Twenty Years After the EU's Eastward Enlargement: Win-Win Integration or Deepened Eastwest Cleavages in European Shipbuilding?

Abstract

In recent decades, European shipyards have offshored the production of hulls (the main body of the ship) and the installation of ships’ equipment (outfitting) to eastern European countries with lower wages, while more and more of the work in western yards has been carried out by lower paid migrant workers from eastern Europe. This distinct pattern of ‘dual mobility’ in shipbuilding has had mixed effects. On the positive side, western shipyards have benefitted from the supply of cheap hulls and flexible labour on lower wages, while most of the labour migrants are paid substantially higher wages than at home. The transfer of production and skills from western to eastern European shipyards has also contributed to a revitalisation of shipbuilding in these regions, preserving jobs and boosting competitiveness. On the negative side, dual mobility has also contributed to a reduction in recruitment and rising labour and skills shortages, along with fragmentation and dualisation of labour markets between directly employed staff and subcontracted workers, mainly migrants. Many of the latter have also experienced precarious working and living conditions, marked by high job and income insecurity, along with poor housing and working conditions.

To strengthen the gains and avoid the negative consequences, the following challenges need to be tackled:
– development of a coordinated European strategy for enhanced recruitment, vocational training and investment in workers’ skills.
– upgrading of blue-collar work, along with better regulation of subcontracting to reduce the disparities in pay and conditions between internal and external labour.
– stricter enforcement of the EU Directives on adequate minimum wages in the European Union (22 October 2022), on temporary agency work (19 November 2008) and on the posting of workers in the framework of the provision of services (28 June 2018) to ensure equal pay for the same work in the same place;
– increased public support through European and national funding for research and development (R&D) and innovation, along with a comprehensive industrial strategy for the sector to advance the development of new technology and fossil-free fuel required to accelerate the sector’s twin green and digital transition.
– more institutionalised and coordinated transnational labour market governance within the shipbuilding industry, especially at the yard level, to strengthen productivity and improve the working conditions of cross-border labour.

Keywords: shipbuilding industry, EU enlargement, labour mobility, production, trade union, workers rights, labour relations, working conditions, EU countries