Hesitant realization

On November 23, 2023, it will be 50 years old: the recruitment stop, a measure taken by the West German government to end labor migration to the Federal Republic of Germany. After years of targeted recruitment of workers from abroad through recruitment agreements, this was to end in the early 1970s.
While a significant number of immigrants then returned to their countries of origin, those who stayed increasingly brought their family members to the Federal Republic, which at the time did not yet see itself as a country of immigration. As a result, instead of working together to find answers to the question of a new “we”, parts of politics and the media vacillated between disinterest in the new fellow citizens and stirring up prejudice against them. And it took a long time for significant sections of the public to realize this: The recruitment stop in no way put an end to migration to Germany. On the contrary – the country became more and more a country of immigration.

Today, half a century later, the increasingly acute labor shortage is causing companies, academia, individual politicians and parts of civil society to call ever more loudly for targeted labor migration. Potential employees are being recruited abroad, laws are being reformed here in Germany and innovations such as the so-called opportunity card are being introduced.

Doch wirft man beispielsweise einen Blick auf die Arbeitsbedingungen ausländischer Arbeitnehmer:innen im Gesundheitswesen, der Gebäudereinigung oder in der Landwirtschaft, drängen sich Fragen wie diese auf: Unter welchen Umständen gelingt dieses Mal die Arbeitsmarktintegration ohne die (Re-)Produktion von Ungleichheitsverhältnissen? Wie schafft man es, Arbeitsmigration und die Aufnahme von Flüchtlingen nicht gegeneinander auszuspielen? Und entspricht die Migrations- und -Integrationspolitik ebenso wie deren mediale Begleitung mittlerweile dem Selbstverständnis einer pluralen Einwanderungsgesellschaft?
Since 1988, the CIVIS Media Prize has been awarded to contributions that deal with the interface between work and migration in an outstanding journalistic and artistic manner. A selection of these productions from television, radio, cinema and the Internet can be found here.