processes, system and order [Special issue]. Journal of European Public Policy, 7 (5), 673–683.

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European Commission. (2014). Labour mobility in the EU: Recent trends and policies. Eurofound. https://www.eurofound.europa.eu/labour-mobilityin-the-eu-recent-trends-and-policies. Accessed 6 March 2015. Faure, R., Gavas, M., & Knoll, A. (2015, December). Challenges to a comprehensive EU migration and asylum policy (European Centre for Development Policy Management, Report). https://www.odi.org/sites/odi.org.uk/files/odiassets/publications-opinion-files/10166.pdf. Holtslag, J. W., Kremer, M., & Schrijvers, E. (2013). Making migration work, the future of labour migration in the European Union. Amsterdam University Press. Jachtenfuchs, M., & Kohler-Koch, B. (2004). Governance and institutional development. In A. Wiener & T. Diez (Eds.), European integration theory (pp. 97–115). Oxford University Press. Martín, I., & Venturini, I. (2015). A comprehensive labour market approach to EU labour migration policy, Migration Policy Centre, EU. http://ec.europa. eu/transparency/regexpert/index.cfm?do=groupDetail.groupDetailDoc&id= 19245&no=1. European Migration Institute. McCormick, J. (2017). Understanding the European Union: A concise introduction. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. McLeod, A. J. (1999). Regional participation in EU affairs: Lessons for Scotland from Austria, Germany & Spain (No. 15). Scotland Europa Centre. Menz, G. (2015). Framing the matter differently: The political dynamics of European Union labour migration policymaking. Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 28(4), 554–570. Nugent, N. (2010). The government and politics of the European Union. Palgrave Macmillan. Peers, S. (2008). Legislative update: EU immigration and asylum competence and decision-making in the Treaty of Lisbon. European Journal of Migration and Law, 10, 219–247. Peers, S. (2010). Decision-making process—The JHA agenda, legislative observatory prepared for Statewatch. Human Rights Centre, University of Essex. https://www.statewatch.org/semdoc/decision-making-process.html. Ponzano, P., Hermanin, C., & Coronathe, D. (2012). Power of initiative of the European Commission: A progressive erosion? Notre Home. Scharpf, F. W. (1994). Community and autonomy multilevel policy-making in the European Union (Working Paper, EUI RSC, 1994/01). European University Institute. Scully, R. (2004). The European Parliament. In M. Cini (Ed.), European Union politics (pp. 166–179). Oxford University Press. Stubb, A., Wallace, H., & Petersen, J. (2003). The policy-making process. In E. Bomberg & A. Stubb (Eds.), The European Union: How does it work. Oxford University Press. Thomson, R. (2011). Resolving controversy in the European Union, legislative decision-making before and after enlargement. Cambridge University Press.

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Trauner, F., & Servent, A. R. (2016). The communitarization of the area of freedom, security and justice: Why institutional change does not translate into policy change. Journal of Common Market Studies, 54(6), 1417–1432. Wallace, H., & Reh, C. (2015). An institutional anatomy and five policy modes. In H. Wallace, M. Pollack, & A. Young (Eds.), Policy-making in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wallace, H., & Wallace, W. (2007). Overview: The European Union, politics and policy-making. In E. Jorgensen, M. A. Pollack, & B. Rosamond (Eds.), Handbook of European politics (pp. 339–359). Sage. Zincone, G. (2011). Migration policy-making in EU, the dynamics of actors and contexts in past and present. Amsterdam University Press.

CHAPTER 6

Institutional Decision-Making in the EU

Introduction Immigration is one of the challenging issues in the EU policy making. The obstacles that are identified in Chapter 4, necessitates a strong patterns in migration policy demands made by different political actors. Within this context, emergence of new and persistent obstacles to mobility has pushed the political actors for the rearrangement of their intra-institutional structures. This is particularly the case for the institutional decision-making, which has become much more in focus. Implicitly or explicitly, this implies more institutional decision-making in the EU, regardless of complexity over the negative effects of migrant inflows to labour market. Consideration should be given to the principle features of legislative procedures which are difficult to comprehend. Much of work produced by the scholars builds on the claim that policymaking in both national and the EU level is complex that cannot be explained by static models of the decision-making process within the context of formal legislative institutions. A part of this complexity derives from the relations between the local officials (both elected and bureaucratic) and their constituencies have also been found to significantly shape local immigration policy, with an important role assigned to partisanship (Filomeno 2017: 105). This may imply that mobilization of local immigration that cooperates with organizations and their engagement with local governments are crucial for the future migration decisions by the political actors. As for different levels of government, authority is divided © The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_6

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between the national and the subnational arenas of action, combined with the European institutional environment. As a set of institutions, the EU can be dysfunctional in terms of political opportunity structure for the domestic social movements.

Responsibilities of the EU Institutions The EU’s ability to resolve dismantle controversies over the labour migration issues is being tested by institutional actors’ capacities in formal decision-making. The EU treaties shed some light on the functions of the institutions regarding policy development. The Treaty of Rome set up three main decision-making institutions of the EEC those of a Commission, a Council of Ministers, an Assembly (the EP). A Court of Justice was another main institution that would ensure the interpretation and application of the Community law. All these institutions expected to serve as a model of ideal decision-making at the supranational level. Additional rules of procedure are applied to the decision-making process. These rules and regulations provide latitude for the institutional actors to outline the range and the scope of their activities. The Treaty also set up the Economic and Social Committee (ESC) and the Committee of Regions and Local Authorities (CoR). The sole right of consultation on the legislative proposal was given to the ECS and the CoR. The process of integration impinges on the balance between the Commission president and the individual commissioners that provide a sense of leadership. Prior to enlargement 2004, there were twenty commissioners, with the five larger states used to have two commissioners and their numbers were increased to twenty-eight. The principle of ‘one commissioner for each member state’ remains to be the current appointment system in accordance to the Lisbon Treaty of 2009 provision. The commissioners are nominated by the member states. But they are not national representatives, rather independent political entity—and thus are expected to represent the European interest. Just like the national governments referring departments of government, the commission consists of organizational units, known as Directorate-General (DG). Collectively, these units are known as services. The Commissioners are responsible for 33 DGs. As for the JHA there is DG Home and DG Justice. Policy importance and specialisation within DGs leads to many departures. The most popular commissionerships are those of the EU’s core policy competences, including internal market,

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agriculture and enlargement. Essentially, there is a link between labour migration and labour market policy that presents a crucial institutional issue at the EU level. This owes much to all forms of migration to the EU (i.e., economic migration) which are still under DG Migration, Home Affairs and Citizenship by is managed by the Commission bureaucracy. The security and justice issues form part of this policy area. The EU employment policy and the DG Employment and Social Affairs are complementary rather than concurrent. When the Commission employs cultivated spillover it can be expected to present the implementation of particular policies as necessary for the successful achievement of previously agreed upon integration goals. In this respect its discourse will resemble articulations, which are characteristics of functional spillover. In distinction to functional spillover, however, with cultivated spillover, the Commission should be the first actor to enunciate a particular policy and would rally support for it from other actors involved. Therefore, when employing cultivated spillover the Commission aims to sway the decision-making-process in its preferred direction, thus setting trends not present before (Kostadınova 2013: 265). In short, the Commission’s main function is to drafting EU law. Among other institutions, the EP is regarded as an extremely active legislative-rule making. There has been a considerable increase in the EP’s powers since its direct elections in 1979. It has proceed as co-legislator with the Council in the most legislative field. There are few indications of this. Firstly, policy discussion takes place between the EP and the Commission at the pre-proposal legislative stage. Secondly, the EP adopts draft text with the Council. Third, the right to ask the Commission written and oral questions is solely assigned to the EP. Fourth, view of the EP is sought for important legislation. The ability of the EP to influence legislation depends on the independence of the members of the EP (MEPS). Because the MEPs are affiliated with the national political parties and the transnational party groups. The MEPs sit in the EP in transnational party groups, rather than in national delegations. Ideologically, the Party of European Socialist (PES) and the Conservative European People’s Party (EPP) as transnational party groups are two largest groups in the EP, which account for a third of EP seats. They are more cohesive groups in terms of influencing the EP’s role in legislation. As in a national legislature, committees of the EP carry out much of its legislative work. The most important task of these committees is to scrutinize the Commission’s proposal, draw up report and vote on the draft.

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Institutionally, the Council of Ministers is at the centre of decisionmaking process. The Council is divided into sectoral Councils composed of the national ministers from the relevant policy areas. Below the ministerial level, many committees prepare ministers’ decisions. The COREPER sits at the top of this committee structure. It meets in two configuration: as COREPER I, composed of the deputy permanent representatives to deal with more technical matters; and as COREPER II, composed of the member states’ ambassadors to deal with more politically contentious matters. Below this, there are many working groups composed of officials from each country. These officials are either based in the member states’ permanent representations to the EU or in relevant national ministers. Legislative proposals are passed up and down the Council hierarchy during the decision-making process. Lower level committees may pass upwards an issue they are unable to resolve. Ministers may agree the general contours of a settlement and instruct lower-level committees to work out the details (Thomson 2011: 14). The task is complicated by the voting system that surrounds the Council activity. In this regard, usual system is the QMV and unanimity voting, and rarely simple majority vote, although a strong preference for consensual decision-making—that is an attempt to reach consensus—is the key feature of the Council. The CJEU founded in the 1950s, just as other the EU core institutions and as noted in Chapter 1, consists of a Court of Justice, a General Court and a Civil Service Tribunal since the Lisbon Treaty. The Court is recognized the most effective supranational judicial body and is represented by the 28 judges from teach member state. The judges are appointed by ‘the accord of the member states’ (TFEU Art. 253) and hold office for a renewable term of six years. Each member state is eligible to nominate one judge whose independence is beyond doubt and who is of recognized competence. The legacy of Lisbon Treaty in 2009 changed this traditional method of nomination to a consultation of advisory panels. The assistance of the panel in appointing judges without public debate, thus becomes indispensable, its opinion must be sought by the nominating state. It attempts to inject judicial qualities into the debate. Being one of the core institutions of the EU, the Court is a powerful institution, as it oversees balance between the European integration, national rights and citizens’ rights, and gives preliminary rulings. Recently, the EU policy competence has been strengthened by the Court, who has now wide jurisdiction to hear various types of action.

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To underline the distinctions of issues, the EU’s courts have generally two main functions. First, they are responsible for directly applying law in certain types of case. Second, they have general responsibility for interpreting the provisions of the EU law and ensuring that the application of the law, which on a day-to-day basis is primarily responsibility of national courts and agencies, is consistent and uniform (Nugent 2010: 223). These are the main tasks of the courts, especially the ECJ reflection of the case law. This is most clearly seen in following respects: Firstly, the Court is a radical actor in a sense that its policy positions are generally have provided the reference point. Secondly, with regard to the internal market, the Court is the most influential. Its judicial activism in the pursuit of deeper labour market integration is the result of practices being ruled illegal. It should also be noted that the institutional dynamics of the EU encompasses the European Council. Ironically, the Lisbon Treaty strengthened the power of the European Council to the extent of which intergovernmental decision-making processes could be increased. The European Council usually plays its role in EU’s the external dimension of migration. Naturally, access to resources tends to reinforce capacities of the EU institutions, when domain of migration have become stronger. The extend and significance of the increased institutional powers are not more clearly demonstrated in the legal competences in the area of the external dimension of migration. As such, the EU institutions could effectively employ their legal competences in broad terms of migration issues. Th intergovernmental bargaining among the member states in labour migration issues could be reduced as long as the European Council structure possesses effective mechanisms that limit intergovernmental bargaining among the member states. It is also worth noting that the new proposal for the European Agenda on Migration, so-called Migration Compact seen a concrete attempt to build a new Partnership Framework with third countries. The initiative is an indication of standing and influence of the European Council for its endorsement of the Commission’s presentation on 28 June 2016. This has partly been because of the increasing practice of very important and politically sensitive decisions being taken, or at least being channelled through for approval, by the European Council (Nugent 2017: 173).

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The EU as a Polity The EU is seen as a policy system. Conceptually, it is governance needs to be explored. The term governance is everywhere in the recent EU literature, but it is rarely defined very clearly. Peterson and Bomberg defined governance as the imposition of overall direction or control on the allocation of valued resources. Governance is synthetic: it results from a mix of factors, including political leadership, state-society relations, institutional competition, electoral politics, and so on (Peterson and Bomberg 2003: 314). Governance in Europe in a such framework generally explained by a political system with a complex set of interconnected institutions across multiple levels. The EU system is a layer of governance that has been merged onto the nation-states. The way in which the EU influences national or domestic politics and policies strongly correspond the governance approach. Hence, the EU is a unique system due to its multi-level governance. In seeking to establish the governance model for labour migration, the EU possesses the hard legislation of regulations and directives in policy making mechanism. The OMC is introduced to ease this situation. In this respect, a clear value emphasis relates to common goals benchmarks, targets and mutual learning in which the member states are voluntarily agree. In the wake of the single European project envisaging free movement of people, an EU-wide labelling system was introduced in 1992, when the member states were under pressure to launch a certain policy objective within specified time. This development does not correspond to the very nature of ordinary legislation, which is complemented by the increasing use of the so-called “new” or “soft” governance tools (i.e., benchmarking or the OMC). The increasing emphasis is placed on these governance tools, without involvement of both the EP and the ECJ in the policy process. On best practice, their roles are rather limited in the form of recommendations, advise and guidelines. When it comes to capabilities, the picture is unclear. Knowing that the OMC is a fairly new method of governance, it’s effect is yet to be felt. A central rational for the creation the OMC is transformation assuming that the dynamics of policy making might serve to spur the member states into action to address the fundamental capability shortfalls. This is yet to be occurred. For policy steps, the ECJ has very limited role. Indeed, in what is perhaps the most damming critique of the EP is that its role remains insignificance; the same goes for the COOPER imaginable. Crucially, it is

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increasingly clear that the EP lacks input, which consolidates the negative features of undemocratic legislative procedures in relation to the multiples actor involvement and the obscurity of the system, and the domination of policy instruments by the national governments. Despite of this drawback about the OMC, it has rapidly spread across a variety of policy sectors, such as economic, employment and enlargement. In principle, the policy system is characterised by different pressures on government including as public opinion, economic changes and external influences, which are known to be inputs into the political process, whereas outputs are described as the end results of collectively policies. One approach is the analysis of the policy system, which is summarised below. • Input: the extent to which governments are responsive to the need and the demands of society. The public policies are deliberate actions or inactions. There is huge amount of work that goes on a platform of explanations, when governments or political leaders run for office. • Output: to the extent of which clarification is considered to be radical governments are aware of the most important problems and challenges exist in society, and contemplate promises in response. For too long, the academic debate is focused on the question of legislative weight of each institution for migration policy area. There is a well-established theoretical literature in support of this point. As Princen (2009) established a path-breaking study, variation in the positions of supranational actors (i.e., the Commission and the EP) and perception of the member states of desirability are closely related to a description of the policy demand (inputs). The EU institution and the member states normally try to reach common agreement so that the process delivers at least some policy output. Because they are positioned in an intricate institutional “triangle of interdependence”, if satisfactory solutions are not found, the whole process grinds to a halt (Versluis et al. 2011: 167). On this account, Hooghe and Marks (2003) produced the state-centric model, which is the basic element underlying European governance. The national governments play dominant role in decision-making, as to limited authority is transformed to European level. The core presumption is that European integration does not challenge the autonomy of national states. State-centrists contend that state sovereignty is preserved or even

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strengthened through the EU governments. No government has to integrate more than it wishes because bargains rests on the lowest common denominator of the participating member states. In this model, supranational actors exist to aid member states, to facilitate agreements by providing information that would not otherwise be so readily available (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 281). Obviously, this model represents interests and relative power of the national governments in any area of policy outcomes. This is undoubtedly intergovernmentalist aspire to gain more power over the international actors. On the basis of the national governments aggregate power, this type of governance may affect the specific nature of policy process. The state-centric model is, as of present, challenged by the idea of multi-level governance. The supranationalists assume that the national governments are no longer capable of exerting power over the supranational institutions. In this way, utility of power is limited on the basis of considering governments can be outvoted in the Council. Looking at degree of participation of the member states representation in the Council, such likelihood of outvoting appears to be considerable. In the light of the fact that their involvement in decision making is arduous, the supranational institutions have acquired control over the territories of the sovereign states. More precisely, the individual state sovereignty is weaken in the EU by the collective decision-making, which is taken by the supranational institutions. They have regularly great policy significance. The type of policy normally required in the European market is characterised by a high degree of specialised technical knowledge. Here, markets are best served by the efficiency-oriented policy that is best provided by experts independent of political pressure. Behind this is the idea that only in this case may policies are achieved the optimal level of collective welfare, whereas political pressure typical of democratic institutions is likely to favour particular interests (Jachtenfuchs 2006: 342). The EU delivers policies that benefits publics all in an efficient and equitable way in the absent of deficit. For a better oversight, it may take actions or avoid to opt in office. The legitimacy of the EP is to meet public expectations and guarantee its survival in the Union of nature. On the main, success or failure of responsiveness depends considerably upon its solution to problems and the source of problems. It is this burden, imposed by the European publics and signal upon the attention-giving and the decisionmaking capabilities that have close parallels in the burden of Civil Liberties Committee as a major role.

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To conclude, the nature of governance in Europe has shifted significantly, with comparison to the early years of the EEC established. Lack of agreement between the member states may lead to an expanded role of the ECJ. In other words, pressing integration forward at a rapid pace seems impossible, because boundaries between the national policy-making and the European policy-making have been blurred. The real challenge and complexity lies in where the EU policy process cannot take place at the European level, it is transferred into the national political and the legal system. This is a new complication pointing to a “drift” of authority in various policy areas to the European level. Therefore, it is likely to confront two distinct domains of politics in Europe—the national and the supranational/European level.

The Policy Circle Drawing on studies regarding the EU governance, the most systematic research into the issues of compliance with the rules and procedures, which has been contacted by the academic researchers suggests that not all issues find their way onto the agenda, depending on their specific features. The density and the scope of initial steps for the policy circle is related an obvious functional logic of collectivity, which is key to find a solution to problem efficiently. Examining the main EU institutional actors behind the migration agenda, the policy initiation engages a wide range of participants. The logical progression of steps that actors have the most decision-making powers and the responsibilities for formal and informal arenas of policy-making included agenda-setting, adoption and implementation of policy on immigration. Thus, a European agenda is formed by such steps (see Fig. 6.1). Applying this logic to the EU, the task of agenda-setting belongs to the European Council that provides impetus and political guidelines for the future development policies. The Lisbon Treaty set a legal framework regarding its reporting obligations to the EP. Traditionally, this tasks is to adopt conclusions during each European Council meetings, following identifying specific issues of concern and then outline particular actions to take or goals to reach. The December 2017 European Council meeting set tone for the year ahead, delivering on policy initiatives launched in the context of the EU’s positive agenda, setting out a way forward on migration, which marked an important step on the ‘Roadmap for a More United, Stronger and More Democratic Union’ (European Commission

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Problem recogniƟon

EvaluaƟon

Agenta-seƫng

ImplementaƟon

FormulaƟon

AdopƟon

Fig. 6.1 The policy cycle (Source John McCormick 2017)

2017). And these meetings consist of the highest political leaders of the member countries, together with the Council’s own president and the Commission President. More importantly, Article 15 TEU empowered the European Council as a key decision-making body and a master of its own agenda. It is not easy to be impartial for these national political leaders, which may hold a reality given the European Council is free to focus on any topic, rather than labour migration issues, it recognises as prominent.

