Germany’s Western Balkans Regulation: Inspiration for facilitating refugee labour mobility?

Complementary pathways provide an avenue for refugees to take up a job in another country, enabling them to use their skills to forge a sustainable future and helping to meet employer and labour market needs in countries of destination. Germany’s Western Balkans Regulation provides a model for the expansion of refugee labour mobility in Germany and other EU countries. Developed with an annual cap and a particular scope, such as a geographic focus on one or more third countries or on specific labour market sectors, an expansion of this approach would ease mobility requirements for people in need of protection who have secured a job offer. The possible expansion of the Regulation’s model to reach people in need of protection has the potential to introduce fresh ideas and positive change to EU migration and asylum policy more broadly.