The Need for a Global Cooperation Framework Regarding Migrant Workers

The central theme of the latest issue of the Revue critique de droit international privé (announced on this blog here) is migration. While most of the articles focus on the new French statute to control immigration and improve integration, Hans van Loon takes a broader perspective and argues in the opening article (La nécessité d’un cadre mondial de coopération pour une réglementation durable de la migration de travailleurs), based on the practical experience in migration-related issues with private international law treaties, that sustainable regulation of labour migration requires cooperation between workers’ countries of origin and destination. There is a need to develop a global cooperative framework to regulate labour migration.

With at least 170 million migrant workers in the world, such a framework is sorely lacking at present. The 1990 UN Convention on the Protection of the Rights of all Migrant Workers and Members of their Families has been ratified essentially by States of origin of workers only, not by any receiving countries. This may be due to its overly broad scope, and the absence of a mechanism for international cooperation. Against this background, successful Hague Conventions on private international law such as the 1993 Hague Intercountry Adoption Convention or the 2007 Child Support Convention may provide models for an innovative approach to regulate international labour migration.

Such a new global legal framework should focus on temporary and circular migration. Circular migration, in particular, may offer a triple benefit. First to the migrant who builds and keeps a relation with both his or her country of origin and the country of their temporary work, as they acquire experiences, qualifications, and networks which they can put to good use in their country of origin. Second, to the country of origin, which will benefit from such returning migrants, who will give their economies a fresh boost, thereby avoiding the definitive loss many of its most ambitious and entrepreneurial citizens as well as “brain drain”. Third, to the receiving country, which will dispose of a flexible mechanism to adapt labour migration to the evolving needs of its labour market.

The success of circular labour migration, however, requires a minimum level of cooperation as illustrated by recent treaties concluded by EU Member States with some non-EU States. Essential aspects of procedures for admission to receiving countries and for readmission and re-integration to countries of origin must be ensured and coordinated. This requires a minimum of institutional and procedural inter-state agreement on an ongoing basis. The cooperation framework should also include a system for licensing and supervising intermediaries (as in the 1993 Hague Convention) and for the easy and inexpensive transfer of money by workers to their home countries (as for the transfer of funds under the 2007 Hague Convention).

This multilateral framework would thus focus on the crucial procedural and institutional aspects that should apply in all cases of circular migration. Under this regime, specific circular migration programmes would be agreed between two countries on a bilateral basis. The framework would also provide a permanent basis for regular consultations between States. Moreover, regular meetings of all States parties would monitor the practical functioning of the framework, thereby combating adverse competition between countries.

Such a framework would also contribute to achieving the goals of the 2018 Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration and those of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. And a refocus on efforts to regulate (circular) labour migration would help clarify the current confusing public debate on migration.

The article concludes with a tentative draft for such a framework convention. It suggests that, if the framework works in practice, it could be extended to other types of migration.

The article ties in with the theme of the roundtable concluding EAPIL’s Wroclaw Conference on Private International Law and Global Crises of June 2024. There, Hans van Loon mentioned this proposal for a framework convention on circular migration, alongside a proposal for a global treaty on environment and climate damage, as possibilities for much-needed global PIL initiatives in response to the question How Can Private International Law Contribute to a More Sustainable Life? He suggested that EAPIL should join hands with other academic NGOs such as GEDIP and ASADIP to advance these and other urgent projects in international fora.

EAPIL Members interested in this project are invited to contact the President or the Secretary-General of the Association to discuss the most appropriate form for moving forward.