This book is based on my PhD thesis, which was completed in September 2010 at the University of Reading. The last two waves of enlargement of the European Union (EU) in May 2004 and July 2007 have refuelled the debate about Turkey’s admission to the Union. The key issue in the enlargement debate has centred on labour migration, with complex and sometimes contradictory implications for Turkey. With this book, I hope to resolve the debate about the potential need for Turkish workers in the post-enlargement period. At a time when the EU has grown in size through the accession of new member states, while its legitimacy regarding the addition of policy areas is ever more contested, employment-related migration seems to me to be of the utmost importance, not only for students of European politics but for the public in general. Its impact on Turkish labour migration is evident and crucial. I am hoping to make a contribution to this debate, as well as highlighting relevant policies and instruments.

On 1 May 2004, the European Union (EU) reached the end of a long process of enlargements that extended membership to eight new Central and East European countries (CEECs) – Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Latvia and Lithuania – plus Cyprus and Malta. Two more countries, Romania and Bulgaria, joined the EU on 1 July 2007. These Central and East European countries are referred to as the CEEC-10, even though they in fact exhibit considerable heterogeneity. The EU guarantees the free movement of workers to all its citizens and eventually to the citizens of the accession countries – the European agreements have already guaranteed the citizens of the CEECs the right to work. EU citizens are to be free to move anywhere within the expanded EU to look for work.

Although the issue of Turkish labour movement has been invoked in treaties, regulations and decisions since 1963, there have been very few attempts to demonstrate the Community’s responsibilities as far as the policy of the European Economic Community (EEC) and then of the European Union (EU) is concerned. From the outset, a main theme for the EEC was to improve the living and working conditions of Turkish migrants and to encourage integration of those migrants into European labour markets, all of which addressed the underlying difficulties. For the most part, the weaknesses of the EEC/ EU in dealing with the principle of free movement derive from the implementation of the rules in the member states. The validity of all kinds of arrangements between the EU and Turkey should, therefore, be questioned in relation to the size and nature of migration flows. The aim of this chapter is to provide a comprehensive overview of Turkish migration in the EEC/ EU. I first review developments in the Turkish workers’ situation and in the migration policy of the EEC/ EU. I then present an analysis of a number of distinct migration periods, looking at the interplay of factors during each period. This section draws on the variety of explanations, which are invoked to demonstrate the social, economic, political and legal variables. Finally, I focus on why Turkish citizens should be allowed to move into the EU freely.

In the early 1980s, anticipated labour migration caused concerns in the European Community (EC). The problem mainly arose from granting the right of free movement to workers from Greece, Spain and Portugal at the time of the accession of these countries. Factors such as income differentials, unemployment and geographical proximity, combined with a long tradition of emigration towards the West, raised an expectation of cheap labour flooding the existing nine countries of the European Community (EC-9) as soon as these countries were given member status. This led to a widespread belief that labour migration from Turkey should, at least temporarily, be avoided, as by now the EC had enough on its plate dealing with the Southern migration episode. Following the inclusion of Greece, Spain and Portugal by 1986, the movement of Turkish labour was actually prohibited and no attempt was made to fulfil the promise that had been made earlier within the EC’s legal framework. The assumption that granting the right of free movement to workers would lead to massive flows from Greece, Spain and Portugal at the time of the accession of these countries to the EC may hold true, since the most significant decrease in the number of Turkish workers in the 1980s was recorded when the Southern enlargement occurred. The accession of Greece, Spain and Portugal could provide some basis for theorizing about the extent to which various receiving countries took a restrictive stand, which might, at the very least, be desirable from an economic standpoint.

Since the inception of European integration in the 1950s, the principle of labour movement has been a cornerstone of the policies of the European Community (EC) and the European Union (EU). From these early initiatives, the opening of labour markets was a comparatively radical change. Over time, the Treaty of Rome’s delimitation of the free movement of labour has been deepened, expanded and transformed by subsequent treaties. There have been problems within the EU’s migration strategy so far. The main objective of this chapter is to present the problem of European labour migration and analyse the implications of policy outcomes for Turkish labour flows. I first provide the necessary background information at the European level to frame the national immigration policies. This lays the foundation for a discussion that examines the development of EU policies. I then elaborate the obstacles to EU policies by pointing out the challenges to and pressures on Turkish labour flows.

There are many push and pull factors that could influence labour flows from the 10 Central and East European countries (CEEC-10) and Turkey into the European Union (EU). The first important step for assessing the possible impact of the Eastern enlargement on Turkish labour movement is to estimate East–West movements after the Central and East European countries (CEECs) joined the EU. I then consider the arguments supporting and rebutting the migration effect, and other characteristics and situations that may counteract the pull and push factors described in Chapter 1. Against this background, I also demonstrate a set of possible explanatory factors to assess the relative strength of their effects, to the extent that such factors may reflect the equilibrating forces of the migration movements themselves. Finally I look at the prospects of labour movement from Turkey to the EU in the foreseeable future, which is, in any event, debatable.

This analysis has been undertaken with the objective of evaluating the possible impact of the Eastern enlargement of the European Union (EU) on Turkish labour movement. It is concerned with why the variation in Turkish flows over the years has occurred, given the changing volume and nature of the mobility rate since 1961. The purpose was to explore, on the one hand, the ways in which enlargement presented challenges for Turkey, and, on the other, how changes in the legal landscape within the EU and at the national level affected Turkish migration. This necessitated an analysis of changing EU and national policies governing the principle of Turkish workers’ movement, and an exploration of the political and social factors both within Turkey and the EU member states that have modified the flow rate. The Southern enlargement has been an important component of this study, which extrapolated from past experiences the various possible developments could be identified for Turkey in the migration of its workforce to European labour markets. Thus, the Southern enlargement of the European Community (EC) in the 1980s provides a benchmark for assessing the enlargement to the Central and East European countries (CEECs).