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As regards the draft legislation to be passed on a specific policy agenda, a complex political and bureaucratic process, with a variety of actors, is usually set in motion, based on the formal institutional procedure, which determines the details of their involvements. The Commission takes the lead for the formal procedure concerning a formulation of proposal. During this stage, the Commission seeks advice of relevant interest groups of which their views can be crucial for a particular issue. In this regard, a range of options is available for consultation purposes. To this extent, strategies and tactics that the interest groups use to constitute strong lobby, it is possible that the Commission’s proposal can be rejected, when it faces powerful lobbying domestically. This consultative tasks of the Commission also involve with a complex set of committees of expert that mostly provides technical advise, although their significance varies to a greater extent. While tactical manoeuvring is available to the interest group lobbying to influence the decision-making at the European level, it does not point to pass legislation on this issue that is highly contested and can be difficult to be implemented at national level. Nevertheless, most legislation that is initiated by the Commission can be pushed through the Council for adoption. In comparison to the national level, there are generally the institutional and the political characteristics that are apply to the EU agenda-setting processes. Firstly, the policy agenda is a credible resort to add new issues by the elected national leaders for the purpose of winning the election. Secondly, a large body of European nationals often demand new reforms at the European level. Thirdly, in the face of competing motives and interests, it is difficult to predict which direction the European agenda would move. There is a struggle for power and influence among the institutions. Table 6.1 briefly indicates approaches adopted by the institutions in terms of agenda-setting. Table 6.1 Institutional agenda-setting approaches The Commission and the ECJ The European Council and the Council of Ministers The EP

In favour of taking supranational approach to agenda-setting Keen to protect national interests Its action is determined by voters interests

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Obviously, the agenda-setting in the EU politics takes place, where certain issues on labour migration becomes part of the political agenda. Before a policy choice can be made, there must be political agreement on the definition of a problem, and a decision must be made to add that problem to list of policy concern that are considered part of the remit of government. In a democracy, the development of the policy agenda is normally driven by a combination of the individual preferences and priorities of elected officials and their advisers, the struggle of powers among political institutions (mainly the executive and the legislature), and the combined pressures of public opinion and media attention (McCormick 2017: 104). The ways in which the member states add new ideas and issues to the policy agenda tend to cause complexities, deriving from the variety of needs and priorities of the member states to be satisfied. A paradox for the agenda setting is that the pan European problems remain to be identified. As the EU law has expanded to more controversial areas, its institutions have found themselves attacked from across the political fronts. This is when they attempt to set the agenda. While the European Council and the Council of Ministers have long been criticised by some concerning the right for protecting national interests, more recently, the common causes of migration crisis, in particular a problem has been identified between the migration policy objectives of the old EU member state, and the actual outcomes of those policies. A potentially powerful principle with respect to the Commission is the European Council, the summit of the political leaders of the member states (plus the president of the Commission), which is held three or four times a year. The European Council has immense prestige and legitimacy and a quasi-legal status as the body that defines “general political guidelines” (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 296). On the domains of EU policymaking which are normally assigned to the Commission, the Council and the EP, a comprehensive strategy to tackle the migration crisis is confirmed by the European Council for the issues of irregular migrants, humanitarian support, relocation, the European Border and Coast Guard and the future architecture of the EU’s migration policy (i.e., the Dublin regulation). Critics claim that the EU is far behind to built political support for a unified response, or to anticipate the potential effects of policy alternatives. Therefore, link between agenda-setting and conflict expansion is far more ambiguous. The idea of conflict expansion as a driving force behind

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agenda access is linked closely to policies in which direct accountability to the public play an important role, and in which political actors operate somewhat integrated political sphere of debate on political issues. In such politics, involving the public is viable strategy, since there is a public to begin with, and decision-makers are likely to take account of what the public thinks (Princen 2009: 27). When it comes to formulating policies, the propensity is that conflicting opinion and advise are confronted by the Commission. Taking into account of these different views and opinion, the Commission tents to follow its own way to come to a conclusion. Its ambitious proposal is usually find itself being smothered with modifications may go for the lowest common denominator. In doing so, at least some legislation goes through the whole policy circle before full implementation. This is especially applicable to the new policy area, which is likely to force the Commission to launch an acquiscommuautaire. Regardless of other steps of policy circle, formulation is the key to the institutional decision-making. Its logic drives from the fact that views and preferences of the main EU institutional actors on labour migration have increasingly gained momentum over years. Some commentators have argued that controversies in labour migration cannot be resolved by the restrictive number of actors. Instead, different actors at different times have played crucial roles in policy-making. On this account, the EU consists of distinct policy-making actors. This ultimately prompted much debate about which actors can be considered and influence of them that provoke or inhibit labour migration policy formulation. For instance, the ECJ overruled on Hungary and Slovakia’s objections to the compulsory fixed-quote scheme, which was seen as a challenge to a migrant relocation deal drawn up at the height of the crisis in 2015. At the same time, resistance of some EU member states (i.e., the Netherlands) to the Blue Card scheme as a Labour Migration Policy Tool was a clear sign of the growing preoccupation with the issue. These two examples suggest that it is useful to attempt to understand the changing political factors, which fuel formation of policies of kind. Throughout the EU history, the policy-making has become focused by the scholars. However, literature on EU governance has devoted little explicit attention to implementation. Having said so, very much in line with the Commission’s function, the direct implementation powers lies in its exclusive tasks. In the external relations of the EU, flexibility in negotiation position allows for a room of manoeuvre across issue areas. Even

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so, this role is challenged in the case of very few policy sectors assigned to the Commission’s tasks. To put differently, the Commission has no direct implementation powers in all policy areas. For most overseas implementation, such as Humanitarian Aid Programme, the apex of multi-level system points to the central authorities of the member states, sub-national authorities and agencies in which tasks are shared with. It is very well to claim that the implementation public polices is normally left to bureaucracies. However, the bureaucracy of the EU (the Commission) is small and has no powers directly to enforce European law, and so must work instead to insure implementation through the bureaucracies of the member states. The Commission occasionally convenes meetings of national representatives and experts to monitor progress, and also carries out its own investigations using its contacts in national government agencies. Most of the time, however, the Commission must rely on other sources, including the governments of the member states (who will occasionally report another governments that are not being as aggressive as themselves in implementing laws) whistleblowing by interest groups, by media and private citizens the EP (which since 1980s required that the Commission submit annual reports on the failure of the member states fully to implement Community legislation) and the European ombudsman(who has the power to conduct inquiries into changes of bad administration against Community institution, expect the ECJ and Court of First Instance) (McCormick 2017: 104). Additionally, a wide range of instruments are used by the EU for implementing the internal dimension of migration. They are included legal agreements, migration dialogues, mobility partnerships and various funding arrangements. To elaborate this point further, it is not only these bodies that take responsibility for implementation of policy, but the national governments are also obligated to keep a close eye on legislation once adopted, regardless of directives or regulations. The treaties make it essential for the national legal system to enforce the EU law. In principle, the national governments is intimately involved in each of these three stages—policy developments, decision-making, and implementation—and must therefore available of the resources-personnel and organizational—in order to maximise their interests. Again, complexity of the EU has grown considerably since the mid-1980s, sometimes at the instigation of national governments. The process just presented is what one might label the direct process of the EU and the national interaction, resulting in the EU policy

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output becoming part of the domestic fabric of law and policy. However, the use of the so-called the OMC as government initiatives point to other arenas of the European-level policy initiatives that do not follow the route of the traditional Community method. There are consequently, multiple channels in which the national executive engage as a part of its EU membership. This is an important point, because it emphasizes the enormous attention that the national executive must expend in relation to EU policy-making (Ladrech 2010: 45). For policy circle from formulation to implementation, the member states are in stronger position to influence the policy process. When all directly involved, the member states’ interests given by a specific policy sector, the process begins with the initiation of the European Council, while a timescale is set to achieve the targets thereby. In order to achieve better outcome of the policy process, a joint cooperation takes place between the Commission and the Council of Ministers. Where appropriate, best practices are selected within the context of “benchmarks”. What political consideration arise and how important it is translated to the European targets into the national and the regional targets are matters of intergovernmental considerations. What it is clear is that it is up to the member states whether they are willing to draw a national plan to achieve these targets, which are already set. Whether or not action plans derives from the Commission’s input are considered as a success depending the reviewing process by the Council. If not, plans are modified through recommendation by the Council accordingly. On a regular basis, the Commission would act as a watchdog on any progress in the way through recorded by the Council in a system of peer review. Beyond sanctions, it remains to be seen what action would be taken against states’ failure for “lagging behind”, quite apart from the disapproval of other member states.

Legislative Decision-Making in the EU For the legislative act to be developed, initially the institutions create policy mechanism in which they influence. There are impact policies at the national level in parallel to inputs which are competing policy demand. The transformation of demands into outputs involves a variety of complexities at both national and the EU levels, because of multiple influences. It is usual that some demands are satisfied and others are rejected

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in a single decision. The key actors involve in the development and implementation of policy initiatives are described a system of action in a given political system. As an initial step for formal legislation, the member states and the EP call for the Commission to introduce proposals (see Fig. 6.2). The underlying theme is to find a common ground for the proposal legislation. The Commission’s proposed draft is also submitted to the Council for a decision and the EP for its opinion on a particular interest in a policy areas. The proposed legislation is reviewed by the EP and the Council. This process ensures that EP agrees with the Council. The EP has the power to block the proposed legislation. If there is still no agreement following the second reading, a conciliation committee, which consists of representatives of the Council and the EP, intervenes to resolve the situation. But EUROPEAN COUNCIL -does not legislate, but may issue guidelines to the Commission and the Council of Ministers

COURT OF JUSTICE -charged with ensuring EU law is interpreted

‘Political’ and ‘significant’ legislations is adopted by

Administrative legislation is adopted by the

the EP and the Council or by the Council

Commission via

EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT works at two levels Plenaries

COMMISSION -innitiates propopals

Committees

COUNCIL OF MINISTERS works at three levels: Ministers COREPER Working parties

Comitology Committees

Direct action by the Commission

Legislation is adopted in three forms 1 Regulations are binding on member states 2 Decisions are binding on those to whom they are addressed 3 Directives are binding as to the result to be achieved, but require transformation by the appropriate national authorities

National authorities, subject to a general supervision by the Commission, carry the main responsibility for implementing EU law

Fig. 6.2 Principal features of the EU’s legislative procedures (Source Neil Nugent 2010)

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even at this final reading, the Council and the EP can block the legislative proposal, as the co-decision-procedure has to do with work of the Council and the EP rather than the Commission, who has no approval task of legislative text. This makes the Commission less valuable in terms of adoption, despite of its involvement in the negotiation process with the Council and the EP. To some extent, the Commission can act to give opinion for the legislative proposal. The legislation is passed under the consultation and the co-decision procedures. The Community method—which used for the making of EU legislation—places limitations on the Council in two main ways. First, it is normally restricted to act on the basis of proposals that are made to it by the Commission. Second, the EP has very important legislative powers. Prior to the Maastricht Treaty, the Council was formally the EC’s sole legislature, but under the co-decision procedure that was created by the Treaty. The EP became co-legislator with the Council in those policy areas where the procedure applied. As a result of subsequent treaty reforms, the procedure—which was re-named the ‘ordinary legislative procedure’ by the Lisbon Treaty—now applies to most significant legislation (Nugent 2010: 140). To put differently, the Lisbon Treaty renamed the co-decision procedure, as the ordinary legislative procedure that is the EU’s standard decision-making procedure. The ordinary legislative procedure gives power to the directly elected EP to approve the EU legislation, together with the Council, so-called the governments of the 28 EU member states. Priority to these changes relating to the co-decision-procedure, the major task the Commission shouldered would allow legislation to get through the Council under the consultation procedure. While most attention has been paid to the relationship between the EP and the Council drives from the ordinary legislative procedure, the greater role of member states are particularly evident in the decisionmaking mechanism. They are less willing to transfer power to the European level, while the institutional involvement remains insignificant pointing to a more limited consultative role for the EP. Consultative can be combined with either the QMV or unanimity in the Council. If the QMV rule applies, then the Council can approve the Commission’s legislative proposal by a qualified majority, or may amend the proposal with the approval of all member states. If the unanimity rule applies, then both approval and amendment of the proposal require the support of all member states. The EP must give an opinion on the legislative proposal, but legally the Council may put aside the EP’s opinion after considering it.

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In practice, the EP’s opinion can affect the contents of the adopted act (Nugent 2006: 404). Any more to develop an European competence in labour migration field will depend on the use of the consultative procedure that applies to the JHA. The vested interest against mobility will likely to face with disagreement in the Council given the sensitivity of the issue. The EU institution and the member states normally try to reach common agreement so that the process delivers at least some policy output. Because they are positioned in an intricate institutional triangle of interdependence, if satisfactory solutions are not found, the whole process grinds to a halt (Versluis et al. 2011: 167). Some policy areas triggers fierce disagreements and disputes against the Commission’s position and unable it push through. All this is not to suggest that compromise is not possible. On the contrary, since the introduction of singe market programme, there have been forged new allies by the Commission in order to ensure its proposal finds support among powerful interest groups or bureaucracies of national governments. The recent treaty development has made the EP’s hand stronger in sharing legislation task with the Council in formal legislative process. Hence, the nature of co-decision procedure draws the EP and the Commission closer. Theoretically, at least, the former has a strong desire with vested interest in further European integration. In recent years, the notion of democratic credentials has forced the MEPs to ally with a variety of interest groups lobbying in their constituents and thus faced confrontation of party-political pressures. Once lobbing becomes crucial exercise domestically, the EP’s independence and importance in relation to the Commission has gained a strong prominence over the issue of such interest. Beyond the nature of the EU’s decision-making systems, the diversity of competing interests across the member states hinders successful policy development determined by mainly key actors (i.e., national governments). The EU’s ability to resolve controversy surrounding labour mobility is being tested by compromise. Actors are concerned about their existence national arrangements and thus may not prepare to compromise. If not, effective decision-making becomes cumbersome. The fact that process can be very difficult derives from what might be considered linkages is worth noting, but does not lessen value of compromise on which agreements and deals are based. Linking different policy issues in the form of “package deals” can push agreements that are clearly of a

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more specific issue, others are left out. The European Council is a gatekeeper in a sense that it can prevent issues from being disconnected, rather formulating compromises and linked deals. This is the dominant characteristics of its position. The cooperation is usually forthcoming, if not, formal voting takes place in the Council. The system of the QMV relates to differences among the member states’ population size (see Table 6.2). Following the enlargements of 2004 and 2007, the allocation of votes to the member states was changed considerably. For the legislative proposal to be adopted by the QMV in the Council, it was required at least 62 of the 87 votes. The new voting system was introduced by the Nice Treaty required 255 of the 345 votes for the proposal to be passed in the Council. The Nice system also required the approval of 62% the member states. The Lisbon rules came into effect in December 2009 provided new legal basis for the QMV. The adoption of acts by the Council now requires the approval of 55% of member states (16) (72% if the act has not been proposed by the Commission), which must represent at least 65% of the EU’s population (currently approximately 328.6 million of a total 505.5 million). To limit the possibility of larger states joining together to stop proposals, a blocking coalition must include at least four member states representing at least 35% of the EU’s overall population. In cases where not all member states participate in voting (e.g. acts adopted only by euro area or Schengen member states, or within enhanced cooperation), the qualified majority is calculated only on the basis of the participating member states (European Parliament 2014). As previously stated, the QMV now applies to the stable core of the EU policies dealing with the single market, such as employment, immigration, visa and social policies. These policies are dealt under the first pillar for the Community policies. More importantly, some provisions under the JHA (pillar third) are subject to the QMV in the Council. By involving domestic interest at the EU level, the co-decision is often incorporated with the QMV in the Council. Under the co-decision procedure, the EP can veto the Council legislative proposals. A conciliation committee, consisting of representatives from both institutions with a representative of the Commission as broker, tries to hammer out a compromise if the EP and the Council are deadlocked. To become law, a compromise proposal needs to be approved by a majority in the EP and a qualified majority in the Council. The codecision procedure comes close to putting the EP on an essentially equal footing with the Council (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 302).

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Table 6.2 Council voting weights in the EU and euro area Member state

Population (thousands)

Old voting system Votes

DE FR UK IT ES PL RO NL BE EL CZ PT HU SE AT BG DK FI SK IE HR LT SI LV EE CY LU MT

80,523.7 65,633.2 63,730.1 59,685.2 46,704.3 38,533.3 20,057.5 16,779.6 11,161.1 11,062.5 10,516.1 10,487.3 9908.8 9555.9 8451.9 7284.6 5602.6 5426.7 5410.8 4591.1 4262.1 2291.9 2058.2 2023.8 1324.8 865.9 537.0 421.4

29 29 29 29 27 27 14 13 12 12 12 12 12 10 10 10 7 7 7 7 7 7 4 4 4 4 4 3

New system based on share of population

% of EU total

% of euro area

% of EU total

% of euro area

8.2 8.2 8.2 8.2 7.6 7.6 3.9 3.6 3.4 3.4 3.4 3.4 3.4 2.8 2.8 2.8 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.9 1.1 1.1 1.1 1.1 1.1 0.1

13.3 13.3

15.93 12.98 12.61 11.81 9.24 7.62 3.97 3.32 2.21 2.19 2.08 2.07 1.96 1.89 1.67 1.44 1.11 1.07 1.07 0.91 0.84 0.59 0.41 0.40 0.26 0.17 0.11 0.08

24.2 19.7

13.3 12.4

5.9 5.5 5.5 5.5

4.6

3.2 3.2 3.2

1.8 1.8 1.8 1.8 1.8 1.3

17.9 14.0

5.3 3.4 3.3 3.1

2.5

1.6 1.6 1.4

0.62 0.61 0.4 0.24 0.16 0.13

Source European Parliament (2014)

Economic wealth has been fundamental in legislative decision-making process in the EU. Based on GDP per capita income 28 members are diverse. The 2017 data indicates that there are considerable differences in the GDP per capita income (see Fig. 6.3). Differences in economic

2017

2007

Fig. 6.3 GDP per capita income, 2017 (Source Eurostat 2017)

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

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wealth of the member states means that their interest diverge. The challenge is to the requirement of the EU subsidies when poor member states involve in decision-making process. In fulfilling economic criteria, some member states are relatively rich and likely to compromise. There is considerably room for manoeuvre to determine economic freedom within the decision-making mechanisms. Drawing upon rich member states, their national economies are organized accordingly, regardless of a common market. Scholars are presented with neutral and negative images of the EU flowing from differences in national economic structures. Such differences affect controversies at the EU level. When deciding on European rules for governing the single market, member states’ national policy positions are influenced by their existing national arrangements (Thomson 2011: 8). Most countries in the EU face a polemic of reconciling a serious economic and demographic need for the foreign workers. Despite these similarities (including internal and external economic constellations) why they have drastically different responses to labour migration is more practical question that drives rationale of this exploration. For many critics, the main problem is that the domestic institutions and norms are not functioning well to ease economic pressure for immigration. Within this complex picture there are plenty of opportunities for an actor with a commitment to increase the European integration to exploit various pressures on governments. The usual suspect here is the Commission, an institutional actor that owes its existence and importance to the process of European integration and therefore has every incentive to try to maximise the extent to which governments are prepared to transfer policies to the EU level. However, much of this shift of activity is voluntary on the behalf of national governments, in search of collective solutions to problems that are increasingly difficult to resolve to the satisfaction of organized interests and public opinion domestically (Cini 2007: 355). Thus, a clear value emphasis is the intergovernmental approach of decision-making has now been obsolete, where by the institutional change coexists. Crucially, the significance of the domestic policy agenda lies in the issues that lead to problems need to be resolved by the national governments. Largely, because of the sensitivities of these specific issues arise from the interest groups, the domestic political pressure or the public opinion, compromise is difficult to achieve. In the circumstances of which decision cannot be made, the logic of implementation or evaluation becomes irrelevant.

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Conclusion In this chapter, the institutional based initiatives that directly or indirectly facilitate geographical mobility is evaluated. Free movement of labour continues to be an important issue for the EU institutions and the policymakers and is regarded as a potential means of addressing complexities and interactions between the institutions and the member states, especially in the context of enlargements. The formulation of legislative proposals falls on the shoulder of the Commission as an executive body. It is not only the Commission that takes responsibility for implementation of policy, but the national governments are also obligated to keep a close eye on legislation once adopted, regardless of directives or regulations. The treaties make it essential for the national legal system to enforce the EU law. Despite the renewed impetus for enhancing labour mobility at EU level, it is often obscured by competing policy demands made by the different political actors at the national level. It may well to conclude that there is little evidence of the effectiveness of these institutions. The chapter is focused on how the institutional actors decides on controversial issues as labour migration and addressed a range of descriptive explanatory question regarding input, process and output of the political systems. While the member states retain their central place in the EU governance, variation in policy demands made by the main actors in the EU: the Commission and the EP. The consequence of this for the institutional decision-making is significant. A great deal of interaction between these institutions takes place explicitly with the ways in which “inputs” are mediated by the forms of negotiation before “outputs”. Thus, the perceived legitimacy of institutions is crucial for understandings about negotiation, its rules, its procedures and its consequences for labour mobility. Examining the main EU institutional actors behind the migration agenda, policy initiation engages a wide range of participants. A European agenda is formed by the logical progression of steps that actors have the most decision-making powers and responsibilities for formal and informal arenas of policy-making included agenda-setting, adoption and implementation of policy on immigration. The EU institutional actors play a leading role in their shaping, adoption and implementation. A complexity in consensus may arise in throughout such processes, which is crucial for understanding the policy-making in the EU.

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That said labour migration is a timely, highly politicized and contentious issue. Therefore, broader public policy debates direct ones’ attention toward mechanism through, which crafted political actors perform to achieve the outcomes they desire. These mechanisms point to the formal rules of decision-making. Far from being success story, the EU’s expansion has negatively impacted on the legislative decision-making. Although the principle of freedom of movement is enshrined in European law, the national policy-makers have empowered in the Council to resort to manoeuvre, when concerned with the potential negative impact of labour migration on their labour markets. As confirmed, the national governments have lost authority with the QMV in the Council. At the same time, this authority is disseminated among the different and many private, and public agents. Nevertheless, shift towards to a state-like European institutions—are still occurring—is important development in the EU history, which has resulted in a portrayal of complex, variable and bumpy patterns of policy making, so far.

References Cini, M. (2007). European Union politics. Oxford University Press. European Commission. (2017). President Junker at the December European Council 15 December 2017. https://ec.europa.eu/commission/news/ president-juncker-december-european-council-2017-dec-15_en. European Parliament (2014). Changed rules for qualified majority voting in the Council of the EU, at a Glance. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/ etudes/ATAG/2014/545697/EPRS_ATA%282014%29545697_REV1_EN. pdf. Eurostat. (2017). Annual growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) in real terms, EU-28, 1996–2016 (%) statistics explained. European Commission. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statisticsexplained/index.php?title= File:Annual_growth_rate_of_gross_domestic_product_(GDP)_in_real_terms,_ EU28,_1996%E2%80%932016_(%25)_RYB17.png&oldid=338466. Filomeno, F. A. (2017). Politics of citizenships and migration. Palgrave Macmillan. Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Multi-level governance in the European Union. In B. F. Nelson & A. Stubb (Eds.), The European Union, readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 281–311). Palgrave Macmillan.

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Jachtenfuchs, M. (2006). The European Union as a polity (II). In Jørgensen, K. E., Pollack, M. A., & Rosamond, B. (Eds.), Handbook of European Union politics (pp. 159–175). Sage Publishing. Kostadınova, V. (2013). The European Commission and the configuration of internal European Union borders: Direct and indirect contribution. JCMS, 51(2), 264–280. Ladrech, R. (2010). Europeanization and national politics. Palgrave Macmillan. McCormick, J. (2017). Understanding the European Union: A concise introduction. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Nugent, N. (2006). The government and politics of the European Union. Duke University Press. Nugent, N. (2010). The government and politics of the European Union. Palgrave Macmillan. Nugent, N. (2017). The crisis and the EU’s institutions, political actors and processes. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), The European Union in crisis (pp. 167–187). Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Peterson, J., & Bomberg, E. (2003). Making sense of EU decision-making. In B. F. Nelsen & A. Stubb (Eds.), The European Union readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 335–339; 313–333). Palgrave Macmillan. Princen, S. (2009). Agenda setting in the EU. Palgrave Macmillan. Thomson, R. (2011). Resolving controversy in the European Union, legislative decision-making before and after enlargement. Cambridge University Press. Versluis, E., Keulen, M., & Stephenson, P. (2011). Analysing the European Union policy process. Red Drop Globe. Macmillan International.

CHAPTER 7

Labour Migration Policy-Making in the EU

Introduction The point about the EU integration process is essential for understanding about the supranational institutions. They matter for migration policy process. The complexity of these structures creates mechanisms in terms of multiple access points. For the member states, responses to the migration policy-making are at least partially shaped by the various inputs in the construction of migration policy, since their willingness and ability to adopt to the EU norms have substantially emerged. Despite complicated political dynamics, the EU institutions own independent status in order to find solutions to seemingly intractable problems for labour mobility. The EU is easy to caricature as evolving process within the context of gradualism and incrementalism, although it confronted difficulties in effecting radical change. In the changing nature of the responsibilities over years, these roles—that being framed the Commission as both a political institution and an administrative institution— provides legitimacy, leadership through capacity improvement in migration policy. It is thus not going too far to say that other EU institutions, namely the EP, together with the Council is highly active in respect of the labour migration issues regarding the exercise of these responsibilities.

