Migration from the developing countries to the European industrialised countries
Doc. 7628
5 September 1996
REPORT[1]
Rapporteur: Mr JUNGHANNS, Germany, Group of the European People's Party
Summary
Migration movements from the developing countries to the European industrialised countries have been a consistent trend for almost the last two centuries. In certain periods they have been encouraged by the host countries in which there was demand for cheap labour. In recent years these movements have tended to intensify, with some negative consequences for both countries of origin and host countries.
In order to diminish migration movements, and avoid the effects of increasing illegal residence and exclusion of certain migrant groups, a series of measures is proposed. These aim at dissuading potential migrants from emigrating by establishing a comprehensive European migration policy which would include monitoring migration routes, ethnic conflicts and human rights violations; direct intervention in migration processes through carefully targetted, project-based economic development policy measures; and global responsibility for solving regional problems.
Steps should also be taken to improve the living conditions of migrants in host countries, and to address the problems arising from the presence of long-term illegal migrants.
I. Draft recommendation
1. The Parliamentary Assembly welcomes the conclusions of the 6th Conference of European Ministers responsible for Migration Affairs, which constitute an important step towards a comprehensive European migration policy. It notes with satisfaction that, in accordance with the Assembly's Recommendation 1278 (1995), the ministers recommended that the Council of Europe should serve as a permanent forum for co-operation between the member states and other international organisations in regard to policies on migration and refugees.
2. Immigrants make a significant contribution to the social, economic and political development of industrialised countries. However, if immigration is higher than the capacity of the labour market to absorb new entrants, as observed over recent decades, this may have negative consequences for the social, economic and political stability of industrialised countries.
3. Migration has various effects on the emigration countries. At first it may result in the social, economic and political weakening of local communities through depopulation. However, through migrants' remittances and investments, it can contribute to the improvement of social and economic infrastructure and to local, regional and national development.
4. The Parliamentary Assembly is aware that the high level of unemployment in all European countries does not allow for immigration with a view to permanent settlement. However, the member states should be encouraged to facilitate short-term migration. The aim should be to ensure that these movements take place within legal channels and are not misused as a means to permanent settlement.
5. Recalling its Recommendation 1211 (1993) on clandestine migration: traffickers and employers of clandestine migrants, the Parliamentary Assembly is concerned by the problems arising from the continued presence of clandestine migrants, who are particularly vulnerable to exclusion, exploitation and human rights abuses.
6. The best way to reduce high migration pressure is to intensify efforts aiming at eliminating the reasons for migration by means of policies designed, where necessary, to consolidate human rights and democracy and to give significant impetus to economic development, particularly through migration-related projects.
7. The Assembly therefore recommends that the Committee of Ministers:
i. follow up the recommendations of the European Ministers responsible for Migration Affairs adopted at their 6th Conference in Warsaw, with a view to promoting coherent migration policies among the member states;
ii. intensify the monitoring of long-term developments in migration movements with a view to identifying feasible policy options;
iii. encourage the strengthening of bilateral and multilateral programmes for development in the countries of origin and study ways to make this aid as effective as possible;
iv. strengthen relations with non-governmental organisations concerned with human rights in areas of intensive emigration, and promote the networking of their activities;
v. study measures to prevent and reduce irregular migration;
vi. study the problems arising from the continued presence of clandestine migrants in the member states;
vii. invite the member states:
a. to provide increased economic resources for migration-related development projects, such as return programmes, assistance in the locality of origin, population programmes, and infrastructural aid;
b. to provide assistance for activities organised by migrants themselves, such as improvement of local medical and social care, with a view to encouraging returns;
c. to improve the living conditions of the poorest migrants;
d. to sign and ratify, if they have not already done so, the European and international conventions designed to improve the status of immigrants, notably the Convention on the Participation of Foreigners in Public Life at Local Level and the European Convention on the Legal Status of Migrant Workers;
e. to sign and ratify, if they have not already done so, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination;
f. to follow up energetically at national level the results of the Council of Europe's Plan of Action on combating racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and intolerance;
g. to consider the conclusion of bilateral agreements with the aim of admitting short-term migrants to a limited extent and under well-defined conditions as a means of reducing irregular migration;
h. to take appropriate measures to moderate migration flows;
i. to continue efforts to conclude readmission agreements with the countries of origin in which human rights are respected in accordance with Council of Europe standards.
II. Explanatory memorandum
by Mr JUNGHANNS[2]
Contents
I. INTRODUCTION
1. Migration currents in the post-war period
a. Colonial and post-colonial migration
b. Expellees: displaced persons
c. Internal migration processes as preliminary forms of
external migration
d. Guest worker policy
e. New immigrants
2. Definition of migration
a. The political definition
b. Refugees are a special kind of migrants
c. Reasons for illegality
II. ANALYSIS OF CONTEMPORARY MIGRATION TRENDS
1. Reasons for the present pattern of migration flows
a. Transformation of migrant types
b. Educational revolution and the lack of jobs
c. Global cities as sources of migration
d. Blockade of the elites
e. Ethnic networks
f. Flexibility of migration frequencies
g. Flight and ethnic conflicts
2. Problems of clandestine migration
a. Clandestine immigration as a consequence of restrictive policies
b. Places of illegality
c. Diverse forms of illegality
d. Illegality and policy-making
III. EFFECTS OF MIGRATION
A. In the countries of immigration
1. Effects on the societies of the receiving countries
a. The utility of immigration
b. Sectoral and fragmental economic upheavals
c. Economic upheaval and unemployment
d. The �complementary� international labour market
e. Ethnicization and cultural change
2. Completion of immigrant communities, migrants as minorities
a. The completion of communities
b. Elites and policies towards minorities
c. Return and integration
d. Origin orientation
e. Diasporas
3. Brief analysis of integration problems
a. What is integration?
