1166 Migration Policies, Types of
service, construction work, cleaning, and residen-
tial care service).
Migrant Rights
Basic human rights, such as access to medical
treatment, legal protection from various forms of
exploitation, and school education for children,
apply to all human beings, including illegal migrants.
However, in practice, migrants’ circumstances and
fear of exposing themselves or being reported to
government agencies (and ultimately risking deten-
tion and deportation) prevent illegal migrants from
engaging with government institutions and exercis-
ing their rights. In addition, migration policies
aimed at preventing migrants from entering a cer-
tain national territory in an irregular way also nega-
tively affect those who saw no legal alternative to
entering a country where they hoped to find protec-
tion from persecution by seeking asylum.
Jenny Kuhlmann
See also Asylum; Borders; Globalization, Phenomenon of;
Immigration and Transnationalism; Migration;
Migration Policies, Types of; Undocumented Persons
Further Readings
Baldwin-Edwards, M. (2008). Towards a theory of illegal
migration: Historical and structural components.
Third World Quarterly, 29, 1449–1459.
Dauvergne, C. (2008). Making people illegal: What
globalization means for migration and law.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
De Haas, H. (2007). The myth of invasion: Irregular
migration from West Africa to the Maghreb and the
European Union. Oxford, UK: University of Oxford,
International Migration Institute.
Gosh, B. (1998). Huddled masses and uncertain shores:
Insights into irregular migration. The Hague,
Netherlands: Kluwer Law International.
Heckmann. F. (2008). Illegal migration: What can we
know and what can we explain? The case of Germany.
In A. Portes & J. DeWind (Eds.), Rethinking migration
(pp. 285–307). New York: Berghahn Books.
Jordan, B., & Düvell, F. (2002). Irregular migration: The
dilemmas of transnational mobility. Cheltenham, UK:
Elgar.
Koser, K. (2005, September). Irregular migration, state
security and human security. Paper prepared for the
Policy Analysis and Research Programme of the
Global Commission on International Migration.
Retrieved June 28, 2009, from http://www.gcim.org/
attachements/TP5.pdf
Papademetriou, D. G. (2005, September). The global
struggle with illegal migration: No end in sight.
Washington, DC: Migration Policy Institute.
Retrieved June 28, 2009, from http://www
.migrationinformation.org/Usfocus/display.cfm?ID=336
Migration Policies, Types of
Migration is regulated on various scales, from
the local to the global. The term migration policy
refers to the regulation of emigration, that is, the
departure of people from their home country or
region, and immigration, that is, the arrival and
settlement of people in another country or region.
Immigration and emigration can be temporary or
permanent, voluntary or forced.
Regulating migration involves a variety of
actors. Research focuses mainly on the regulation
of international migration by national govern-
ments and supranational institutions. The expan-
sion of international migration has led to policy
convergences as well as interdependences among
states regarding the monitoring, encouragement,
and discouragement of cross-border emigration
and immigration.
Yet global migration policies remain less devel-
oped than the global regulation of other cross-
border policy fields, such as health and trade. No
generally accepted typology of migration policies
has to date been established. Earlier research dif-
ferentiated between national types of migration
policies, whereas more recent literature emphasizes
cross-comparisons of policy areas. Further work
discusses the extent to which, and by whom,
migration is regulated and explores the desirability
of migration policies.
Policy Convergences
Following the UN definition of an international
migrant as a person who has lived outside of his
or her country of origin for more than 12 months,
international migration has tripled over the past
40 years. It amounts today to approximately 200

million people. In 2005, 60% of international
migrants were located in more developed regions
and 40% in lesser developed regions of the world.
The diffusion of the nation-state and the increas-
ing significance of international borders since the
19th century have fostered the bureaucratic regis-
tration of departures, arrivals, and settlement of
migrants. The end of the colonial era and the two
World Wars contributed to these developments.
Even if policy convergence was noticeable early
on, immigration and emigration policies remained
uncoordinated until the mid-1980s, with the
exception of forced migration policies. After World
War I, the League of Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees was mandated to provide assistance
in Europe to people displaced during the war.
Intergovernmental institutional developments
expanded after World War II. The Office of the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
was established in 1950. The convention relating
to the status of refugees and its protocol removing
the geographical and temporal restrictions of the
convention were respectively adopted by the
United Nations in 1951 and 1967 and progres-
sively ratified by most states.
Since the early 20th century, the United States,
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and, after World
War II, western European countries, developed
immigration policies to attract immigrant labor
that could compensate for labor scarcities in peri-
ods of sustained economic growth. Economic cri-
ses in the 1970s led western European countries to
interrupt the recruitment of immigrant labor.
Restrictive immigration policies were developed
simultaneously. The Schengen agreement in 1985,
which created an area of free movement between
member-states of the European Economic
Community, the future European Union, fostered
some policy coordination in Europe. If the free
movement of citizens of EU member-states was
encouraged, restrictions dominated policy initia-
tives toward the population of non-member-states,
especially toward undocumented and asylum
migration. The latter dramatically increased after
immigrant labor recruitment was severely reduced.