© The Author(s) 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3_7

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The Commission Influence The incessant political debate about the Commission’s real influence on the free movement of labour is deeply occupied the European commentators and has its reflection in the big scholarly controversies. Surely, the Commission has formal role and sole right to initiate proposal for legislation. This is a core and inclusive task that gives the Commission a strong position. Neither the Councils nor the EP can act without initiation of its proposals. Power resources available to it is summarised below. • Its power of initiative: exclusive and non-exclusive. • Its neutrality (which results in it been seen as less partisan and more trustworthy than most other EU actors. • It is present in virtually all decision-making forums and in all decision-making stages (and so is very well-informed about the positions of other actors and is often looked to by them for advice). • Its access to information about EU policies need (an access that is associated by it being surrounded by hundreds of expert and advisory committees). • Smaller states are often looked to the Commission for leadership and protection—most EU states are small (Nugent 2010: 121). Here, is the role of the Commission must be fully comprehended in relation to the institutional outlook of the migration decision-making. For the Commission, ability to access many key resources is far greater than any other institutions in the EU. At the centre of migration policy process, the principle resources concern its treaty authorization to initiate policies and propose, and draft legislation in general. The Commission formulates and introduces legislative proposals give it potential to exert considerable influence on decision outcomes. The EU’s rules of procedure stipulates that the Council can only amend the Commission’s proposals unanimously when the consultation procedure applies. Potentially at least, this means that the Commission can use the rules of procedure to ensure that decision outcomes are a close as possible to its policy preferences (Thomson 2011: 79). From the labour migration viewpoint, one can assume that the Commission makes a real difference. As regards the JHA field, the Commission has been one of the main actors involved in delivery and implementation of the labour migration

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policy outcome. That is it takes a certain amount of supranational governance for granted, when focusing on legal and policy related instruments concerning the EU’s internal (as well as external) dimension of migration policy. With regard to its competences and mandates of the different bodies of the Commission’s active role varies, while a great deal of overlap and competing interests exist between its different Services and Directorate-Generals (DGs). Sofaras, they have contributed to the creation of a fragmented, disparate landscape of actors, competences and roles. The new Jean-Claude Junker’s Commission established a new college of Vice-Presidents with overarching powers and coordination responsibilities over multiple DGs. The intention has been to ensure more synergies and policy coordination/monitoring between the different Commission DGs, which corresponds to the “better regulation strategy” adopted by the Commission (European Commission 2015). Certainly, the Commission is delegated rule making powers to the extent of which it has made several efforts to address mobility barriers (i.e., the upgrade of the European skills). In circumstances and under conditions in which they are defined by treaties, as a result, the Commission competence in migration field is firmly established. For the Commission’s implementing powers, successive amendments to the treaties have increased its powers just as other bodies of the EU. As noted in Chapter 3, the Lisbon Strategy introduced a guidance in line with delegated and implementing act for the Commission. According to Article 290 TFEU, delegated act allows the Commission to adopt the non-legislative secondary measures that would make it possible to reform the non-essential elements of a legislative act. More specifically, Article 291 TFEU defines the Commission’s implementing powers as ‘where uniform conditions for implementing legally binding Union acts are needed’. Although the Commission has taken advantage of a phrase article of Article 291 it has no direct implementation powers of migration legislation. It is often stressed that the details of legislation for implementation must be worked out carefully and cannot succeed in implementing migration policy without direct involvement of the Commission. For this, some factors such as size, competences, working patterns and cultures between the national administrations are taken into account. No implementation practices would be perfect if all member states do not provide some sort of assistance to the Commission. In collaboration with the member states, in

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January 2014, the Commission successfully implemented the social security systems in order to safeguard the EU migrant workers’ benefit entitlements. A claim for leadership offered by the Commission holds some true. It is generally recognized that Walter Hallstein (1958–1967), Roy Jepkins (1977–1981), Jaques Dollars (1985–1995) and Baroso (2004–2014) have been the most dynamic and forceful leadership in the Commission’s history. This is not to suggest that all their ideas and proposals were translated into practice, but it is to say that they were particularly helping to bring issues onto the policy agenda and pointing to what could, and perhaps should be done (Nugent 2010: 280).The ability of the Commissions, to have a real effect on the policy development is no more clearly illustrated than in the way the Barrosa Commission helped to force the pace on such key issues including growth, enlargement and governance. In a different sense, Romano Prodi, former President of the Commission underlined the thinking within the Commission at Tampere when at the Council’s meeting in Stockholm in March, he identified growing skills gap as a challenge facing the EU. The Union, he argued, urgently needs to ease restrictions on labour mobility, particularly in the technology sector, and to coordinate policies on labour migration where appropriate (Spencer 2003: 125). These capacities of the Commission give insight that it is a supranational body that acts as a leadership in the European affairs. Despite of these executive competences, and favourable circumstances, somewhat paradoxically, many opponents of European integration view in the academic literature is that autonomy of the Commission has been weakening in recent years (Kasim et al. 2013; Rasmussen 2003; Majone 2014; Nugent 2017). Understandably, the Commission itself has stressed its lack of autonomy from more democratically accountable institutions. In an internal accounting exercise in 1998, the Commission estimated that only 5–10% of legislative proposals arose spontaneously within itself. The rest was a response to international obligations (35%), amendments to or codification of existing law (25–30%), requests from other EU institutions, national governments, or interest groups (20%), or required by prior treaty (10%) (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 295). Nugent makes the following remarks: The Commission has lost some of its standing and influence on migration policy-making over the years. This has partly been because of the increasing

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practice of very important and political sensitive decisions of labour flows are been channel through the EP. It has partly also been because of an erosion of the Commission’s powers and independence within the decisionmaking process. Although the Commission and the EP have traditionally been allies in attempting to wrest powers away from the member states, the Commission has always vigorously resisted suggestions that the EP be given an equal right of legislative initiative. Secondly, the introduction of co-decision made it more difficult for the Commission to play the role of motor of integration because its proposals had to satisfy a larger numbers of actors. Thirdly, co-decision also left open the possibility of the Council and the EP agreeing entirely different legislative text from that put forward by the Commission. (Nugent 2010: 268)

Surely, this institutional setting puts the Commission in a weaker position in a single market programme. First of all, the economic crises promoted change by reinforcing bargaining over obligations of the member states and the new EU measures. Secondly, the European Council and the EP have become a powerful player in policy process. An important development is that the EU attracted actors interested in policy change in migration. Thirdly, concerns over the negative effects of migrant inflows to the labour market have triggered the use of nonlegislative policy instruments frequently. The increasing new agencies and bodies have inevitably reduced the formal powers of the Commission to a considerable extent. Concerning the supposed decline of the Commission, more direct constrains on the Commission stem from the Council and the EP. These three institutions compete for the power of initiative which has been increasingly turned out to be “a shared competence”. In this regard, the Council is not in a position to draft proposal itself. Although Article 192 gives the EP competence to do so, it cannot force the Commission to produce proposal. This can only be achieved by an absolute majority of its members. At the very least, here is, nonetheless, the Commission’s real power lies in. The bottom line is that theorization of the role of the Commission moved from the neo-functionalist view of it “motor of integration” to the intergovernmental view of it as no more than the servant of the member states. This balance of swung back after the launch of the single market programme in the mid-1980s (Bache and George 2006: 264). The enforcement of an open market for the corporate labour movement is charged with the leadership role for the Commission well beyond and

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above other actors. This has been successfully put in practice in policy proposals, giving the Commission a special position among the other institutions, due to concerns about its neutrality and non-partisanship. Taking into consideration how controversial them migration related issues are, it is still a question mark how far-reaching the Commission’s proposals will be, especially when the EU struggles with the migration crisis. Given that, a renewed impetus for promoting geographical mobility at EU level stems from its unique nature of the EU (Pillar 1/EC affairs). This tendency is both driven and then reinforced by the fact that the Commission holds a major role in DG Home and Migration. The Commission can act of its own accord in the area of DG Home and Migration. Most often the area of labour migration lacks legal competence to the extent of which the Commission’s proposals may not be backed up by the member states. Lastly, if a given balance, as defined by legislation of the Commission, is challenging the legitimacy of the EU via unaccountable institution, one should consider if this framework is functioning well. It is very well to claim that the Commission involves almost in all states of the policy process, since the treaties increased its role. This is particular relevant within the single market programme since 1986. For migration policy area or process, the Commission’s decreasing power is too often overstated. Focus is on the central legislative function of the Commission originating from the treaty based transfer of executive competences, which has increased its importance in parallel to the increasing use of co-decision procedure. This in itself makes the Commission as an autonomous actor, while the prevailing national interests matter.

The Council of Ministers: Limits on Individual Control A notable body of work has carried out by Scholars (see Bache and George 2006; Stephenson et al. 2010; Zimmermann 2005), who usually labelled the Council as a heart of EU decision-making. The Council represents the member states’ governments and is a central actor in the making and implementation of both legal and policy instruments in EU internal migration. Political action is concentrated within the Council. Its role lies in both a decision-maker and repository of EU legitimacy (Andersen et al. 2001: 26). Representing a preliminary mapping of the main EU institutions, the Council functions with competences over the internal

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(as well as external) dimension of the EU migration policies. Undoubtedly, the supranational power of the Council lies in its limitation of individual control concerning migration decision-making. The prevailing view in the academic literature is that the interests of the member states are protected through consensual decision-making. This is simply the Council consists of the national representatives who attend the ministerial meetings in different formations. This can restrain effective decision-making. Taken together, the Council is a multi-faced decisionmaking structure across a wide range of policy domain, with negotiations going on concurrently. In one guise or the Council is almost continually in session (Cini 2002: 150). Over time, as governments get used to take decisions on the migration issues at the EU level, it became clear that the individual governments can be outvoted over the broad areas of the EU competences. Most scholars agree that the most transparent blow to the individual sovereignty has come from the progressive extension of the QMV in the Council. One claim is that the treaty negotiators never intended unanimity to be the default rule for the Council. From the start, there were at least as many treaty provisions with majority rule as with unanimity. In fact, the proportion of rules stipulating unanimity in the Council has steadily declined from 49% under the Treaty of Rome (1958–1987), to 35% under the Maastricht Treaty (1993–1999), with a slight increase to almost 37% under the Amsterdam Treaty (from 1999) (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 296). Gradually, consensus has emerged. Governments would have to accept the QMV for the single market to be created. Otherwise other individual measures would be vetoed by government of the state that stood to be most adversely affected. This implied, though, that national parliaments would no longer be able to a proposed measure by instructing their government representative to veto it in the Council (Bache and George 2006: 301). This institutional retreat forms a basic theoretical foundation of intergovernmentalist approaches national actors in the Council act collectively, and many developed a shared sense of responsibility that the work of the Council should move forward and the legislative output of the Council should be a success. As a chamber of continuous negotiation across a wide range of issues, national actors often develop long-term relations

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of trust, mutual understanding, and obligations to try and help out colleagues with domestic political difficulties or request for special consideration (Cini 2002: 151). The notion of collective government control predominantly restricts the independent action of the member states. The outcome of EU decision-making is to large extend determined by the constellation of actors who asserts their national positions in the Council at any given moment. Very often, the “fit” between newly proposed legislation and existing national arrangements is crucial in determining the position of individual member states (Stephenson et al. 2010: 170). An indication of the Council’s legislative role is seen in the migration legislation. The introduction of policy coordination mainly means a collective EU regime pointing to a mechanism of transition from nationally rooted policy-making. For example, the Commission has promoted increasingly systematic consultations on the labour migration issues. In response, the Council has passed the legislative acts upon the Commission’s proposals. Several implementation packages under the Agenda on Migration have already been adopted, when the Commission presented the European Agenda on Migration. Directive 2016/801/EU on the conditions of entry and residence of the third-country nationals is of kind. Intra-institutional cooperation is the legacy of the SEA to assign explicit powers to the EU regarding labour migration issues. Much of the enhanced role of the Council has been focusing on maintaining most room for the independent manoeuvreu. As such, the treaty framework makes it necessary for the Council to work with other institutional actors. The extent and significance of the Council’s legislative power is “above” and “beyond” powers of other actors. In actual decision-making it is expected to take a lead. Although the Council’s role is crucial for the migration policy process, the credibility of the Council much owes to the power-sharing authority with other institutions. As set in the Lisbon Treaty, the Council’s role as an inter-governmental forum remains in the EU system in contrast with the background of the institutional strengthening of the Commission and the ECJ. An efficient policy-making is closely associated with the Commission and the EP, although a variation occurs between the policy areas and the type of the decisions-making. As a main legislative body, the Council pays particular attention to the European Commission to the extent of which the Commission is in charge with elaborating the European Migration Agenda and expected to bring changes to the rationale driving. As noted above, the Council processes formal legitimacy, which is reflected on its

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superiority depending on the Commission proposals. The Council ultimately derives its formal legitimacy from TFEU, which explicitly touches upon the dispossession of the policy- initiation role. Article 241 states: ‘the Council acting by a simple majority may request the Commission to undertake any studies the Council considers desirable for the attainment of the Common objectives’. In practice, this means that the constrained initiation power has come with the discretion of the Commission, which has not generally involved much questioning of the objectives of labour mobility across the EU. In this effort, the role of the European Council is praised for setting the strategic priorities. A complex coordination machinery has been built up in which case the European Council and the Council of Ministers has reinforced this coordination in a strong response to migratory pressure. This paradox cooperation towards a better managed migration policy enables the Council to set up lines of action and provides mandates for negotiations with the third countries. These competences work well, when the European agenda on migration is managed effectively. That said, some weaknesses of the European Council are identified, as its limitation on agenda setting that is due to the fact that it does not meet regularly and is unable to provide the Commission with specific policy proposal. Although the Council continues the core of the EU’s legislative process, its sole power has shifted, as some of the decision- making procedure is handed out to the EP under the co-decision procedure. Its relations with the EP have even become more acute. As a directly elected legislator, the EP influences the legislative outcomes. It can even veto the Council legislative proposal, which may be politically damaging. Indeed, there appear to be sharp trade-offs between the EP and the Council. The EP has now more equal status with the Council in some policy areas. Prior to the Maastricht Treaty, the Council had to consult the EP before adopting legislation. The proposal by the EP to amend legislation was not binding. Especially, budgetary legislation has an unprecedented effect of creating different ties, despite the EP has key role in deciding budget. It is reasonable to claim that the decision rules are ambiguous. It is difficult to find ways to resolve the issues. This is because of the loss of control by the national parliaments that has caused a controversy across the Union. Such reasoning reflects a more general remarks about the nature

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of the Council’s involvement in policy making: in areas where mass matters such as shaping and driving the internalisation of EU migration policy. However, whatever the level of intensity of Council’s involvement in this process, its competences are limited. The Council faces accountability challenges encountered in this decision-making process, when the national governments pursue and prioritize the labour migration-related issues. In spite of this, the Council remains a main legislator in policy mechanism, since a large majority decisions are made under the QMV rules. The functional differentiation of migration policy exists, when its own internal constellation of priorities, input and recipients of its output. Within this logic, resistance by the domestic actors inhibits to develop coherent and properly—ordered policy development, when they hold an upper hand, as in the treaty reform. Over time, regulation of migration policy has become indispensable thereby. On the other hand, a challenge for any national government showing stronger interest to gain maximum benefits from the migration deal may suggest that no single actor is in a position to control the whole process, regardless of consensual and compromiseoriented nature of the EU decision-making.

Executive Oversight Role of the European Parliament In the cases of crossroads, labour mobility requires more than a certain volume of facilitating legislation for passing. The seeds of the geographical mobility as part of the process were inherited in the structure of the single market, which called for abolition of barriers across the member states, despite wide-ranging labour market rigidities stand on the way for mobility. It creates not only intangible burdens upon the Commission and the Council, but the EP as a supranational body. The EP’s policy position is attributed to the fact that it is only directly elected institution. Like most national parliaments, the EP has oversight responsibilities. Therefore, it is expected that the EP’s institutional efficiency will make a real difference in outstanding obstacles to labour migration. One core assumption of the legislative influence of the EP is made by Ritterberger (2003) is that it is effective co-legislator with the Council. The effective influence of the EP is due to the introduction of first the co-operation procedure and then the co-decision procedure (now called

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“ordinary”). The crucial breakthrough was the introduction of the cooperation procedure in the SEA. This was insisted upon by the governments those states—especially Germany and Italy—that were more convinced by the federalist arguments and the argument about widening the democratic deficit (Ritterberger 2003: 220). In the first place, the aim was to make the EP fit well into a supranational account of the European integration. Assuming that strengthened role would help to put into practice the newly established principles of freedoms (i.e., labour), as a result. Perhaps, the key point is that it should be assumed that the EP has gained significant powers over the migration legislation can always enhance its role and influence. In incrementalist manner, its institutional position has obviously been enhanced since 1980s and 1990s. In regard to the decision-making capacity, the Maastricht Treaty created a new procedure co-decision. This pace of change was viewed as a significant advancement to the previous arrangements. The success of this institutional change is such that is attracting considerable interests because of a joint act of the EP and the Council in which the co-decision laws were pronounced. Time is precious for the political decision because of the labour market barriers, which are expected to generate dynamism for success, implying that the acts of the Council alone does not provide a strong policy position on the labour mobility issues. Notwithstanding power and influence of the EP on migration, the dominant trend has been towards a greater involvement in establishing and improving the internal market. This is due to the greatest and the most recent advancement in the area of law-making, given its limited role prior to the Single European Act. At that time, the EP was not in a position to take into account all employment-related topics to be among the EU’s main priorities under the consultation procedure, whereby its opinion could not put pressure on both the Commission or Council to become responsive to this opinion, with the exception of delaying tactics. The cooperation procedure as part of the single market was introduced to allow the EP to propose amendments or issue a veto for the migration legislation. It led to the presumption that the EP would enjoy a personality which could provide coordinated efforts among the institutional actors and the member states to advance the free movement principles, as one of the objectives of the completed internal markets. The legal reality borne out overwhelmingly by the fact that the right to propose amendments gives the EP a dynamic role could only be overturned by the unanimous Council, otherwise accepted by a QMV. What

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is crucial to find out is that whether the EP’s willingness to use the power granted it for fundamental reforms. That said, empowerment of an autonomous and directly elected Parliament is expected to remove the present labour migration problems, it is thus called for the higher level of responsibility in migration decision-making. On 29 May 2018, the EP passed a law on foreign temporary workers requiring firms to comply with local standards, when they post workers temporarily to another EU member states. The revised rules adopted by the EP meant that posted workers would be entitled to the same level of pay, as their local counterparts. In member states (most notably France, the UK and Germany), there have been complaints of unfair competition from the cheaper eastern European labour, said to undercut locals. In this respect, the Brexit lobby should especially be highlight to the extent of which the Brexit campaigners argued that EU freedom of movement was undermining British workers in sectors, such as construction and food processing, with some firms cutting costs by importing workers from the newer EU states, such as Poland and Romania (BBC News 2018). Regardless of the Brexit campaigners, this piece of legislation is a source of supranational attempt for accounts that conceived authority is delegated or pooled by the member states. What seems to be a big turnover after the treaty revisions that gave a stronger hand to the EP in formal legislation. Still, it is hard to maintain the view as supranational nature of the EP, as the intergovernmental deliberations is increasingly typical of the migration policy process. Quite frankly, the EP’s influence on migration crisis is limited. Its assistance has not become indispensable during the crisis. This is for usual fact that the EP has been excluded from the decisionmaking process on the crises. The effect of this limitation could be seen in the passing 15 resolutions for Syrian crisis from 2011 to 2015. Far from seeking to play a high profile in labour mobility process, its primary concerned was to provide advisory resolutions. At that time, a very different view was taken of the EP to exert an influence on the idea of political dialogue between decision-makers, (i.e., the European Council President) during the crisis. It is therefore no surprising that its representation is looked upon as a more ambitious and holistic sense by many researcher alike. Admittedly, the EP has taken for granted Nice and Lisbon Treaties that have upgraded the migration policy areas from the consultation and cooperation procedure to co-decision or ordinary procedure for the legislative proposal. A significant number of proposal has fallen under the ordinary

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procedure. Given that, the EP is commonly perceived to have been institutional “winner” of the Lisbon Treaty. This is because the remit of the co-decision legislative procedure (the procedure under which the Parliament has co-equal powers with the Council) was greatly extended in scope. However, the new powers it was assigned in the Treaty did not extend to the EP being given a seat at the intergovernmental deliberations that were to become so much a part of the EU’s attempts to deal with the crisis and did not extend either to it being given formal powers over the various intergovernmental agreements that were contracted in respond to the crisis (Nugent 2006: 175). It is also worth noting that neither the EP’s power is required nor any significant role is assigned to it with respect to the new treaties. Notwithstanding, it is important to highlight the executive branch to oversee other institutions via the increased role of the EP should not be underestimated. Indeed, the EP has often sought to maximize its influence on the migration legislation. As regards social security coordination, for instance, in its January 2014 resolution on social protection for all, the EP called on the Commission to review the legislation and monitor the implementation and coordination of social security systems in order to safeguard EU migrant workers’ benefit entitlements (Kraatz 2018). Better still, concerning cooperation with the third countries in the GAMM framework, the EP stressed that it should be focused on tackling the root causes and illegal migrant flows to Europe via existing policy instruments, such as regional and bilateral dialogue, mobility partnership and readmission agreements, among others (Latek 2016: 7). The EP is especially popular for easing challenges to the Schengen area that has constituted integration paradox. While being a favourite target, the principle resistance towards a further transfer of formal decision-making competences to supranational level is strongly shared between the EP and the member states. Under the treaties, the Schengen-related measures are subject to parliamentary (as well as judicial) scrutiny and part of the acquis to be adopted by candidate countries (Gatto 2016). Then, it seems forced to conceive the EP to be keen to advance the EU’s interest in abroad, since its proactivism is observable, especially in relocation and resettlement of the irregular migrants. Most of the requests for international protection have been fell on the EP position. Beyond its legislative tasks, the EP acknowledges the need to strengthen the link

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between migration and development policies, as exemplified in its resolution of 7 June 2016 on the EU report on the policy coherence for development. It points out that the development policy objectives to eradicate poverty would be better integrated into a new EU migration policy, including economic, political and social development-focused actions that would help to address the root causes of the current crisis. In particularly, the external dimension of the EU migration policy is extensively addressed in the EP resolution of 6 July 2016 on the preparation of the post-electoral revision of the 2014–2020 Multiannual Financial Framework. To be fair, the EP clearly assumed an increased role in the external management of migration. At the generality of end of its external role, the EP has, moreover, reaffirmed the need for the EU to adopt a long-term strategy to deal with push factors in the third countries, such as conflict, persecution, ethnic cleansing, extreme poverty, and climate change. The EP has emphasised that the main goal of development policy, as stated in Article 208 TFEU, must remain reduction and eradication of poverty. The same line—making sure that no development money is diverted to support security or for other purposes—previously prevailed during the vote on the discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the EU for the financial year 2014, when the proposal to devote 25% of the European Development Fund for 2014–2020 to measures to combat the migration crisis was rejected. On the human rights front, the EP called upon the EU and the member states to scale up resources for a capacity-building in countries of origin. The Foreign Affairs Committee report on human rights and migration in the third countries, voted in the committee on 12 July 2016, called for the member states to fulfil their engagement to earmark 0.7% of gross national income to development aid, and stressed that aid should not be conditional on cooperation with regard to migration. The report urged the EU and the member states to ensure efficient and effective Policy Coherence for Development (PCD) and to prioritise the respect of human rights in their migration policy. It is estimated that improvements in the coherence of the GAMM, and more rigorous integration of human rights monitoring and oversight mechanisms in all external agreements, is necessary. The Foreign Affairs Committee and the Development Committee are working on a joint report on the role of EU external action in addressing refugee and migrant movements (Latek 2016: 7). The committee system of the EP certainly allows the MEPs

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to develop specialized knowledge of their committees’ policy areas. However, this specialization is unlikely to eradicate the information asymmetry between the MEPs and the implementers concerning the more technical aspects of the legislative proposals under consideration (Thomson 2011: 229). Even if the EP has a strong hand in external migration policy process, some commentators, have claim that the “executive oversight” role of the EP, again, appears to be limited (see Cini 2002; Bache and George 2006; Nugent 2010), while having clear idea of its greatly increased migration activities at any given time. First and most obvious weakness is that the EP does not have full legislative power. Although there are generally a genuine legislative influence, the EP’s positions vary considerable among different legislative proposals and controversial issues, even after the expansion of co-decision procedure. Unlike national parliaments, it does not have the final say over what is and what is not to become law. The second weakness is that although the EP usually attempts to deliver opinions as soon as possible to ensure they are available to the Council at an early stage of its deliberations, it is not unusual—although more so than it used to be—for the Council, before the opinion of the EP has been delivered, to take preliminary decisions or to adopt common positions in principle or pending the opinion of the EP. The third weakness is that the EP does not have full powers over the Commission legislation, though numerically Commission legislation makes up most of EU legislation (Nugent 2010: 183).That notwithstanding, the EP is not always fully and comprehensively involved in policy process, when it comes to the agenda-setting and setting of priorities in legislative text, and its role continues to be mainly ad hoc. The principle reason for this is that in most national chambers, parliamentarians are bound by strong ties of party loyalty to support or oppose government. In the EP, there is no clear government to either support or oppose, while part loyalties are also more diffuse. It is thus less surprising than it may initially appear that those who have attempted to compare the EP’s policy-shaping influence with that of national chambers conclude that the EP ranks higher in this regard than many, if not most, of its national counterparts (Cini 2002: 171). Whereas the democratic deficit argument implies that the loss of control by the national parliaments should be made up by an increase in the role of the EP (Bache and George 2006: 301).

