Global Migration Governance (2011), Oxford University Press

Full Title: Global Migration Governance

Author: Alexander Betts

Type: Book

Abstract

Unlike many other trans-boundary policy areas, international migration lacks coherent global governance. There is no UN migration organization and states have signed relatively few multilateral treaties on migration. Instead sovereign states generally decide their own immigration policies. However, given the growing politicisation of migration and the recognition that states cannot always address migration in isolation from one another, a debate has emerged about what type of international institutions and cooperation are required to meet the challenges of international migration. Until now, though, that emerging debate on global migration governance has lacked a clear analytical understanding of what global migration governance actually is, the politics underlying it, and the basis on which we can make claims about what 'better' migration governance might look like.

In order to address this gap, the book brings together a group of the world's leading experts on migration to consider the global governance of different aspects of migration. The chapters offer an accessible introduction to the global governance of low-skilled labour migration, high-skilled labour migration, irregular migration, lifestyle migration, international travel, refugees, internally displaced persons, human trafficking and smuggling, diaspora, remittances, and root causes. Each of the chapters explores the three same broad questions: What, institutionally, is the global governance of migration in that area? Why, politically, does that type of governance exist? How, normatively, can we ground claims about the type of global governance that should exist in that area? Collectively, the chapters enhance our understanding of the international politics of migration and set out a vision for international cooperation on migration.

Author Bios

Dr Alexander Betts is the Hedley Bull Research Fellow in International Relations at the University of Oxford, where he is also Director of the MacArthur Foundation-funded Global Migration Governance project, and a Fellow of Wadham College. He completed a D.Phil in International Relations at the University of Oxford. In addition, he holds a First Class honours degree in Economics from the University of Durham, and an MSc in International Relations and M.Phil in Development Studies (both with Distinction). He has won a number of academic awards including the Eugene Havas Memorial Prize, the European Association of Development and Training Institutes (EADI) prize for postgraduate research in development studies and the Babsybanoo Marchioness of Winchester Prize. He has previously worked in the Executive Office at UNHCR Headquarters in Geneva and as a consultant on refugee and migration issues for UNHCR, IOM and the Council of Europe. He is Senior Researcher at the Global Economic Governance Programme (GEG) and a Research Associate of the Refugee Studies Centre (RSC), the Centre for Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), and the Centre for International Studies (CIS).