b. Rights of immigrants
c. Racism and discrimination
d. Differing approaches
e. Illegal immigrants in the welfare state
B. In the countries of emigration
1. Contribution to development
a. Country and city dwellers
b. Chain migration and ethnic networks
c. First development surges in the region of origin
d. Transfer of resources
e. Migrants and foreign exchange
f. No uniformity
g. Urbanized migration and development
IV. CONTROL MECHANISMS FOR MIGRATION MOVEMENTS
1. Economic development in the countries of origin
a. Development and the decision to migrate
b. No uniform concept
2. Development aid
a. Projects and national programmes
b. Return programmes
c. Assistance in the locality of origin
d. Population programmes
e. Infrastructural aid and diasporas
f. Assistance through diasporas
3. Improvement of the human rights situation in the countries of origin
a. Development aid and human rights
b. International and non-governmental organisations (NGOs)
4. Immigration control mechanisms
a. Immigration control thwarted
b. Visa exemption and migration reduction
c. Need for an integrated immigration policy
V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
a. Three kinds of policy
b. Monitoring
c. Intervention
d. Regionalization and localization of policy
I. INTRODUCTION
1. Migration currents in the post-war period
a. Colonial and post-colonial migration
1. The first phase of migration from Third World countries after the Second World War derived from colonial relationships. The major colonial countries (Belgium, France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom) defined their dependent territories as part of their national territory. Even as early as the nineteenth century, former colonial officers as well as people of other trades, such as seamen and soldiers, who had served the colonial power were accepted as immigrants. Collaborators were also admitted. As a rule, no racial differentiation was made. Immigration flows thus developed at an early stage from West Africa and the Maghreb to France, from the Indian colonies and other parts of the later Commonwealth to the United Kingdom and from Indonesia and the South American possessions to the Netherlands. The first immigrant populations came into being that would later further the admission of other immigrants as chain migrants. These migration processes continued into the sixties. They intensified even later in Portugal in the wake of the 1974 democratic revolution.
b. Expellees: displaced persons
2. The events of the second World War intensified the colonial and post-colonial migration flows to Europe and gave rise to the movement of what were called displaced persons and diaspora refugees from the eastern and central European war theatres to Western Europe, where they received support through settlement programmes.
c. Internal migration processes as preliminary forms of external migration
3. Internal migration processes on the Iberian and the Italian peninsulas and in Greece and Turkey seem to have been particularly significant after 1945. These movements, themselves to be understood as an expression of domestic development differentials, paved the way for later �guest worker� migrations. During the fifties most of the industrialised regions of Europe underwent a phase of industrial growth of unexpected intensity. The rapid industrial buildup immediately resulted in internal rural depopulation and the so-called �guest worker� immigration.
d. Guest worker policy
4. The basis for the �guest worker� migration itself was the recruitment of rural labour for poorly-paid, arduous jobs for which there was little demand among the native populations. Immigration from the British colonies was promoted by the State and adapted to industrial development in the British Isles; the Benelux countries, too, recruited labour first of all from their former colonies, though some was recruited from Mediterranean countries. France intensified migration from the Maghreb on a planned basis; it was later reinforced by the Algerian civil war. But on the whole this recruitment basis was insufficient, so migrants from Turkey, Morocco and Tunisia were also recruited in the individual European countries. These migration waves very quickly led to the formation of migration focal points in Europe's traditional industrial regions. The interest shown at that time in limiting the duration of stay of such workers was later put aside because of the cost that would be involved in training new workers, so that the rotation systems collapsed and the duration of stay of the immigrant workers constantly grew. This created one of the preconditions for the family reunification phase of immigration, which continued on into the nineties after direct recruiting ended with the 1973 oil price shock.
e. New immigrants
5. Developments in the Third World and in particular the relative improvement of the income of the middle classes made it possible for many people to finance their passage to Europe, even at the risk of being deported. The costs of international mobility fell and communication routes were modernized, so that growing international mobility was observed from the sixties onwards. At first this involved the upper social classes in the Third World, who usually emigrated to the countries of their former colonial rulers when new states were established or regimes changed. Later they were followed by people with little money in their pockets and with little training. These made greater use of the gate of asylum to immigrate, because as a rule this guaranteed a longer-term stay. The intensified use of the European asylum laws since the end of the seventies has led to repeated asylum legislation reforms. In the eighties, and then in the wake of the opening of the Iron Curtain, the number of asylum-seekers increased. The western European countries reacted with mutually reinforced restrictions on the right of asylum and with a frontier policy to be framed in common. Since then those migrating to western Europe tend rather to be civil war refugees and persons classified as illegal immigrants. In the nineties, there has been a revival of �guest worker� and service contract programmes.
