Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-qsmjn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T16:58:08.281Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Managing the Labour Market in an Open Economy: From the International Labour Organisation to the European Communities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2018

LORENZO MECHI
LORENZO MECHI*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Law and International Studies, Universita degli Studi di Padova, Via del Santo 77, Padova 35123, Italy; lorenzo.mechi@unipd.it
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Since their foundation, the European Communities were characterised by a specific recipe for the labour market, centred on the promotion of labour mobility and a marked focus on vocational training and social dialogue. Drawing on an extensive range of primary sources, this article retraces the roots of that recipe in the reformist thinking of the interwar years, with a special point of reference in the International Labour Office. Identified within that body since the 1920s, the recipe evolved through the experiences of the great crisis and post-war demobilisation. It was then adapted to the needs of European economic integration.

Type
Article
Information
Contemporary European History , Volume 27 , Special Issue 2: Continuity and Change in European Cooperation during the Twentieth Century , May 2018 , pp. 221 - 238
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Discussion du projet de rapport du Directeur Général à la Conférence régionale européenne, 8 Dec. 1953, Historical Archives of the International Labour Organisation (hereafter HAILO), David Morse papers (DM), file Z 10-1-7.

2 Social Aspects of International Economic Cooperation, preliminary draft, 24 Nov. 1954, HAILO, DM, Z 11-6-12. A synthetic reconstruction of the genesis of the Ohlin Report is provided in Mechi, Lorenzo, ‘Economic Regionalism and Social Stabilisation: The International Labour Organization and Western Europe in the Early Post-War Years’, The International History Review, 35, 4 (2013), 844–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Whereas the focus there is on the ILO's contribution to the earliest steps of European integration, here the aim is to describe the strong continuity between the labour market policies designed by the ILO in the interwar years and those concretely applied by the European Communities from the 1950s.

3 Rodgers, Gerry, Lee, Eddy, Swepston, Lee and Van Daele, Jasmien, The ILO and the Quest for Social Justice, 1919–2009 (Geneva: ILO, 2009), 1–10Google Scholar; Ghebali, Victor-Yves, The International Labour Organisation: A Case Study on the Evolution of UN Specialised Agencies (Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1989), 2–3Google Scholar.

4 Amongst the most recent works on the ILO are Kott, Sandrine and Droux, Joelle, eds., Globalizing Social Rights: The International Labour Organization and Beyond (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Maul, Daniel Roger, Human Rights, Development and Decolonization: The International Labour Organization, 1940–70 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the above mentioned matters, see Rodgers et al., The ILO and the Quest for Social Justice, 12–8, 74–85; Böhning, Roger, A Brief Account of the ILO and Policies on International Migration (Geneva: ILO, 2012)Google Scholar, Mechi, Lorenzo, L'Organizzazione Internazionale del Lavoro e la ricostruzione europea. Le basi sociali dell'integrazione economica (1931–1957) (Rome: Ediesse, 2012)Google Scholar.

5 Haas, Ernst B., When Knowledge Is Power. Three Models of Change in International Organizations (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 18–51, 138–55.Google Scholar

6 Steiner, Zara, The Lights that Failed. European International History, 1919–1933 (Oxford: OUP, 2005), 131–255CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a more theoretical discussion on trade issues, see Endres, Anthony M. and Fleming, Grant A., International Organizations and the Analysis of Economic Policy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 105–32Google Scholar. The most famous remarks on the matter are, of course, in Keynes, John Maynard, The Economic Consequences of the Peace (London: Macmillan, 1920), 265–70.Google Scholar

7 See, for example, Kaiser, Wolfram, Christian Democracy and the Origins of European Union (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 42–118CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Dimitrakopoulos, Dionyssis G., Social Democracy and European Integration: The Politics of Preference Formation (London: Routledge, 2011), 25Google Scholar. See also Brian Shaev's article in this special issue.

