Irregular immigration: economic convenience and other factors

Abstract

F E SummaryThis article illustrates the factors leading to the entry of irregular immigrants and their integration into the labour market, that is to say: the economic convenience for both businesses and families of employing unauthorised manpower; the support from compatriot networks and ethnic economies; the embedded liberalism within democratic states' legal systems; the cost and organisational difficulty of controls and expulsion; and the part played by solidarity providers in civil society, including trade unions. Repeated mass amnesties especially in southern Europe, periodically regularise the situation of these migrants and function as the principal tool of migration policy. To this extent, the irregular immigrant appears to be a transitional figure, awaiting recognition and destined to obtain authorisation sooner or later. Trade unions are one of the social groups pushing for the enactment of regularisation measures. In this way they are asserting their attachment to the ideals of justice and solidarity, while at the same time combating the unfair competition which the hidden economy poses to law-abiding companies and declared workers. ❖❖❖ Sommaire Cet article illustre les facteurs qui ont entraîné l'entrée d'immigrés irréguliers et leur intégration dans le marché du travail, à savoir l'opportunisme économique de l'emploi d'une main-d'oeuvre non déclarée au sein des entreprises et des familles, l'appui des réseaux de compatriotes et des économies ethniques, le libéralisme ancré dans les systèmes juridiques des états démocratiques, les coûts et les difficultés d'organisation des contrôles et des expulsions, le rôle joué par les acteurs de lasolidarité dans la société civile, en ce compris les syndicats. Des mesures d'amnistie octroyées en masse de manière régulière, en particulier dans le Sud de l'Europe, ont permis de régulariser la situation de ces migrants, constituant ainsi le principal outil

Surviving underground: Irregular migrants, Italian families, invisible welfare

“…The second step refers to the reasons why the domestic and caring sector, in particular, attracts irregular migrants, especially in Italy and in Southern Europe (Baldwin‐Edwards & Arango, 1999; King & Black, 1997; Ribas‐Mateos, 2004; for Spain: Solé & Flaquer, 2005), and also elsewhere (Anderson, 2000; Düvell, 2009; Van Valsum 2010; Widding Isaksen, Devi & Hochschild, 2008). From a sociological perspective, one can speak of a post‐industrial society that retrieves and revitalises pre‐industrial labour relations, enabling native women to continue their professional careers while maintaining their traditional roles as family managers, compensating for the shortcomings of support from the state and in the sharing of housework (Ambrosini, 2008; Andall, 2000).…”

“…The pre-existence of large sections of the informal economy, rarely challenged by public authorities, promotes the absorption of illegal immigrants on the lower rungs of the economic system (Triandafyllidou & Kosic, 2006). Second, contrasting interests and inconsistencies in the regulation policy can be identified: the 'liberal constraint' that requires the protection of human rights (Boswell, 2007;Hollifield, 1992); the interests of some sectors (e.g., tourism or international trade); and the scarce resources allocated for the implementation of policies of control in comparison with the phenomenon's dimension (Ambrosini, 2008). Thus, governments are more uncertain and contradictory, more articulated and under greater pressure than they would like to be (Penninx & Doomernik, 1998).…”

‘We are against a multi-ethnic society’: policies of exclusion at the urban level in Italy

“…The same entries allowed under the quota programme are actually used as disguised regularizations. In other words, the Italian state must periodically bend its rules in the face of the reality of an economic system that absorbs many more immigrants than the political system would like to admit (Ambrosini 2008): it is the Italian version of the attitude of reluctant importers of foreign workers that characterizes all developed countries in various ways (Cornelius, Martin and Hollifield 1994 With the complex of small companies of several sectors (construction, catering, cleaning, agriculture, but also small manufacturing industries, especially in the industrial districts) Italian families as employers are the main actors in the regularization process. In many ways, they are involved in hiring unregistered migrants and in managing the migrants' underground work, especially that of women, as they welcome and accommodate them in their homes.…”

Migration and the Global Crisis: New Prospects for Return? The Case of Ecuadorians in Europe

“…Remarkably, both employer associations and trade unions – not to mention migrant associations – showed scepticism about the programme since its beginning (Martin, 2009: 8). Well before the low take‐up of the Plan became clear, a dichotomy had emerged once again between the immigration agenda of members of economic and civil society, and that of policy‐makers (Ambrosini, 2008). The latter struggle to cope with the pressures of public opinion favouring harsher migration management, as well as with the risk of unemployment undermining the rationale of the massive resort to a foreign labour force of the past.…”