Six countries (Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands) signed the Treaty of Rome, creating the European Economic Community (EEC). The treaty set the long-term goal of a “common market,” including freer movement of workers and coordination measures to make cross-border work practical.
The EEC treaty took legal effect, turning the “common market” goal into an operating legal framework. This made it possible for later laws and court decisions to build enforceable rights tied to cross-border work and residence.
The EEC adopted rules coordinating when a Member State could restrict movement or residence on grounds like public policy, public security, or public health. This helped define that free movement could be limited, but not without procedures and justifications.
Regulation 1612/68 set detailed rules for the free movement of workers, including access to employment and equal treatment in working conditions. It became a central legal tool for making cross-border labor mobility more predictable across the EEC.
Directive 68/360/EEC required Member States to abolish remaining restrictions on movement and residence for EEC workers and their family members covered by the worker regulation. It set practical rules for entry, residence permits, and renewals, helping workers move without long delays.
Regulation 1251/70 clarified when a worker could stay permanently in a host Member State after retiring, becoming permanently incapacitated, or in certain cross-border work patterns. This reduced the risk that migration for work would force people to leave once their job ended.
Regulation 1408/71 coordinated national social security systems so workers moving within the Community could keep key rights, such as combining (“aggregating”) contribution periods across countries. This made long-term labor migration more realistic by reducing the chance of losing benefits when crossing borders.
In Van Duyn v Home Office, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) addressed how Member States could use “public policy” to limit free movement for workers. The case helped shape the idea that exceptions must be interpreted carefully so they do not undermine the general rule of free movement.
In Rutili, the ECJ held that “public policy” limits on free movement had to meet strict standards and be based on the person’s conduct and a genuine threat. This pushed Member States toward narrower, more evidence-based restrictions rather than broad or preventive limits on mobile workers.
Five EEC countries signed the Schengen Agreement, launching a separate but related project to reduce checks at internal borders. While outside the EEC’s core legal framework at the time, it became an important practical step toward easier travel that supported the broader idea of an “area without internal frontiers.”
The Single European Act (SEA) made the “internal market” a treaty objective, defining it as an area without internal frontiers where the free movement of goods, persons, services, and capital is ensured. It also strengthened decision-making to help pass the large set of laws needed to complete the Single Market project by the end of 1992.
With the SEA now legally in force, the EEC had a clearer treaty mandate and tools to remove remaining barriers inside the Community. This helped connect earlier worker-focused free movement rules to a broader “four freedoms” agenda and a concrete deadline for completion.
By the end of 1992, the Community’s Single Market program had reached its target date, marking a major turning point in European integration. The result was a far more harmonized legal environment for cross-border economic activity, with free movement of persons treated as part of a wider internal market—while debates continued over how far border checks and immigration controls should be removed in practice.
EEC/EU free movement and migration policy developments from the Treaty of Rome to the Single Market (1957–1992)