Exporting labour: new doctoral thesis on Yugoslavia’s labour migration policy
Mato Bošnjak has gone back to the archives in his doctoral thesis ”For the benefit of the state: Yugoslavia's agenda for controlling, shaping, and utilising labour migration, 1962-1975”.
During the 1960s and 1970s, more than one million people left the former Yugoslavia, many of them to work in Western Europe. A new doctoral thesis demonstrates how the socialist state developed extensive systems to regulate, shape, and capitalise on labour migration in close cooperation with Western European countries.
“Yugoslavia pursued a clear agenda aimed at controlling migration in ways that served the state’s economic and political interests,” says Mato Bošnjak, who recently obtained his doctorate in history and history didactics at Malmö University.
In his thesis, Bošnjak examines how the Yugoslav state organised and governed labour migration during the 1960s and 1970s. The study is based on extensive archival research conducted in Belgrade and Zagreb, including government reports, statistical material, and correspondence between ministries and embassies.
“The analysed material shows that the Yugoslav state was highly ambitious and remarkably innovative in its efforts to regulate and utilise labour migration. It established an apparatus capable of adapting to the changing conditions in Yugoslavia and demands of receiving countries,” he explains. An example of this was following the oil crisis when many states tightened restrictions on labour immigration and Yugoslavia embarked on regulating and shaping return migration.
New perspectives on migration
Another central finding of the thesis is the significant role played by women in Yugoslav labour migration – a perspective that, according to Bošnjak, remains underexplored in research on the history of migration. Women were incorporated into state planning at an early stage, not merely as accompanying family members but as a labour force sought after in the West, in sectors such as healthcare and the textile industry.
“The study also offers a new perspective on relations between Sweden and Yugoslavia during this period. It demonstrates that the Yugoslav state played a central role in establishing the agreements that regulated labour migration to Sweden,” he says.
Imporant to maintain ties to the migrants
For the Yugoslav authorities, however, their strategies on migration policy were not solely concerned with short-term economic gains. They also sought to preserve migrants’ long-term loyalty to the state.
“Through financial support for associations and media organisations in host countries, the authorities were able to maintain ties with migrants, encouraging them to continue sending remittances, build houses, and spending their holidays in Yugoslavia.”
According to Bošnjak, there are clear parallels between these historical developments and contemporary migration governance systems, in which wealthier states cooperate with poorer countries to recruit labour for specific sectors, often assigning migrants work that domestic populations are unwilling to perform.
“History demonstrates that many contemporary ideas surrounding selective labour migration are far from new. Much of what we debate today can already be found in the archives,” he concludes.
Mato Bošnjak defended his doctoral thesis on 5 June 2026.
