Policy Response to Emigration from the Baltics: Confronting ‘The European Elephant in the Room’

At a time when migration policy has moved to the centre of national and European policy agendas, the three Baltic states are taking their first steps towards building a cohesive policy response to emigration. This is especially important in the wake of the global financial crisis, which generated an increased outflow from the Baltic states.

The Baltic states are facing variety of challenges in part caused by this movement of mainly working-age men and women: demographic issues related to an ageing society, labour market challenges and social security system sustainability. Within this context, the discussion of human resource losses is growing in the public sphere in the Baltic states.

Based on interviews with experts in labour and migration in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and a review of key national policy documents, this article analyses the commonalities among and differences between these three countries’ national responses.

Despite some variations in the characteristics and extent of emigration from the three countries, the interviewed experts agree that the European Union’s policy of free mobility is socially and economically problematic. As the interviews indicate, there have been strong calls in Latvia and Lithuania for a more cohesive intra-European migration management policy to address current imbalances between EU member states and ensure that the loss of human resources in sending countries is accounted for in the recruitment policies of receiving countries. On another hand, Estonia experiences more circular movement patterns and demonstrates a rather liberal view towards migration issues, seeing a virtue in the (regional) open market.