European Birds of Passage - An Empirical Legal Theory of Temporary Labour Migration in Europe

The E-BoP project is an innovative study of the legal framework for temporary labour migration in the European Union (EU). While unevenly researched, the subject is hotly debated and in continuous expansion.

Temporary labour migration increasingly represents the compromise between calls to ""take back control"" of borders, and the demands from employers of access to migrant workforce.

The legal regulation of this phenomenon is grounded on concepts, such as ""temporariness"" and ""labour market"", which are either not defined by the law or in conflict with their socio-economic reality.

E-BoP explores these concepts through an empirical legal analysis to address the foundations of the legal framework for temporary labour migration in the EU.

In doing so, it covers forms of temporary labour migration which legal doctrine has never analysed together, namely posting of workers, seasonal work, and intra-corporate transfers.

The project aims to answer a set of questions concerning this legal framework: what is the implicit definition of ""labour market"" accepted by legislation and courts, and what are its boundaries? What does the law mean when it classifies certain migrant workers as ""temporary""?

What would be the legal and socio-economic consequences of conceiving temporary labour migrants as fully integrated in the Member State where they perform their work?

The E-BoP project triangulates the results of a systematic analysis of legal documents with quantitative analysis of the phenomena at stake to explore the real world meaning of concepts upon which the legal regulation of temporary labour migration in the EU is construed.

As such, the ambition of E-BoP extends beyond the field of labour and social rights, and into other legal disciplines and branches of social sciences.

Considering how the legal construction influences employment statistics, leading to the undercounting of temporary labour migrants, the project challenges the societal perception of reality.