Moving People in a Post-Neoliberal Era

While a neoliberal framework presents the effects of factor mobility as an outcome of individuals choosing between locations to improve earnings, people mobility remains highly restrictive. While international migration has the potential to enhance the prospects of poor people around the world, it is treated as a threat to general standards of living. I consider first how mobility is shaped in the face of public preferences over migration. International flows of people and capital are then linked with business cycles fluctuations and the redistributive effects of labour mobility are queried. Departing from market principles, I present the current framework governing migration as an appendix to preferential trade agreements. I show how European countries have extended ‘free movement’—until Brexit, which has reversed the process. I finally conclude by exposing restrictions to mobility as temporary fixes, in contrast to engrained social and economic concerns requiring wider redistributive and social policy consideration.