5.1 Economic and Political Instability

Long standing economic and political instability has led to an underdeveloped private sector and, in some areas, a reliance on the public sector and migrant labor

Political strife, episodes of extreme violence and civil conflict have remained major characteristics of the Libyan political scene since the 2011 uprising and the ensuing period of regime change.

Since 2011 there have been successive interim governments and administrative splits in the country including dual rival governments. Libyan parties have agreed to hold elections on December 24th, 2021.

With regard to economic structure, the public sector employs the majority of Libya’s active workforce. The private sector, due to decades of semi-socialist government policies has remained confined in size and despite relative liberalization post-2011, has had to contend with a poor security situation which has limited its growth.7

With regard to the labor market, as of 2018 the Libyan population was estimated at a total of 6.6 million with the largest concentration of the populace located in Tripoli and major urban centers along Libya’s northern coast, including Misrata, Sirt and Benghazi.8 For decades the Libyan economy has been reliant on migrant labor mainly from neighboring Egypt and the bordering countries of SubSaharan Africa. As a consequence of the 2011 uprising and the ensuing conflict an estimated 1 million foreign laborers left the country according to the World Bank.9 The continued political instability and poor security conditions in many cities across the country have prevented the return of pre-2011 labor migration patterns.10 However, labor market stakeholders interviewed for this study have conflicting views about their employment preferences regarding migrants versus domestic labor.

7 Ibid (2015), p.47 8 https://data.worldbank.org/country/LY 9 World Bank (2015) Labour Market Dynamics in Libya: Re-integration for Recovery, p. xii. 10 World Bank (2015), p.9.