Abstract

Economic theory advocates the free movement of labour as means of labour markets harmonization. However, without a preliminary institutional harmonization, free movement undermines wage organizations power of negotiation. This acknowledgement widely shared for the developed economies, is also relevant for the intermediate economies in which illegal labour immigration may be substituted for emigrated labour. The strategies elaborated by the syndicate of the employees of the Turkish textile industry reveal one of the major problems of the Euro-Mediterranean partnership, which is that of the creation of a zone of harmonized labour laws and a regulated labour market. Indeed, from the standpoint of an intermediate country, free movement seems to be a secondary problem as regards the objectives of labour markets integrated regulation. This dilemma can also be expressed as a preference for an institutional or regulated harmonization of labour markets as opposed to their harmonization by market processes.