The effectiveness of measures of labour insertion of adult immigrants: a transnational enquiry in Italy and Spain

The essay reports findings from an investigation carried out by a network of institutions in July-October 2002 in the framework of the European project “Migratools: skills upgrading and orientation instruments for the labour insertion of immigrants” (Program Leonardo). A sample of entities, which are involved in providing immigrants with services of vocational training and orientation desks, was scrutinized in four countries (France, Romania, Italy, Spain) although in this essay we take into account only Italy and Spain. After a brief description of the labour market dynamics in the two nations (commonalities and differences are underlined), the article examines data emerging from the questionnaires in a comparative way. Data are dealing with: offer of services; need for services as expressed by immigrants; demands of services as expressed by the labour market representatives (entrepreneurs, trade unions); mismatch between demand and supply. It raises a multidimensional profile of what public and no-profit sectors actually do for the labour insertion of immigrants, including what the involved operators consider as problems in their dealing with adult immigrants. In this fragmented social and cultural frame a relevant contradiction, which affect the effectiveness of these activities, is the one between the wide request for foreign workforce on one hand, and the temptation to limit its claim to full citizenship.