MOVEMENT  OF  NATURAL  PERSONS
AND  THE DOHA  ROUND.

While at VOE we may favor a wide range of expression in many languages, yet basically our aim is toward cohesion in variety, solidarity in diversity.
That is the reason why we are attentive on the proper span of the European Union, its optimal borders, so that too large an extension of range shall not undermine unity of substance.
The number of articles found in this website on the Turkish candidature is an expression of that concern.
Another element which requires caution are the flows of migration which globalization will bring with it (as well as laxity of our governments).
If limits of tolerance should be exceeded society may be fractured. That will happen in each of our European countries to the varying extent of their laxness, but as a result also cohesion between the countries will be fractured.

Related to that concern we want to mention a point which comes up in the efforts made towards the DOHA round of multilateral trade negotiations.
We are profoundly in favor of those efforts, for many reasons. They will strengthen Europe and help solving problems in specific european countries. It may cost Europe giving up on part of its agricultural subsidies, but if that could help developing countries to grow and thereby retain their populations, so much the better.
On one part of the DOHA round we would suggest caution, namely the part concerned with freedom in providing services and the connected flow of natural persons.
Again basically we are in favor:an appropriate measure of liberalization of the movement of natural persons may increase productivity, and increased productivity is what ageing societies in Europe will need. At the same time a morel iberal attitude on this point may show that “industrialized countries and developing countries are able to work together to ensure that the benefits of globalization are spread more widely” as the ICC recently put it.
For those interested in a background to this topic reference to a document of the Internhamber of Commerce, the World Business Organization, will be useful (reference ICC recommendations on the movement of natural persons, Policy Statement.)

The document deals more specifically with the question in how far the free movement of natural persons should be incluced in the DOHA trade negotiations. Many entrepreneurs claim that they need freedom to move personnel to supervise their investments in host counties, to train on foreign locations, or just for career development of personnel, or to perform specialized functions abroad in order to perform tasks connected with their activities abroad, be their in commerce or investments.

So far so good. Indeed for such purposes procedures could and should be facilitated. There is scope to cl;arify procedures. For temporary work regulations may well be made lighter than for permanent migration Mutual recognition of diplomas should be pursued We applaud the ICC and those who work in that direction.

Nevertheless we have to be careful to borderlines, and not to overstretch and thereby spoil a good program. We should abstain from stretching such a program for migration of natural persons to the point where it might lead to mass migration , or to the undercutting of social policies in the host countries. An article illustrative of some concerns in the USA may englighten us, and reference is therefore made (Jessica M Vaughan – “Some lost jobs never leave home” The Washington Post May 2 2004 p B2 We are happy to have this opportunity to salute CIS, the Center of Immigration Studies)

We shall limit ourselves however to a more basic comment and recommendation which we venture to phrase in the following way:

Let us be careful not to expand the DOHA program on the movement of natural persons where it would lead to massive flows of guest workers as we have seen in Europe during the ‘60s and 70’s.
Movement for tasks necessary for and incidental to valid commercial and financial investment purposes will be a good thing. However stretching it to such an extent where the financial rationality would mostly depend on lower labour costs, compared to local costs would be a bad thing.
A genuine connection between the need for movement of natural persons and the rationality of the cross border business project should be kept in view. We might well expand the concept of “economic needs tests” often imposed by host countries, when they insiste on a favorable priority employment chance for their nationals. We might add: sending natural persons abroad may be subject to an inherent “needs test” at the very base of the project evaluation. Let us see whether this concept can fly. Competing on just lower wage and connected labor costs hould not be sufficient title to get a DOHA freedom of movement for natural persons.

We hope all organizations with an interest in the DOHA round would keep this question at heart. Let there not be a false “Grand Bargain” where the cooperation of developing countries in the Doha round on trade and investment matters would be bought by unreasonable stretching of the movement of cheap guest workers.

Let organizations like the International Labor Organization, the WTO, entrepreneurial organizations and civil society (for instance EDC, UNIAPAC, the International Christian Union of Business Executives, the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington and other similar bodies) to continue devoting their creativity and prudence to this matter. But since the quoted document came from the International Chamber of Commerce, our plea goes to them in the first place.

Gerard Hannezo
Anton Smitsendonk
Paris june 2004