Make the Union through its people: a “migratory ECSC”
There are six reasons why the movement of people should be one of the Euro-Mediterranean common policies:
1) the complementary age structures of North and South;
2) the constant need to use mobility to adjust work markets between countries in the region;
3) the need to circulate for professionals, who are increasingly numerous and diverse;
4) international competition to attract qualified workers, who continue to leave the region;
5) the community of interest concerning countries from both sides on managing migration;
6) the specific cultural characteristics of regional Euro-Mediterranean integration, whereby the intermixing of people is a historic legacy and a strategic necessity.
In the Mediterranean over the long term, inhabitants are unlikely to understand the concept of a union where people cannot circulate freely. There is much work to be done before the Euro-Mediterranean can assimilate the statement of the UN Global Commission on International Migration that, “the old paradigm of permanent migrant settlement is progressively giving way to temporary and circular migration”.
Authors :
- Ali Bensaad: Senior lecturer at the Jacques Berque Institute, Rabat.
- Hakim El Karoui: President of Young Mediterranean Leaders.
- Philippe Fargues: Director of CARIM, Professor at the European University Institute, Florence.
- Hervé Le Bras: Director of Research at EHESS, Director of the Laboratory of Demographic History, Paris.
