Abstract
This article examines the connections between employment agencies, ethics and migrant workers. The article identifies three approaches adopted by agencies towards ethics and migrant workers, namely, ‘business case’, ‘minimal compliance’ and ‘social justice’ approaches. Through case studies of three agencies in the UK, the article explores the potential and limitations of each of these approaches for meeting the needs of migrant workers. The article points to the limitations of both the business case and ‘minimal compliance’ approaches, stemming from tensions between the attempt to put in place ethical approaches towards the employment of migrant workers and the imperatives of the competitive strategies being pursued by agencies. The article points to the potential for social enterprise agencies to effectively meet the needs of migrants. These agencies can focus on more than just the first transition of migrants into the labour market; can formalize transitions within the labour market and link people to jobs that are more appropriate to their skills and experience, as a means of preventing the perpetuation of skill underutilisation.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Association of Labour Providers. (2008). Agency labour audit tool. London: ALP.
Bach, S. (2007). Going global? The regulation of nurse migration in the UK. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 45(2), 383–403.
Commission on Vulnerable Employment. (2007). Employment agencies: A different model. CoVE/Migrant Workers NorthWest Update, June 2007.
Commission on Vulnerable Employment. (2008). Hard work, hidden lives, final report of CoVE. London: CoVE.
Confederation Internationale des Entreprises de Travail Temporaire. (2000). Orchestrating the Evolution of Private Employment Agencies towards a stronger society. Brussels: CIETT.
Confederation Internationale des Entreprises de Travail Temporaire. (2008). Work migration. CIETT: Brussels, available in http://www.ciett.org/index.php?id=45.
Datta, K., McIlwaine, C., Evans, Y., Herbert, J., May, J., & Wills, J. (2007). From coping strategies to tactics: London’s low-pay economy and migrant labour. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 45(2), 404–432.
European Commission. (2005). Europe on the move: Working together for more growth and jobs. Strasbourg: European Commission.
European Commission. (2008). Employment in Europe. Brussels: European Commission.
Fellini, I., Ferro, A., & Fullin, G. (2007). Recruitment processes and labour mobility: The construction industry in Europe. Work, Employment and Society, 21(2), 277–298.
Fitzgerald, I. (2007). Working in the UK: Polish migrant worker routes into employment in the north-east and north west construction and food processing sectors. Report for the Trades Union Congress. London: TUC.
Forde, C. (2008). You know we are not an employment agency: Manpower, government and the development of the temporary help industry in Britain. Enterprise and Society, 9(2), 337–365.
Forde, C. & MacKenzie, R. (2008). Migrant workers, agencies and the ‘new’ intermediaries. Paper presented at the British Academy of Management Conference, Harrogate, 9th–11th September.
Forde, C., & Slater, G. (2005). Agency working in Britain: Character, consequences and regulation. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 43(2), 249–271.
Freeman, H. & Gonos, G. (2009). Taming the employment sharks: The case for regulating profit-driven labor market intermediaries in high mobility labor markets’. Employee Rights and Employee Policy Journal, 13, 101–176.
Gonos, G. (1997). The contest over ‘employer status’ in the post-war United States: The case of temporary help firms. Law and Society Review, 31(1), 81–110.
Hatton, E. (2008). The making of the Kelly girl and the rise of the temp industry in postwar America. Journal of Historical Sociology, 21(1), 1–29.
Holgate, J. (2005). Organizing migrant workers: A case study of working conditions and unionization in a London sandwich factory. Work, Employment and Society, 19(1), 463–480.
Legge, K. (2006). Ethics and work, Chapter 11. In M. Korczynski, R. Hodson, & P. Edwards (Eds.), Social theory at work. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
MacKenzie, R. & Forde, C. (2007). The social and economic experiences of asylum seekers, migrant workers, refugees and overstayers. Centre of Employment Relations Innovation and Change Research Paper 1, CERIC. Leed: University of Leeds.
MacKenzie, R. & Forde, C. (2009). The rhetoric of the ‘good worker’ versus the realities of employers’ use and the experiences of migrant workers’. Work, Employment and Society, 23(1), 142–159.
McDowell, L., Batnisky, A., & Dyer, S. (2008). Internationalization and the spaces of temporary labour: The global assembly of a local workforce. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 46(4), 550–570.
OECD. (2006). From immigration to integration: Local solutions to a global challenge. Paris: OECD.
Peck, G. (2000). Reinventing free labor: Padrones and immigrant workers in the North American West 1880–1930. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Peck, J., & Theodore, N. (1998). The business of contingent work: Growth and restructuring in Chicago’s temporary employment industry. Work, Employment and Society, 12(4), 655–674.
Piore, M. J. (1979). Birds of passage: Migrant labor and industrial societies. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Purcell, J., Purcell, K., & Tailby, S. (2004). Temporary work agencies: Here today, gone tomorrow? British Journal of Industrial Relations, 42(4), 705–725.
Recruitment and Employment Confederation. (2008). REC code of professional practice. London: REC.
Rodriguez, N. (2004). “Workers wanted:” Employer recruitment of immigrant labor. Work and Occupations, 31(4), 453–473.
Ryan, L., Sales, R., Tilki, M., & Siara, B. (2007). Recent Polish migrants in London: Social networks, transience and settlement. End of ESRC Research Grant Report.
Theodore, N. (2003). Political economies of day labor: Regulation and restructuring of Chicago’s contingent labor markets. Urban Studies, 40(9), 1811–1829.
Trades Union Congress. (2007). Migrant agency workers in the UK. London: TUC.
Waldinger, R. (1986). Through the eye of the needle: Immigrants and enterprise in New York’s garment trades. New York: New York University Press.
Ward, K., Coe, N., & Johns, J. (2008). The role of temporary staffing agencies in facilitating mobility in Central and Eastern Europe. Research report for Vedior Staffing.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Forde, C., MacKenzie, R. The Ethical Agendas of Employment Agencies Towards Migrant Workers in the UK: Deciphering the Codes. J Bus Ethics 97 (Suppl 1), 31–41 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1077-5
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-011-1077-5