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The International Migration Institute gathers researchers who are committed to develop new thinking about migration and mobility across the world.
Explaining the Rise of Diaspora Institutions
Why do states establish and empower diaspora engagement institutions? Origin-state institutions dedicated to emigrants and their descendants have been largely overlooked in mainstream political studies, perhaps because they fall in the grey area between domestic politics and international relations. Now, diaspora institutions are found in over half of all United Nations member states, yet we have little theory and broad-sample statistical evidence to guide our understanding about when they are more likely to emerge and increase in importance. In response, we identify and then investigate empirical support for three theoretically-grounded perspectives on diaspora institution emergence and importance: instrumentally rational states tapping resources of emigrants and their descendants; value-rational states embracing lost members of the nation-state; institutionally-converging states governing diasporas consistent with global norms. We document support for these alternative perspectives in regression and related analyses modelling diaspora institution emergence and importance in 144 states observed from 1990-2010. Tapping perspective estimations exhibit better overall model fit compared to estimations based on other perspectives. Estimations combining perspectives exhibit the best model fit. Individual terms exhibiting signs contrary to prediction suggest new directions for theoretical and empirical research from different perspectives. We advance international relations research by identifying, distinguishing and testing alternative perspectives explaining diaspora institution emergence and importance. We also advance international relations practice and policy with evidence-guided insight on near-term trends in institution emergence and importance.
Immigration and Extreme-Right Voting in France: A contextual analysis of the 2012 presidential elections
Whereas Realistic Conflict Theory claims that there is a negative relationship between the share of immigrants and the level of support for the extreme-right, Contact Theory claims that the relationship is positive. Using the technique of multilevel modelling, I will challenge these mutually exclusive theories by arguing that the relationship between immigration and extreme-right support is more complex. Instead of working in opposition to each other, Conflict Theory and Contact Theory operate simultaneously but at different levels of aggregation. The focus on immigrants as a contextual factor gives the impression that the Front National is an ‘urban phenomenon’ concentrated in high-immigration suburbs, however recent headlines suggest that the vote is declining in urban strongholds and spreading to rural areas. In a second analysis, I will demonstrate that the level of support for the Front National is higher in rural communes than in urban communes. Drawing from Social Disintegration Theory, I will argue that the party’s appeal to rural areas is a result of: 1) France’s agricultural crisis; 2) the growing divide between rural and urban spaces; and 3) the cut-backs on public expenditures.
Law and the credibility of migration brokers: The case of emigration dynamics in Cameroon
This paper analyses relations between aspiring migrants and migration brokers from the perspective of a place of departure, such as Anglophone Cameroon. The paper seeks to go beyond a statist perspective on so-called irregular migration by drawing on empirical insights into the perspectives of aspiring migrants, their family members, as well as on direct observations between migrants and brokers within their respective context. Relations between aspiring migrants and migration brokers cannot be understood through the lens of legal paradigms, such as trafficking and smuggling. This paper thus sets out to explore locally relevant terminology and factors: how do aspiring migrants come to evaluate the credibility and ‘powers’ of migration brokers? By exploring locally operated distinctions between doki men, feymen and big men, this paper questions the relative place of state-enforceable law as opposed to other regulatory norms in places of departure. The paper draws on 14 months of ethnographic fieldwork on migration aspirations and emigration trajectories in Anglophone Cameroon (2007 and 2009).
Local Belonging, National Authenticity, and the Foreigner: The Encounter between Bangladeshi and Senegalese Street Hawkers and International Holidaymakers in Rome and Naples, Italy
Building upon the idea that nationhood and nationality are social constructions, I argue that the actors who create these often multiple and contradictory narratives are not only the citizens of a nation-state with officially recognized belonging. Rather, those individuals outside official recognition and the imagined limits of a nation – foreigners and strangers – are also essential to the articulation of the boundaries of national belonging. Focusing on the interaction between immigrant street hawkers and international holidaymakers in Italy, I analyse the ways different foreigners enter into a dialogue of national and local authenticity and belonging. I examine the context of Bangladeshi and Senegalese migration to Italy, establishing how these populations are constructed as foreigners by the Italian nation and its imagined cohesive and authentic embodied community, and analyse how these communities have forged a place for themselves within that context. Then, I breakdown the interaction between immigrant hawkers and holidaymakers to see how the dialogue between foreigners reshapes the discussion of local authenticity and national belonging as something very different from the Italian national narration but which has parallel lines of inclusion and exclusion.
