Linking aid and migration policies is worse than misguided

The article was first published on the PRIO Website (see link on the right)

The idea of using development aid to stem migration has come in and out of fashion for decades. It is unsurprising that immigration sceptics, including many European governments, pursue this use of aid. But it was alarming that Amy Pope, head of the UN’s International Organization for Migration applauded this trend in a recent interview with the Financial Times.

PRIO Global Fellow Jessica Hagen-Zanker and her colleague Claire Kumar responded with a letter arguing that this approach has spurred both inefficient migration policy and bad aid policy.

'If migration and development policy objectives are increasingly intertwined,' they write, 'policy efforts will focus on the hardships that appear to drive migration, as opposed to those hardships that matter the most to all people.'

This does not only mean that aid becomes less efficient. It is also based on misunderstandings about the causes of migration. The PRIO-led MIGNEX project strengthened the evidence base with in-depth data from 25 local communities across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, including a survey with 13,000 young adults. Referring to the project results, the letter pointed out that migration decisions are dominated by drivers that are outside the scope of policy. Moreover, economic growth and development often leads to increasing, rather than decreasing migration. Development policy should therefore be steered by development outcomes and not by its presumed effects on migration.

Jessica Hagen-Zanker and PRIO Research Professor Jørgen Carling, who led the project, worked closely together on the survey data collection and analysis. They have jointly written a policy brief, a research short, project report, and a scientific article in World Development about the causes of migration and the notion of root causes.