Reuters: BEIRUT/GENEVA: The International Labor Organization warned in a report Monday that the risk of social unrest in the MENA region was bigger than the pre-Arab Spring period.“In the Middle East and North Africa the risk of social unrest remains slightly elevated compared with the pre-crisis period,” the report said.

 

“Moreover, the risk of unrest peaked in 2008 and remained high afterward. The risk of unrest increased by 14 percentage points in the MENA region between 2006 and 2008. This is principally driven by two factors – limits to political freedom and weak job markets – which jointly account for 40 percent of the variation in the social unrest index.

 

“While growth prospects have improved in this region since the Arab spring, political struggles continue in many countries, which tends to be manifested in people’s perception of freedom in their lives,” the ILO said.

 

Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the regions where the risk of social unrest has lessened since the Arab Spring.

 

The ILO also said that the potential for social unrest in EU countries was higher than anywhere else in the world and the already big gaps between the rich and poor – a major trigger – are likely to widen globally.

 

In its annual World of Work Report, the ILO said social unrest – strikes, work stoppages and protests – had increased in most countries since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008.

 

But the risk, it said, “is highest among the EU-27 countries – it increased from 34 percent in 2006-07 to 46 percent in 2011-12.”

 

However, the risk was not evenly spread and had not grown in at least seven of the member states.

 

Those most vulnerable, the report said, were Cyprus, Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain. However the risk of social unrest had declined since 20120 in Belgium, Germany, Finland, Slovakia and Sweden.

 

Overall, the risk of unrest in the EU “is likely to be due to the policy responses to the ongoing sovereign debt crisis and their impact on people’s lives and perceptions of well-being,” the United Nations agency said.

 

“This bleak economic scenario has created a fragile social environment as fewer people see opportunities for obtaining a good job and improving their standard of living.”

 

The risk of social unrest had also risen in Russia and non-EU countries of the former communist bloc, as well as in South Asia and in advanced economies outside the EU.

 

The ILO said it based its findings on correlating economic growth and income levels with inflation, unemployment, debt as a share of economic output or GDP, and income inequality – all factors which influence levels of social tension.

 

Government austerity policies of the last few years had been accompanied since 2010 by increasing wage inequalities in which middle-income groups’ revenues declined and those of top-salary earners began to grow again, according to the ILO.

 

Across the richer countries, profit margins for larger companies were rising, as reflected in booming stock markets, and were now at levels similar to those of the immediate precrisis years, the ILO said.

 

Global unemployment rates were also expected to rise, the report said.