Determinants of transnational political engagement among Dominican and Colombian migrants in Southern Europe
This paper seeks to investigate the determinants of transnational political engagement among contemporary Latin American migrants in Spain and Italy. We test a series of hypotheses drawing on conventional assimilation theory and recent transnational migration and social network studies. Zeroinflated negative binomial regression models are used to analyse survey data on Colombian and Dominican migrants in Spain and Italy collected as part of the New Landscapes of Migration: A Comparative Study of Mobility and Transnational Practices between Latin America and Europe (NELMI) research project, conducted in four European countries – Spain, Italy, Denmark, and England. Results indicate that political transnational engagement is a gendered processes dominated by highly educated men. Dominican migrants are generally more likely than Colombians to engage in transnational politics. Overall results challenge the assimilationist assumptions that incorporation and transnational engagement are opposite processes. In fact, Colombians and Dominicans living in Spain, a country with which they share the same language, religious affiliation, and a history of colonialism, are more likely to engage in transnational political action than their counterparts in Italy. We conclude by comparing the findings from the European data with previously published results examining the same groups’ transnational political engagement in the United States.
Understanding the electoral breakthrough of Golden Dawn in Greece: A demand and supply perspective
In the June 2012 Greek national election, the right-wing extremist party known as Golden Dawn (Chrysi Avgi) gained 6.92% of the vote, thus entering the Hellenic Parliament for the first time with 18 seats. Given that its share of the vote was as low as 0.29% in the 2009 parliamentary elections, this was a remarkable success for the party. This paper uses a demand and supply framework to explain the electoral breakthrough of what is one of the most racist and extreme right institutionalised parties in Europe. While Golden Dawn has been exceptionally violent and activist in comparison to its Western European counterparts, this paper contends that at their core they are in fact very similar. It argues that four factors in particular are crucial to an understanding of the party’s breakthrough. These include unemployment and economic discontent; immigration and asylum; Greek conceptions of citizenship and nationhood; and the conduciveness of the political space. While there is no doubt that demand-side factors such as the economic crisis and the subsequent bailout have had massive social consequences that have been favourable to Golden Dawn, it is the latter two supply-side factors – the model of citizenship and the political space – that have allowed the party to truly capitalise on social discontent.
Deflection into irregularity? The (un)intended effects of restrictive asylum and visa policies
Recent research into the impact of restrictive immigration and asylum policies has found a considerable deterrence effect reducing the number of persons claiming asylum, that is as rules and procedures are tightened fewer applications are received. However, restrictive asylum policy might also push potential and rejected applicants into an irregular status. This paper investigates to what extent the deterrence effect of asylum policy is counterbalanced by such a ‘deflection into irregularity’. We analyse this question drawing on a new large dyadic dataset detailing asylum and visa policy as well as forced and irregular migrant flows to 29 European states in the period 2001 to 2011. We find that restrictive asylum policy does, as expected, reduce the number of persons claiming protection. But there is also a significant deflection dynamic at work. Our estimates suggest that a ten percent increase in asylum rejections raises the number of (apprehended) irregular migrants by on average about three percent, and similarly, a ten percent increase in short-stay visa rejections leading to a five percent increase in irregular migration.
Offshore enrolment in higher education and migration: Some evidence from Australia
This paper presents empirical evidence on the relationship between enrolment in transnational higher education (TNE) and subsequent skilled migration to the country that provided the educational services. Based on macro-level panel data, the analysis shows a close link between offshore enrolment in Australian higher education and subsequent skilled migration to Australia, suggesting that countries may successful use the provision of higher education outside their borders to enlarge skilled migrant recruitment. Although further research on the issue is needed, this paper represents the first step in the exploration of an issue of particular interest for both developed and developing countries, constituting an original contribution to the current debate on skilled migration, student mobility, and new trends in the higher education sector.