2. Definition of migration
a. The political definition
6. Historically, the migration flows outlined above are easy to distinguish. However, they are part of a consistent social trend that will be described below. In general, migrants are persons who move from one social context to another over a certain distance and for an extended period. This abstract and frequently altered definition includes forced migration, that is, migration by refugees. An initial typology of migrants can be developed based on political considerations or research interests. From the political point of view, a distinction between refugees and migrants seems necessary. Refugees are generally defined as those migrants whose primary reason for migration is direct violence (or fear of persecution, as the Geneva Convention puts it). People who cross frontiers in search of work are defined as migrant workers. However, the distinction between refugees and migrant workers is primarily a political and not a social or economic distinction.
b. Refugees are a special kind of migrants
7. It is now a commonplace that political refugees have come to Germany and other European countries as migrant workers, during the dictatorships in Spain, Portugal and Greece, for instance, to seek protection from persecution. The refugees may even have viewed their flight themselves as labour migration. Conversely, migrant workers have attempted since the seventies to gain entry into the industrialised European countries through the gate of asylum. To that extent the definitions overlap, but still it is of fundamental importance to retain the concept of refugee as an international instrument for guaranteeing human rights against the background of escalating persecution. The assumption that refugees come only because of political persecution has led European policy into a blind alley. The image of the refugee as an individualized bourgeois who flees with his fortune and depends on his own resources and those of his friends to survive is obviously outdated. Today refugees come because of ethnic and religious group conflicts and often belong to the less prosperous, though seldom to the lower, classes in their societies of origin. Migrant workers, on the other hand, are increasingly well educated and skilled, come from proletarianized or sub-proletarianized urban classes, and migrate to the industrialised countries in the context of a world-wide ethnic grid of social relationships and on the basis of a global labour market.
c. Reasons for illegality
8. The closing of gates of entry confronts both migration currents with restrictions that force migrants into illegality. This illegal immigration can thus be seen as the result of a migration policy that is limited to the mere closing of gates of immigration without taking the changing demand for immigrants in Europe and the inherent dynamics of migration systems and ethnic networks into account.
II. ANALYSIS OF CONTEMPORARY MIGRATION TRENDS
1. Reasons for the present pattern of migration flows
a. Transformation of migrant types
9. Since the mid-eighties it has been possible to speak of a fundamental transformation in migration flows within the Third World. These migration flows are generally conditioned by short-term labour migrations or mass flight. Moreover, since the seventies the industrialised countries of Europe, North America and East Asia have been more intensively integrated in new, world-wide migration systems. This has involved a change in the living conditions in almost all countries of the Third World as well as in the manner of migration and the social groups that emigrate and immigrate. The success that the Green Revolution at least temporarily had is of particular importance. The rapid mechanization and industrialization of agriculture reduced the demand for manpower in the countryside. The typical peasant was reduced to subsistence farming or had to migrate to urban areas. There was an explosive increase in cash-crop production. This brought with it an increase in the number of seasonally employed farm workers and an improvement in the living conditions of landowners in the Third World, so that it is possible to speak of a transition from large-scale farmer and lord of the manor to agricultural entrepreneur. The consequence is the slow disappearance, with variations from region to region, of the poor and small-scale peasantry.
b. Educational revolution and the lack of jobs
10. Almost all countries of the Third World have revolutionized their educational and health domains. Educational institutions everywhere are producing graduates looking for white-collar, civil service or similar jobs. But only a fraction of this group of people with intermediate and higher education can be integrated into suitable vocational positions. Large sections of these educated classes sink into the sub-proletariat of the Third World metropolises, where they form a reserve for world-wide migration.
c. Global cities as sources of migration
11. The metropolises known as �global cities� have novel characteristics connected with the internal migration outlined above. They have a large manpower potential that is supplemented from abroad to fill special niches, and their economies are oriented towards the world market. Corporations from the First and Third Worlds have their business offices there, and the working conditions and conditions of production are virtually indistinguishable from those in the First World. A part of the above-mentioned educated proletariat is entrepreneurially active in the informal sector and can accumulate an income that is low but still sufficient for later emigration. Thus the global cities affect the international labour markets as exporters and importers of migrants.
d. Blockade of the elites
12. All the countries of the Third World are affected by the problem of a stagnating elite replacement process, since a regular exchange of elites through democratic succession seldom takes place. Almost all countries are subject to a sine-curve changeover from dictatorship to democracy and the reverse. For the upwardly mobile and entrepreneurially active classes, this is a regular source of disillusionment. With the end of the anti-colonial and anti-imperialist ideologies, the utopia of advancement through revolutionary liberation movements and political parties collapsed for the educated youth of the Third World, and the sclerosis of the existing elites meant that chances of advancement remained limited. This too nurtures the wish to emigrate.
e. Ethnic networks
13. The importance of ethnic networks for migration patterns is one of the central findings of migration theory. For almost all citizens and ethnic groups from the Third World in almost all western European countries, corresponding communities have emerged that serve as mediation points or bridgeheads for migration. Such communities are often small, but they can comprise several hundred thousand people. The most significant communities at the present time stem from the �guest worker� migration phase, and this is where the largest immigration figures are to be found at the present time. Many immigrants today try to gain admission by asking for asylum, and there are probably many illegal immigrants in these communities.
f. Flexibility of migration frequencies
14. The improvements in communication and transport already mentioned as well as the existing income differentials tend to make migrants more flexible. They enable migrants to resettle for a short period, assume certain tasks and then return. Such rotation, produced through the needs of the migrants, can possibly change the process of community formation. The flexibility of migration frequencies corresponds to the demand for cheap and flexible manpower in the European countries. It has led to the development of a complex, largely illegal labour market extending from semi-legally employed construction crews through cleaning-women and baby-sitters to seasonal workers in agriculture.
g. Flight and ethnic conflicts
15. The most significant movements of refugees to Europe in terms of numbers are those that came about in the course of nation-state formation and in the context of ethnic conflicts. These refugees can easily become immigrants, especially since many of them cannot be sent back to their regions of origin because of the international human rights covenants. Since the paths of refuge also pass through the existing bridgeheads of the ethnic networks, there is again a clear link here between flight from civil wars and labour migration.
