The dominant channels of globalization of the labor market, as one of the determining patterns of its modern structural transformation, are, on the one hand, the convergence of individual subsystems of national labor markets and the elimination of legal, national-ethnic, cultural-humanitarian and other barriers between them, and on the other – international labor migration. Due to its economic nature and the driving forces of development, the cross-border movement of labor resources is an extremely complex process capable of exerting a powerful transformational influence on both the scale and structure of national labor markets, as well as the demographic, professional-qualification, educational, gender, and age composition of the population of states and entire regions. It is no accident that issues related to the regulation of international labor migration processes have become an integral component of global economic policy and the adoption of various political decisions regarding interstate cooperation in recent decades. In this regard, the substantiation of the conceptual design of the global theory of labor migration based on the generalization of its theoretical arsenal and taking into account the most constructive elements of existing theories and concepts acquires significant theoretical and methodological importance. And to generalize the theoretical discourse of international labor migration processes, let us emphasize the following: each of the theories and concepts of cross-border labor movement, having its competitive advantages and methodological flaws, performed an important ontological function in the formation of scientific views on its essence, driving forces, vector orientation, organizational-economic and institutional-regulatory formats, as well as the mechanisms of the impact of migration on global employment and the functioning of national labor markets. Their key methodological principles make it possible to adequately understand the key patterns of the development of international labor migration at various stages of global economic development, to forecast their prospective trends, as well as to develop effective migration policies of states and regional groups. Despite the fact that various aspects of the classical concepts of labor migration to some extent lose their relevance in modern conditions, they are still actively used by states and regional groups to solve a wide range of strategic goals and tasks of competitive development.
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