Belonging on the Move: The question of clan amongst Somali migrants
Contemporary migration literature still often takes for granted the idea migrants continue to hold a deep attachment to their home countries and those in them – with such attachments compelling them to assist future migrants, send remittances or dwell transnationally. In reaction to this, much of the diaspora literature has rejected the idea of innate attachments to homelands, instead conceptualizing diasporas as political formations. However, this in turn misses the very real and compelling sense of attachment migrants sometimes – but not always –do feel. To overcome this impasse, I suggest focusing on the notion of belonging; the idea that subjecthood and a sense of ontological security arise only out of situated engagements within particular contexts. When contexts change – as they often do in the case of migration – migrants experience a fundamental need to reconstitute a sense of belonging, and this shapes the particular transnational attachments and engagements that they pursue. I elaborate this point by examining the role of clan identities for Somalis, both in Somalia and the UK diaspora. Though often presumed to be innate, I show how clan identities are variously deployed in response to the changing possibilities Somalis face for establishing and maintaining a sense of belonging.
Compiling and coding migration policies: Insights from the DEMIG POLICY database
This paper outlines the conceptual and methodological underpinnings of DEMIG POLICY, a new database tracking major changes in migration policies of 45 countries between 1946 and 2013. Besides significantly extending the geographical and historical coverage of existing migration policy databases, DEMIG POLICY attempts to overcome the common ‘receiving country bias’ by also including emigration policies. This paper describes the process of compiling migration policy data and shares insights into the theoretical foundations and the operationalization of a coding system that disaggregates policy packages into their sub-components, categorises specific policy types and target groups, and assesses changes in policy restrictiveness and their relative importance. This paper also addresses the challenges involved in the various phases of the database compilation. It stresses that theoretical considerations should guide the making of well-reasoned, non-arbitrary decisions on database features; and that transparency with regards to policy selection and coding decisions is essential to achieve consistency. The paper also underlines the importance of grounding the compilation and analysis of policy databases in a thorough understanding of the historical and political contexts in which those policies have emerged. Finally, the paper discusses the potential of DEMIG POLICY and its flexible coding system to increase insights into the nature and evolution of migration policies, and their interaction with migration and broader processes of economic and political change.
Uncovering international migration flow data: Insights from the DEMIG databases
This paper presents the features and potential uses of two new migration flow databases that were compiled as part of the DEMIG (Determinants of International Migration) project from a wide range of primary archival and digital sources. While DEMIG TOTAL reports total immigration, emigration and net migration for up to 163 countries extending back from several decades to over one century; DEMIG C2C (‘country-to-country’) covers bilateral migration flow data for 34 countries over the 1946-2011 period. The paper also discusses the methodological considerations behind decisions on the selection, compilation and categorisation of migration data in constructing the database. These databases provide unprecedented coverage and detail in terms of flow data with historical depth, the inclusion of several countries outside Europe and North America and gender breakdown. The paper argues that, despite inevitable imperfections and inconsistencies, existing migration flow data is less scarce and low-quality than is commonly assumed in the research literature, and that these databases have considerable potential to contribute to a better understanding of the nature, determinants and impacts of migration processes.
The Effect of Visa Policies on International Migration Dynamics
The effectiveness of migration policies has been widely contested, yet evidence has remained inconclusive due to conceptual and methodological limitations. Moreover, a general ‘receiving country bias’ in migration research, causes prior studies to focus on the effects of policies on inflows and fail to assess the simultaneous effect of policies on outflows. From a theoretical viewpoint, immigration restrictions reduce both inflows and outflows and, hence, overall circulation, which renders their effect on net migration theoretically ambiguous. To test this hypothesis, and using unique migration and visa datasets compiled by the DEMIG project (covering 38 countries over the 1973–2012 period), this paper assesses the short and long-term effects of travel visa policies on bilateral (country-to-country) inflow and outflow dynamics. The results suggest that travel visa policies significantly decrease inflows, but that this effect is to a large extent undermined by decreasing outflows of the same migrant groups. This seems to confirm that migration restrictions decrease circulation and tend to encourage long-term settlement, and thereby significantly reduce the responsiveness of migration to economic fluctuations in destination and origin societies.