2. Problems of clandestine migration
a. Clandestine immigration as a consequence of restrictive policies
16. Clandestine migration to Europe comes about when gates of entry � that is, possibilities of entry created by political decisions or geographic conditions � are closed at a time of growing or continuing demand for cheap and flexible manpower. This is not a separate migration phenomenon, since clandestine immigration occurs in all the migration systems mentioned: among migrant workers and diaspora immigrants no less than among migrants from the metropolises of the Third World and among refugees from poverty and civil war. There are now an estimated one million illegal immigrants in France (the lowest estimate is 300,000), and it is presumed that the figure for Germany is higher. In Berlin alone there are assumed to be between 70,000 and 100,000 clandestine migrants; sometimes figures between 200,000 and 500,000 are cited.
b. Places of illegality
17. In respect of clandestine migration, a distinction has to be made between illegal sojourn and illegal employment. Migrants without legal residence status are illegally employed in a wide range of industries: in the domestic sector, in the entertainment and amusement business, and in the catering industry as well as in all the branches that large industries and administrations eliminate as part of their austerity drives. This applies to cleaning services, security services, waste recycling and so on. The ethnic economies, which have taken on greater significance in recent years, are also employing more illegal manpower for the dirtier and heavier jobs. Construction is one of the economic sectors presently employing illegal manpower rather than modernizing and automating. To some extent this manpower reserve fluctuates between accepting illegal employment and drawing benefits from the welfare state.
c. Diverse forms of illegality
18. To a relatively large extent, illegal employment came about as a side-effect of existing work contract agreements concluded with countries outside the Union. In the last three years, however, illegality has arisen with the implementation of the Schengen Agreement and the increasing freedom of movement within Europe. It is not changing one's place inside western Europe that is illegal, however, but accepting employment without the requisite registration for taxation and welfare-state purposes. The grey area is growing, since contract workers try to use intermediary firms in other European countries to veil their illegality. Clandestine migration seems to be on the increase in the Mediterranean countries in particular.
d. Illegality and policy-making
19. Illegality has increased in the context of these different paths of immigration, but it is still far below the estimates that were constantly being propagated by demographers in the eighties and early nineties. What is taking place is rather a systematic infiltration of immigrants who use the existing ethnic networks as orientation-points. Gaining normal resident status remains a key problem for this immigrant population. Whereas in the eighties and to some extent in the nineties growing numbers of immigrants tried to acquire legitimate resident status through asylum applications, large groups of immigrants today have no access to such an instrument. Since Europe can hardly be interested in the long-term presence of population groups that are not legally settled and who are particularly vulnerable to exploitation and human rights abuses. The problems raised by the presence of large numbers of clandestine migrants should be addressed by the appropriate intergovernmental committees of the Council of Europe. This would be in keeping with the Parliamentary Assembly's Recommendation 1211 (1993) on clandestine migration: traffickers and employers of clandestine migrants and also with the final communiqu� of the Sixth Conference of European Ministers responsible for Migration Affairs..
III. EFFECTS OF MIGRATION
A. In the countries of immigration
1. Effects on the societies of the receiving countries
a. The utility of immigration
20. An evaluation of the economic benefits of the work done and goods consumed by migrants has to be based on an extended period of observation. Only a historical perspective can take account of the fact that immigrants have had a special role to play in certain phases of economic upswing and technological innovation and that such changes have different ways of manifesting themselves. The long-term benefits of immigration in particular have seldom been correctly predicted in the countries of immigration. In Germany, for instance, guest workers were recruited at a time of rapid economic growth when investment capital was in short supply and the companies could only keep the old machinery running at a profit by using cheap labour. The growth of the manpower potential as a result of immigration thus delayed necessary investments. It was due to coincidence rather than economic planning that the decisive technological renewals, in the machine tool industry for instance, took place at the beginning of the seventies, at the same time as the recruitment of guest workers ended. Labour migration was thus partly responsible for the circumstance that new investments were made in Germany very late, but at the technologically most favourable moment. That was the most important contribution of the guest worker immigrants to the economic prosperity of West Germany. Against this background the economic contributions of immigrants as taxpayers and contributors to social insurance and their role as consumers, so often cited in the political debate, are seen to be of secondary importance.
b. Sectoral and fragmental economic upheavals
21. In the past few years the economic upheaval in the industrialised societies has been accelerated by further technological innovations, as well as the massive renovation of managerial procedures. Whereas the traditional industries (mining, shipbuilding, automotive engineering, electrical engineering and textiles) have either been fully automated or relegated to the sidelines, private and public services, the catering industry, the entertainment and leisure industry and the communications and media sector have developed into the most important sectors of the economy. The farming sector, on the other hand, is significant for labour market policy only in the sphere of seasonal work.
c. Economic upheaval and unemployment
22. In all major European cities, ethnic economies have emerged that absorb a part of the immigrant manpower released from the traditional labour markets. The fact that the spreading post-industrial industries are becoming less and less dependent on poorly-trained labour affects the guest worker immigrants and their children even more than the unskilled workers from the native lower strata. But new immigrants, who have acquired schooling and vocational training but not the skills required for a modern automated or semi-automated workplace, are also affected. Thus more and more immigrant guest workers, refugees, and diaspora immigrants as well as native lower classes are being plunged into unemployment. Increasingly, the victims of the industrialization thrust are coming to include white-collar workers who, as bank employees or administrative employees, had previously ranked as members of the middle classes. Common to these social groups is the threat of social exclusion.
