Migration and security : history, practice, and theory

Abstract

Receiving states viewed international migration as a means of economic development well until late 20th century. Since then policy makers around the world have increasingly associated migration to security and sought to meet this ‘threat’ through ‘control’. In the 21st century, the significance of international migration increased further as migration flows increased and took on new forms affecting the world as a whole. This thesis looks at the emergence of migration as a security issue in the practices of world actors within a historical and contextual framework and highlights the politics of associating migration with security. In doing so, it does not take as pre-given a relationship between migration and security. Two interrelated arguments are made. First, migration’s association with security has been context-bound. Second, whether migration is a security issue or not changes according to actors (in the policy and scholarly worlds). Critical approaches to security, focusing on the role of state and societal actors in associating migration to security, and stressing security of not only states but also individuals, offer a fuller account of migration. Whereas objectivist approaches to security take migration as a ‘real’ threat, and fundamentally in relation to state security and national interest.