On the other hand, in less than two years, some millions of workers from Eastern Europe have been added to the European labour market. Whether they are unemployed (as are two million in Poland for example) or awaiting privatization or western investment, these men and women henceforth constitute an additional part of the available labour force which is dependent on the economic decisions of the European "cen-
This is not the least important of the questions that EEC leaders have to consider when they are confronted with problems like of Yugoslavia, Albania or the Soviet Union. Already German unification has introduced several million extra people at the heart of the European labour market. In a coun try like France, while there has been a net decrease in immigration from North Africa, one of the highest relative rates of growth in the last few months has been that of Polish immigration!
trolled immigration from the East. But for the moment they must forestall the risk of a mass exodus. To stabilize this work force, particularly through investments by multinationals, would exercise, moreover, a downward pressure on wag es in the West. The determination of the western European capitals to intervene in the Yugoslav crisis, the determination of the Italian government against the Albanian immigrants, the desire of the Community to propose very quickly some kind of partnership with the Baltic states and, in a non-contradictory manner, the fear of a break up of the rest of the Soviet Union are all signs of what is at stake. The market economy, yes... on condition that the stratifications and the segmentations of the international labour market are maintained as much as possible.
### Increase in available workforce
There are two main reasons why this sudden growth in the available labour force on the market is unlikely to reproduce the situation of the Third World; on the one hand, we are here dealing with a relatively qualified labour force and, secondly, there is the prospect of integrating these countries into the immediate periphery of Western Europe (in association with the EEC, for example). This would form an intermediary level in the concentric circles of dependence.
Politically, European investors remain reluctant to take too many risks in these countries. The fear of an uncertain future, the risks of chaos and national conflict justify this prudence. Yet the project of a rapid restoration of the market economy means that a place in the international division of labour has to be found for these countries.
This will result from unequal exchange with the countries of the "centre". It will be determined by the volume of capital but also by its function; or, again, by the level of delocalization towards these countries of certain types of production. There is, consequently, an immediate link between the form of insertion of these countries in the market and the control of their labour forces as well as their mobility. The reluctance of private investors must then be partially compensated for 1. Social Europe, March 1990, Brussels.
----- pull-quotes on this page -----
Controlling the labour market BRUXELLES
----- photo credits and running heads -----
7
International Viewpoint #213 • September 30, 1991
EUROPE by the voluntarism of European public finances.
But things become more complicated when account is taken of what is happening at the same time on the labour market in Western Europe. All Western European countries are experiencing an aggravation of unemployment?. The perspectives of economic upturn are no longer sufficient to imply a substantial lowering of unemployment; the current bank rates policy, caused by the costs of German unification, has limited the boldness of investors; finally, and most importantly, the general reorganization of labour in industry engenders new phenomena, structural in nature, involving the lasting marginalization of a part of the workforce.
Increased unemployment likely
Thus, in Great Britain, despite the upturn in growth, the Organization ol Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) predicts a growth in the reduction of jobs. The official rate of unemployment is now 9.6%, against 5.9% in 1990.
In France, the situation is similar. A recent study showed that "overmanning [declared by the employers] affected 43% of the enterprises of more than 500 workers, 27% of those employing between 100 and 499 employees and 25% of those employing less than 100'3.
In negotiations with the countries of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA), and notably with the Swiss, one of the key problems is that of the right of circulation of the labour force inside the great
Western European unit, the rate of unemployment being very different between the countries of the EEC and those of
EFTA.
In the course of the difficult negotiations between Tokyo and Brussels concering quotas of Japanese cars, what is at stake is not only the protection of European firms. As the recent agreement between Mitsibushi, Volvo and the Dutch government attests, it is also about securing some thousands of jobs through direct Japanese investments in these states. The principal European countries have to simultaneously settle the question of unemployment in their own countries, the demand for jobs for the peoples of the Third World, to begin with those of the Mediterranean basin, and, finally, the insertion of Eastern Europe, now "free" to sell itself on the market, in the global management of the labour force. We can already see the first damaging effects; for example the multinational ABB proposes dismissals at Mannheim, in exWest Germany, to assist a delocalization to Poland or even the ex-GDR. The competition between workers could then be very sharp. It will obviously be determined by the investments and industrial policies implemented. The place accorded to the countries of Eastern Europe in the hierarchy of the world capitalist market will be largely determined by the comparative advantages offered by these states; qualities and qualifications of workers, but also, reliability of the infrastructures and the administration. Such is the law in a world market in which 80% of commodities exchange between the most industrialized countries.
Minor role envisaged for
A French politician, Lionel Stoleru*, explained recently: "Seeing that the Baltic states are close to Europe, and given their total economic invisibility, must become members of the EEC. One can only offer them a minor role, perhaps not a chair with a right to vote, but they should be members of it. It is necessary that they link themselves to an international currency with a free convertibility, as is the case of the countries of the dollar zone in South East Asia, for exam-
However, things will not be so simple; hourly labour costs are 127.3FF in Germany, as against 74FF in Ireland and 20.7FF in Portugal. This significant difference between countries with similar administrative structures, all members of the EEC, already offers opportunities to industries wishing to delocalize, without some of the more reliable
The solicitude offered to the countries of Eastern Europe, like all imperialist aid, is offered on the basis that what is given to one is not given to another. Investments made in Czechoslovakia will be investments which are not made in Lithuania. Capitalism cannot work to all, as attested already by the vast numbers without work in the Third World. The brutal discipline of the world market has nothing to do with the good "democratic" conscience shown in London, Paris, Brussels or Bonn. There will be no royal road towards expansion, nor true sovereignty, through making the labour of men and women a commodity whose price is determined by the Western economies.
It is frightening to hear the Baltic states already debating the possibility of "free trade zones" in the name of "regained sovereignty", just like the mayor of Leningrad who has already evoked the same perspective for his region. What it amounts to is a competition to accede to some subaltern status in the world hierarchy. It is in this light that one should understand the importance which EEC leaders attach to avoiding political or military upheavals which de facto aggravate the mobility of the labour force. They wish to avoid the chaos of Yugoslavia, negotiate economic agreements with the Baltic states, support Albania if pos sible, and so on. The new doctrine of the "right of humanitarian interference" has
No free circulation of
The Schengen convention can limit the breadth of the flows of immigration, but it will not stop the free market from operating, albeit in clandestine form. market will only open itself unevenly to the East. The capital market, the commodity market, that of services and that of workers will not follow the same rhythms. Indeed it is precisely this distortion that renders still more "dangerous"
the possible free circulation of persons.
Far from any doctrine of democracy or the free self-determination of peoples, the attitude of the EEC is dictated by the imperious necessity of controlling henceforth the new European labour force market. It has been a supplementary factor in support of a reinforcement of the interna discipline of the Community and for a consolidation of economic and political
The Dutch European Commissar, Frans
Andriessen, has already explained that it is necessary to combine "the deepening"
of the Community with its enlargement"
to the association countries of its periphery. 2. Among the "founding" reports of the Single Europe. an Act, the Cecchini report estimated that the dynamic thus opened up would permit in time a positive balance of new jobs of between 1.5 million and 5 million. On the eve of 1992 it is evident that the first effects of "free circulation" are exactly the opposite. 3. Le Monde, August 7, 1991. 4. Lionel Stoleru, who was a minister in a right wing government, is now director of the newspaper The European and adviser to the Romanian prime minister Petr Roman.
----- photo credits and running heads -----
8