d. The �complementary� international labour market
23. The contribution of immigrants to the socio-economic and political development of industrialised countries should also be considered, however, from the point of view of growing flexibility. Immigrants are a part of a world-wide labour market in which manpower is available that in certain phases the native markets cannot provide. This is the case with highly skilled jobs (scientists, physicians, nursing personnel and performing artists) as well as with workers who assume typical niche functions, such as specialty cooks, stucco workers, professional athletes and alteration tailors. Immigrants also retain their function as cheap labour in a transitional phase of structural and economic change. Recruiting them makes it possible to bridge crises in economic sectors where capital is in short supply. Seen from that perspective, immigration remains a necessary complement for national and local labour markets.
e. Ethnicization and cultural change
24. Immigrants contribute to the progressive ethnicization of the western European industrial societies, since they have brought new ways of life and cultures to Europe and thus helped overcome outmoded nationalist conceptions of cultural homogeneity. No doubt artistic activities and the constantly changing youth cultures have helped, but in view of the more than two hundred immigrant cultures in our societies the role of �polyethnicity� should not be underestimated. The religious sphere, in which Islam is not the only new congregation to have found a place in Europe, appears to be especially important in this connection.
2. Completion of immigrant communities, migrants as minorities
a. The completion of communities
25. One of the discoveries of migration researchers at the beginning of the eighties was the thesis concerning the emergence of immigrant communities. In contrast to the prevailing assimilation theory, which was predicated on the need for the individual immigrant to adapt to the autochthonous societies, these researchers noted an autonomous socialization process in the immigrant populations. The immigrants were not only conspicuous for their peculiar milieux and their many cultural symbols, such as their dress, eating and shopping habits, languages, behaviour and religion, they also brought with them organizational patterns and philosophies which they in part reconstructed in the countries of immigration. This development of autonomous organizations and philosophical constructions is called �completion of migrant communities�. One characteristic of such organizations, which concern themselves with religion, politics, leisure, economics, art and customs, is their need for new elites.
b. Elites and policies towards minorities
26. Migrant communities became consolidated through their organizations and provided themselves with mediators with the society as a whole through their elites. The network of organizations and elites often presented the ethnic milieu in order to draw attention to special needs. In this way a new policy of ethnic minorities emerged to which as a rule the surrounding societies responded with offers of cooperation. In various countries, in the Netherlands and Germany, for instance, the local and regional authorities made funds available to support such a minority policy. In other countries, such as Sweden, such organizational patterns are supported at the central government level.
c. Return and integration
27. The problems of immigrant communities were generally seen from two perspectives. On the one hand it was assumed that the immigrants would not want to go back home (the end of the myth of return). On the other it was assumed that the immigrant communities would increasingly be oriented towards the country of immigration and that in the final analysis the immigrant minorities would at some future time adapt organizationally to the possibly multicultural political structures of the host country.
d. Origin orientation
28. In recent years migration researchers have begun to question these propositions, since there has been a high rate of fluctuation of individual immigrants between the country of origin and the country of immigration, especially in the larger immigrant communities, such as the Turks in Germany or the Pakistanis in the United Kingdom. Although remittances to the countries of origin have decreased, informal economic relationships have persisted and even expanded. Nor has there been any lessening of political orientation towards the societies of origin: on the contrary, there has been a noticeable increase, especially in crisis situations, as the Kurdish and Kashmiri problems show. The forms of support in old age are one example of orientation towards one�s origins that is relevant to social policy. In order to resolve the problems this involves, the communities seem to be looking for a compromise between family-oriented support in the country of origin where the social and health care infrastructure is poor, on the one hand, and the individualization of elderly immigrants with simultaneous acceptable support on the other.
e. Diasporas
29. Recently international policy-makers have concerned themselves more intensively with migrant communities, and a new branch of research has emerged dealing with the so-called diasporas, or communities that have international relations. The elites of such diasporas do business between the country of origin and the country of immigration, between the immigrant community and the region of origin, and in the process further international ethnic networks develop. In the case of many migrant groups, autonomous organizational forms emerge as actors on the international political stage. Because of the variety of social and political points of reference, the orientations and loyalties of the diaspora migrants refer to different political entities.
3. Brief analysis of integration problems
a. What is integration?
30. The integration of migrants in European societies will be dealt with only briefly here, since the focus of this report is on the connection between development policy and migration. Moreover, integration policies and practices are subject to continued and detailed scrutiny by the European Committee on Migration (CDMG) and were only recently reviewed by the European Ministers responsible for Migration Affairs (Warsaw, 16-18 June 1996). The Ministers' review showed that there was a growing convergence of policies on the need to ensure a legal status for legally settled immigrants and to grant them progressively a stable right of residence; the need to provide means for real participation by immigrants in decision-making processes in society; the need to take determined action against racism, xenophobia and discrimination; the need for effective measures to promote equal opportunities for immigrants and persons of immigrant origin; and the need to place integration policy within the context of a comprehensive approach to the problems of social exclusion, while not neglecting the specific problems faced by immigrants. However, in spite of this growing convergence of policies, serious problems of community relations remained, and the integration process was sometimes less successful than originally hoped, according to the Ministers.