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That is, the point of the EU is to facilitate integration process. Because the EU is designed to promote the supranational features, its rules and institutions have favoured labour exchange. Increasing powers of the national government do not take the supranational governance for granted. But such governance endures equal share of voting weight, implying net contributor by the EP to the decision-making mechanism in the Council. Doubtless, the EP is not proactive and does not use its potential legislative power, as many would like to be. It may not be as influential as it could be, despite on its strengthen role at the expense of other institutions.

The European Court of Justice’s Political Power As was noted in the Chapter 3, the EEC recognised at the time of agreement that freedom of movement was a cornerstone of the four freedoms in order to build a common market. The Treaty of Rome made provision for allowing the European citizens to move freely. Regulation 1612/68 of 15 October 1968 on freedom of movement for (employed) workers within the Community was created to serve this purpose. Since then, there has been an outcry pointing to the limitation of freedom of movement for workers and self-employed workers. To overcome this, the scope of these freedoms has been extended by the jurisprudence of the ECJ over years. The ECJ stepped into multiple vacuums, when it launched its legal revolution of the 1960s. The EC was faltering as the deadlines inscribed in the Treaty of Roma passed with little progress made towards building common market. In 1962 the ECJ declared direct effect of European Law in national courts (Van Grend en Loos, 1962). In 1964 the ECJ declared the supremacy of European law over conflicting national law (Costa v. ENEL, 1964), and 1977 the ECJ demanded that national judges sets aside any national rules that conflicted with EC law (Simmenthal II. ECJ 1978). The ECJ then worked to build support for its vision of the Treaty of Rome as a constitution for Europe (Alter and Kelemen 2016: 84).In the EU, policy competence has been consolidated and protracted by these Court judgements. At the same time, the secondary EU legislation (directives and regulations) increasingly constitute specific EU treaty framework for the free movement rights. The ECJ has played a key role in widening the scope of free movement by placing emphasis on the free movement

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of persons, especially workers, although it has marginal role in policy process. Its task mainly involves in managing budget and cohesion policy that is considerable. In reality, the reference point rarely captures the full implication of disagreement outcome for the free movement rights utilised in the EU. In order to avoid implications of failure, a number of permanent derogations to the general principle of non-discrimination on grounds of nationality are in operation. Failure to resolve controversy by adopting the legislative proposal by the Commission that gives rise to mean that the Court has to develop a number of guiding principles to counter an abusive reliance on the exceptions by the national authorities. The 1986 Nouvelles Frontieres case concerning de-regulating air transport provides significance evidence in support of its policy competence for pressurizing or forcing the Commission and the Council to act. In the early development of the EC, the treaty provisions were interpreted by the Court as being directly effective. The nationals of the member state were expected to be treated equally and any forms of discrimination were set to be eliminated. All actors (the member states) were subject to judicial constrained and their obligations under the founding treaties not to discriminate against workers from other member states. This is by all means of the obstacles—that were embedded in the EU. In this early stage, the technical aspects of market integration was less popular, which dominated the ECJ’s rulings. When the EC was largely concerned with trade regulation, particular decision of the Court may have been noticed by few people, outside those connected with specialized commercial interests. The Court has expanded its reach along with the EU. In recent years, for example, the Court has invoked citizenship guarantees in the Lisbon Treaty to make ruling on how the EU member states deal with migrants and what welfare benefits they can receive. These rulings have provoked great controversy in the UK and were an important topic in the campaign prior to the June 2016 referendum on British EU membership (Rabkin 2016: 95). Of course, the Court has gone beyond what the national governments were expecting, extending its ruling into politically charged policy areas. Other areas, such as the fundamental rights and the education policy have fallen within the jurisdiction of the Court. The biggest beneficiary of the ECJ’s approach to the labour market issues has been the EU citizens. The legislation of national parliaments can be overthrown by citizens’ right of access to the ECJ thereby reducing control of citizens by governments. Issues arising in these ways often cut

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across traditions of party politics in member states and even render them irrelevant, which leads to a sense of frustration and dissatisfaction. These remarks might be read in the press of most countries at some time or other, as they relate to many issues in the everyday life of ordinary citizens throughout the Union (Williams 2007: 34). As a matter of fact, there is significant evidence in support of the “EU citizens’ Directive”, as the source of the main legal rules on this issue. Seeing solution to the complexity of residence rights, Directive 2004/38 embarked on the “categories” of people who have right to reside in a host member state for longer than three months. They were included essentially, workers/self-employed and their family members, and students who must have health insurance and make a declaration of sufficient resources. The Dano case provides a reference point to the extent of which not everyone, who resides in a member state have a right to claim benefits. This right can be restricted within the context of applicable special circumstances of the member states that are entitled to set eligibility conditions. A right to reside only applies to the EU nationals and economically inactive EU nationals, who are entitled to claim benefits. Obviously, discretion over the arrangement of their welfare systems belong to the member states. Somewhat surprisingly, the Court rulings on cases of kind are proved controversial. On controversial matters, as such eligibility for welfare benefits of those with an EU law-based right to reside, the ECJ has concluded that right to equal treatment is preserved by the member states. Given the policy area in which legislative activity is most intense, the EU nationals must be qualified one of given categories in Directive 2004/38 included workers, family members of workers self-sufficient or students with the declaration of self-sufficiency during their stays in a host member state. Following the Court rulings, it is now straightforward that only limited rights for jobseekers,—who are not entitled to claim social assistance—are provided by the EU. Such a right is not inclusive for persons, who move solely to claim benefits. In a similar case of Alimanovic and Garcia Nieto, the ECJ made it explicit that the EU nationals are entitlement to the social security benefits during their first three months of residence in another member state. In order to reinforce their integration to the labour market smoothly for the economically active people, the court stated that the main aim of the benefit for jobseekers, who were entitled to claim benefits, was preservation of dignity. The situation would have been different if the Court

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had not extended the exclusion to full social security benefits for economically inactive EU nationals. For the eligibility condition for right to reside, the EU nationals must be self-sufficient in financial terms. These workers must show clearly that their work is genuine and effective. Although there is evidence that the ECJ has been instrumental in advancing labour market integration via its rulings on the individual cases, a question has arisen as to whether the supranational debate holds a reality. Reviewing further role of the ECJ, it is an agent of the member states or an autonomous actor in its own right, there is little doubt that the judgements of the Court have gone beyond what the governments of the member states were expecting. The radical jurisprudence of the Court may represent the logical consequences of the actions of the member states, but it is not a logic that is thought through by their governments, nor is it always welcome to them. In this sense, the Court has proved itself to be an autonomous actor in the process of European integration. From the intergovernmentalist point of view, the member states can rescind those powers that they have given to the Court; but this is not easy, because without an independent authoritative interpreter of the law, all the rules put in place by the treaties and by the EC secondary legislation would be subject to different interpretation by different parties. There has to be an authoritative source of interpretation, and it has to be unquestionably independent (Bache and George 2006: 330). Above all, for the sake of desirable feature of labour market is to be created, objective and independent interpretation of the EU law is key to this. The challenge of the Court is that some of these limitations have been made definitive. The confusion was compounded by the fact that the Court’s role varied not only over time, but also according to law it interpret and make it. The Court possesses judicial activism, which is reflected in the superiority of EU law. This applies in the interpretation, application and adjudication of laws constitutes a central element of the supranational character of the EU. This has necessarily involved the member states in surrendering some their sovereignty, since they are obligate to summit to a legal system over which they have only partial control. In consequence of this, the government of the member states are sometimes obligated to apply laws they do not want and are occasionally prevented from introducing laws they desire (Nugent 2010: 225). In line with Nugent’s argument, the nature of migration governance in Europe has shifted significantly, with comparison to the early years

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of the Community established. Lack of agreement between the member states may lead to an expanded role of the ECJ. The extensive judicial activism it has secured, the Court is still widely viewed as being quite protector of the rights of individuals. Whenever a difficult political problem arises, it is wise to turn to history for clues as solution by the Court. Of course, some of disagreements concerned controversies about the right of migrant workers. The national governments generally favour to coordinate certain aspect of social security system. When controversies arise about level of entitlements, the Court’s positions are directed towards harmonization through a number of judgments some of which given above. The tendency is that the member states hold different view about the desirable level of the Court activity and do not certainly anticipate the provisions of certain law procedures in the Council. While political progress towards achieving a uniform policy is very much frustrated, there is no denying that is a uniquely successful experiment in passing new legislation. The ECJ makes binding decision on the policy field over the treaty provisions and secondary legislation in which accounts for 40% of the EU new legislation. A continuing barrier to progress is more or less achieved. In practice, this implies a heavy reliance on the national courts, when the EU law-making has stretched out ever more sensitive field of free movement of labour. There has been a greater resistance from some national courts, government, as well as citizens to the Court rulings. But notwithstanding, the Court has enjoyed the types of legitimacy, which comes from relationships of support within the national legal communities, in this case no doubt governments. Since introduction of the single European market, the national economies have actively engaged in passing laws that are subject to judicial review of the European level rules. These combined a burning ambition that the Court should play an extremely important role in establishing the EU’s legal order, with the judicial activism of private litigants bringing cases to both national courts and the ECJ. The main delicate of this approach is balance individual rights, states’ rights and the European integration, which have seen as a reinforcement of the national and the European level of laws. A balance is reached whereby the European leaders should satisfy all member states alike. Based solely on this reason, currently, it seems a long road towards the Court’s creation of a legal and constitutional balance.

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Intergovernmental Governance: Limits on Individual National Government Control As for state-centric argument, legislative powers of the national governments in the decision-making mechanism has gained more weight in recent years. The basic assumption is that the national governments shape the migration policies in accordance with their needs, demands and preferences. This viewpoint suggest that the European collaboration has come an end, while the Commission’s and the ECJ’s role is redefined in due course. One of the noteworthy features of decision-making is thus the member states and the Commission on the JHA policy in general and on the labour migration in particular. They take distinctive policy positions on these types of controversial issues. What they all share the view is that they are primarily concerned with the retaining human rights standards and have been proactive on the question of integrating youth immigrants in the European labour markets. At the same time, it is hard to ignore constantly growing activism at the top-level of member states’ involvement in the migration policymaking and, thus their dominance in the EU in general. The root of the vertical separation of powers lies in tensions between the member state sovereignty and the incremental involvement of the EU in areas of migration policy. The 1957 Treaty of Roma dedicated its signatories to the eradication of a common market with different level of decision making. Over time, the principle of subsidiary was created by the Maastricht Treaty to regulate the exercise of competence and the detailed description of allocation of competences between the EU and the member states. Functional differentiation seems to cause tensions inherent in the fluidity of the multilevel system. Building single and integrated market is defined by the shared policy activity allows freedom of movement for European workers. All member states have been linked to each other in the labour migration pattern for the policy development. Having an internal migration policy, engaging collective action and pooling of financial resources in this area are claimed to be beneficial preferences. In particularly, the new member states sought emissions allowances by acting together, while acknowledging the principle perceived advantages are being lost of national sovereignty and limitations placed on the national room for the policy manoeuvre. Other domain of the curtailing EU’s migration management—normally is assigned to the core of signal market governance—and

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is thus subject to willingness of the member state to delegating making of proposals to the Commission. This manner is a neutral arbiter between the conflicting national interests. The argument here is that legislative proposal is unlikely to be vetoed, delayed or refused and so that the cost of decision making mechanism is avoidable. In the first place, the EU as a policy system is a highly unusual and transnational polity. It has grown dramatically in size since 2004, from 15 to 28 countries, with more waiting to join. More member states mean more languages, more cultural diversity and more socio economic differentiation (Dinan 2017: 37). Same is true for the increasing policy scope. The original common market has developed into an integrated economic area, while states have lost some of their former authoritative control of the traditional policies in their respective territories. A question arises as to how far the supranational institutions function independent of influence of the member states. The ability of the member states to act effectively is largely dependent on their resources at hand. In fact, there seems little to prevent the member states from complete controlling the migration process. While divergences had been marked during the early phase of the introduction of European single market, the intergoverntalist view of the Commission as an agend of the member states is to hold, the member states are reasserting themselves by repatriating powers to the national level. Beyond the stable core of the common market policy dealing with free movement, the story of the last few years has actually been a steady increase in the scope of policy competences of the member states. While struggling with the migration crisis, it became difficult for the national governments to find agreement on the free movement of cooperation with each other. Perhaps the most recent example of incompetencies to the intergovernmental level is the Italian government upended years of Italian policy toward migrants by refusing them entry in June 2018. This has created a severe backlash for the free movement zone could collapse completely, when the entire Schengen zone is “at risk”, as Angele Merkel admitted (Express 2018). In a large part of the EU—called the Schengen area—people are able to move freely without internal border controls, but flow of migrants has caused some EU countries to reintroduce temporary checks at their borders with other Schengen states (European Commission 2017: 7). In addition to this, this legal measure is based on Article 26 of the Schengen Borders Code that enables the member states to keep temporary border

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controls in place for a maximum of two years. Where there is no compromise on the particular aspect of migration, it is inconvenient for the member states to delegate some control over the issue concerning the Commission. Some member states (most notably Germany and Austria) imposed the temporary border controls. As the situation deteriorated, the member states proposed the Commission to prepare legal and practical basis for the continuance of temporary border measures in line with Article 26. Complementing the EU’s socio-economic policy suggests that the member states have intensified cooperation in the field of JHA. However, the JHA’s importance in practical terms has been declined in two ways. First, the member states are reluctant to get involve in law making or do not comply with the policy framework in general. In particularly, the policy coordination in the labour migration sphere is difficult to achieve and binding decisions are left to the member states own devices. Secondly, in the event of enlargement, needs, demands and interests and changing circumstances of the member states have increased to the extent of which the policy process has become far more rigid. The member states’ position can be explained by the mutual dependence in economic terms. Particularly, type of strategic issues such as employment pushes them to get closer and they see employment a matter for the Union as a whole, as well as a matter for the individual national policies. It may then be argued that the member states are reluctance to make judgement about the potential long- term policy coordination due to politically sensitive migration issues. This is despite of economic benefits for collective bargaining and coordination. That’s why, most member states are unwilling to participate in policy development for this case of domestic interests and policy position. The member states’ position in JHA issues reflect “differentiated integration”, has become increasingly important in the post-enlargement period. However, differentiation is not permissible in all policy areas, and generally does not apply in areas directly related to the operation of internal market (though there are differences between the member states regarding precise what these areas are), but it does allow “fast stream” states to develop integration and policies in some areas where there would be little development at all if member states were to be obligated to participate (Nugent 2006: 177). Under these circumstances, it is sensible to claim that the effect of migration legislation cannot be understood without paying systematic

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attention to the role of member states in uploading domestic preferences to the European level. The outcome of EU decision-making is to large extend determined by the constellation of actors, who asserts their national positions in the Council at any given moment. Very often, the “fit” between newly proposed legislation and existing national arrangements is crucial in determining the position of individual member states (Stephenson et al. 2010: 170). As the EU is confronted with the dilemma because high volume of regular and irregular migration, the term acting together is particular relevant for the current migration crises. Since the height of the migration crisis in 2015, the EU has implemented measures to better control external borders and migration flows. As a result, irregular arrivals to the EU have been reduced by more than 90%. The EU and its member states are intensifying efforts to establish an effective, humanitarian and safe European migration policy (European Council 2019: 2). While these priorities are addressed some of the institutional weakness, they did substantially increased coordinated effort in tackling the current migration crises to the certain extent. Given the decision-making process of the EU—when it is laid out in detail—is very complex because of the numerous links that exist in the system, it might be said that it is the very existence of some of the international links in the system that gives rise to political tension in the domestic policies of member states. Such links may tend to break the sovereignty of the parliaments of member states. Parliaments have found a weakening of their control over Ministers, when decisions are taken in the Council (Williams 2007: 30). If the EP may claim direct legitimacy from the people of the EU, the Council represents its people indirectly through the member state parliaments and national governments (Andersen et al. 2001: 26). Concern on weakening decision-making is directed at various positional differences that exist between the member states. Such differences give rise to tensions and contesting of legitimacy, as the growth of policy differences between the member states cannot be eliminated. In his analysis of role of the member states in decision-making process by Nugent (2006) offers three adjustments as a respond to the EU crisis in general. The first of these has been increased availability and use of the QMV in the Council. The second adjustment has been the increased use of nonlegislative instruments to make policy progress. Because such instruments are not legally enforceable, states with reservations are more likely to

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accept them. And the third adjustment has been the increased use of differentiation, which has resulted in not all member states participating, or fully participating, in all of the EU‘s policy activities (Nugent 2010:177). Undoubtedly, Nugent’s description provides solution to the complexity of migration policy-process, in particularly policy involvement of the member states, a robust for the proceeding integration in general—on the fragmented manner of membership basis. In fact, the three adjustments have been used to manage or guide the current migration crises. The expectation of speed up a change of attitude towards the decision-making in the Council has been high. Instead of erecting fences around the member states‘ powers, they now sought to blur the boundaries between them by resorting the QMV for the passage of legislation. It is hoped to encourage the emergency of a “common migration policy” combining regular input from all. Relatively, harmonization process is key to smooth out the whole process. Differences among the member states in terms of formal voting power are obviously cannot be removed. The Council has the ultimate influence on the outcomes. It’s the QMV rules is the voting weight of the member states reflection of protecting their interests, whenever labour flows is risky for their labour markets (Stephenson et al. 2010: 160). Current policy changes, outlined above gives insight that depth and the political incentives of differences between the member states can be eliminated by the use of three forms of adjustments outlined above, given the decision-making process is extremely difficult, lengthy and inefficient within the context of their outcomes.

Conclusion As claimed by the intergovernmentalists, the Commission is a servant of the member states for the migration policy-making. The view that institutions are important for decision-making suggests that the agenda setting powers are retained by the Commission. This is despite the fact that its intergovernmental nature stems from its role as broker under the cooperation procedure. Centrally, the Commission is involved in the labour migration policy process at all levels and on all fronts. This is partly because of an array of power resources and policy instruments continue to remain at its disposal. Its position is even strengthened by unwillingness or inability of other EU institutions to provide clear leadership. The Commission is empowered to make migration decision on its own, it is

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at the very heart of the EU system. Any claims that the powers of the Commission as an independent entity is eroded will inevitably come up against changes, which were created by the Lisbon Treaty. A right to initiate is largely inclusive, giving other actors, (notably the European Council) to embark on policy with the Commission. The legitimacy of the European integration process relies on well operation of the EU policies in which the Commission takes the lead. What is unique about delegating role of the Commission is that it is given a formal power to set the agenda. But nonetheless, its proposals and its decision exhibit a mixture of intergovernmentalism and supranationalism space, which the JHA currently inhabits. The legislative role of the Council is increasingly shared with the EP. This role derives from the co-decision which became the norm in the EC pillar. The principle role that the Council plays is to take policy and legislative decisions. Although it can be, and has been, argued fiercely that the preferences of governmental actors are dominant and often determinant factors in migration decisions. For this reason alone, only a starting point for any analysis takes into account the diversity of occasions and contexts of the national governments. The supposed declined of Council does not preclude it from taking part in current labour migration problems, instead it has involved in encouraging mobility by the QMV, so far. When looking critically at the European migration policy and actors delivering the EU’s external dimension, it is important to assess the role of the EP involved in shaping and delivering migration policy, its relations with other institutions. The true is, the primary sources of democratic accountability, as well as supranational body in Europe are directly elected and representative institution, as in the case of the EP. Increasing diversity among the national governments and successful amendments to the treaties that have increased powers of the EP has consequently acted at the expense of the Commission. Even if subsequent treaties have increased the influence of the EP on the migration issues, a weak position is attributed to it in comparison to many national parliaments. Arguably more importantly, point is that the EP evinces substantially more willingness to its powers than do most national legislatures. Its weak influence makes it ineffective in migration policy process, despite of the treaty revisions. Overall, its influence is at the best intergovernmental deliberation behavior and low profile. This wisdom of approach is not contented by the EP itself.

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The ECJ is also considered as key player, even if it does not directly take part in this process. Since the principle of free movement of labour within the EC was initially introduced by the Treaty of Rome, migration policy has been embodied very high level of interest, with the objective of enhancing the European integration generally. This was not political feasible at the time because of the polarized geographical socio-economic conditions and the member states’ positions reflected difficulty of pursuing radical policy. To easy this complexity, the ECJ has intensified the scope of free movement by including the free movement of persons for its legislative act. Undoubtedly, ruling on some cases are proved controversial, while admitting that the national governments and other EU political bodies are equally responsible for its judicial activism. A key set of priorities in the JHA has been reinforced labour mobility across the member states as part of the process in building the single market. The policy analysis of EU decision-making means constructing political process, often characterized by the member states’ positions and interests, which still matter in the decision-making process of this policy domain. Beyond the national governments, it is therefore essential to highlight the entrepreneurial activity of the institutions concerning their commitments of free movement of labour. For example, the Commission illustrates an important component of the causal pattern. The fundamental disagreement about the nature of the Commission whether it is an agent of the member states effectively commit themselves to pursue their national interests. In migration policy area, bargaining should precede attempts to meet demands and needs in different member states and the third countries in partnership framework.

