Abstract
This article examines the contribution of the FILEF (Federazione Italiana Lavoratori Migranti e Famiglie) to the European debate on the human, social and civil rights of migrant workers during the 1970s. Through the project of an ‘International Statute of Migrant Workers’ Rights’, presented to the European Parliament in 1971, FILEF submitted a proposal for the reform of the 1968 Community Regulation on the Free Movement of Migrant Workers in Europe in order to extend to workers from non-European countries the same rights and protections accorded to those from the EEC area. The analysis is focused on the discussion around the proposal in the committees of the European Parliament as well as on the debate that developed within the transnational network of the FILEF during the international conferences organised by the Federation from the mid-1970s until the early 1980s.
Highlights
The associations of Italian migrant workers represent a central aspect of the history of Italian emigration after the Second World War
With its proposed ‘Statute’ the FILEF intended to be fully involved in the debate on the human, civil and social rights of Italian migrant workers abroad
Through the promotion and coordination of round-table panels, meetings and working groups with the EEC institutions and thanks to its associative networks, the FILEF carried out, throughout the 1970s, an action of ‘political brokerage’, integrating and bringing together different social and political actors, in order to reach the common objective of a legislation aiming at respecting and safeguarding the human rights of migrant workers in the European Community
Summary
Alongside the traditional forms of mutualism and legal and economic assistance to Italian workers abroad – carried out mostly by the Catholic Missions, the Caritas and the trade unions, which were fundamental reference points for Italian communities – larger organisations based at national, regional or provincial level spread from the end of the 1960s onwards (Colucci and Sanfilippo 2010, 27; Sanfilippo 2011, 368) The birth of this new type of ‘umbrella’ organisation is partly the result of a process of sensitisation of the Italian political class, in particular of the main political parties, Democrazia Cristiana (DC) and Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI).
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