31. Integration can be defined as the successful access of migrant groups to the social institutions of the host society. In this respect, integration success has to be considered in terms of legal status, political participation, and equality of treatment and opportunity with regard to education and training, housing, employment, welfare provision, and leisure. Language competence seems to be one overriding criterion for the degree of integration - hence the primary importance of education as a medium of integration. However, in view of the large number of ethnic groups and status differences, the question arises whether the curricular concepts of intercultural education (and other instruments of European integration policy) should be re-thought.
b. Rights of immigrants
32. Differences with respect to migrants' access to the host country's institutions and resources based on migrant definitions and migrants' status are of eminent importance for the debate on integration versus segregation or that on inclusion versus exclusion. Social scientists call this the citizenship problem although it concerns not just citizenship and voting rights but also differing claims vis-�-vis political and social structures in the country concerned. This point needs to be stressed because the differentiation depends on the gate of entry through which a migrant group enters the country and hence on the differing definitions of such gates, depending on the political conditions prevailing. Thus the attribution of specific rights depends in no small measure on when the group concerned immigrated.
c. Racism and discrimination
33. Since the 1980s it has been clear that the central problem with regard to integration is the growing opposition to immigration (restrictions on the one hand, racism and discrimination on the other). The incidence of individual and institutional discrimination has distinctly increased. More and more sectors of society are susceptible to exclusion of foreigners. For example, as a major International Labour Office (ILO) project showed, racist and ethnic discrimination still constitutes a barrier on the labour market. The growing number of self-employed persons in what is called �ethnic business� is not enough to compensate for this. The origins and consequences of racism are well-documented, but there is no simple answer on how to reduce it. The Plan of Action on combating racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism and intolerance launched by the Council of Europe in 1993 should be followed up energetically, especially at national level.
d. Differing approaches
34. Differing instruments are used in the European countries to resolve integration problems. In the United Kingdom, for instance, the Commission for Racial Equality has been set up as a central authority; in France an assimilation approach was pursued until a few years ago; the Netherlands were noteworthy for the support given to ethnic communities, while in Germany an integration policy that varied locally and regionally was implemented without regard for the official policy of non-immigration. For a long time Swedish integration policy was a model of liberal welfare-state support of immigration. In the Mediterranean countries, on the other hand, the integration of immigrants took place largely without government intervention until well into the nineties. In sum it can be said that what the Swedish social researcher Tomas Hammar called the denizens (�semi-citizens�, as it were) model of integration has prevailed in Europe. One characteristic of denizen status is that even immigrants with foreign citizenship who have been in Europe for a long time are treated largely as natives. But much remains to be done to promote equality of treatment. For example, the Council of Europe Convention on the Participation of Foreigners in Public Life at Local Level, ratified so far by Italy, Norway and Sweden and signed also by Denmark, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, is not yet in force. The Convention defines the civil and political rights which foreign residents should enjoy.
e. Illegal immigrants in the welfare state
35. One problem in particularly urgent need of attention at this time seems to be the accommodation of clandestine migrants - a problem that obviously has considerable conflict potential. The few studies that have been made point to housing conditions which to social researchers evoke the slums of the Third World metropolises or the early industrial revolution. Another problem that seems to be emerging is that of crime, deriving from differentiation and exclusion, among members of new internationally operating gangs and poverty migrants, whose reception tends in turn to promote syndromes of racism. Against this background the question now arises how the new immigrants from the Third World, who can expect less support than their predecessors, can be incorporated into the welfare state. In particular, it is worth discussing whether the governments can make active use of the diasporas that exist in Europe as a means of promoting integration. The new immigrants follow the paths of the diaspora connections, and in the eyes of the immigrants themselves, the development of their home communities is an integral part of the social transformation of their situation in life. Both spheres should therefore be seen as parts of a common integration concept.
B. In the countries of emigration
1. Contribution to development
a. Country and city dwellers
36. As explained above, migration systems have changed in the past few decades. Whereas at the time of guest worker migration it was migrants from rural backgrounds who were recruited for heavy and poorly-paid work in large-scale industry, in the migration movements that followed it was mostly groups with urban socialization desiring to earn their living in different ways. Thus a distinction has to be drawn between social and economic change in rural and in urban environments.
b. Chain migration and ethnic networks
37. From the beginning the path of migration was not limited to two stages: the points of departure and arrival. In contrast to the image of the peasant transplanted from the countryside to the big industrial town, the real pattern is more like the one described in the early years of migration research. A family sends individual members of the household to the next town and then to the capital city, where new branches of the family develop. Passing through these intermediate points, the first emigrant crosses an international frontier. A family network and later an ethnic network thus emerge along which the migrants move step by step. Thus from the beginning, migration involves a broadening of the social horizons of family and village; that is, first there is a broadening of their potential to act and then as a rule the improvement of their economic and political situation.
c. First development surges in the regions of origin
38. Migration can also lead to such a sharp reduction in the village population, however, that only the old and the very young are left behind, dependent on remittances from their relatives. In general the consequence of such a process is that the village community degenerates economically and politically for a certain period of time, with corresponding effects on the region. For the migrant population living abroad, however, the dream of return remains. Social organizations that define the development of the village as their immediate goal are generally formed in the first phase of community formation. This brings about a development surge in the region of origin, usually restricted, however, to the building sector and residual activities in the service sphere. There are also examples of the regeneration of agriculture and the creation of new industries, however (tourism, textiles etc.). The ties with the region of origin usually remain close; it is more or less included in the diaspora network. Investments made along the path of migration are also included, however. The families have spread out along the migration route, but still remain an economic unit for a long time. They are often even regenerated as a result of the success of small enterprises.
