Regionl Integration: Migration Priorities for The East Africa Community (EAC)
Globalization poses a challenge to national governance policies and regional integration labour policies in particular. This challenge of continuing to transform the economies, while ensuring that the poor and vulnerable are protected, workers equipped with skills necessary to compete in today’s global economy remains very relevant to East Africa Community (EAC) integration process. However, the speed with which EAC policies are shaped is varied, and generally low: we are facing a long-term process marked by differing ambition levels. Taking data constraints and conceptual challenges into account, our research, nonetheless, contribute some of the building blocks of a cross-regional analysis, including the following themes:
• Focus on correlation between the share of intra-regional migration and regional coordination on policies on labour/migrant worker rights;
• Free movement of labour as the natural economic complement of free movement of goods, services and capital.
• Free movement labour in relation to geographical expansion to new Member States that remain subject to constraints in relation to the fears of the old Member States.
• Free movement of workers and other economically active persons but also those with sufficient means; categories of third country nationals, such as family members of citizens of the EAC.
• Continued existence of difference of treatment over which the question whether they amount to unlawful discrimination.
• The aggregate and envisioned complex arrival on the scene of a regional EAC citizenship and the universal application of human rights that raise the question of the intrinsic nature of citizenship.
• Free movement of labour as the natural economic complement of free movement of goods, services and capital.
• Free movement labour in relation to geographical expansion to new Member States that remain subject to constraints in relation to the fears of the old Member States.
• Free movement of workers and other economically active persons but also those with sufficient means; categories of third country nationals, such as family members of citizens of the EAC.
• Continued existence of difference of treatment over which the question whether they amount to unlawful discrimination.
• The aggregate and envisioned complex arrival on the scene of a regional EAC citizenship and the universal application of human rights that raise the question of the intrinsic nature of citizenship.