References Alter, K. J., & Kelemen, R. D. (2016). Understanding the European court’s political power. In H. Zimmermann & A. Dür (Eds.), The key controversies in European integration. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Andersen, S. S., Eliassen, K. A., & Sitter, N. (2001). Formal process: EU institutions and actors. In S. S. Andersen & K. A. Eliassen (Eds.), Policy-making in the EU (pp. 20–41). Sage. Bache, I., & George, S. (2006). Politics in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. BBC News. (2018, May 29). EU tightens law on foreign temporary workers. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44293265. Cini, M. (2002). European Union politics. Oxford University Press.

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Dinan, D. (2017). Crisis in EU history. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), The European Union in crisis (pp. 16–33). The European Union Serious. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. European Commission. (2015). Better regulation for better results—An EU agenda (COM(2015) 215). Brussels. https://ec.europa.eu/smartregulation/better_regulation/documents/com_2015_215_en.pdf. European Commission. (2017, July). The EU and migration crisis, the EU and collection. http://publications.europa.eu/webpub/com/factsheets/ migration-crisis/en/. European Council. (2019). The EU migration policy. https://www.consilium. europa.eu/en/policies/migratory-pressures/. Accessed 7 March 2019. Express. (2018, July 2). End of EU: Merkel admits “Schengen at risk” as migrant crisis leaves bloc in tatters. https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/982743/ Angela-Merkel-germany-news-migrant-crisis-migration-csu-horst-seehofer. Gatto, A. (2016, March). Challenges to the Schengen area. European Parliamentary Research Service, at a Glance (PE 579.073). Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Multi-level governance in the European Union. In B. F. Nelson & Stubb, A. (Eds.), The European Union, readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 281–311). Palgrave Macmillan. Kasim, H., Peterson, J., Bauer, M. W., Connolly, S., Dehousse, R., Hooghe, L., et al. (2013). The European Commission of the twenty-first century. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kraatz, S. (2018). Free movement of workers. Facts Sheets on the European Union, European Parliaments. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/ en/sheet/41/free-movement-of-workers. Latek, M. (2016). Growing impact of EU migration policy on development cooperation. European Parliamentary Research Service, Members’ Research Service, European Parliament, Briefing October 2016. http://www.europarl.europa. eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2016/589815/EPRS_BRI(2016)589815_EN. pdf. Majone, G. (2014). Rethinking the union of Europe post-crisis: Has integration gone too far? Cambridge University Press. Nugent, N. (2006). The government and politics of the European Union. Duke University Press. Nugent, N. (2010). The government and politics of the European Union. Palgrave Macmillan. Nugent, N. (2017). The crisis and the EU’s institutions, political actors and processes. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), The European Union in crisis (pp. 167–187). Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Rabkin, J. (2016). A strange institution. In H. Zimmermann & A. Dür (Eds.), The key controversies in European integration. Macmillan Education, Palgrave.

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Rasmussen, A. (2003). The role of the commission in co-decision: A strategic facilitator operating in a situation of structural disadvantage. European Integration Online Papers, 7 (10). Ritterberger, B. (2003). The creation and empowerment of the European Parliament. Journal of Common Market Studies, 41, 203–225. Spencer, S. (2003). The challenges of integration for the EU. Migration Information Source. Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute. http://www. migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=170. Stephenson, P., Versluis, E., & Van Keulen, M. (2010). Analysing the European Union policy process. Red Globe Press, Macmillan International. Thomson, R. (2011). Resolving controversy in the European Union, legislative decision-making before and after enlargement. Cambridge University Press. Williams, R. E. (2007). The political economy of the common market in milk and dairy products in the European Union. FAO, Amazon Publication. Zimmermann, K. (2005, December, Spring). European labour mobility: Challenges and potentials. De Economist, 153(4), 425–450.

CHAPTER 8

The EU as Efficient Polity in Migration: Conflict and Cooperation

Introduction Since the early cooperation on immigration, the underlining the principles of European migration policy have been liberalisation of migration inside the EU through freedom of movement and safeguarding of control over migration from outside the Union (Lavenex and Ucarer 2003: 48). The member states must still overcome a number of barriers identified in Chapter 4, although the free movement of labour is guaranteed by treaties and underpinned by the principle of equal treatment and nondiscrimination. As part of the EU’s integration process, focus is policy coordination in order to remove obstacles to labour mobility. Hence, the EU’s integration process is considered as leap forward, but its policymaking has extended to ever sensitive field. The underlying point is that the European migration governance is complex, involving multiple actors and institutions, operating at different levels, and with different objectives; and different types of migration are regulated by different policy regimes (De Somer 2012: 30). In the 1950s, the EEC emerged as a typical international organization. By the time being, it expanded from its involvement in the internal market and then freedom of movement across its borders. As part of this involvement, the institutional developments have gradually given way to new and interesting features of it.

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More Supranational Migration Governance A broad enough body of scholarly literature examining politics of the EU policy-making acknowledged increased capacity to promote mobility, which is particularly evidence (Hooghe and Marks 2003; Spencer 2011; Stephenson et al. 2010; Toemmel 2014; Kraatz 2018). As Carmel (2013) argued, the EU interventions in migration governance are significant in two ways. They are significant for migration policy because of their real, but in practice uneven and unpredictable, effects in their application to different categories of migrant across Europe. This makes it difficult for migrants and policymakers alike to oversee the relative rights attached to different categories of mobile person in practice. This is especially visible once we move our analytical perspective from national-level rights frameworks to the European-wide institutionalisation, organisation and framing of migrants’ rights and their regulation (Carmel 2013: 250). Arguing that the EU is an efficient decision-making entity with its supranational institutions and its members pose a question of how they can directly or indirectly foster the labour migration policy. As already noted, decisions on choices between free markets and strong regulations generally lie in compromise among the actors. Article 3 (2) TFEU states that relationship between the Commission and the member states is inevitable for shared competence, in order to initiate legislative proposals in the area of asylum, borders, immigration and the third country nationals. Insofaras it may be desired to provide shelter for the plight of thousands of migrants putting their lives in peril to cross the Mediterranean and perhaps even a general watch over the policies of the individual member states. Any line of action recommended would be establish a common front. This may turn out to be at odds, when the member states address huge migratory pressures alone. To some extent, there are now few indications that the Commission encouraged migration policy process. Indeed, the Commission has promoted increasingly systematic consultations on labour migration issues. In response, the Council has passed legislative acts upon the Commission’s proposals. Several implementation packages under the Agenda on Migration, have already been adopted, when the Commission presented the European Agenda on Migration. Directive 2016/801/EU on the conditions of entry and residence of third-country nationals illustrates this. The Commission’s further effort can be found in its proposal to establish

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a permanent EU resettlement framework in July 2016. This new framework would have a common procedure and criteria across the EU. It would replace two current resettlement schemes. It is also worth noting that in September 2017 the Commission adopted a recommendation calling on the member states to offer resettlement places for 50,000 people, to be admitted by 31 October 2019. Upon its recommendation, the EU ambassadors agreed on a mandate for negotiations on the draft rules for this new framework in November 2017. The negotiations with the EP are ongoing (European Council 2017). On the main, the introduction of policy coordination means a collective EU regime pointing to a mechanism of transition from nationally rooted policy-making. Chapter 2 demonstrated that the emergence of new and persistence crises has pushed the EU’s main priorities of kind closer towards a dangerous tipping point. These priorities have become a point of coordinated efforts not only in the Commission and the EP, but in the member states alike. The combination for a stronger of cooperation in the EU’s policy-making authority to promote the free movement of labour as one of the objectives of the completed internal market is becoming a permanent systematic credibility. More specifically, a stronger involvement of the EP in the policy-process has strengthened the legislative position of the Commission. The improving the internal market has always energetically reinforced the efforts of the Commission in labour mobility area. The policy coordination between the Commission and the EP conforms the supranational interaction among them. In this sense, one of the EU’s priorities is to fulfil the Lisbon Agenda, which set targets for the EU to improve its employment levels, productivity and take-up of technology, and pursue a range of other goals to ensure that the EU would be able to compete with the “knowledge-based” economic blocs of the US and the Far East. Romano Prodi, former President of the Commission, underlined the thinking within the Commission at Tampere when, at the Council’s meeting in Stockholm in March, he identified a growing skills gap as a challenge facing the EU. The Union, he argued, urgently needs to ease restrictions on labour mobility, particularly in the technology sector, and to coordinate policies on labour migration where appropriate. There are also some structural reasons behind the Commission’s and the EP’s desire to coordinate policy on labour market, in particularly skilled labour. It is significant that the recent Commission communication emanates from the Employment Directorate and is the responsibility of the Employment and

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Social Affairs Committee (Spencer 2003: 125–126). While this development is a clear sign of immigration as an issue for the EU-wide economy, it reflects an acknowledgement of supranational action between the Commission and the EP. Indeed, the key actors suggesting that there is increased boost for migration policy process among supranational institutions. According to Article 4 (3) TFEU, the Council is in a position to act unanimously to adopt common positions and actions. Accordingly, the Council is empowered to promote cooperation and draw conventions in terms of the intergovernmental legal basis. Apart from this, an institutional arrangement with an impact upon the EU decision-making is the rotating Presidency of the Council, which is held by the member states for a six-month period on a rotating basis. The official procedure of the Council’s institutional structure as a guidebook of every national presidency was updated in 2004 to accommodate the accession of ten new member states. The Presidency can assert its prerogative, deciding, for instance, whether or not a particular working group or Council formation should be convened, or when to vote—and such issues can be critical to the outcome of negotiations (Stephenson et al. 2010: 160). Still, the Council’s role in negotiating compromises can be regarded as the developing nature of the EU’s institutional processes, while the EP has explicitly been abstained to amend fragile compromises negotiated in the Council. Hence, the EP’s role is considerable. The EU’s treaty framework provides the legal representation task for the EP to the extent to which the collective interest of the European electorate is pursued. The EP has a genuine representative role—a role that the national parliaments may not have. The bureaucracies of the EP own its inner logic to conservative feature, mostly relying on and maintaining its established procedures. Perhaps, the single most striking event to enhance the status of the EP was the dismissal of the Commission over the mismanagement practices in March 1999. Decision to a motion of censure by a two-thirds majority of the vote casts led to the resignation of all 20 Commissioners. The role of the EP is already entrenched by Article 17 (7) of the TFEU states that the Commissioners-designate ‘shall be subject as a body to a vote of consent by the European Parliament’. Article 17 provides the Commission president–designate power, whose veto power was formally approved by the Amsterdam treaty. On the basis of these legislative developments, the EP has become as a co-legislator, following the Treaty of Lisbon. There is now immense body

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of procedure in which the EP takes part. In this new role, the EP shares legislative power with the Council. Its involvement in adoption of legislation and conclusion of international agreements concerning all migration components was envisaged by the treaties. Upon these roles, the EP has gained simply joys and hopes which may make migration policy workable among the member states. Therefore, the emergence of the EP as a powerful player has altered the institutional balance in the EU. The authoritative competences of the EP are more narrowly circumscribed than those of the Council, but the EP is nonetheless a weighty player (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 291). Consequently, it has become difficult to impose individual will by the national governments in many areas of migration policy-making. One could rightly point to the fact that the EP has always energetically supported the efforts of the Commission on the respect for the fundamental right of free movement. In its resolution of 16 January 2014, the EP recalled that the right of free movement for work purposes cannot be associated with abuse of social security systems (see also CoJ judgment in Case C-413/01 Ninni-Orasche) and called on the member states to refrain from any actions that could affect the right of free movement. As regards social security coordination, in its January 2014 resolution on social protection for all, the EP called on the Commission to review the legislation and monitor implementation and coordination of social security systems, in order to safeguard the EU migrant workers’ benefit entitlements. Equally important, maintaining the desirable feature of influence, the Commission and the EP take radical positions compared to the member states. The policy position is sometimes taken by the Commission followed by other institutions. To illustrate this point, the EP (and the Council) joined the Commission to adopt Article 13 anti-discrimination directive on race equality and employment directive of the Amsterdam Treaty. This measure acts as a safeguard to eliminate any discrimination in the labour markets of host countries control (Kraatz 2018). There appears to be a sharp trade-offs between the EP and the Council. The EP is intinctively in efficient position in the course of decisionmaking process, although it can not make binding decisions. Following an agreement with the EP, the Council gave the go-ahead to increase lending by the EIB’s European Investment Bank to projects outside the EU that address migration issues in 29 November 2017. Decision was taken at a meeting of the General Affairs Council, without discussion. The Council adopted decision and regulation on 27 February 2018, following an

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agreement with the EP on a mid-term review of the EIB’s mandate for “external” lending. In total, the financing limit under an EU guarantee is increased by e5.3 billion. Of this, e3.7 billion are earmarked for projects in the public and private sectors providing a strategic response to the root causes of migration (European Council 2018). In particularly, budgetary legislation has the unprecedented effect on the creating different ties, although the EP has key role in deciding budget. Beyond the stable core of the EU policies dealing with the single market, compromise interaction of the EP and the Council on these funding projects gives insight of new competences. Much claim has, however, been based upon a democratic deficit by the exertion of the EU institutions, especially, the Council over the EP, which have affected the internal dimensions of the EU migration policies. Previously, power of the Council held of a monopoly in the legislative decision making process. At the very optimism sense, the EU external migration policy is developing through soft/policy instruments, such as Mobility Partnerships and Common Agendas on Migration and Mobility, side-lines the role of the EP and limits the democratic control and transparency of “who” and “what” goes abroad in this highly evolving and dynamic policy domain (Carrera et al. 2015: 70). Here, real issue is variance in policy output. Explanations of variance in policy output lies in the abilities of actors to use their institutional resources to attain success. Under co-legislation procedure, both the EP and the Council can influence the legal outputs. However, how far it could go in the view of controversies and conflict matters for obstacles to labour mobility constitutes the new EU policy agenda-setting the priorities and instruments to guide EU cooperation with the member states, as well as with the third countries on migration, borders and asylum in the long run. Notwithstanding such concerns, Article 79/2 (ex-63b) TFEU states as: the European Parliament and the Council, acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, shall adopt measures in the following areas of (a) the conditions of entry and residence, (b) the definition of the rights of third-country nationals residing legally in a Member State, (c) illegal immigration and unauthorised residence (d) combating trafficking in persons.

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Somewhat paradoxically, tendency of the Commission, the Council and the EP to pursue integration in the area of labour migration by knotty, in turn makes it compelling in introducing the new migration laws and also makes the relations efficient in producing good and well-targeted migration policies. At the top of this supranational role stimulates the successive negotiations of migration governance began since the enlargement 2004, which reinforced cooperation between the Commission and the Council to the extent of which the Commission as conditional agenda setter is empowered the supranational roles. In order to press and secure the policy making machinery of various countries themselves, pattern adopted by the Commission’s agenda on migration sets implies a greater progress towards an European response. In such relationship, it is hard to ignore policy compromise between these three institutions at the top-level of supranational decision-making. A particular evidence is that the recent proposal for visa liberation policy of the third countries by the Commission entrenched the existing rules on the Shenghen agreement more deeply. Klaas Dijkhoff, Minister for Migration of the Netherlands and President of the Council stressed that visa requirements could only be lifted, when previously agreed benchmarks were fulfilled. As noted, decision would be taken in a strict and a fair manner whether these benchmarks were fulfilled on the basis of an assessment by the Commission (European Council 2016a) and agreed upon on a mechanism that would work against abuse. Negotiation process on visa liberalisation may run smoothly in the presence of the EP joining the Council to share with its legislative decision-making power. On the basis of this mandate, the Netherlands presidency started negotiations with the EP as soon as the latter has adopted its position. This may suggest that pressure to reach compromise is partly a result of the nature of the system but also, perhaps even more so, result from the conflicting interests that three institutions represent. In brief, the most prominent and deepest divide, requiring delicate negotiations and compromise to overcome, is between the Commission and the Council. These two institutions represent, in a nutshell, the most significant and, simultaneously, most contradictory set of interests in the process of European integration (Toemmel 2014: 126). In December 9 2016, conclusions of the Council meetings invited the Commission to explore ways for the EU action and support for the member states on the following issues not mentioned in the Action Plan, with a view to strengthening cooperation with the existing Council preparatory bodies

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and committees (in particular the Education Committee, the Social Questions Working Party, the Employment Committee and the Social Protection Committee) in order to improve, if appropriate, country-level data to better monitor integration policy outcomes at EU level, and to improve their current methods and tools (European Council 2016b). Again, this is mainly due to the fact that the treaties increased the role of these institutions. This is particular relevant with the introduction of the SEA. Nowhere has this supranational nature of action been more obvious than the ECJ’s jurisdiction. The member-state governments have occasionally sought to limit the ECJ’s efforts to promote deeper legal integration. But in a larger sense, the national governments have been great enablers of the Court, acting to expand its powers. In every round of EU Treaty revision, the member states have extended the ECJ’s jurisdiction to new fields of law, including to sensitive areas, such as the JHA and the fiscal surveillance. Likewise, the member-governments have granted the Court new enforcement powers—including the ability to impose fines on noncompliant states. Finally, the member governments have dramatically increased the Court’s capacity to process cases by adding judges to the Court and by establishing subsidiarity courts (the General Court and the Civil Service Tribunal) below the ECJ. The member states governments have repeatedly empowered the ECJ because, despite their occasional complaints about the Court’s activism, they know they need a robust Court to make their commitments credible and to maintain the rule of law within the Union (Alter and Kelemen 2016: 84) This suggests that the contemporary European integration is marked by supranationalism, with the ECJ as another driver of integration. Generally, the inter-institutional cooperation is a desirable feature of the EU’s political system, while the policy process tend to be run by disagreements and disputes between the key actors, concerning both policy and institutional matters. Enduring characteristic of the decision-making process is that it incorporates intense inter-institutional cooperation in the policy field of labour migration. The formal procedural rules would be hampered, when cooperation is unobtainable. Decision-making process would not work well, if cooperative exchange is not stronger in institutional structure.

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A Renationalization of Powers to the Member States First of all, it should be noted that the research findings draws on the EU’s labour immigration policy suggest that complex and incoherence the policy process within the EU institutions takes place, implying a high degree of fragmentation and dispersion. In view of complex structure dominating policy process on labour migration, it is not surprising that a vast body of literature analysing the EU legislation in this area has—either more or less explicitly—taken over the conflict rationale underlying the policy process. This of course poses doubts on how the rational compromise will emerge. An emphasis is then place on cooperation. It can be seen that the EU immigration policy still favours intergovernmental incline, although much has been done to the communitarize the policy. From the beginning of formation of a common policy, the EU level cooperation on immigration issues was shaped by preferences of the member states and motivation for coordination. The reason was due to escape form of the domestic judicial and bureaucratic constraints that impeded to attain the restrictive immigration policies. Thus, scope for political and judicial control has been far weaker at the EU level than at the national level (Geddes 2000: 14). Envisaging supranationalisation of the immigration policies would be as absurd as denying that the member states are always enthusiastic to support the jointly action and the will continue to do so, since that is in their interests. For a simply reason, they wish act on individually and not to be constrained by the EU level institutional framework. A notable body of work has grown around the concept of multi-level governance in Europe a generating binding collective decisions inspired by Markus Jachtenfuchs and Beate Kohler-Koch (2004). The idea of the exclusive authority of the nation-state has become very popular in research on the European integration. This complexity of rapidly evolving field of research gives some clues about how authority in a particular sector has shifted towards the EU. The evidence from the empirical research assumes that the road to common policy on migration is not smooth. Rather, from time to time vigorous defence is presented by the member states over sovereign authority in the EU. The resistance to supranational governance is utterly articulated. In Decision-Making: Cooperation and Conflict among the Core Institutions Toemmel (2014) argued that the institutions and actors of the EU seek to expand competences and to compete for powers to define,

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shape, and control the process of European integration. More generally, institutions struggle for maximum influence with regard to their counterparts. At the same time, however, the EU’s comparatively “open” architecture, within which there are no clear hierarchies, compels actors and institutions to work towards compromises and to search for consensus (Toemmel 2014: 115). To put differently, the sophisticated procedures to smooth out differences and reinforce the ability to reach a compromise among the political actors seem a difficult task. Hence, like most aspect of the EU, any discussion of who governs is complicated, it is important to note that are actually two lines of conflict that are typical in federal-like political systems—within levels of authority and between levels of authority (Beach 2016: 46). Theoretically, actors compete for power and position within levels to the extent of which conflict becomes inevitable (see Fig. 8.1). Taking into account this line of analysis for any given policy area or process, growing presence and intensity of interactions between the member states and the EU. These interactions are understandable, when the member states reassert themselves by repatriating powers to the national level. A scaling back of migration policy dealt with at the EU level seems to be gaining support. It is understable that this shift to be “radicalised” to the extent that a core competence of the nation state is to effectively delegating migration policy. Within the context of the EU’s political spectrum, the issue of radicalisation should be further elaborated. A particular point is to make is that rise of nationalism in Europe has confronted the EU and in many countries nationalist got higher scores in EP elections and opinion polls in the 23–26 May elections, 2019. In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party won the highest share of the vote at 23%. The Eurosceptic populist parties including Matteo Salvini’s anti-immigrant, the League made big gains in Italy. Ireland is one of the few countries in the EU without any Eurosceptic parties. With Europe’s decades-old project of unity increasingly in the balance, the voting energized both sides on a polarized continent. It was a contest between angry, disaffected nationalists who want to beat back what they see as a remote and overreaching bureaucracy in Brussels, against the once-sleepy, complacent supporters of Europe looking to defend a unity that can no longer be taken for granted (Horowitz 2019). The results indicated that the struggle over the future direction of the bloc—more integration among European countries, or less—would

2. Who decides at the EU level? (within=> institutional battles) [Member state level]

Supranational (Commission, ECB, CJEU, EP strong roles in “community method” decisionmaking)

Fig. 8.1 Lines of conflict between and within levels of authority in the EU (Source Derek Beach, More powers for Brussels or renationalisation?, 2016)

Member state level

1. Level at which policy dealt with? (between=>) EU or MS level)

Intergovernmental (European Council, intergovernmental, “Union method” decisionmaking)