d. Transfer of resources
39. Many sending countries have meanwhile realized the economic importance of emigration for local, regional and national development and adopted corresponding programmes. They have started offering preferential interest rates, tax relief or investment bonuses. Despite such measures, the sums remitted decrease over the period of migration. The diaspora�s own resource transfer facilities, on the other hand, expand. In most countries of origin, international transfers and investments are controlled by a transnational elite.
e. Migrants and foreign exchange
40. This experience has led emigration countries like Pakistan and the Philippines to establish agencies to promote the acceptance of labour migrants internationally and to try to provide jobs for migrants abroad. These agencies then recruit suitable workers within the country and provide them with some training. The aim in this case is to improve the balance of payments through the controlled export of manpower.
f. No uniformity
41. In the rural environment, the contribution of migration to development is erratic. On the one hand, emigration can improve the social and economic infrastructure. On the other, emigration does not seem to encourage the modernization of agriculture directly. Most of the studies in this connection are from the early seventies, and no systematic research has been done on the current situation.
g. Urbanized migration and development
42. Internal urbanization in the highly mobile societies of origin has been far more significant in terms of quantity than external migration. With the Green Revolution and progressive industrialization, those migrating from rural regions increasingly converged on the metropolises of the Third World. The new migrants were recruited from these urbanized populations and especially from among groups who had completed their schooling and acquired vocational training. Driven by political unrest and increasing unemployment in the metropolises, these groups try to obtain residence status in the industrialised countries as refugees or through other gates of entry. These potential emigrants include university graduates and highly qualified experts. Considering the massive supply from these population strata, however, it would be wrong to speak of the sapping of human resources through emigration. The same applies to the brain drain, which, apart from small occupational segments, is mostly a myth of the development theorists. The claim can certainly be made that the emigration of these urban strata and the subsequent support for those left behind produce demonstrable development effects that outweigh the possible negative consequences in the societies of origin.
IV. CONTROL MECHANISMS FOR MIGRATION MOVEMENTS
1. Economic development in the countries of origin
a. Development and the decision to migrate
43. The more recent migration flows have their roots in political and economic relations in the countries of origin on the one hand and the demand for migrants in the destination countries on the other. The perception of this relationship on the part of individual migrant groups when deciding whether or not to migrate is decisive here. Economic development in the countries of origin has a great many shortcomings that can very well lead to ad hoc migration such as was seen in Albania at the beginning of the nineties. Such migration flows are the exception, however. One central discovery of more recent migration research is the importance of ethnic networks for the direction and continuity of migration. Economic development plays a secondary role here, for migration requires certain resources to pay for the journey. In general, therefore, temporary improvement of the financial situation of established migration systems leads to larger numbers of people migrating. For that reason many American migration researchers uphold the thesis that improvement of living standards in the countries of origin simply heightens the mobility of the population and that growth regions remain net emigration regions for many years before they become net immigration regions.
b. No uniform concept
44. Development aid, intended macro-economically to increase the per capita income of the population, can therefore be related to the migration situation only indirectly and influences it only indirectly. And the internal dynamics of the economies concerned as well as the cycles of their policy have to be assigned greater importance for migration behaviour than development imposed from outside. Reference has already been made to the role of the education sector and that of agrarian reform. All in all, however, the individual developing countries are structured so differently that it is not possible to make a general assessment.
2. Development aid
a. Projects and national programmes
45. A distinction is made in development policy literature between assistance to a national economy as a whole and assistance for project-oriented measures. The latter has far fewer resources available and can only be seen as peripheral aid within the context of national development programmes. Project-oriented measures can pin-point problem areas with their projects, however. For the field of migration, that means that the problem areas have to be defined. The difference between rural and urban development is fundamental, but the interdependence between them is of great significance. Many global cities on the periphery have themselves become centres of immigration for migrants from abroad, since wages and skills differ from one Third World country to the next. It is also necessary to ask who will be involved in these processes as actors, and this introduces the diaspora problem into the process of shaping development policy. A few examples of development policy situations relevant to migration will serve to illustrate this point. A distinction should be made, however, between development policy intervention in established migration systems and the effects of development policy measures on the possible establishment of new migration systems.
b. Return programmes
46. The most advanced development projects are those connected with settlement and repatriation programmes. As a general rule, individuals or families are provided with return allowances. These cover their fares and their initial expenses in the country of destination. Often monthly grants and small business start-up grants are included. Some countries finance further education and training courses. Those who benefit from such courses are generally people who either do not qualify for residence rights in the country of immigration or have renounced such rights. Many countries of immigration have joined in this type of promotion of return as a development policy measure. The pattern for such programmes was set by the German Ministry for Development Aid; it was adopted and further developed by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
c. Assistance in the locality of origin
47. A second classical development policy measure is that of settling migrants and refugees at their starting-points by providing accommodation and initial opportunities to work. The purpose is to use humanitarian aid to prevent further migration to the industrialised countries. Such measures go far beyond disaster aid, in the case of education programmes, for instance.
d. Population programmes
48. For some time the contradiction between demographic expansion and economic underdevelopment played a role in the migration theory debate. For that reason development schemes were linked with a population policy intended to close the gap. This policy met with little success and generated resistance in many countries. It should not be assumed that population growth alone causes migration. Instead one should ask which strata and groups are rendered geographically mobile by their training, their social position and the integration of their families in earlier migration systems. Research needs to be done here. Possibly development policy could provide support to precisely those mobile strata so as to strengthen their roots in the society of origin.
