(Sergio Briguglio
4/12/2002)
Abstract: An important asymmetry exists between asylum and immigration: only the former corresponds to a right. The asylum seeker has the right to be admitted into the destination country (non refoulement principle) until his request is proved to be unfounded. No right of admission is recognized to the economic migrant: he is accepted or not on the basis of rules based on the country's convenience.
Can such rules be fixed by the labour market? There is a risk of labour market failure due to the distance between the (potential) migrant and the destination country: such a distance indeed can cause a) the migrant to have incomplete information about the real situation of the labour market; b) an impossibility of repatriating in the case of failure of the job search, because of the amount of travel expenses, previous debts, etc.. The market failure occurs, when both these conditions happen to a certain migrant: expensive forms of public assistance or removal are required to avoid unacceptable conditions for the migrant.
State intervention is then
required to prevent this market failure. Minimum intervention could be aimed to avoid just one of the two damaging
effects of the distance mentioned above. Italian policy has tried, in the last
fifteen years, to prevent
incomplete information: formally, migrant workers have been admitted
only if a job contract had been previously established. This solution seems to
be a purely formal one, as there is no way to get a job
contract while still residing abroad. In fact, direct contact between workers and employers is
necessary before employment is offered and accepted for all the main
sectors of the labour market where foreign workers are required
(home-assistance services, work in small-size factories, etc.).
The main consequence of such unrealistic policy
is that foreign workers try to migrate in any way possible, in order to get the employment.
In the years 1990-1998 there has been an average of 79,000 illegal
migrants per year who got a residence permit through a regularization process,
versus an average of 22,000 legally allowed migrants per year. NGOs working on
immigration, however, are sure that even the latter got their job contract, in
fact, sur place, before going back home
to ask for a regular visa. Therefore, the rate of illegal migration amounts to
80-100 % of the whole economic-migration flux: it should be considered a State failure!
An alternative (and more reasonable) approach could be aimed to prevent the second effect – namely, the impossibility of repatriating. The admission of the migrant worker (for a job search) should be decided by the self-sustaining ability of the worker – the ability to cover living and repatriation expenses. The worker is allowed to perform temporary or permanent work: the former enables him to renew his economic resources and, consequently, to prolong his stay permit; the latter motivates the release of a long-term residence permit.
Such an approach could establish a sort of right of immigration: the admission is decided by precise, subjective data of the migrant, not by political motivations. The basic elements of this approach are contained in the EU Commission proposal for a Council directive on the conditions of entry and residence of third-country nationals for the purpose of paid employment and self-employed economic activities. The same elements have been however recently criticized by all the representatives of the EU governments in the ad hoc working group.