EU level

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only intensify. With more of a voice in the EP, populists and nationalists would be expected to try to push harder on issues like controlling immigration (and the budget). And they are likely to try to gum up the plans of the pro-Europeans, pressing for more power to go to the nations rather than to a bureaucracy they consider elitist. Still, the anti-EU forces remain disparate and divided, and may have trouble wielding significant power (Erlanger 2019). Underlying some of outstanding drawbacks, it is very difficult for the political actors to appeal to a European public: newspaper broadcasting systems are formally national in scope, and national level remains by far the most important level of reference for the European citizens when it comes to the European issues. As a result, the member states level dominates the European level a focal point for citizens’ political loyalty and interests. Moreover, decision-makers at European level are less directly accountable to (national or European) publics than domestic decisionmakers in most democracies. The EP is directly elected and the elections remain dominated by the national issues. The political parties, which are important channels to the political agenda in many member states, are much weaker and less integrated at the European level. The national representatives in the Council are indirectly accountable through their domestic parliaments, but European issues tended to be rather unimportant in parliamentary affairs. The Commission is not accountable to any public, the best only indirectly through the EP’s powers to dismiss it (Princen 2009: 27). Otherwise, disagreement among the decision-makers affects the whole policy mechanism. Surely, scale and salience of the international migration is to be increased, the public policy frames crossborder human mobility has been subject to the institutional manoeuvre. In general terms, the emergence of new and persistent crises has pushed the EU’s legitimacy problem closer towards a dangerous tipping point, which could eventually become a point of no return if national governments continue to try to muddle their way through (Schweiger 2017: 203). As noted above, a recent boom in voter support for rightwing and populist parties poses a particular risk for the principle of free movement of labour, although the origins of nationalism dates back to the early years of the EEC. The EU is bound to experience a severe shock from the rise of the far-right and populist movements, which are united by their condemnation of its migration, apart from its bureaucracy (and Islam). Implicitly, this implies the disruption of its institutions from within, let alone encouraging cooperation and compromise between the

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member states. A backlash against the political establishment in general will make it more difficult to stabilize the situation in European labour markets. As claimed, the politicization of the EU in the domestic political discourse has occurred in the form of surprisingly efficient organization, where policy process has increasingly become under scrutiny by voters in relation to institutions and decision-making procedures of the EU. This often-overlooked generosity is all more remarkable given the everyday decision-making in the field of labour migration. Some commentators have even argued that obstacles to labour mobility cannot be overcome by a clear and comprehensive policy proposal by the Commission, the Council and the national governments without innovation in institutional structure. On this account, the EU consists of the distinct institutional, national and ideological positions, and perspectives, all of which are seen obstacles to mobility. They stand on the way to eradication new plans making impossible departing from the status quo. The increase role of national parliaments in the policy-making clearly illustrates a negative integration, although they are regarded as guardians of the proportionality of action at the EU level and such an increase is compatible with the principle of subsidiarity. A complexity in consensus may arise in agenda-setting processes, while the Commission enjoys a higher degree of autonomy in this regard. Most often in the area of labour migration, where lacks legal competence, the Commission’s proposals may not be backed up by the member states, who are undergoing high level of unemployment as a consequence of the economic crisis. One of these setbacks drives from the Council’s failure to reach agreement on the Commission’s proposal for a directive on the conditions of entry and residence for the purpose of paid employment and self-employment. In 2001, the directive on labour mobility issues (i.e., Blue Card of 2009) allowed the member states broad flexibility in terms of implementation. The directive on a single permit for migrant workers and their rights of 2011 is far more rigid. The agenda-setting is a vital role of the Commission. But the member states should not override this role. Indeed, formally in the Treaty of Rome, that is the main responsibility given to it. Given how controversial immigration related issues are, a return to intergovernmentalism at the EU level implies that the national governments lack the Commission’s detailed knowledge of policy programme and also knowledge of other member states’ national bureaucracies

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regarding policies in those countries. Even at lower levels of the Council’s hierarchy in its working groups, where discussions are of a more technical nature, officials are often generalists who must deal with abroad range of legislative proposals. These decision makers must also recognize that implementers—either the Commission or national authorities—have more detailed knowledge regarding one of the proposals they consider (Thomson 2011: 229). Focus is on the formal application of policies, with some excellent exceptions. However, there is a negligence of the substantive impacts of the EU policies. Assuming the weakening autonomy of the Commission under codecision procedure, much of the legislative work cannot be achieved without involvement of the EP. In order to relieve the normal legislative process of its involvement with migration issues such as employment related topics, it has been desirable to have collaboration of the EP. However, institutional analysis demonstrates that the EP must be taken seriously in explaining the legislative outcomes. The EP was almost powerless under the Treaty of Rome. It played no role in 73% of the provisions and was consulted on the remaining 27%. By 1999 and the Amsterdam Treaty, the EP had emerged as a force to be reckoned with. Roughly equal propositions mandated co-decision, consultation, and exclusion. If the Council is stronger, of course. It votes under all treaty provisions, but trend seems perfectly clear, as are implications for the collective capacity of national governments to determine policy making (Hooghe and Marks 2003: 302). As years went by, the EU became more accustomed to the EP’s presence in deficiency. A number of executive functions in the JHA is surrounded by the national governments, who are unwilling to become under scrutiny of the EP’s. Most recently, debate on the implementation of the different migration measures, which have been adopted by the Home Affairs ministers, so far, is related to the shortfalls. Particularly, such measures raised the issue of the calls by the agencies for experts. While there is a strong support by the Council Presidency for increasing the number of experts provided by the member states to the agencies, there is also a good deal of discontent about capacity. The critics suggest that there is a lack of right profile experts, pointing to provision of training experts. At this point, what need most is the political will of ministers (of the Council) to strengthen the agencies as a whole. In the circumstances of which decision cannot be made, the logic of implementation or evaluation becomes irrelevant.

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The European commentators argued that the ECJ has, like other EU institutions, an independent effect on the political outcomes. They are typically confident that the EU would flourish and remain the important international organization through the “most effective supranational judicial body”. It can prove resilient and survive by powers conferred on it by the treaties. In so far as the Court may be regarded as a legal entity having jurisdiction over the entire range of policies, let alone labour migration issues. Seen from this perspective, the deciding cases are anything, but are difficult tasks. However, critics suggested that the actions of democratically elected governments are undermined by rulings of unelected Courts’ judges, when they have much more manoeuvrability available to them. Although the judges can use this to considerable effect regarding clarifying the EU policy in many different spheres, the overriding concern is that their democratically elected institutions are overruled by an organization legitimacy of the democratically elected institution that has less legitimacy in their eyes (Bache and George 2006: 330). Although the Court’s tactics can be seen in the early rulings of Van Grend en Loos (1962) and Costa v. ENEL (1964), effect of these limitations is greater. In particularly, the Court currently faces private challenges demanding implementation of the European standards of labour protection, which would facilitate free movement of labour. In reality, the reference point rarely captures the full implication of disagreement outcome for the free movement rights utilised in the EU. In order to avoid the implications of failure, a number of permanent derogations to the general principle of non-discrimination on the grounds of nationality is in operation. Failure to resolve controversy by adopting the legislative proposal by the Commission gives rise to the rulings of the ECJ. Surely, the Court has to develop a number of guiding principles to counter an abusive reliance on the exceptions by the national authorities. Again, it has to be noted that the Court has marginal role in policy process, but its task in managing budget and cohesion policy is considerable. At the very highest level, influences the member states create and impact policies at the national level are many and complex, but at the level of the EU those complexities are compounded, coming from sources that they are internal and external to the EU institutions, formal and informal, predictable and unpredictable, expected and unexpected, and structured and unstructured (McCormick 2017: 104). True, the Council’s dominated position is now replaced by the intensive interaction between the three institutions. But it holds a weaker position regarding law-making,

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as its capacity of kind depends on the support of either the Commission or the EP, with the exception of unanimous voting. The prospect that one or more actors may block a decision is not remote possibility for legislation planning. For example, conflict arises when the Commission and the Council resource legally binding procedures to enforce their powers, pointing to the refusal of the EP’s amendments to legislative proposals. The circumstances of kind may imply highly inefficient decision-making processes. This is crucial for understanding migration policy-making in the EU.

Conclusion This chapter sought to understand how the EU institutions, as well as the member states, interact with each other and what forms of conflict and collaboration may be the result of such interaction. In the first place, influence of the institutional mechanism works well. That is the third pillar structure strengthened, especially the Commission and the EP in policy-making. The fact that these institutions are well insulated against the member states are keen to preserve their national sovereignty in the area of JHA. However, the linkage between the member states’ policy positions and the domestic interests has been a significant departure from the migration policy, so far. Only limited convergence is achieved due to member states’ positions. Control order to avoid this conflictual environment, there should be more rules to govern each institution. With exhibiting a particular logic and a conflict potential, the EU’s policy continues to be strengthened gradually and incrementally. Taking into consideration, for instance the Commission’s role as agenda-setter, it is a question mark how far-reaching the Commission’s proposals will be, especially when the EU struggles with the migration crisis. Its proposals and its decision exhibit a mixture of supranationalism and intergovernmentalism space, which the JHA currently inhabits. It is likely that the issue of migration policy process will for a long time controversial concern throughout the Europe, as long as demand for labour continues.

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References Alter, K. J., & Kelemen, R. D. (2016). Understanding the European court’s political power. In H. Zimmermann & A. Dür (Eds.), The key controversies in European integration. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Bache, I., & George, S. (2006). Politics in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Beach, D. (2016). More powers for Brussels or renationalisation? In H. Zimmermann & A. Dur (Eds.), Key controversies in European integration (pp. 65–91). The European Union Series. Macmillan Education. Carmel, E. (2013). With what ımplications? As assessment of EU, migration governance between union regulation and national diversity (Research Paper Series, the Analysis of Social Policy). Carrera, S., Radescu, R., & Reslow, N. (2015). EU external migration policies, a preliminary mapping of the instruments, the actors and their priorities (EURANET. Deliverable 3.1). http://www.uta.fi/eura-net/. De Somer, M. (2012). Trends and gaps in the academic literature on EU labour migration policies (CEPS Paper in Liberty and Security in Europe, No. 50/December). Erlanger, S. (2019, May 26). European election results show growing split over union’s future. The New York Times, p. 2. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/ 05/26/world/europe/european-elections-results.html. European Council. (2016a). Justice and Home Affairs Council. https://www. consilium.europa.eu/en/meetings/jha/2016/05/20/. Accessed 20 May 2016. European Council. (2016b, December 9). European Council meeting—Conclusions. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2016/12/ 15/euco-conclusions-final/. Brussels. European Council. (2017). Reform of EU asylum rules. https://www.consilium. europa.eu/en/policies/ceas-reform/. Accessed 15 November 2017. European Council. (2018). EIB: Council approves extra e3.7 billion to address migration issues. https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/ 2018/02/27/eib-council-approves-extra-3-7-billion-to-address-migrationissues/. Accessed 28 February 2018. Geddes, A. (2000). Immigration and European integration: Towards fortress Europe? Manchester University Press. Hooghe, L., & Marks, G. (2003). Multi-level governance in the European Union. In B. F. Nelson & Stubb, A. (Eds.), The European Union, readings on the theory and practice of European integration (pp. 281–311). Palgrave Macmillan. Horowitz, J. (2019, May 27). Election puts Europe on the front line of the battle with populism. The New York Times, p. 5. https://www.nytimes.com/ 2019/05/27/world/europe/europe-election-results-populism.html.

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Jachtenfuchs, M., & Kohler-Koch, B. (2004). Governance and institutional development. In A. Wiener & T. Diez (Eds.), European integration theory (pp. 97–115). Oxford University Press. Kraatz, S. (2018). Free movement of workers. Facts Sheets on the European Union, European Parliaments. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/ en/sheet/41/free-movement-of-workers. Lavenex, S., & Ucarer, E. M. (2003). Migration and the externalities of the European integration. Lexington Books. McCormick, J. (2017). Understanding the European Union: A concise introduction. Macmillan Education, Palgrave. Princen, S. (2009). Agenda setting in the EU. Palgrave Macmillan. Schweiger, C. (2017). The legitimacy challenge. In D. Dinan, N. Nugent, & W. E. Paterson (Eds.), European Union in crises (pp. 188–211). Palgrave Macmillan. Spencer, S. (2003). The challenges of integration for the EU. Migration Information Source. Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute. http://www. migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?ID=170. Spencer, S. (2011). The migration debate. The Policy Press. Stephenson, P., Versluis, E., & Van Keulen, M. (2010). Analysing the European Union policy process. Red Globe Press, Macmillan International. Thomson, R. (2011). Resolving controversy in the European Union, legislative decision-making before and after enlargement. Cambridge University Press. Toemmel, I. (2014). The European Union: What it is and how it works. The European Union Series. Palgrave Macmillan.

CHAPTER 9

Conclusion: The Present Realities and the Future of the EU’s Labour Migration Policy Process

The Merits of Theoretical Labour Governance As Chapter 2 demonstrated, attempting to come to terms with the interplay of different approaches and conceptual framework applied in the study of EU governance since 1950s, the changing context of the European integration implied theorizing the new Europe. With the transformation of power from the member states to the European level, the notion of governance has gained scholarly attention. The SEA of 1987 and the Maasthrict Treaty of 1992 were two developments which led to the theoretical responses, pointing to the neofunctionalist explanations of the trajectory of European integration. Latter on, a new set of perspectives are largely drawn on the setting of policy agendas and formulations. In the form of the multi-level governance, the national governments have become one of many potential participants in the broader process of the labour migration decision-making in the Council. With the renewed dynamism of the EC from the mid–1980s, the supranational institutions had occurred simultaneously. The continuing theoretical joust between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism are embedded in various relevant integration process and policy areas. The new institutionalist theories that have emerged in the context of the IR theories and the systematic level of analysis has widened the role and the responsibilities of the institutions in the decision-making. As a result, a variety of formal and informal course of actions, practices, relationships,

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committees, customs, and norms have come into play, in order to influence the decision-making procedure in migration effectively. Unlikely to the old institutionalism, “new governance” in the light of new institutionalism now reinforces the activities of the EU institutions to achieve the sustainable agenda setting, formulation, decision-making and implementation efficacy at the national and the EU level. In this context, a complex decision in labour migration may involve multiple and, perhaps, conflictinggoals, as the importance of institutions is considered to be vital in the EU governance mode. The political science literature on new institutionalism can offer insights into the dilemma that the distribution of power in organization such as the EU is likely conflictual, as rationalist approaches assumed. The changing relative power of institutions is often the case. As a process of institutional-building in this sense, the political actors desire to maximize some material outcome. Here, core concern is to resolve complexities about the preferences of actors they express in the labour migration decision-making in Europe. It is a fact of some significance that a considerably level of input to the policy process has occurred, as the national governments’ degree of autonomy is taken by the supranational actors since the early 1980s. The delegating power from the member states to the supranational level has its logic in the effectiveness of organizations, such as the EU to shape the process of integration. The central institutions act as the agent of the member states keeping a check on their activities. The debate about whether the institutional actors interact with one another effectively during the policy-making process is largely relevant from a point of view of historical institutionlists. It is not unwise to look upon the long-term effects of institutions in the circumstances of which a range of possible action and policy choice is constrained. In this case, the study of migration crises could be incorporated into and contributed to the long-term effects of institutional developments rather than be set apart from the general conceptual and the theoretical concerns of political scholars, who are keen to reshape or redesigning political institutions on demand. This addresses the matter whether the policy entrepreneurs are able to respond the need of migrant. No matter how far political actors can be rational, the limitations of the formal institutional structures at the national and the EU levels can easily be constrained. This fairly rationalist approach is evidenced of the effectiveness of the different migration policy initiatives is scarce. Three

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separate, but interconnected reasons can be traced: one stemming from the literature on the relative powers of the national government actors compared with the supranational actors, the second on the intergovernmental process within the Council and, finally, studies focusing on the role of the EP in the final decision. This understanding of conceptualization has a great merit of allowing us to study reasons for comparatively low level of mobility by international comparison. The theoretical approaches in historical sense are in line of fluctuations of a remarkably compressed period of time. The prominent position occupied by sociological institutionalism in the EU studies is designed to figure out whether labour mobility is relatively corresponsive to the culture or persuasion and communication action. Available evidence suggests that the level of mobility remains low, even if measures are introduced to facilitate free movement. This is because language and cultural barriers are continued to be the main impediment to cross-border mobility. It can be assumed that the cultural practices, the institutional and the individual identities, and the values are closely related to mobility level. In this respect, sociological institutionalism is the most ambitious, particularly in the way it conceptualizes the linkages between the cultural norms and mobility. While literature on the transformation of the role of the state in the regulatory sense, the concept of the MLG stresses the political system that springs up beyond the state. Studies start from assumption that the regional actors are important in terms of their roles played in labour migration policy process and should not be undervalued. Faced with migration crises, the member states are urged for collaborative and networked forms of policy-making. Hereby, migration policy can be taken as an example in a MLG system to the extent of which the member states and the Commission (in particular) interact collectively to overcome the crisis that had a negative impact on intra-EU mobility but there has been a rebound since 2011. The fluidity between these ties are yet to come. As chapter suggested, interactions between the member states and the institutions as the political actors at the national and the supranational level is essential to develop and implement comprehensive labour migration policies in the European political system. None of these level of governance are in a position to do so single-handedly.

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The European Policy Approach to the Migration Problem In order to shed some light on the complexity of the labour migration policy process in the EU, Chapter 3 highlighted the main developments in migration history, admitting that evaluation of the role of the institutionsis essential for exploring their influence in reinforcing labour mobility in the EU wide. As such, the Treaty of Rome recognized the free movement of labour as one of the four basic principles and called upon the member states to come to terms with discordant development of economic activities. Under certain conditions, this legacy now provides the EU nationals with the right to stay and work, and live in another member state. Came into effect in 1968, scope and extend of mobility is widened to include most countries in European mainland. It was ensured that any complexity would be dealt with ever greater cooperation on migration policy among the member states of the EC, while the cumulative effect of free movement of labour have already felt somewhere in Europe. In the early years of the EC, the pattern of incremental progress towards commnitarization did, the European policy-makers would expect, not always run smoothly. This said, the institutional role of political actors would come into play to move forward labour mobility in the case of any conflict, distortion and complexity. A leap forward initiative had taken by the introduction of the SEA of 1986 created the unprecedented conditions of labour mobility. The Community members would first time experience free movement for goods, services, capital and labourso-called “borderless” internal market by 1993. The need was purely economic within the context of EU-wide employment policy frameworks. The large labour market would have the employment opportunities for all the members, which make it easy for Europeans to access, reside and start up an activity in another member state. With the introduction of the QMV in the Council, the profound change is being made possible essentially by the new method of voting system that would ease or speed up the decision-making process. To understand this extraordinary change in all its basic simplicity in general, the TFEU entered into force in 1993, further consolidated freedom of movement by enshrining the concept of European citizenship. Significance of these further steps towards the unification of migration policy was its applicability to economically active persons (i.e. employed persons and jobseekers). It was still at the discretion of the member states

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to determine volumes of admission of the third-country nationals, who were seeking work for employment or self-employment. In this climate, the institutional reforms would provide new opportunities for setting target of conditions for entry. Freedom of movement was further encouraged by the Amsterdam Treaty of 1997, with the incorporation of the Schengen Treaty into the EU legal framework. Beyond the sphere of socio-economic rights and policies, the increasing intervention of the EU in the field of the JHA provided uniformity in the road to supranationalism. Expansion of the EU activities included the introduction of the new co-decision procedure and the greater use of QMV in the Council are exemplified this claim. Development as close cooperation on the JHA regarding free movement of labour, especially conditions of entry and movement by nationals of the third countries on the territory of the member states are worth noting. Although these steps are considered as effecting radical changes, a mix of the supranational integration and the intergovernmental cooperation was still the case at this stage. In institutional sense, one reason for this was the unanimity voting for the matters of the JHA meant that the domination of the national actors on the immigration issues. This is something that has been recognized as gradualism and incrementalism based on different assumption that concerning difficulties in effecting radical change. Assuming that a deeper labour market integration among the member states cannot be collectively achieved in the foreseeable future, differentiation in policy process are the practical options to protect the nationally running sectors. In this regard, the Schengen Agreement somehow created a mixed bag: a top priority for the citizens of Europe, as well as the national of the third countries is the provision of a “single external border”. A uniform manner in movement of labour is usually the remit of migration policies at the European level. The Schengen cooperation agreement is practically the only EU policy area that is concerned with freeing workers across the regions. This freedom has been under the constant threat with the creation of a new “paper curtain”. Faced with migration crises, the stricter controls on the external borders and, to some extent, the internal borders have created restrictions on the free movement of labour should be avoided. As long as high volume of migrants seeking to enter the European borders continue, the very logic of the principle of free movement of labour will become irrelevant. The process that TFEU has initiated was taken up by the Lisbon Treaty in which a clear line of responsibilities between the EU and

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the national competences were drawn as far as the principle of free movement of labour was concerned. Unlike the expectations, the Lisbon Treaty increased the supranational basis of cooperation in migration policy process. Simply, further institutional reforms increased the Council’s decision-making capacity by the introduction of co-decision and the QMV on migration issues. Overwhelmingly, new treaty measures were included the declaration of the EP as co-legislator with the Council, full jurisdiction for the ECJ and an increase the policy entrepreneurship capacity of the Commission. These new and strengthened competences given to the institutional actors seem bound to have a very noticeable impact on the labour migration policy process. And in any event, all of these institutions would likely to dominate policy agenda or other procedures of policy process at the different stage. Certainly, there has been noticeable decline in the use of manoeuvre—for the benefit of the national interests by the member states. Much focus is on the recent legal developments, with some excellent implications. Since the mid–2000s, a well-developed legislation concerning the rules on both the EU and the non-EU nationals points to the substantive impacts of the treaty reforms. It is not just the fact of effective functioning institutions that can bring benefits for everyone, but also willingness of the member states to proceed with the migration policy process. In this context, there is no doubt that the negotiation hands of the national governments in the Council have been strengthened by the treaty framework, unless they make a convincing case concerning the policy process from agenda setting to implementation could be very difficult. This was no more clearly demonstrated than in Directive 2004/38/EC on the right of citizens of the Union and their family members to move and reside freely within the territory of the member states. It is possible to assume that the toughest/sensitive migration issues will likely be resolved once the institutional and the national actors show a strong desire. In terms of recent policy developments on labour migration, the strengthening the EU institutions that has been provided for family entry and long-term settlement. Unlike to prior to the post-enlargement period of 2004, the current labour market policies of the member states are characterised by selective, with more emphasis on migrants’ skills. Indeed, the main rationale for convincing the political actors on compromise that produced a new legal migration package in 2016 was the liberalized labour migration for the purpose of economic growth and competitiveness. Since the early 1980s, law-making on migration issues has become sensitive

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that has been largely a consequence of economic development, notion of the national identity, sovereignty and autonomy. In the context of security, incorporation of free movement of citizens, cross border, organized crime, asylum and immigration matters into the JHA is essential if (mainly economic) labour migration across the member states is to be achieved. Unsuprisingly, substantial labour flows were observed in most European countries with the removal of internal borders by 1992. Regardless of the labour market rigidities or restrictions placed on flows, intra-labour mobility will persist in the medium or long run, as long as income differential exist between the “old” and “new” member states. The scale and the challenge facing migration policy is seen in the fact since 2005. While recognizing that irregular migration is an important dilemma for contemporary Europe, the magnitude inward migration has ring the bell to set up the common political principles and solidarity. To determine how to give effect to organize the legal migration and wellmanaged mobility, the Commission’s initiative for establishing a general framework for the relations with the third countries, namely the GAMM has become a test of the EU’s commitments to the international front. This is because it became increasingly clear that thousands of asylum seekers are seeking to enter the European mainland; the national border authorities struggle for devising policies. In seeking to establish the conditions for the free movement of labour, “interconnectedness to simultaneous crisis” means the EU, the partner countries and migrants need to be established closer relationship as part of tackling problem. Given the global economic crisis, the challenge of migration crisis will undoubtedly remain high on the list of the EU policy priorities for years to come. There will therefore be many other migration policy processes issues that will be addressed and given considerable attention.

