More than 500 academics including Thomas Piketty call for a science-based approach to policies on immigration and the creation on an International Panel on Migration and Asylum

We need a paradigm shift in the way we think about migration

Like climate change, migration is a global issue that needs to be addressed both locally and internationally. The regulation of population movements has long been a pitfall of international cooperation. The European asylum crisis of 2015 revealed that, even in highly integrated and cooperative contexts such as the EU, unpreparedness, political confusion and misinformation generate inadequate and humanly costly policy responses. At the global level, from the 1990 convention on migrant workers’ rights to the currently discussed “global compacts”, attempts to coordinate policies and foster global governance fell short of providing innovative and impactful solutions.

The recent inflow of Syrian asylum seekers in Europe forced upon EU leaders and citizens a brutal awareness regarding the global refugee crisis that is mostly unfolding in the global south. This particular refugee inflow resonates with broader discussions on immigration, integration and diversity in European societies fragilised by the 2008 economic crisis. The current European crisis is made of the confusion of short- and long-term policy issues, of asylum and migration regulation, of debates around rights, politics and economics, which cannot be solely addressed at the national level.

Beyond Europe, the emergence or entrenchment of political crises around migration and asylum issues calls for an urgent reaction of all stakeholders. Scientists, civil society organisations, activists, concerned citizens and policymakers must join forces to bring about a better understanding of migration, both forced and voluntary, of its determinants and consequences for host societies and countries of origin. By doing so, we will provide grounds for evidence-based policymaking and sound practices beyond ideological constructions and discourses that obfuscate debates in the media and political arena today.

This call for a change of approach has become urgent.

• Migration and asylum policies in Europe and North America as well as other countries (Kenya, Saudi Arabia etc) have created unprecedented attacks on individual human rights for mobile populations and on asylum rights.

• Since the 1990s, attempts by the UN or regional organisations such as the EU to regulate migration and asylum have failed (The 1990 convention, the Dublin agreements in Europe, up to the global compacts) and collapsed when confronted by the trial of either refugee arrivals (Iraq, Syria, South Sudan, Burma) or political crises around migrants’ incorporation and diversity.

The policy options adopted by OECD countries in the past decade – building walls, externalising control at high political and financial costs – will neither prevent people leaving their country, nor will it impact the determinants of migration in the long run as often repeated by scientists and shown by recent experiences.

The lack of understanding of the impact of migration in host and receiving societies generates enduring mismanagement. Fearmongering discourses infuse policy agendas and ignores scientific knowledge. Although scientific controversies on migration and asylum do exist, some well-established facts remain unheard and unused in policymaking:

• Migration mostly occurs within regions and not between continents. Migrants are mostly located in the global south, especially refugees.

• 246 million migrants only represent 3.4% of the world’s population, far less than in the 19th century.

• Visa restrictions increase the settlement of immigrants already present in a host country: migrant workers stay instead of moving back and forth across countries. The absence of visa opportunities for asylum seekers in countries of origin and transit also increases criminal practices and smuggling.

• Border closure not only restricts mobility but also exchanges and transfers of funds, knowhowand ideas across borders.

• Rapid access to housing, education as well as the formal labour market increases the quality of incorporation of migrants and asylum seekers in host societies, further reducing inequalities and disenfranchisement.

• The impact of migration on population trends is short-lived as fertility behaviours rapidly catch up with demographic patterns in host countries.

• Financing development can increase emigration in poor countries, making the migration-development relations much more complex than what current policies present as grounds for action. The effect of immigrant inflows on labour market outcomes and national growth is neutral or positive overall, depending upon economic conditions and dynamics, upon workers’ mobility and labour market regulations.

In understanding the impact of immigration, analyses that are both context-specific and connected to global dynamics are crucial to determine the effects of migration. Recent concern has been formulated about the lack or unreliable quality of migration data. Beyond data, we argue that robustness and clarity in the analytical premises of policymaking is the key to sound and efficient regulation of population movement. One-size-fits-all and ideology-based policies do not work.

We therefore urge the ending of the short-term and inadequate political solutions that brought us to political and humanitarian crises. We ask for a radical change of paradigm in dealing with migration and asylum, based on a rational, realistic, scientifically informed and humanist approach. We thus call for an emergency meeting of scientists and experts to inform policymaking, and for the creation of an International Panel on Migration and Asylum.

Virginie Guiraudon CNRS director of research, Sciences Po, Paris, Andrew Geddes Director, Migration Policy Centre, European University Institute, Italy, Steven Vertovec Director, Max Planck Institute, Germany, Jean Jouzel Founding member of the International Panel on Climate Change, Thomas Piketty Co-director, World Inequality Database, Paris and more than 500 others. Full list of signatories at www.iepam.eu/posts/list-of-signatures

• I am sometimes asked why I buy such an expensive paper. Explanations come readily, especially recently. The Guardian gave us lovingly wrought profiles, with pictures, of all the Grenfell victims. Amelia Gentleman made us truly aware of the Home Office’s cruel treatment of many of the Windrush citizens. And last week on World Refugee Day, that dreadfully sad yet amazing List of 34,361 people who died trying to reach Europe. Thank you, Guardian!

Thelma Percy

Bognor Regis, West Sussex

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