Non-economic Migrants as Workers: Securing the Right to Work for Asylum Applicants in the EU

The figure of the asylum applicant worker sits uncomfortably in the oppositional framing of refugees and economic migrants. Yet, the recast Reception Conditions Directive 2013/33/EU provides a right to work for asylum applicants. Through case studies of Ireland and Sweden, this article examines the implementation of the right to work and describes an assemblage of de lege and de facto barriers that restrict access to the right to work in both Member States. Three legal avenues in EU law are explored to assess their potentiality to better secure this right. While the principle of effectiveness and fundamental rights prove useful, non-discrimination law remains limited in protecting the specific socio-legal status of asylum applicant workers. This article contributes to scholarship on the intersection of migration and labour law and the location of the asylum applicant worker within that intersection.