8 Sandrine Kott, ‘Constructing a European Social Model: The Fight for Social Insurance in the Interwar Period’, in Van Daele, Jasmien, Garcia, Magali Rodriguez, Van Goethem, Geert and Van Der Linden, Marcel, eds., ILO Histories: Essays on the International Labour Organization and Its Impact on the World During the Twentieth Century (Berne: Peter Lang, 2010), 173–95.Google Scholar

9 Alcock, Antony, History of the International Labour Organisation (London: Macmillan, 1971), 3–37CrossRefGoogle Scholar; De Felice, Franco, Sapere e politica. L'Organizzazione Internazionale del Lavoro fra le due guerre, 1919–1939 (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 1988), 9–43, 89–103.Google Scholar

10 Guérin, Denis, Albert Thomas au BIT, 1920–1932. De l'internationalisme à l'Europe (Geneva: Euryopa, 1996), 7–12Google Scholar; Schirmann, Sylvain, ‘Albert Thomas, il BIT e i progetti di Europa sociale fra le due guerre’, in Mechi, Lorenzo and Varsori, Antonio, eds., Lionello Levi Sandri e la Politica sociale europea (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 2008), 119–32Google Scholar; Dogliani, Patrizia, ‘Progetto per un'internazionale “aclassista”: i socialisti nell'Organizzazione Internazionale del Lavoro negli anni Venti’, Esperienze e problemi del movimento socialista fra le due guerre mondiali, Quaderni della Fondazione Feltrinelli, n. 34 (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 1987), 45–68.Google Scholar

11 Cayet, Thomas, Rationaliser le travail, organiser la production. Le Bureau International du Travail et la modernisation économique durant l'entre-deux-guerres (Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2010)Google Scholar.

12 ILO, ‘Unemployment Problems in 1931’, Studies and Reports, series C (Employment and unemployment), No. 16, Geneva, 1931, 34–5.

13 Convention no. 2 on ‘Unemployment’. Further examples are convention no. 21 on ‘Inspection of Emigrants’ (1926), and recommendation no. 19 on ‘Migration Statistics’ (1922). All texts of ILO conventions and recommendations are available on the ILO website, ‘Labour standards’ section: www.ilo.org/global/standards/ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017).

14 Commission of Enquiry for European Union. ‘Memorandum by the International Labour Office’, ILO Official Bulletin, vol. 16, 7 Jan. 1931, 34–8.

15 Ivi, 35–6.

16 Ivi, 37.

17 Lorenz, Edward C., Defining Global Justice: The History of US International Labor Standards Policy (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2001), 92–8Google Scholar; Jensen, Jill, ‘From Geneva to the Americas: The International Labor Organization and Inter-American Social Security Standards, 1936−1948’, International Labor and Working Class History, 80 (2011), 215−40CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Patel, Kiran Klaus, The New Deal: A Global History (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016), 137–8, 195–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

18 Lorenz, Defining Global Justice, 105–20; Hiscox, Michael J., ‘The Magic Bullet? The RTAA, Institutional Reform, and Trade Liberalization’, International Organization, 53, 4 (1999), 669–98CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

19 ILO, Minutes of the 74th Session of the Governing Body, Geneva, 20–22 February 1936, 71–4.

20 See the Minutes of the Informal Meeting Between Members of Various Departments and Mr. Louis Lorwin of the International Labor Office on August 1, 1936, and the other documents in HAILO, Economic Problems series (EP), f. 0-4.

21 ILO, ‘Employment, Wages and International Trade’, Studies and Reports, Series B (Economic Conditions), no. 32, Geneva, 1940, 11.

22 ‘Vocational Training: Problems and Trends’, International Labour Review, 37, 2 (1938), 139–67.

23 Troger, Vincent, ‘L'histoire de l'enseignement technique: entre les entreprises et l’État, la recherche d'une identité’, Histoire, économie et société, 4 (1989), 593–611CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also the notes by the French Labour Ministry, Rôle des écoles pratiques et professionnelles, relevant du Ministère de l’Éducation Nationale dans la formation de la main-d’œuvre des industries de guerre, of 15 Dec. 1939, and Formation professionnelle de la main-d’œuvre des industries de guerre, of 29 Feb. 1940, both in HAILO, Education series (ED), f. 5006-22.

24 ILO, ‘Labour Supply and National Defence’, Studies and Reports, Series C (Employment and Unemployment), No. 23, Montreal, 1941, 80–94.

25 Leighninger, Robert D., Long-Range Public Investment: The Forgotten Legacy of the New Deal (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2007), 11–34, 55–79, 194Google Scholar; ‘Federal Programmes to Assist Unemployed Youth in the United States’, International Labour Review 40, 6 (1939), 836–48; Patel, The New Deal, 79–90.

