Plus: migration and services trade; refugee entrepreneurs in Australia Is a hardline position on immigration the key to electoral success for the beleaguered centre-left? Denmark’s Social Democrats certainly think so. They took first place in a general election this month after arguing that immigrants threaten the country’s social cohesion and generous welfare state. The far-right Danish People’s Party, whose line that message echoed, suffered significant losses. But notwithstanding the Danish …
Continue readingMobility matters
Even in a digital age, trading services often requires people to move too, says Sam Lowe The internet makes the world feel smaller. Gone are the days when sending documents overseas took months, or paying for a 20-minute call to a supplier in the Philippines required taking out a second mortgage. Yet services trade is still constrained by geography – a 10% increase in distance between countries tends to reduce services …
Continue readingOut with Orban
Plus: the right Canadian model for Brexit Britain; the coming trade war over European cars For all her faults, Angela Merkel has done more to help refugees in recent years than any other European leader. So it is incongruous – indeed, shameful – that the German Chancellor’s party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), is in the same political group in the European Parliament as Fidesz, the party of Hungary’s vehemently xenophobic …
Continue readingThe right Canadian model for Brexit Britain
Britain has much to learn from Canada’s modest realism in negotiating with a neighbouring economic giant By Jack Graham “Britain clings to imperial nostalgia as Brexit looms” (Washington Post). “Whatever form Brexit eventually takes it is a rearward step into an imagined past” (Globe and Mail). “With Brexit, [Britain] seems to be embracing an introverted irrelevance” (New York Times). Having moved from the UK to Toronto last summer, I’ve been struck by the fact …
Continue readingThe new global disorder; is Berlin the new London?; year in review
The new global disorder Season two of The Trump Show. Season three of Brexit Breakdown. Part five of Homicide: Australian PM. 2018 has been another eventful year – and not just on Netflix. There’s also an edgy new French drama, Gilets Jaunes. A terrifying new Brazilian telenovela, Comandante Bolsonaro. Meanwhile a long-running German series, the Merkel Mysteries, has been cancelled. And much else besides. Yet when historians look back at 2018, it is likely …
Continue readingMilitarising the US-Mexican border
Plus: the value of asylum seekers; Brexit; after Merkel As so often with Donald Trump, the move is both for show and at the same time deadly serious. Sending up to 15,000 US troops to defend the border with Mexico against an unarmed “caravan” of Central Americans fleeing violence to seek refuge in America is primarily a way of rallying the Republican base for today’s crucial midterm elections. The images …
Continue readingAsylum Seekers aren’t a Burden for Europe
Photo credit: Takver By Hippolyte d’Albis, Ekrame Boubtane and Dramane Coulibaly Contrary to public perceptions, new research shows that asylum seekers don’t harm the economies that receive them. On the contrary, the faster they are allowed to work, the bigger their contribution can be While the number of asylum seekers arriving in Europe has plunged since 2015, tensions among EU governments remain high. Asylum seekers are typically seen as a …
Continue readingOur open world is under threat; the business case for employing refugees; the new global talent race
Trump. Brexit. Salvini. Trade wars. Border walls. The Great Firewall of China. America First. Italians First. New Zealand First. After decades in which our world has become ever more closely connected as people, products, money and data criss-cross borders ever more intensively, resurgent nationalists now seek to close borders and stamp on difference. It is tragic, though perhaps not surprising, that foreigners are increasingly scapegoated for all manner of primarily domestic problems. Immigrants are …
Continue readingThe new global talent race
With Trump’s America and Brexit Britain turning away talented migrants, Canada and Australia are well placed to capitalise By Jack Graham From tech gurus to top scientists, every country says it wants to attract the best brains. Highly-skilled workers are increasingly mobile, and help to stimulate innovation, enterprise, jobs and growth. But while the global competition for talent is nothing new, the contest has recently changed. Two of the leading …
Continue readingHow do we persuade sceptics of the value of immigration?; overcoming the politics of pessimism
Image thanks to Max Pixel By Philippe Legrain Openness to immigration is a good thing, as I hope you agree. But how can we persuade moderate sceptics? Presenting rational arguments and evidence is important, but often insufficient. As part of its excellent Open Future series, The Economist has published an open essay by Philippe Legrain on this topic. The first part is out today, and the subsequent parts will feature readers’ best …
Continue readingIn memory of Mike Moore
OPEN Advisory Board member Mike Moore sadly passed away on 2 February. Mike had an illustrious career, as the trade minister of New Zealand who opened its economy up to the world in the 1980s, as his country’s prime minister, as the Director-General of the World Trade Organisation who launched the Doha Round and brought China into the WTO in late 2001, and as New Zealand ambassador to the US during the …
Continue readingEver Cleverer Union launch
Philippe Legrain presenting Ever Cleverer Union: how AI could help EU institutions become more capable, competent, cost-effective and closer to citizens Great panel discussion with (from left to right): Jochen Richter, Director, Support and Technological Services for Translation, European Parliament; Eva Maydell, Member of the Industry Research and Energy (ITRE) Committee, European Parliament; Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, Co-founder, OPEN; Dana Manescu, Head of Unit, Social Media & Video Communication, DG COMM, European Commission; …
Continue readingNotre rapport sur l’intégration des réfugiés cité par Reuters
Selon une enquête dédiée d’Eurostat de 2014, 58,4% des personnes ayant obtenu l’asile en France y travaillent. Cette part augmente à 64,5% pour les réfugiés y résidant depuis 10 ans ou plus, souligne Philippe Legrain, chercheur associé à la London School of Economics et fondateur de l’institut de réflexion Open. En 2016, le taux d’emploi global des populations immigrées dans l’OCDE était de 67,4%, contre 55,3% en France, dans le …
Continue reading‘Step Up’ quoted in InfoMigrants
Our findings are quoted at length (in French) here.