The European Labour Market Outlook As demonstrated in Chapter 4, recent trends in labour migration explictly pose the question of whether the national labour markets issues and problems are a good predictor of how the member states and the institutional actors will manage labour flows, invoking and converging immigration policies. By surveying effects, predicted and actual expansion of the Union on flows, this exclusive role of the national governments to encourage mobility becomes crucial. Most studies pinpoint the role of national governments in facilitationg intra-mobility. In principle, this role

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is the top priority of the EU institutions (i.e., the Commission), although a negligence of the substantive impacts of institutional actors is the case, suggesting that studies of executive politics remain underdeveloped. The issue of potential barriers to cross-border mobility examined, both at the EU level and at the level of individual countries give some insights that various ways of conceiving mobility potential is possible without appeal to the European and the national decision-makers. One is to emphasize the downturn in the logic of the internal market. The worsening economic situation seems wider implication for the political objectives to achieve higher level of labour mobility, although the Europe 2020 Strategy set the target as 75% employment among those aged 20–64. One sees this, in particular those sharp drops in GDP and consequently extensive loss of jobs in most countries resulted from the global economic crisis and its impact on the EU–28’s economic output. Indeed, this outlook have little say little about the distributional effect of the Union’s social policies and adversarialism, thereby, one associates with the restrictive labour market policies of the member states at the expense of free movement principle. Fair enough, one might say, the principles of free movement of labour was firmly established by the treaties and had overwhelmingly reached the stage that irrevocable—under no circumstances can be removed. One should be sceptical of those bearing decisive evidence of technical barriers to mobility inside border of the EU. When it is observed that there is a decline population in Europe, restrictions placed on labour mobility become nonsense. From a viewpoint of population ageing and its negative labour market effects in Europe should not be underestimated and undervalued by the institutional actors and the member states. The capacity of them meeting the challenges of a shrinking workforce necessitates reviewing the labour market policies, in particularly principle of free movement of labour. The costs of importing labour force from the neighbour countries, or components of such as unskilled labour, may be intimidatingly high. With an uneven distribution of human resources (young versus old population structures), the EU will evolve into a club with differentiated labour migration integration. To elaborate this point further, greater labour mobility does not only lead to challenges, but opportunities. Drawing on the advantages, mobility can, for example, help to deal with the labour shortages that many member states currently experience. This is especially true for qualified workers, who are likely to be attracted to fill the vacancies within more

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flexible labour markets. For the member states with a demographic timebomb—a rapidly ageing population, it is important to seize these opportunities. In a system marked attractive destination for migrants, demographic decline in Europe highlights how apparently communatairize migration policy making becomes vital. Reviewing the Blue Card scheme is a crucial action for reprioritizing the integration policies. The success lies in fostered coordination with the countries of origin, such as easing remittances. This performance is impressive for a new policy on legal migration. A balanced, comprehensive and common migration policy will help to tackle the challenges head-on. The consequencies of this for the political institutions is significant. When it comes to the labour market participation, picture is clearer still. It is true that there remains a considerable worsening outlook of employment in almost all goups. In particular, recent analysis points to the increasing rates of youth unemployment concerning comparability of international figures. In the realm of employment policy, this challenge has come to the fore since the recent crisis underlies the declining faith. The presence of barrier may affect the functioning of these potentially balancing mechanisms. There are good reasons, then, for the national policies directed at promoting labour mobility. But the paradox is that more mismatch of jobs in the member states, with an implication of the high unemployment rates in certain groups, less likely it is that the policymakers resolve discrepancies. Hence, the commitment to a well-functioning labour market by the political actors will likely to be proved little more than wishful thinking. A common market, with extensive freedoms to move and transfer of powers, and competence to the EU cannot be an illusion. That the economic dimension to integration has often been embraced and generally treated with trust has inevitably helped the labour market integration. Yet, such portrayals tent to be overlooked how much skill composition in the EU has played a pivotal role in the key developments of the European labour markets. The Europe 2020 Strategy urged the member states to review their current education policies to the extent in which the educational outcomes should be matched with the labour market needs. In several regions, the level of territory education attainment is relatively low (20%), which is a clear reflection of the quality of workforce. Assuming that that demand for skill labour will increase in the future, the quality of force may act as deterrent to mobility. Also, the problem with over-qualification and discrepancies between the educational attainment level and occupation are

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twofold. Later is has to do with its unbalanced nature. In such cases, new policy initiatives should be put in place to address these concerns. Most scholars, who adopt the theoretical language of wage differential, agree that the far-reaching mobility occurs, when the expected wage at a destination country exceeds the actual (potential) wage at home and the outcome is large flows of people from low income to high income regions. Their findings point to the significant effects on mobility, which is higher in countries with higher GDP per head, indicating a positive correlation between mobility and growth. Usually, large income differential between the EU-15 and the new accession countries, in particular Bulgaria and Romania is viewed as the East–West conflict over free movement. For political reasons, this divergence is an outcry, especially for the member states, which are the most effected by the economic crisis. It seems that very legacy of principle free movement of labour is at risk, the national governments restrict mobility for the sake of protecting native labour force losing jobs. After reviewing key barriers and obstacles identified above, the EU can, at first glance, be effective by using regulations (hard law) as instruments. Therefore, it is sensible to conclude that harmonization is crucial for understanding migration policy-making in the EU. A large divergence in labour market performance across the EU, which exists can be removed by increasing movement of all factors, more specifically free movement of labour, which is effective way to address labour market imbalances and bottlenecks. So as to try and prevent the growth of policy differences between the member states undermining the decision-making capacity, the EU’s migration competence is praised, although having weaken as a result of current migration crises. In many different areas, standards, forms and levels, disparity exists despite of substantial changes/reforms have been taken place since the SEM, so far. The European labour markets are anything, but distorted by these divergences, may be overcomed by launching a range of new policy initiatives and schemes that will surely stimulate mobility across the member states. Based on this, the integration of regular immigrants into the labour market is never going to be easy: it is a marked broad political will, while adding some simplicity to the matter. The looking glass through which the political actors makes sense in terms of facilitating measures and efforts at the EU-level cooperation, but their actions sometimes come under pressure.

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To reteriate, a variety of obstacles to labour mobility is the case and scholars have pointed to the need to get rid of loopholes in the current legal framework that are deemed no longer fit for purpose. Each attempts is to ease the problem of labour mobility seriously. Seeking temporary solution to the stream of migrants flowing into Europe, the EU policy-making is expected remarkably capable and its institutions to facilitate norm and policy diffusion is resourceful and resilient entity. Surely, greater mobility brings with it opportunities and challenges. A balanced, comprehensive and common migration policy will help the EU to seize these opportunities while tackling the challenges head-on. This policy— currently under development—is built upon solidarity and responsibility. It will have the added advantage of making a valuable contribution to the EU’s economic development and performance in the long term (European Commission 2018).

Framework for Analyzing the EU’s Policy Process As was shown in Chapter 5, the growing tendency of EU scholars over the last decade to conceptualize the EU as a mode of governance is characterized by hierarchy, negotiation, competition, cooperation and conflict. With regard to mode of governance, the central core is usually the formal distribution of competencies among different institutions. These sets of characteristics described above are a clear indication that the EU policy process does not only relate to governments and institutions, other actors, such as political parties, media or interests or lobby groups. Policies are combined internally and externally with its burden upon the EU agencies and tools, and all other actors. They included institutions, governments, international organisations, civil society, local authorities and national partners outside the EU. Since the multi-level governance perspectives are described as the deliberate choice of the national actors to delegate powers to the supranational level, search to achieve the political goals by these actors will be one of the liveliest areas of research on the EU politics. The great solidity of political actor participation in migration policy, the complexity of a variety of the European institutions that involve in policy process, and the plethora of levels makes this concept a very unfertile one. Given the very different position of the member states, it seems hard to impose on them by the EU institutions (i.e., the Commission) to accept certain aspect of migration policies.

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Reviewing the main pattern of policy-making, roles and influence of the institutional actors, and the member states are crucial. Their influence on labour migration depends on the different modes of policy-making. At a most basic level, an emphasis is placed on the Community method— as one of the four frameworks of the EU policy process—in the 1950s stems from a belief that the decision-making arrangement would be single and relatively simplier within this complex picture. The Lisbon Treaty strengthened Commission’s role primarily in new policy spheres of the Community method. Based on the intergovernmental nature of policyprocess, with the member states’ domination, its logic lies in a strong role should be assigned to the main institutional actors. In achieving high level of supranational regulation, the side-effects of the national governments’ “heavy” involvement could be reduced or removed, when they have every incentive to try to maximize their goals rather than transfer policies to the European level. To the extent that the successive rounds of integration strengthen utility and capacity of supranational actors (institutionalization dynamics) their responsibilities and powers have overlapped or mixed and so “who does what” becomes unclear. In this political climate, the labour migration policy process will be difficult to sustain in years to come. Attempts to understand policy-making in labour migration movements in Europe have often relied upon the regulatory framework with the resulting policies, which are adopted by the authorities of the area concerned towards encouraging these movements, or more commonly towards attempting to control or to reduce them. A Question arises as to at what point does labour migration, which has extensive legislative framework that otherwise would not possible to proceed, become regulated. Since the launch of the single market and more particularly since the TFEU, development of the collective market regulation has been appraisable because more integrated market has seen as indispensable, assuming that immigration policy has wider implications for “pure” market activities. Considerably, the EU policy involvement in the market regulation raises the issues of new forms of accountability generated by the multilevel governance. If labour market fails (i.e., higher level of unemployment among immigrants), then, disassociation between the single market and labour mobility becomes a possibility. This will likely be initially apparent in regime unregulated, which has already been floated as a possibility, given the current picture of labour market participation. In broad terms, the prevailing view in the academic literature is that migration has become a hot issue in recent years and its benefits, and

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drawbacks often cause controversy among Europeans. Faced with migration crisis, an Europe-wide redistribution of migrants has generated lively debate. As ever before, labour migration is considered to be one set of distributional issues that have been persistently highly politicized in the EU political system. Though the member states, notably Germany has been highly active from the early days of the crisis—it is questionable whether at any stage they can exercise greater independent powers than previously. It is remain to be seen. Drawing on theoretical developments in the study of transgovernmentalism, intergovernmentalist scholars conceptualized the EU as an international regime, whose institutions performs important functional tasks for the national actors, but are in deprivation of power to pursue their own political agendas. The divergent developments in intra-EU mobility rates clearly mark differences in labour market performance in the respective countries gives some clues that intensive transgovernmentalism is not possible. As was the case in the Community method practices prior to 1980s, the member states are apparently not keen to be firmly in charge of developments due to enlargement and migration crises rather than being dependent in any way on the Commission, the Council and the EP. Moreover, debate about supranationalist and intergovernmantalist approach to migration issues refers to constantly ongoing interaction between the representatives of national governments of all member states and the institutional actors, as they work with one another on a day-to-day basis to make migration decisions. Regardless of these decisions are meaningful and effective, the interactions take many different forms, ranging from preliminary and relatively informal discussions to implementation. Articulations between restriction and expansion andbetween inclusion and exclusion of migrants and between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism have characterized the European immigration policies for over 30 years (ArtalTur et al. 2014: 8). However, it is difficult to draw the line of clear distinction between supranational and intergovernmental management of labour migration issues because of all complexity involved and will continue so in the existence of interconnectedness, interactions and dependence.

A Multi-dimensitional Policy-Making in Migration As discussed in Chapter 6, there is, functionally, a meaningful distinction between institutions clarified by the treaties. Much focus is the formal procedures of migration legislative decisions in the Council, with some

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excellent exceptions, although an elaboration of brief roles of institutions is given. To put it simply, the Commission proposes draft legislation, the EP gives opinion, the Council takes decisions and the Court rules on conflicts. Although role of the institutions are clear-cut as such, their competences, functions and responsibilities often overlap, but mostly reinforce one another. A combination of these characteristics ambiguously constitutes what one might call the supranational policy-making. However, scholarly debate is still going on whether a transformation of the EU from a strong supranational institution into a weaker Union dominated by the national governments or a shift towards a new intergovernmental Union is the case. No matter how and if the institutional dynamics allows the policy-making at different levels of governance, they, in their own rights, exercise significance influence on the migration policy process. The EU as a polity employs different perspectives such as multi-level governance. In this context, the EU’s migration policy demonstrates how power has become dispersed across and between levels. Main assumption is that the European integration can only be understood by emphasizing on the roles played by the institutional and political actors—regional actors–that take part or influence the decision-making process. Within this political context, the EU has the policy system that is subject to different pressures; public pressures, economic changes and external influences (inputs), resulting in producing collective policies (outputs). Not only is the institutions that create policy mechanism, the member states (national government) take actions or avoid opt in office, beyond this institutional existence. Shared responsibilities for the decision-making process produce a complex pattern of negotiation. The policy circle is in logical order at work in the EU from the policy recognition to evaluation and is crucial for understanding the labour migration policy-making. Taking into account this order, the European rules emerge out of the successful treaties and are clarified within the logical progression of steps all of which become areas for the EU politics. These multiple influences have led to a complex and sometimes disorderly labour migration policy environment. Beyond the legal framework, it is impossible to be sure of the source of policy initiatives, or of the key actors involved in the agenda-setting, adoption and implementation of policy on immigration.

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The importance of the interaction between the institutional actors and the national governments could, to a certain extent, constitute supranational mode of decision-making. In this sense, the policy circle can consideredas an importance of the connection between outputs and results, but also awareness of the difficulty faced by policy beneficiaries (the political actors), to define and pursue their interests at such connections. For this reason, disputes are difficult to resolve. When one is assessing whether it may not be better to allow for a multiple influences for supranational governance. In short, the EU could be made more democratic through these institutions and political actors. Regarding the legislative decision-making in the EU, power is dispersed among actors, institutions (and or sectors)ina unique system of multi-governance. It can be easily categorize as a system of cooperating nation states and a system of the supranational institutions. The theoretical approaches make sense of type of decision is made at each level. Key role of influence on the policy process and the mutual dependency among these two system of cooperation are defined by the treaties. Literature on the EU governance suggests that the question of “who and what determines which issues” has much to do with the type of decision-making. Much of the EU legislation is decided in the form of compromise without resorting the formal way of voting in the Council, which may lead to the successful policy outcome, while leaving most controversial issues to be decided by the QMV as to how they might be at the discretion of the national governments. To a considerable extent, the precise content of migration issues discussed at the early stage of decision-making process between the parties to secure agreement before disillusion.

Motivations, Expectations and Realties of Migration Policy Process The Chapter 7 has sought to emphasize that notwithstanding the seemingly bewildering overall labour migration policy process in Europe, recognizing that mutual dependency between the political actors to influence the decision-making. As treaty reforms have made a way towards the institutional advancement of both supranationalism and intergovernmentalism, which are characteristics of the EU even during the migration and economic crises. Ubiquity of controversy and difficulty of finding ways to resolve the issues surrounding labour mobility in Europe, many institutions and the national governments contributed to it presented in

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this chapter. It is highlighted that neither institutional actors and nor the member states are monolithic. If attention is switched to the supranational institutions, such as the Commission and the EP have clearly extended their roles and influence. The EU internal market is dominated by these actors of different origins, who share the same objective on labour mobility and make decisions thereby. At the top of the EU’s institutional architecture, the Commission is generally represents the common interest in furthering the labour market integration, in spite of its marginal influence as a policy proposer. The Commission was assigned a role of the sole proposer of legislation in the EC pillar, while the Council and the EP would take the tasks of the joint legislative decision makers. Where the member states’ proposal in labour mobility is backed by the Commission, one of the resorces is a formal power to set the migration agenda. The Commission is delegated rule-making power to the extent which it does not have to wait for the policy proposal to bring forward by other actors, such as sectoral interests or the member states. In a similar position on the national executives, the Commission identifies the problem in the migration in which the frequent decision has to be made, and then act upon it. Labour migration and other related proposals could offer the basis for autonomous role of the Commission. As for the implementation of legislation, the Commission retains its monopoly of the right. It is therefore inevitable to present the Europeanization solution of the migration problems to the agenda of governments through its advisory committees. The policy-process, with the initiation of the Commission, touches upon deliberations and negotiations on the legislative works has been focused on trying to balance allies between the governments of the member states and the European competence. To the extent of the EU’s labour migration decision-making is shared enormously between the institutional actors, the Council consists of the individual interests of the member states, who are likely to reach decisions to maximise their own benefit or to minimise costs. Given fact that the Council represent the common position of its members, the perceived problems of power being dispersed by increased use of majority voting. The basis of the QMV in the Council, limits on individual control are regarded a blow to the sovereign member states. It is difficult to effect radical change because of unanimity voting can be eased by the treaty

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revisions in the future. Under the co-decision and the cooperation procedure, the Council is obligated to build a complex relationship of compromise and contestation with the Commission and the EP. This is seemingly rather vague, but a general characteristic of multi-level governance, which is distinctively contrast with a state-centrict system. Maintaining the desirable feature of the labour market run counter to the Council’s role on the additional and more specific conditions, and limitations. Being a main institutional winner of the Lisbon Treaty, the EP has clearly assumed increased legislative powers in the labour migration policy process over years. This is because the remit of the co-decision legislative procedure gives the EP co-equal powers with the Council. While the EP acts as the representation of the citizens of Europe, its influence is mostly seen in advancing the project of integration, as in the case of the Commission’s position. But notwithstanding the increased powers and influence it has secured, the EP is no more than intergovernmental organization than those of the national governments, in spite of its exclusion from highlevel, supranational deliberations and decision-making. Indeed, the Commission regularly consults the MEPs, especially for the issue concerning the member of the relevant specialist committee of the EP. In principle, the question of what constitutes the role of EP in cooperation with other institution in particular policy area is associated with the co-decision procedure. The power to block legislation is at the discretion of the EP can actually issue a negative opinion on the proposal. It is largely confined to the consultative roles. The legitimacy of the EP’s democratic mandate may be sustained by the development of a stronger sense of European identity among the EU citizens. Like any EU policy, the ECJ’s role in labour migration policy-process is visible foremost among the other institutions. A dual role is assigned to the Court as directly applying law in migration cases and interpreting migration provisions of the EU law. The Court (the Commission) becomes empower to confirm that the member states function effectively. Falling back on its many sources of information, the Court is expected to reach decisions and, to lesser extent, make precise judgements on the reforming of the EU migration policy. Its judgements, having faithing in exercising authority by more actors (i.e., the national governments) is crucial from policy initiation to implementation. As for the supranational character of the Court, its supremacy applies in the interpretation

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and adjudication of laws, when it establishes legal order, however, having undermining the national court, in migration sense. From the intergovernmental point of view, the bottom line is the member states can, overturn powers that they have given to the Court, when they desire to control migration policy process to their satisfaction A broad enough body of scholarly literature examining the politics of the EU policy-making acknowledged increased capacity to promote labour mobility, which is particularly evidence. However, it does not foster agreement on the driving mechanism debilitating it all. Still, the idea that Union’s institutions should able to control policy-process is plainly challenging. The European leaders face challenges in reaching political agreements, since the EU expanded its involvement on the internal market and freedom of movement across borders. The legislative decisionmaking requires overcoming controversy and disagreement. While individual national migration policies of the 28 member states of the EU have remained diverse, a complex, but the stready process of institutional cooperation has taken place since the introduction of the single market. Analysis demonstrates that the shaping of the migration policy at the EU level is political sensitive. Differences among the national governments’ approach migration policy making suggest that the EU’s labour market should be further liberalized the ways in which economic activity should be permitted. Differentiation is nor permissible in labour mobility area. The status of the EU as a polity that is expected to delivery of coherent and meaning policy outputs forces one to look upon the EU as a supranational organization, with the well-functioning institutions. As being intergovernmental pillar, the JHA is exclusive of these powers and procedures as to the right of initiative is specific to both the Commission and the member states, and the EP plays only consultative role, despite of being democratically elected institution. However, pressing integration forward at a rapid pace seems impossible, because the boundaries between the national policy making and the European policy making have been blurred. A real challenge and complexity lies in where the EU policy process cannot take place at the European level, it is transferred into the national political and the legal system. This is a new complication pointing to a “drift” of authority in the area of migration to the European level. So, it is likely to confront two distinct domains of politics in Europe—the national and the supranational/European level.

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A Political Efficiency of the Migration Policy-Making in the EU As demonstrated in Chapter 8, recent developments entail a comprehensive analysis of the dynamics of institutional change, cooperation, control and competition between the EU institutions.Intra-institutional cooperation is the legacy of the SEA to assign explicit powers to the EU concerning the labour migration issues. To some extent, the EU treaties shed some light on the functions of the institutions regarding policy development. Additional rules of procedure are also applied to the decisionmaking process, apart from regulated by these treaties. These rules and regulations provide latitude for the institutional actors to outline the range and the scope of their activities. More importantly, the EU’s common institutions are often more than mere arbiters in the decision-making process and have become key players at the supranational level, which is very much in line with new institutionalist analysis. This is because articulations between intergovernmentalism and supranationalism have characterized the European immigration policies. As the form of immigration cooperation can be seen among the political actors to the extent that the EU immigration policy still favours supranational incline. Again, the policy-making is extremely complex even with the traditional states. It is even more so in the EU where institutional structures are more in flux, the allocation authority is more contested, and multiple levels of governance engage in multitude of actors in different policy area (Young 2017: 47). The most important features are the decision procedure is that formal rules and structure that give equal decision-making power to two institutions, namely the EP and the Council that in itself makes procedure highly complex and conflictual. It can not be doubt that the Council’s relations with the EP have even become more acute. If these two institutions act in equal footing, each ones try to influence decisionmaking procedure at the experience of others.In political sensitive area, it is difficult to reach compromise and consensus. It is largely accepted that there is a variation in the member states’ policy preferences and positions. The point of departures from acting together is closely associated with their national economic and political attributes. In general, states’ preferences for acting together are readily observable, when they outweigh the disadvantages, primarily economic in kind. Whatever the mix of motives behind it, the Commission’s policy leadership can be explained simply by the renewed drive for the market

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unification. What started as a forum for the EU to challenge the member states soon developed into a machine by which the increasing communitarisation in relation to the decision-making procedures is looked upon an important factor that limits the influence of the member states. Indeed, the Commission regularly consults the MEPs, especially for the issue concerning the member of the relevant specialist committee of the EP. In principle, the question of what constitutes the role of EP in cooperation with other institution in particular policy area is associated with the codecision procedure. The power to block legislation is at the discretion of the EP can actually issue a negative opinion on the proposal. Still, the idea that Union’s institutions should able to control migration policy-process is plainly challenging. The EU has grown from 6 to 28 members which involve in migration process from initiating to implementation. However, these institutional developments do not foster agreement on the driving mechanism debilitating it all. The process will likely become a cumbersome with further expansion in the future, although much has been done to communitarize migration policy. It will come as no surprise, therefore, the EU’s policy process is one that accounts for power struggles and conflict among the relevant institutions and the political actors. For too long, the academic debate is still and will be focused on the question of legislative weight of each institution and the member states for migration policy area. On the way to freeing labour, the key challenge for the policy-makers is to find the right balance between safeguarding the rights of mobile citizens of the EU. Yet, because public perception and opinion are the source of innovative migration policy, they will, at the same time, have to keep an eye on adverse effects on other parts of society, in particularly national citizens and companies.

