MigrAID

The increasing flow of immigrants and refugees from third-countries to the EU, as well as the continuing internal migration of European citizens from one member state to another, have led to the ethnic diversity of the European workforce. According to a Eurofound report (Eurofound, 2015:1), immigration by non-EU nationals in 2015 represented half of the employment growth in the past five years. At the same time, in 2014 some 2.7% of the EU population resided in a Member State other than their country of origin (EY, 2014).

In this context, ethnic diversity management and migrants’ integration in the labour force constitutes a major challenge for the EU. There are continuing ethnic inequalities in the workforce and a lack of equality awareness by many employers and employees. Ethnic minorities and migrant employees are more vulnerable to discrimination (Kirton and Read, 2007:134). They have less access to training and learning opportunities and they are under-represented in decision-making positions in the trade-unions (ibid: 134). At the same time, cultural differences between employees and employers and/or between employees themselves may lead to communication difficulties between them, drawn from the lack of skills and awareness in regard to multi-culturism and diversity management.

Because of all these factors, ethnic diversity is a complicated challenge. The role of the trade unions and the employers’ organisations is critical. Trade unionists need to acquire specific skills and knowledge, and have equality awareness in order to meet the needs of all their members and have a fruitful contribution towards handling ethnic diversity and promoting migrants’ integration at workplace level. Employers’ organisations should have the relevant awareness, knowledge and skills in order to promote a diversity management agenda at the level of the enterprises. Both social partners need to acquire conflict resolution skills, have knowledge of the relevant legislation, of good practices and policies. The principle objective of this project is to address those needs by developing social partners’ knowledge and skills – particularly trade unionists and employers’ organisations – to manage ethnic diversity and promote migrants’ integration in the SMEs of five European countries; Cyprus, Greece, Italy, France, and Denmark

The team decided to focus on the SMEs due to certain characteristics they acquire. Importantly, the role of SMEs in the European economy and the total employment is decisive. In 2014, EU SMEs employed almost 90 million people which represent the 67% of total employment (European Union, 2015;3). Nevertheless, the literature in the field of industrial relations has given much greater weight on equality and diversity issues within large organisations rather than the SMEs (Kirton and Read, 2007: 132). However, the SME workforce consists of some of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged groups in the labour market, including an over-representation of ethnic minorities and migrant workers (ibid:132). At the same time, the legislation for equality is often notwithstandind in SMEs due to the informality and unitarism character of SME employee relations (Woodhams et al, 2004). Although this makes the role of social partners even more crucial, they often fail to successfully play that role because of the lower levels of trade union membership and organising by the employees of SMEs, compared to the larger organisations.