26 Ware, Susan, Beyond Suffrage: Women in the New Deal (Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1981), 145Google Scholar.

27 Recommendation no. 57 on ‘Vocational Training’, ILO website, ‘Labour standards’ section: www.ilo.org/global/standards/ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017). The debate on its approval is in International Labour Conference, 25th session, Geneva 1939, Record of proceedings, 314–20, 360–1, 429–44.

28 See the Memorandum sent by the Office of Education and Department of Labor to the State Supervisors of Trade and Industrial Education, October 1939, and the Correspondence Between Clara Beyer and Pierre Waelbroeck, Chief of the Employment and Migration Section of the ILO, of Nov. 1939 – Feb. 1940. All documents in HAILO, ED, 61-1-2.

29 Maier, Charles S., ‘The Politics of Productivity: Foundations of American International Economic Policy after World War II’, International Organization, XXXI, 4 (1977), 607–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

30 Alcock, History of the International Labour Organization, 151–70; Geert Van Goethem, ‘Phelan's War: The International Labour Organization in Limbo (1941–1948)’, in Van Daele et al., ILO Histories, 313–40.

31 The text of the ‘Declaration concerning the aims and purposes of the International Labour Organization’ (Declaration of Philadelphia) is annexed to the ILO Constitution; ILO website, ‘about the ILO’ section: www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017).

32 Grant, James, The Forgotten Depression. 1921: The Crash That Cured Itself (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2014)Google Scholar; Sparrow, John C., History of Personnel Demobilization in the United States Army (Washington: Department of the Army, 1952), 11–22.Google Scholar

33 Recommendation no. 71 on ‘Employment (transition from war to peace)’, ILO website, ‘Labour standards’ section: www.ilo.org/global/standards/ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017). The debate on its approval is in International Labour Conference, 26th session, Philadelphia 1944, Record of Proceedings, 1–2, 352–68, 602–16.

34 Kennedy, David M., Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 786–7Google Scholar; ‘The G. I. Bill of Rights: An Analysis of the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944’, Bulletin of the Social Security Administration, 7, 7 (1944), 3–13.

35 Lorimer, Frank, Lenroot, Katharine F. and Coil, E.J., ‘Problems Relating to Migration and Settlement in the Postwar Period’, paper presented to the Commission to Study the Organization of Peace, International Conciliation, 21, 379 (1942), 184–94Google Scholar; Hillmann, Robert P., ‘Quincy Wright and the Commission to Study the Organization of Peace’, Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations, 4, 4 (1998), 485–99Google Scholar.

36 Gillingham, John, ‘Background to Marshall-Plan's Technical Assistance: Productivism as American Ideology’, in Barjot, Dominique, ed., Catching Up with America: Productivity Missions and the Diffusion of American Economic and Technological Influence after the Second World War (Paris: Presses de l'Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 2002), 53–65Google Scholar; Carew, Anthony, Labour under the Marshall Plan: The Politics of Productivity and the Marketing of Management Science (Manchester: Manchester UP, 1987)Google Scholar.

37 Daniel Roger Maul, ‘The “Morse Years”: The ILO 1948–1970’, in Van Daele et al., ILO Histories, 365–400.

38 Mechi, L'Organizzazione Internazionale del Lavoro, 100–13. It is true that, even during the peak years of the Cold War, Eastern European member countries were not totally neglected by the ILO. On this see, for example, Sandrine Kott, ‘Par-delà la guerre froide. Les organisations internationales et les circulations Est-Ouest (1947–1973)’, Vingtième Siècle. Revue d'histoire, 2011/1 (n° 109), 142–54.

39 Comité de coopération économique européenne, Conférence de la main-d’œuvre, Rapports, Rome, janvier-février 1948, 24–7, 71–4.

40 ‘The ILO Manpower Programme’, International Labour Review, LIX, 4 (1949), 367–93.

41 Alcock, History of the International Labour Organization, 220–35.

42 Imber, Mark F., The USA, ILO, UNESCO and IAEA. Politicization and Withdrawal in the Specialized Agencies (London: Macmillan, 1989), 42–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ghebali, The International Labour Organisation, 113–6.

