This paper focuses on the new forms of labor migration in Europe in the context of European integration and the new mobility paradigm. It emphasizes the paradoxical management of migration by policies that pave the way for a resumption of temporary labor migration while rejecting long-term immigration. This positioning leads to an understanding of the foreigner as different and distant from the nation’s citizenry, so that it becomes acceptable to treat labor migration in a derogatory manner and to reconsider the state’s obligations to immigrant labor. This paper first proposes an examination of the migration policies which confirm this perspective. In a second part, it questions the possibility of the empowerment migration still offers in the framework of globalized economy and looks at three ways of mobilizing foreign labor (seasonal contracts, illegal labor, and posted workers).