Continue reading‘Refugees Work’ quoted in Open Democracy
First, they should make greater efforts to achieve CRRF’s Goal 2, “Building refugees’ self-reliance.” The Open Political Economy Network, in collaboration with the Tent Foundation, has laid out a number of ways to accomplish this in a new report, Refugees Work. They call for creating efficient, fair asylum systems to process applications, allowing asylum seekers with substantial claims to work immediately, and investing in language and skills training. Key to establishing these …
Continue readingHow to help refugees get into work fast
What kind of support do refugees really need to get jobs? Philippe Legrain outlines his new 22-country study for the Tent Foundation and OPEN on what works best to help refugees find employment quickly, thus bringing dividends to local economies. Read the full piece for Refugees Deeply here Photo: AFP PHOTO/STEFFI LOOS
Continue readingFar From Being a Burden, Research Suggests Refugees Come With Benefits
An Open Political Economy Network study released last May determined that an investment in “welcoming refugees” will nearly double in economic benefits within five years. Refugees often take “4D” jobs — dirty, difficult, dangerous or dull — that many don’t want. They start new businesses that create new jobs. The experience of being uprooted from one culture and exposed to another often sparks creativity and entrepreneurship among refugees. And they tend …
Continue readingInvesting in refugees would reap economic benefits, interviewed on RN Breakfast
Hamish MacDonald interviewed Philippe Legrain about OPEN/Tent’s refugee study on ABC’s RN Breakfast on 6 September. Listen to it here
Continue readingQuoted on the trade implications of Brexit in Quartz
OPEN founding partner Hosuk Lee-Makiyama was quoted by Quartz in an article on the trade implications of Brexit on 5 July. Now that Britain has voted to leave the European Union, it faces the daunting task of renegotiating a long list of trade deals as a newly independent entity: all the deals the EU already has with other countries, the ones the EU is currently negotiating, and a deal with …
Continue readingMinority Businesses Matter: Europe
The contribution and challenges of ethnic minority businesses in Europe Minority businesses in Europe, of which there at least 800,000, contribute at least €570 billion to the economy and employ at least 2.7 million people, according to OPEN’s pioneering new report with MSDUK. Key findings include: the first-ever list of the top 50 minority businesses in Europe; studies of the contribution of dynamic minority entrepreneurs in the tech, healthcare and …
Continue readingEQUIP Europe
Why an increasingly diverse Europe needs EQUality In Procurement for ethnic minority entrepreneurs The world’s first Covid vaccine was developed by BioNTech, a German biotechnology company founded and led by scientists of Turkish origin. CEO Uğur Şahin was born in Turkey and moved to Germany as a child to live with his father, who was a “guest worker” in a car factory in Cologne. His co-founder – and wife – …
Continue readingMinority Businesses Matter
Businesses led by ethnic-minority entrepreneurs contribute at least £74 billion a year to the UK, according to a new OPEN report by Philippe Legrain and Martyn Fitzgerald published today.
Continue readingEver Cleverer Union
OPEN’s new report explains how AI could help EU institutions become more capable, competent, cost-effective and closer to citizens Europe’s productivity performance is woefully inadequate. But the development and deployment across the economy of artificial intelligence (AI) tools could provide a big boost, benefiting citizens, businesses and public administrations – not least the EU institutions, the focus of this report. Ever Cleverer Union: How AI could help EU institutions become …
Continue readingStep Up: How to get refugees into work quickly
OPEN’s new report, published with the Tent Foundation, sets out how best to get refugees and asylum seekers into work quickly, with a focus on entry-level jobs. Governments, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and businesses provide many different schemes to help refugees get jobs, often without knowing how effective they are. However, there is plenty that they can learn from what works well elsewhere. From research, analysis and evidence from 22 advanced …
Continue readingOpen Up: How to fix the flaws in the EU’s Digital Single Market
The EU has launched a blizzard of digital initiatives recently – including a wide-ranging Digital Single Market (DSM) strategy, new data-privacy rules and several antitrust cases against US tech giants – with the latest announcement due on 11 January. But what if these EU initiatives don’t add up – or would actually make matters worse? In a ground-breaking new study for OPEN, Open Up: How to fix the flaws in the EU’s Digital …
Continue readingRefugees Work: A humanitarian investment that yields economic dividends
Investing one euro – or dollar – in welcoming refugees can yield nearly two in economic benefits within five years. That is a key finding of OPEN’s new report – to our knowledge, the first comprehensive, international study of how refugees can contribute to advanced economies – which is co-published with Tent, a foundation whose mission is to help forcibly displaced people. Amid the worst refugee crisis since the Second World War, developed countries …
Continue readingConversation about “Refugees Work” with Ratna Omidvar of Global Diversity Exchange
On 16 September OPEN founder Philippe Legrain was interviewed by Senator Ratna Omidvar of Global Diversity Exchange about the economic dividends that refugees can provide.
Continue readingProtected: How diversity helps create new ideas and businesses
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