43 ILO, Minutes of the 122th session of the Governing Body, Geneva, May–June 1953, 96. See also the press release of 12 Aug. 1953, announcing the coming into force of the agreement, in Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU), Collection of the ECSC High Authority (CEAB), series 5, f. 104.

44 See all documents in HAEU, CEAB 11, f. 392, and HAEU, Collection of the EEC Commission (BAC), series 1/1970, f. 477.

45 CECA, Rapport de mission de M. Carpentier au BIT, 20 December 1954, HAEU, BAC, 1/1970, f. 680; Haute Autorité, Division des Problèmes du Travail, Évolution des relations entre la Haute Autorité et le Bureau International du Travail, 1 April 1957, HAEU, CEAB 5, f. 635.

46 CECA, Haute Autorité, Septième rapport général sur l'activité de la Communauté, Luxembourg, 1959, 231. Haute Autorité, Division des Problèmes du Travail, Convention européenne de sécurité sociale pour les travailleurs migrants, Summer 1957, HAEU, CEAB 5, f. 635.

47 ECSC Treaty, art. 56.

48 Confidential note Conversation entre le Directeur général et M. Monnet, 3 Dec. 1952, HAILO, DM, f. Z 15-9-1.

49 EEC Treaty, original version (1957), artt. 48–51 and 123–8. See also Mechi, Lorenzo, ‘Les États membres, les institutions et les débuts du Fonds Social Européen’, in Varsori, Antonio, ed., Inside the European Community: Actors and Policies in the European Integration (1957–1972) (Brussels: Bruylant, 2006), 95–116Google Scholar.

50 ‘Agreement concerning Liaison between the International Labour Organisation and the European Economic Community’, 7 July 1958, ILO Official Bulletin, No. 8, 1958, 565–7. See also Mechi, Lorenzo, ‘Between Community Building and External Relations: The ILO-EEC Cooperation from the Treaty of Rome to the Charter of Social Rights (1958–1989)’, in Idem, Migani, Guia and Petrini, Francesco, eds., Networks of Global Governance: International Organisations and European Integration in a Historical Perspective (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholar Publishing, 2014), 205–28Google Scholar.

51 Discussion du projet de rapport du Directeur Général à la Conférence régionale européenne, 8 Dec. 1953, HAILO, DM, Z 10-1-7.

52 Cafiero, Salvatore, Questione meridionale e unità nazionale, 1861–1995 (Rome: La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1996), 177–93Google Scholar; Roy Willis, F., France, Germany and the New Europe, 1945–1963 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1965), 126Google Scholar; Ohlin's biography is available on the Nobel Prize website: www.nobelprize.org (last visited 29 Nov. 2017).

53 ILO, ‘Social Aspects of European Economic Co-operation: Report by a Group of Experts’ (‘Ohlin Report’), Studies and Reports, New Series, 46, 1956. The citation is from ILO, Minutes of the 132nd Session of the Governing Body, Geneva, 1, 2 and 29 June 1956, 54–5.

54 See, for example, the Conférence Intergouvernementale pour le Marché commun et l'Euratom, Projet de procès-verbal de la réunion du Groupe du marché commun, tenue à Bruxelles les 19 et 20 juillet 1956, and Idem, Extraits du rapport des chefs de délégation et du rapport des six experts du BIT concernant les distorsions générales, les distorsions spécifiques et le rapprochement des législations, 1 Sept. 1956, both in HAEU, French Foreign Ministry collection (MAEF), f. 602.

55 Giubboni, Stefano, Social Rights and Market Freedom in the European Constitution: A Labour Law Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 40–5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

56 Sapir, André, ‘The Interaction between Labour Standards and International Trade Policy’, The World Economy, 18, 6 (1995), 791–803CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the influence of the Ohlin Report on socialist thinking about economic integration see Brian Shaev's article in this special issue.

57 Lisbon European Council, 23–24 Mar. 2000, Presidency Conclusions, website of the European Council, ‘European Council conclusions’ section: consilium.europa.eu/en/european-council/conclusions/ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017); website of the European Commission (ec.europa.eu), section ‘Europe 2020’ (last visited 29 Nov. 2017).

58 Haas, Ernst B., Beyond the Nation-State: Functionalism and International Organization (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964), 139–93.Google Scholar

59 Milward, Alan S., The European Rescue of the Nation-State (London: Routledge, 2000), 216Google Scholar.