International Migration, Trade and Aid: A Survey
In this chapter we survey the voluminous literature on migration affecting trade and the somewhat less developed literature linking aid flows to migration. We aim to guide the reader through the two literatures, highlighting key contributions and identifying important lines of enquiry. Simmering below the surface of both literatures is the issue of causation. Given the macroeconomic nature of the global flows under examination and the numerous direct and indirect links that potentially exist between them, establishing causality proves particularly problematic and is thus an issue that we pay close attention to throughout. The evidence from the trade and migration literature, in which causality has been more concretely established, suggests an almost ubiquitous positive effect of migration on trade, although exceptions exist; this suggests that richer data might be required to delve even deeper into the trade-migration nexus. While policymakers often wish that aid reduced migration, the literature suggests the opposite - namely that aid increases emigration. The mechanism has yet to be resolutely established in this literature, however, which suggests a need for future research.
Migrant Networks and Trade: The Vietnamese Boat People as a Natural Experiment
We provide cogent evidence for the causal pro-trade effect of migrants and in doing so establish an important link between migrant networks and long-run economic development. To this end, we exploit a unique event in human history, the exodus of the Vietnamese Boat People to the US. This episode represents an ideal natural experiment as the large immigration shock, the first wave of which comprised refugees exogenously allocated across the US, occurred over a twenty-year period during which time the US imposed a complete trade embargo on Vietnam. Following the lifting of trade restrictions in 1994, the share of US exports going to Vietnam was higher and more diversified in those US States with larger Vietnamese populations, themselves the result of larger refugee inflows 20 years earlier.
On the Economic Geography of International Migration
We exploit the bilateral and skill dimensions from recent data sets of international migration to test for the existence of Zipf's and Gibrat's Laws in the context of aggregate and high-skilled international immigration and emigration using graphical, parametric and non-parametric analysis. The top tails of the distributions of aggregate and high-skilled immigrants and emigrants adhere to a Pareto distribution with an exponent of unity i.e. Zipf's Law holds. We find some evidence in favour of Gibrat's Law holding for immigration stocks, i.e. that the growth in stocks is independent of their initial values and stronger evidence that immigration densities are diverging over time. Conversely, emigrant stocks are converging in the sense that countries with smaller emigrant stocks are growing faster than their larger sovereign counterparts. Lastly, high skilled immigration and emigration stocks expressed in levels or as densities all exhibit signs of convergence. We conclude by discussing some competing mechanisms that could be driving the observed patterns including: differing fertility rates, reductions in emigration restrictions, migrant sorting and selective immigration policies, immigrant networks and persisting wage differentials.
The influence of migration policies in Europe on return migration to Senegal
Over the past decade, return migration has generated increasing policy and public attention. It is often believed that African migrants travel to destination countries and generally do not return home. Policy makers in European countries have adopted policies designed to encourage or force African migrants to return. European countries have also designed policies intended to control access and stay of migrants in their territory. These policies have become increasingly restrictive over time towards most categories of African migrants, and they are sometimes invoked to explain the reluctance of migrants to return, since they prevent circulation. Due to the lack of data however, the influence of the different migration policies on return migration remains poorly understood. This paper aims to fill this gap by analysing transnational and biographical data of the Migration between Africa and Europe (MAFE) surveys as well as data of the DEMIG POLICY and DEMIG VISA databases, which cover major changes in migration policies across a large range of destination countries. I implement event history logistic regressions to study the effect of migration policies on the return of Senegalese who migrated to France, Italy and Spain between 1960 and 2008. The results reveal that the policies aiming at controlling the stay and encouraging or forcing the return of migrants do not significantly affect return, but that Senegalese migrants are less likely to return when the entry restrictions have become important. This suggests that barriers intended to reduce the flow of African migrants actually prevent those who are already in Europe from returning. The results show that the preoccupation of migrants is not only the return, but also the possibility of a new migration after the return.
The effects of independence, state formation and migration policies on Guyanese migration
Using a historical approach, this paper examines the evolution of Guyanese migration from the 1950s until the 2010s. It explores the role of the Guyanese state in migration, the effect of independence and the establishment of a border regime on migration, with a particular focus on how political decisions and socio-economic policies have affected the timing, volume, composition and direction of migration in the post-independence period. After elaborating a new conceptual framework, the paper analyses the role of the Guyanese state across three broad historical phases: from the early 1950s to independence in 1966; from independence to the gradual political and economic opening of Guyana in 1985; and from 1986 to the present. The paper finds that the uncertainties generated by Britain’s introduction of its Immigration Act in 1962 and Guyana’s independence in 1966 led to two initial increases in emigration in the 1961-1962 and in 1965-66 periods. The Guyanese state’s support of 'cooperative socialism' and its authoritarian stance until the mid-1980s then promoted large emigration, which gradually included all classes and ethnic groups. At the same time, British and North American migration policies cause the partial redirection of migration towards the US and Canada. The importance of family re-unification and skilled migration channels explain on one hand, how entire Guyanese families have emigrated, while on the other hand, how Guyana is one of the top ten countries for skilled migrants. This paper shows the importance of shifting beyond the ‘receiving country’ bias by considering the important role of origin country states in migration processes.