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Index

A accession countries, 11, 12, 102, 103, 134, 230 actors, 1–3, 6, 8, 9, 11, 15, 20, 22, 23, 31, 32, 34, 36–40, 42–46, 55, 70, 73, 111, 121–123, 127, 132–137, 142, 143, 149, 151, 153–155, 157, 159, 162, 164, 168, 169, 174, 175, 177–180, 182, 189, 191, 196, 198, 203, 204, 206, 208, 210–212, 214, 218, 222, 223, 226, 231, 234–237, 239 adoption, 16, 55, 57, 105, 108, 111, 134, 155, 157, 163, 165, 169, 207, 234 advanced technology, 98 agenda-setting, 140, 155, 157, 158, 169, 187, 208, 215, 234 Amsterdam treaty, 135, 138, 179, 206, 207, 216, 225 anti-discrimination directive, 108, 207

arrangement, 4, 12, 14, 31, 53, 64, 124, 133, 160, 164, 168, 180, 183, 190, 196, 206, 232 asylum policy, 66, 68, 75, 86, 138 authority, 9, 31, 43–47, 73, 124, 133, 143, 147, 153, 155, 170, 180, 184, 205, 211, 212, 237–239 B baby boom, 87 bargaining, 39, 124–127, 151, 177, 195, 199 barriers to mobility, 114, 228 behaviouralism, 34, 35 benchmark, 14, 103, 133, 143, 152, 209 better regulating strategy, 175 blue card scheme, 65, 141, 159, 229 borderless internal market, 53, 112, 224 border management, 68, 75, 109 Brexit, 5, 184 bumpy pattern of policy-making, 170 burden-sharing, 70

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 G. Oguz, ˘ Labour Migration in the European Union, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36185-3

257

258

INDEX

C candidates, 12, 64, 185 Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs), 5 Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, 52 citizens, 4, 5, 17, 20, 30, 50–55, 57, 58, 60, 62–64, 70, 74, 80, 81, 84, 93, 104, 106, 108, 111, 114, 133, 150, 188–190, 192, 214, 225–227, 237, 240 civil society, 2, 67, 133, 231 co-decision procedure, 52, 125, 163–165, 178, 181, 182, 187, 216, 225, 237, 240 cohesion policy, 15, 132, 189, 217 common market, 30, 31, 33, 51, 130, 168, 188, 193, 194, 229 common migration policies, 56, 197, 229, 231 competing interest, 45, 164, 175 complexity, 1, 10, 18, 20, 21, 30, 33, 57, 67, 105, 122, 139, 147, 155, 160, 169, 173, 190, 197, 199, 211, 215, 224, 231, 233, 238 conflict, 7, 12, 14, 21, 41, 65, 72, 107, 123, 143, 158, 186, 208, 211–213, 218, 224, 230, 231, 234, 240 consensus, 3, 4, 56, 121, 150, 169, 179, 212, 215, 239 consultative task, 157 cooperation, 3, 4, 6, 11, 20, 22, 30, 53, 55, 56, 58, 61, 66, 67, 74, 75, 96, 106, 123, 132, 136, 137, 139, 140, 143, 161, 165, 181, 183–186, 194, 195, 197, 203, 205, 206, 209–211, 214, 224–226, 230, 231, 235, 237–240 coordination, 7, 68, 96, 138, 175, 181, 211, 229

Council Conclusions, 66 Council of Ministers, 6, 7, 36, 123, 124, 148, 150, 157, 158, 161, 181 countries of origin, 61, 68, 72, 186, 229 courts, 8, 34, 125, 129, 151, 188, 192, 210, 217 cross-border cooperation, 58 D decision-making, 6, 7, 15, 19, 20, 30, 32–34, 37–40, 42–44, 51, 63, 73, 123, 125, 126, 136–138, 140, 147, 148, 150, 153, 154, 157, 159, 160, 163, 164, 166, 168–170, 174, 178–180, 182–185, 188, 193, 196, 197, 199, 204, 206, 207, 209, 210, 215, 218, 221, 222, 224, 226, 230, 234, 235, 237–240 decisions, 7, 12, 15, 32, 35, 36, 39, 40, 51, 64, 121, 123, 125, 127, 132, 133, 135, 137, 139, 143, 147, 150, 151, 179, 182, 187, 195, 196, 198, 204, 207, 211, 233, 236, 237 deepening process, 138 delegate, 108, 195, 231 democratic control, 3, 208 democratic legitimacy, 13, 42 demographic change, 87, 89, 90, 99 demographic trends, 14, 92 destination countries, 50, 65, 230 development cooperation policies, 86 differentiated integration, 195 directorate-general (DG), 7, 121, 122, 148, 175, 178 discrepancies, 93, 101, 229 discrimination, 10, 93, 102, 103, 106, 108, 114, 129, 189 divergences, 96, 194, 230

INDEX

Dublin Regulation, 69, 158 dynamic labour market, 65

E East-West flow, 63 economic crisis, 14, 21, 54, 82–84, 86, 94, 95, 99, 113, 114, 215, 227, 228, 230 economic development, 59, 82–84, 106, 110, 227, 231 economic efficiency, 94 employment, 2, 4, 5, 10, 15, 18, 33, 51–53, 58, 64, 65, 67, 68, 72, 81, 84–86, 89–96, 98–100, 105, 109, 110, 112, 113, 128, 129, 131–133, 140, 149, 153, 165, 195, 205, 207, 215, 216, 224, 225, 228, 229 enlargement, 6, 11–13, 17, 22, 33, 37, 45, 50, 63, 64, 73, 74, 82, 102, 103, 114, 125, 126, 129, 131, 134, 148, 149, 153, 165, 169, 176, 195, 209, 233 European Agenda on Migration, 68, 72, 86, 151, 180, 181, 204 European Commission, 10–12, 14, 55, 56, 66–68, 72, 74, 80, 82–84, 86, 87, 94–96, 98, 108, 124, 133, 134, 142, 155, 175, 180, 194, 231 European Community (EC), 3, 4, 30, 31, 50, 51, 60, 61, 97, 107, 126, 132, 163, 188, 189, 191, 198, 199, 221, 224, 236 European Court of Justice (ECJ), 6, 7, 43, 51, 52, 56, 74, 94, 122–126, 129, 137, 139, 141, 151, 152, 155, 159, 160, 180, 188–193, 199, 210, 217, 226, 237 European Economic Area, 4, 50

259

European Employment Strategy (EES), 96, 112, 131, 140 European labour markets, 10, 15, 16, 31, 52, 70, 73, 74, 79, 87–91, 94, 99, 102, 103, 128, 130–132, 193, 215, 229, 230 European Parliament (EP), 7, 55, 165, 166, 206 European Single Market (ESM), 1, 9, 14, 31, 126, 128, 194 European Union (EU), 59, 109 Europe Flagship initiative, 109 evaluation, 20, 23, 112, 168, 216, 224, 234 expulsion of foreign nationals, 106

F fiscal surveillance, 210 flanking measures, 109 flexibility, 17, 79, 96, 109, 133, 140, 159, 215 flexible workforce, 90, 96 flows, 4, 5, 13, 16, 18, 19, 60, 62, 64, 65, 68, 80–83, 97, 102, 103, 105, 134, 185, 230 foreign-born person, 93 foreign-born unemployment, 94 foreign-born workforce, 93 formulation, 8, 38, 41, 133, 139, 143, 157, 159, 161, 169, 221, 222 freedom movement of labour, 4–6, 9, 12, 14, 16, 22, 49–51, 53, 55, 70, 74, 79, 84, 103, 104, 112, 128, 130, 169, 174, 192, 199, 203, 205, 214, 217, 224–228, 230 free movement principle, 4, 5, 12, 29, 49, 52, 54, 104, 183, 228

260

INDEX

G geographical balance, 68 geographical mobility, 53, 73, 91, 169, 178, 182 glass ceiling effects, 102 global competition for talent, 105, 111 global financial crisis, 84, 86 globalization, 17, 18, 21, 106, 122 globalization of migration, 18 governance, 1, 6, 8, 11, 15, 19, 20, 23, 29–33, 35, 43–47, 121–123, 125, 126, 130, 133, 138, 141–143, 152–155, 159, 169, 175, 176, 188, 191, 193, 203, 204, 209, 211, 221–223, 231, 232, 234, 235, 237, 239 grand integration theory, 33

H harmonization, 106–108, 111, 114, 123, 129, 192, 197, 230 highly skilled labour force, 65 high-wage destination countries, 64, 82 historical institutionalism, 23, 35, 39–41, 46 horizontal conflicts, 103 human capital, 3, 97, 99, 100, 132 humanitarian support, 158

I ideological position, 215 illegal immigration, 65 implementation, 30, 50, 58, 67, 71, 108, 123–125, 127, 129, 130, 133, 149, 155, 159–162, 168, 169, 174, 175, 178, 180, 185, 186, 204, 207, 215–217, 222, 226, 233, 234, 236, 237, 240

income, 5, 12, 13, 65, 103, 110, 166, 167, 186, 227 incrementalism, 61, 63, 173, 225 influence, 3, 7–9, 13, 20, 22, 32, 34–36, 38, 43, 45, 46, 56, 64, 105, 121, 123, 124, 135, 137, 143, 149, 151, 153, 157, 159, 161, 174, 181–185, 187, 194, 197, 198, 207, 208, 212, 217, 218, 222, 224, 232, 234–237, 239, 240 input, 19, 37, 153, 161, 169, 173, 182, 197, 222, 234 institutional actors, 2, 19, 22, 23, 64, 123, 148, 168, 169, 180, 183, 222, 226–228, 232, 233, 235, 236, 239 institutional development, 1, 8, 22, 31, 34, 41, 52, 203, 222, 240 institutional dynamics, 15, 151, 234 institutional functions, 30 institutions, 1–7, 9, 20, 22, 30, 32, 34–40, 42, 44, 46, 52, 58, 61, 64, 69, 73, 74, 82, 121, 122, 125, 126, 136, 137, 142, 147– 150, 152, 154, 157, 158, 161, 165, 168, 169, 174, 176–178, 180, 185, 188, 197–199, 203, 204, 206, 207, 209–212, 214, 215, 217, 218, 221–223, 226, 229, 231, 233–240 integration, 3, 4, 7, 8, 10, 14–16, 18–21, 29, 30, 33, 40, 44, 45, 49, 55, 57, 58, 60, 61, 65, 66, 68, 70, 73, 84, 92–96, 105–108, 111, 113, 122, 128, 129, 131, 132, 136, 140, 148, 149, 151, 155, 185, 186, 188–191, 195, 197, 209, 210, 212, 215, 221, 222, 225, 228–230, 232, 236–238

INDEX

intergovernmental decision-making, 124, 151 intergovernmentalism, 14, 39, 45, 46, 136–138, 140, 143, 198, 215, 218, 221, 233, 235, 239 internal market, 4, 30, 40, 49, 51, 79, 84, 113, 128, 137, 148, 151, 183, 195, 203, 205, 228, 236, 238 international migration, 17, 58, 59, 69, 71, 214 international relations (IR), 30, 45 intra-EU mobility, 58, 71, 83, 223, 233 intra-institutional cooperation, 180, 239 irregular migration, 11, 66–70, 72, 74, 109, 128, 196, 227 J job creation, 83, 106 job mobility, 109 job-seekers, 58, 107, 112 judicial activism, 74, 151, 191, 192, 199 jurisdiction, 56, 58, 64, 82, 125, 126, 137, 150, 189, 210, 217, 226 Justice and home affairs (JHA), 7, 53 L labour flows, 12, 17, 22, 23, 64, 74, 80, 86, 106, 197, 227 labour market divergencies, 111 labour market rigidities, 130, 182, 227 labour market shortages, 90 labour mobility, 2–5, 9, 10, 12, 14, 21, 22, 24, 33, 46, 50, 52, 54, 56, 57, 59, 62, 64, 65, 73, 79, 83, 84, 87, 89, 96, 99, 103, 107, 113–115, 164, 169, 173, 176,

261

181–184, 199, 203, 205, 208, 215, 223, 224, 228, 229, 231, 232, 235, 236, 238 legal instruments, 62, 67, 74 legal migration, 11, 17, 56, 59, 65, 66, 68, 72, 74, 86, 87, 130, 226, 227, 229 legislation, 4, 8, 19, 20, 31, 35, 36, 38, 40, 41, 44, 50, 52, 55, 57, 69, 72, 108, 109, 125, 126, 133, 135, 138, 141, 143, 149, 152, 157, 159, 160, 162–164, 169, 174, 175, 178, 180–185, 187, 189, 191, 192, 195–197, 207, 208, 211, 218, 226, 234, 236, 237, 240 legislative power, 22, 45, 123, 129, 163, 180, 187, 188, 193, 207, 237 legislative procedures, 15, 56, 124, 125, 147, 153, 162, 163, 185, 208, 237 legislative proposal, 129, 148, 150, 163, 165, 169, 174, 176, 181, 184, 187, 189, 194, 204, 216–218 liberalization, 17 life expectancy, 87 Lisbon European Council, 99, 139 Lisbon objectives, 91 Lisbon Treaty, 13, 14, 19, 55, 56, 73, 103, 130, 138, 148, 150, 151, 155, 163, 180, 185, 189, 198, 225, 226, 232, 237 lobbying, 8, 38, 157, 164 local government, 6, 141, 147 lower-skilled migrant, 105, 111 lowest common denominator, 154, 159 low skill workers, 98

262

INDEX

M membership, 12, 37, 82, 104, 133, 135, 161, 189, 197 member states, 2, 4, 7–9, 11–15, 18–22, 29–31, 36, 38, 41, 43–45, 49–59, 61, 64, 65, 67, 69–71, 73, 74, 79–84, 89–94, 96, 98, 99, 101, 103–111, 113–115, 121–123, 126, 128, 130–134, 136–143, 148, 150– 155, 158–165, 168, 169, 173, 175, 177–180, 182–186, 189– 197, 199, 203–212, 214–218, 221–234, 236–240 migrant inflow, 73, 114, 147, 177 migration crisis, 10, 13, 54, 67, 68, 70, 74, 84, 111, 127, 134, 142, 158, 178, 184, 186, 194, 196, 218, 227, 233 migration decision-making, 11, 174, 179, 184, 221, 222, 236 migration flows, 5, 18, 56, 61, 69, 80, 131, 196 migratory pressure, 65, 110, 181, 204 migratory routes, 68 motor of integration, 177 multinational level policy process, vi multiple channels, 161 multiple influences, 161, 234, 235

N national governments, 5, 8, 9, 12–14, 16, 20, 21, 31, 36, 37, 40–46, 68, 103, 124, 128, 133, 137, 138, 141–143, 148, 153, 154, 160, 164, 168–170, 176, 182, 188, 189, 192–194, 196, 198, 199, 207, 210, 214–216, 221– 223, 226, 227, 230, 232–235, 237, 238 national identity, 59, 83, 227

national interests, 3, 14, 41, 56, 83, 107, 133, 157, 158, 178, 194, 199, 226 national wage system, 64, 81 native-born youth, 93 negotiation process, 126, 127, 163, 209 neofunctionalism, 32, 44, 46 new governance, 222 new institutionalism, 23, 34, 35, 42, 46, 222 New Skills Agenda, 65, 98 non-discrimination, 52, 189, 203, 217 North-West Europe, 60 O old age dependency, 89 outflow rate, 81 output, 13, 30, 46, 73, 84, 111, 121, 125, 153, 161, 164, 169, 179, 182, 208, 228, 234, 235, 238 over-qualification, 101, 102, 114, 229 P passport-free travel, 54 polarization of skill experiences, 98 policy agenda, 20, 68, 157, 158, 168, 176, 221, 226 policy circle, 155, 159, 161, 234, 235 policy coordination, 137, 175, 180, 195, 203, 205 policy instruments, 112, 153, 177, 178, 185, 197, 208 policy-making, 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13–15, 20–23, 29–35, 43–45, 47, 49, 55, 62, 63, 73, 121–126, 128, 129, 136, 139, 142, 143, 147, 155, 158, 159, 161, 169, 173, 180, 193, 197, 203–205, 207, 215, 218, 222, 223, 230, 232, 234, 238, 239

INDEX

policy preferences, 174, 239 policy-process, 20, 126, 197, 205, 232, 236–238, 240 Polish Plumber, 64 political controversy, 13, 105 political dialogue, 184 political efficiency, 61 political parties, 6–8, 32, 71, 122, 142, 149, 214, 231 polity, 45, 46, 61, 121, 194, 234, 238 poor working conditions, 108 population ageing, 87, 90, 113, 228 population declining, 65 populist right-wing parties, 10 post-transtional, 87 power, 1, 6–8, 11, 21, 22, 29, 32, 34–38, 40–46, 52, 71, 73, 121–123, 125–127, 129, 132, 135–137, 139, 142, 149, 151, 154, 155, 157–160, 162, 163, 169, 174, 175, 177–181, 183–185, 187, 188, 191, 193, 194, 197, 198, 206, 208–212, 214, 217, 218, 221–223, 229, 231–240 pressure groups, 32 principle, 3–6, 8, 12, 14, 35, 37, 38, 42, 45, 49, 51–53, 56, 57, 64, 66, 68, 70, 73, 74, 82, 84, 97, 110, 113, 132–134, 138, 141, 142, 147, 148, 153, 158, 160, 170, 174, 183, 185, 187, 189, 193, 198, 199, 203, 214, 215, 217, 224–228, 230, 237, 240 professional qualifications, 100 public opinion, 13, 153, 158, 168 public policy, 4, 8, 135, 170, 214 public unemployment spending, 112 Q Qualified Majority Voting (QMV), 51 qualified pool of workers, 2, 97

263

R rational choice institualism, 23, 35–37, 43, 46 referendum, 5, 12, 89, 104, 189 regulation, 2, 6, 10, 23, 31, 32, 50, 51, 57, 64, 69, 70, 74, 81, 82, 96, 112, 121, 128–130, 132, 137, 148, 152, 160, 169, 182, 189, 204, 207, 230, 232, 239 regulatory state, 31, 128 research, 16–18, 20, 21, 33, 40, 41, 64, 81, 128, 132, 135, 136, 155, 211, 231 research question, 6, 19 Residents Directive, 72 restrictions, 11, 13, 17, 53, 55, 94, 134, 176, 205, 225, 227, 228, 233 restrictive policy, 11, 60 rules, 4, 5, 7, 12, 19, 23, 30, 35, 36, 39, 41, 45, 46, 49, 53, 56, 57, 63, 64, 68, 72–74, 96, 104, 108, 110, 121, 128, 129, 133, 137, 148, 155, 165, 168–170, 174, 179, 181, 182, 184, 188, 190–192, 197, 205, 209, 210, 218, 226, 234, 239 S Schengen Agreement, 9, 53, 54, 61, 225 Schengen Treaty, 225 seasonal work, 105 Single European Act, 38, 63, 183 single external border, 53, 225 Single Permit Directive, 72 skills, 14, 18, 64, 65, 72, 74, 83, 90, 97–99, 101, 102, 109, 113, 114, 123, 127, 131, 176, 205, 226 skill shortages, 99, 102, 114 Social Action Programme, 93 social chapter, 40

264

INDEX

social policy, 16, 79, 108, 114, 132 social provisions, 106, 107, 114 social security coordination, 4, 107, 185, 207 social stability, 83 sociological institutionalism, 35, 41–43, 46, 223 soft governance tool, 152 solidarity, 56, 66, 70, 74, 106, 114, 134, 227, 231 South-South flows, 66 state-centric governance, 43 strategic calculation, 42, 129 subsidiarity, 45, 134, 139, 141, 210, 215 supranational actors, 9, 19, 36, 37, 43, 44, 126, 153, 154, 222, 223, 232 T tactical manoeuvring, 157 temporary immigration, 84, 96 third country nationals, 53, 56, 57, 64, 65, 130, 204 trade-off, 181, 207 transitional arrangements, 11 treaties, 8, 15, 41, 49, 50, 58, 59, 62, 79, 106, 114, 124, 126, 127, 135, 148, 160, 169, 175, 178, 185, 189, 191, 198, 203, 207, 210, 217, 228, 233–235, 239 Treaty of Rome, 3, 9, 29, 49, 127, 148, 179, 188, 199, 215, 216, 224 Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), 4, 9, 10, 16, 49, 52, 53, 56, 62, 132, 133, 138, 175, 181, 186, 204, 206, 208, 224, 225, 232 U unanimity voting, 139, 150, 225, 236

union, 6, 13–15, 30, 41, 45, 72, 74, 107, 109, 122, 129, 130, 132–134, 143, 154, 175, 176, 181, 190, 195, 203, 205, 210, 226–228, 234, 238, 240 unrestricted access, 35 unskilled-labour market, 94

V vertical skills mismatches, 101 vocational training, 101, 112, 135 voting weight, 166, 188, 197

W wage increments, 83, 106 wages, 12, 16–18, 33, 80, 94, 103–105, 111, 114 weighty player, 207 welfare state, 31 Western European capitalism, 59 widening process, 13, 33, 105, 131 workers, 2, 4–6, 10, 11, 15–19, 22, 49–52, 54, 56–59, 61, 62, 64, 65, 67, 73, 80, 82, 83, 90, 91, 96–99, 102, 103, 105–109, 111, 114, 122, 131, 133, 134, 168, 176, 184, 185, 188–193, 207, 215, 225, 228 workforce, 90, 96, 99, 100, 108, 228, 229 working age population, 80, 87, 89, 90, 99, 115

X xenophobia, 10, 108

Y young population structures, 89