Europeanization and the Negotiation of a New Labour Migration Policy in Germany

Abstract

The article focuses on the negotiation of a new labour migration policy in Germany in the years 2011 and 2012, and on the role that actors on both the regional and the European Union levels played in encouraging the introduction of a more open labour migration framework. Up until now, research has highlighted the German use of the European level for introducing more restrictive changes in migration policy. In line with these precedents, during the negotiation of a European policy for admitting highly-skilled migrants, Germany advocated a restrictive framework. However, at the transposition of the EU directive on highly-skilled migrants in national law, the German government used the directive as an opportunity to introduce a paradigm change in labour migration policies, establishing a significantly more open labour migration policy hitherto exclusively associated with Anglo-Saxon countries. The article will analyse the preconditions for this change, assessing the value of the goodness-of-fit approach for understanding processes of Europeanization.

Introduction: Labour migration in Europe: Changing policies – changing organizations – changing people

“…Although it focuses more on irregular and refugee migration than on labour migration, national labour regimes have been influenced by the European level, most notably with the implementation of the so-called Blue Card directive. Although notable differences in its implementation have led to different degrees of changes in the national contexts (Kosc, 2013) migration regulations for highly-skilled migrants from third states have been harmonized to a certain extent (Laubenthal, 2014;Kosc, 2013).…”

From Brakeman to Booster: Policy change in Germany's EU Labour Migration Policy

“…Given this, the transposition of the Blue Card directive must be regarded as a clear outlier significantly deviating from this traditional dominant German pattern of 'one-to-one'. Instead, the government used the ample political leeway provided by the directive for a far-reaching opening of the country for academically educated third country nationals (see among others Laubenthal, 2014;Kuczynski and Solka, 2009: 229;Herzog-Schmidt, 2014;Langenfeld and Waibel, 2013;Strunden and Schubert, 2012). Two aspects deserve particular attention in this regard: the abdication of the labour market test and the definition of the wage threshold.…”

“…Existing literature on policy change in the field of labour migration policy specifically highlighted as features of policy change the introduction of human capital-based attraction schemes, the set-up of immigration offers for skilled workers (without academic degrees) as well as the creation of easier access to permanent residence for labour migrants (see for example Laubenthal, 2014;Kolb, 2014;Finotelli and Kolb, 2015). Existing literature on policy change in the field of labour migration policy specifically highlighted as features of policy change the introduction of human capital-based attraction schemes, the set-up of immigration offers for skilled workers (without academic degrees) as well as the creation of easier access to permanent residence for labour migrants (see for example Laubenthal, 2014;Kolb, 2014;Finotelli and Kolb, 2015).…”

“…The main aim of this article is to introduce and discuss a specific dimension of policy change in the field of labour migration policy: the attitude of the German government towards efforts of Europeanisation of this specific subfield of migration policy. Existing literature on policy change in the field of labour migration policy specifically highlighted as features of policy change the introduction of human capital-based attraction schemes, the set-up of immigration offers for skilled workers (without academic degrees) as well as the creation of easier access to permanent residence for labour migrants (see for example Laubenthal, 2014;Kolb, 2014;Finotelli and Kolb, 2015). 1 The discussion of the rapidly changing position of the German government towards attempts at EU-harmonisation of labour migration policies thus is thought to add a new feature to the history of a policy change in this particular subfield.…”

Changing labour migration politics in Germany: an organizational perspective

“…Research into the macro‐level aspects of migration has included patterns of labour migration (Zaiceva & Zimmermann, ), political strategies for managing migration (e.g. Kolb, ; Laubenthal, ; Pastore, ) and the effects of labour migration on the development of the home country (De Haas, ) or on host labour markets (e.g. Angrist & Kugler, ; Borjas et al., ; Pischke & Velling, ) and labour standards (Dølvik & Visser, ; Maletzky & Pries, ) as well as on the host country's society (e.g.…”