Fifty years of Maghreb emigration: How states shaped Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian emigration
This paper analyses emigration from Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia to main European and North American destinations since the 1960s. It explores the role of states, post-colonial ties and migration policies in emigration dynamics. By adopting a historical-comparative approach and an origin country perspective, this paper shows that Maghreb emigration was continuously shaped not only by government strategies in Europe but also by those of Maghreb states. Drawing on new bilateral migration flow data compiled in the DEMIG C2C database, the paper reveals three distinct phases in which Maghreb emigration patterns converge and diverge: the post-independence period in which Maghreb emigration boomed; the period from the mid-1970s until the early 1990s when Algerian emigration levelled off while emigration from neighbouring countries’ remained high; and the period from the early 1990s when Moroccan emigration increased exponentially while Tunisian and Algerian only grew moderately. Similarities in Maghreb emigration patterns can be explained by the countries’ comparable geopolitical and socio-economic features and that European states apply the same immigration policies to all Maghreb countries. To understand the divergences however, a closer look at origin country factors is required. The paper finds that Algeria’s departure from regional emigration patterns in the 1970s can be traced back to the emigration stop implemented by the Algerian government in 1973. Conversely, the active promotion of emigration by the Moroccan state facilitated emigration by making access to passport easier and fostering a culture of emigration that together with high unemployment partly explains Morocco’s emigration boom after the 1990s. Finally, recent diversification of Maghreb emigration to divergent South European countries, can be attributed to specific historical linkages, with Moroccans and Algerians mainly migrating to Spain and Tunisians to Italy.
Growing restrictiveness or changing selection? The nature and evolution of migration policies
Drawing on the new DEMIG POLICY database that comprises over 6,500 migration policy changes in 45 countries, this paper analyses the nature and evolution of migration policies over the 20th and early 21st centuries. The findings challenge the common assumption that migration policies have become increasingly restrictive over the past decades, and instead demonstrate that since 1945 migration policies have been consistently dominated by less restrictive changes. This trend is robust across a large number of countries, but differs across policy types and migrant categories. While entry and integration policies have generally become less restrictive, border control and, since the 1990s, exit policies have become more restrictive. Instead of a growing restrictiveness, the essence of post-WWII migration policies has been an increasing sophistication through the development of specific policy instruments targeting particular immigrant groups. While policies towards migrant categories such as irregular migrants and, more recently, family members have often become more restrictive, a larger number of – generally less visible – policies targeting high and low-skilled workers, students and migrants from specific origins have become less restrictive. Migration policies should therefore be understood as a tool of migrant selection rather than as an instrument affecting numbers.
Does Shelter Assistance reduce Poverty in Afghanistan?
Forced migration, often resulting from violent conflict, imposes large economic costs on both sending and receiving countries, on those agencies that coordinate humanitarian services and most importantly upon the forced migrants themselves. Programs encouraging the return of refugees are therefore potentially crucial interventions, which can result in all parties benefiting. In this paper, we assess the UNHCR post-return shelter assistance program in Afghanistan between 2009 and 2011, the country most affected by refugee movements, where no less than one-third of the population is a returnee. We are motivated by the fact that the resolution of lost housing and property is commonly understood as a key ingredient in sustainable return and reintegration. Given the infeasibility of randomizing shelter assistance to those repatriated, we implement a variety of matching techniques to insulate our results from selection biases. Adopting a multidimensional approach, our results show that shelter assistance reduces multidimensional poverty by around six percent. This reduction in poverty is driven by particular indicators of deprivation including dietary diversity, food security and heating, all of which are shown to fall by five to six percent depending on the matching specification. The former results are particularly encouraging in the context of Afghanistan given the prevalence of chronic malnutrition in the country.