e. Infrastructural aid and diasporas
49. The fact that the immigrants are embedded in diasporas is also important in this context. The intensified incorporation of immigrant communities and their organizations in development work seems to some extent to open up new perspectives. Here it is a question of the contrast between the industrialised environment and the semi-industrialised society of origin. As a rule, migrants feel the effects of the neglect of the public sphere in their communities of origin directly and mobilize ad hoc protest there. Owing to the lack of resources and inadequate know-how, however, they are generally unable to improve the infrastructures in the communities and countries of origin.
f. Assistance through diasporas
50. The utilization of migrant groups for social development has often been considered and has already been demonstrated by development agencies, but not systematically. For the most part this potential is still terra incognita. Here too, recourse should be had to assistance activities organized by the migrant groups themselves, even if the success of such activities has not been sufficiently long-lasting. Old-age migration provides a concrete example of this kind of development policy. The rate of return of elderly migrants is low, and in contrast to the preconceived notion of intact migrant families, the solitude of elderly migrants in the industrialised countries is increasing. They require intensive medical and social attention. They can fall back on extant collectives only in the home country. For that reason elderly migrants generally make trips of short duration to their regions of origin. Various research findings have confirmed that they have a preference for being in their community of origin. Development policy could bring about an improvement in on-site medical and social care, and this would not be of benefit to migrants alone.
3. Improvement of the human rights situation in the countries of origin
a. Development aid and human rights
51. A migrant-specific development policy that helps reduce human rights violations also seems important, however. This would include, for instance, re-integration assistance for the victims of international trafficking in women and for returning civil war refugees. As explained above, migration systems generally are based on a complex network of social organization and targets. In particular, there is demonstrably a mixture of economic and political causes of migration. Unequal economic development often leads via the perception of missed opportunities to political protest movements that become increasingly ethnicized. They thus evoke reactions on the part of other movements and government agencies. Human rights violations are a part of this development, they are based on democratization deficiencies and the absence of a civil society in many transitional societies. The transition from the political to the private sphere there is not cushioned to any great extent by government institutions. Military intervention is often the response to demands for an improvement in living conditions. There has been a steady increase in internal conflicts in the last few years.
b. International and non-governmental organisations (NGOs)
52. A political strategy seems to be required at two levels: first, international and transnational organizations should be given the means to set new minimum international legal standards and guarantee the implementation of existing covenants. Such organizations also comprise an important forum for discussion of developments relevant to human rights in all regions of the world. Secondly, systematic support should be given to smaller NGOs monitoring human rights developments and documenting violations. The increased networking of such activities should be promoted, in part with international assistance. One important reason for this is to protect the NGOs from repression. The beginnings already exist with various networks. Effective human rights work by NGOs with international support could make the flight of a large number of migrants unnecessary.
4. Immigration control mechanisms
a. Immigration control thwarted
53. Immigration control is a matter that concerns all the spheres and migration systems discussed so far. Experience has shown that orientation towards mere border controls or other restrictive measures is not very effective. This was the experience with the British immigration laws of 1962 and the regulations adopted by other European governments (1973/74) and even the border controls along the Mediterranean coasts, the Oder and the Rio Grande. It has also become apparent that development policy measures can increase mobility at first.
b. Visa exemption and migration reduction
54. The policy of the Schengen group towards Poland, which has been extended to other central European countries and will embrace other countries as well, shows that the consequences of permitting visa-free entry tend to be positive. Knowing that one would be able to return resulted in a reduction in permanent immigration in favour of more flexible, individual solutions.
c. Need for an integrated immigration policy
55. The existence of an integrated immigration policy that goes beyond tourist entry regulations is essential to immigration control mechanisms. The integration of immigration policies involves flexibility of admission conditions on the basis of special local, regional and national conditions, clarity of legislation and knowledge of absorption capacities, including the demand for migrants in the new fragmented and localized labour markets. This step has to precede all other measures, but in principle it has not been taken in any European country as yet. In addition to regular asylum and immigration procedures, which ought to be anchored in European law, there exists a migration-regulating development policy which, despite the shortcomings and uncertainties described above, is conducive to the lasting harmonization of economic and social relations in the countries neighbouring on the European Union. Such a policy reduces migration, as is shown by the small numbers of persons who have emigrated from Portugal, Greece and Spain to western and northern Europe in recent years despite freedom of movement within the European Union. The possibilities of a development policy that simply regulates migration, on the other hand, have been regarded with scepticism. The more project-specifically one proceeds, the more likely is the intended result, and the more local conditions other than migration are involved. A long-term opportunity will present itself, however, if development policy measures are closely tied up with human rights guidelines.
V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
a. Three kinds of policy
56. Various forms of policy follow from this report as recommendations for future migration policy towards countries of the Third World. They include first monitoring of the migration routes, ethnic conflicts and human rights violations, second direct intervention in migration processes through development policy measures, and third global accountablity for regional migration problems.
b. Monitoring
57. There should be monitoring of long-term developments so that strategically feasible policy concepts can be derived from them. This applies, for instance, to human rights violations and the migrations they engender. Ethnic conflicts should be monitored so that refugee potentials can be assessed or development policy measures planned for such population groups. Peace processes should be monitored so that intervention will be possible in periods of stagnation. A broad discussion on promoting monitoring is needed to amplify and concretize this list. The Council of Europe could well initiate such a discussion.
c. Intervention
58. Development policy intervention in migration processes is useful in order to help potential migrants overcome conflicts and deficiencies in regions of emigration and thus reduce the causes of migration. This involves work in the immigrant districts of Third World metropolises, and it includes medical and social attention in the rural regions of origin. It would be useful to involve emigrants from the regions concerned in the definition, planning and strategy discussion concerning such intervention, since they have direct access to the project regions through diaspora structures.