What difficulties face people entering the labour market, seen from the particular perspective of ethnicity? This chapter will examine the experience of those – including younger people of labour market age – who enter the European Union (EU) and associated states from outside the EU, and are typically identifiable by skin colour, culture and first language distinct from that of the majority ‘host’ population.

Given the many differing national legislative, socioeconomic and political contexts that will be covered here, it is necessary to define certain key concepts. The term ‘ethnicity’ is used to denote the primary ethnic origin of people – defined in terms of ancestry, culture and language (Fenton, 1999) – regardless of their status as legal citizens (or not) of particular nation states. We also refer to ‘ethnic minority’ or ‘minority ethnic group’ to mean people – a numerical minority – of different ethnicity from the host country. These are referred to in differing national literatures as ‘foreigners’ or ‘immigrants’ and we borrow these terms without any pejorative connotations – although to use the term ‘immigrant’ for someone who may have been settled for 30 years or more is misleading. The term ‘ethnic minority’ is also used in some countries to refer to small indigenous minorities.

The chapter begins with general remarks about the demographic characteristics and origins of ethnic minorities in a sample of European countries. This is followed by a review of the ethnicity data publicly available in these countries, grouped roughly into those of greater and smaller minority populations. Although this sample is not strictly representative – given it is the data that were less difficult to obtain within a limited time-scale – there seems no reason to believe that the conclusions drawn from this review are not equally apposite to those countries not represented here. Some concluding comments highlight general policy issues and gaps in our knowledge.

Unfortunately, the quality and comparability of current data on ethnicity from differing countries is highly variable – although universally poor – making international comparisons fragile. The editors comment in their introduction that “solid knowledge about labour market change, its interrelationship with welfare policies and, in particular, its joint impact on citizenship appear quite rudimentary and fragmented”.