Temporary migrant work and the unwanted social effects of its institutional framework
This research focuses on public policy in Canada on international labor migration. It examines the impacts of the institutional framework of the temporary migrant workers (TMW), implemented at the federal level in 2014, with the global reform, “Overhauling the temporary foreign worker program”, followed by a provincial component, the Law 8 amending the Labor Code. This research, conducted in Quebec since 2016, in the agribusiness, services, hotels and restaurants, analyzes these impacts on: 1) the employment relations and the labour relations; 2) the socio-legal status of TMWs, their career curriculum and the access to unionization (association and negotiation rights). Its methodology combines a qualitative approach with research findings from other Canadian provinces. Noting the increasing economic orientation of the Canadian model of migration policy, our conclusions propose a theoretical model explaining two levels of consequences of public policies. Firstly, the process of employment segmentation resulting from the de-unionization and from the gradual elimination of collective labour relations in these sectors. Secondly, the differential of social labour rights resulting from a process of an institutional precariousness directly related to 1) the multiplication of the TMWs status and 2) their individual and nominative subordination to the employer. This public action, combining migration policies and employment policies, allows companies to internalize an inexpensive and legally vulnerable foreign labor force; it regulates migratory flows which can fill indefinitely permanent jobs by this workforce without having to assume their social costs.