Recruitment of Third Country Nationals in Central and Eastern Europe: The Case of Filipino Migrant Workers in the Czech Republic and Slovakia

Countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) are not the ‘traditional’ receiving countries nor the Philippines is the ‘traditional’ source country of migrant workers of the region. Nevertheless, ageing population, labour shortages, and recent crises have become driving forces that made the migration streams between the Philippines and the CEE to gain salience.

This paper is based on a research project that compares the processes, infrastructures, and networks involved in the recruitment and integration of Filipino migrant workers (as a case of third country nationals) in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. As comparative cases, the Czech Republic and Slovakia provide a way of understanding how the practices of state and non-state actors in receiving and sending countries as well labour market needs shape the particular migration streams of Filipino workers in these ‘emerging’ destination countries, specifically with regards to deployment in more male-dominated jobs and the complexities of recruiting third country nationals amidst anti-immigration sentiments in the region. What are the similarities and differences between the two countries in terms of responding to the shortages of workers, manner of recruitment, and support and integration efforts?

It is also interesting to compare these destination countries not only in terms of the larger issue of the recruitment of migrant labour, but also in examining how these destinations are ‘marketed’ in the Philippines – where the desired destinations are primarily the United States and, to a certain extent, Canada. How are migration aspirations and place-specific imaginations relating to destination countries manifested in the discourse and individual narratives of migrants?

The paper brings together motivations and desires to migrate (micro), the channels through which such aspirations are formed, encouraged, and enabled (meso), and the policies and demands of destination countries for migrant labour as well as the emigration environment in the source country (macro).