Restrictive immigration policies toward undocu-
mented immigrants also expanded in other indus-
trialized countries. Deterrent policies have been
fueled by hostilities toward the cultural specifici-
ties of migrants and, more recently, by fears of
Migration Policies, Types of 1167
immigrant-induced terrorism, especially since the
terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
Yet at the close of the 20th century, population
aging and scarcity of domestic labor in specific
economic areas fostered simultaneous national
debates regarding the orderly expansion of immi-
gration intakes in order to help maintain popula-
tion levels, support welfare policies, and encourage
economic competitiveness. This policy orientation
is often termed migration management.
The regulation of the effects of emigration has
become a significant issue in numerous states in
which large temporary or permanent emigration
movements have occurred in the past few decades,
especially in the Middle East, Latin America,
South Asia, and Africa. The consequences of emi-
gration cover the organization of long-distance
migrant networks or diaspora communities, the
development of circular labor migration between
migrant-sending and migrant-receiving countries,
“brain drain” (i.e., the departure of the most
capable and qualified), and the development of
remittances sent home by migrants, which, in sev-
eral countries, far exceed official development
assistance or foreign direct investment.
The Emerging Globalization of
Migration Policies
The first attempts to develop an international
migration regime beyond the area of forced migra-
tion occurred in the 1990s. Both internal migration
and international migration presented serious chal-
lenges to global economic transformation; these
challenges were discussed at the UN Conference
on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994.
A Global Commission on International Migration,
which was established in 2003, published its final
report in 2005. According to this report, the inter-
national regulation of migration, which involves
the purposeful movement of human beings, is
more demanding than the management of the
movement of inanimate objects. The report rec-
ommended the creation of an interinstitutional
group of international agencies involved in migra-
tion-related activities. In response, the Global
Migration Group was established in 2006. The
Global Migration Group comprises UN agencies
such as the UN High Commissioner for Refugees
and the International Labour Organization along
1168 Migration Policies, Types of
with the International Organization for Migration.
The latter does not belong to the UN system, yet
it has been playing an increasing role in the devel-
opment of global migration policies in the past
decade. A UN High-Level Dialogue on Migration
and Development was launched in September
2006. A yearly global forum on migration and
development has been held since then. However,
no UN agency is specifically dedicated to the regu-
lation of international migration. Moreover, the
ratification of international agreements regarding
migration regulation has been slow. For instance,
the International Convention on the Protection of
the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members
of Their Families, adopted by the UN General
Assembly in 1990, has been ratified primarily
by labor migrants’ countries of origin. As of late
2011, 45 countries had ratified this convention.
Despite the limited globalization of migration
policies, the rhetoric of international and regional
organizations permeate the contemporary dis-
course and, to an extent, the practical develop-
ment of migration regulation. To various degrees,
border control, the repartition of forced migrants
in countries of destination (often labeled “burden
sharing”), the management of labor immigration,
and the relations between migration and develop-
ment are all issues in which the influence of supra-
national organizations is significant.
Typologies of Migration Policies
Early typologies of migration policies differentiated
between national policy types and those focused
primarily on the global North. The main dis-
tinction was between “traditional” and “new” or
“reluctant” immigration countries. “Traditional”
immigration countries, that is, the United States,
Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, compara-
tively early on developed legislative and administra-
tive frameworks regulating permanent immigration.
The migration policies of “new” immigration coun-
tries, that is, most western European countries,
were shaped by histories of emigration and, in
some cases, by colonial legacies. Regulations were
developed later in new immigration countries than
in traditional immigration countries. “Reluctant”
immigration states had to deal with the unplanned
and undesired permanent settlement of labor
immigrants.
Some recent literature that classifies migration
policies features a functionalist rather than a
state-oriented understanding of migration poli-
cies. The typology of migration policies corre-
sponds to types of migratory movements. Such
types are compared across states, and countries
beyond the global North are included. Policies
encompass, among other things, labor migration,
differentiated along skill levels; family migration;
unauthorized migration; forced migration, such
as asylum, refugee policies, and human traffick-
ing; and policies related to the consequences of
large emigration movements for countries of ori-
gin, such as remittances, diaspora, and their
respective roles in the development of the country
of origin. Authors increasingly differentiate
between policies directed at permanent versus
temporary migration. Migration policies are also
considered a subset of international mobility
policies, which include temporary border cross-
ings for individual leisure (tourism, family visits),
economic (business travelers, commuters), or
educational purposes.
A number of scholars argue that the attempt to
regulate migration is bound to fail, as the behavior
of migrants, the influence of other policy areas,
and the role of domestic and foreign officials on
the ground are ignored in policy planning. To oth-
ers, the role of national governments as the main
actor regulating migration is declining. Authority
over regulation is relocated to international orga-
nizations, local bureaucracies, and private actors
such as firms. International law plays an increasing
role in the determination of migration policies.
Further research, which focuses on the
Europeanization of migration policies, considers
that the intervention of new actors in the policy-
making process does not diminish governmental
control over migration policies. Rather, local, pri-
vate, and international actors are co-opted to ful-
fill tasks that they can execute better than can
national governments. Most recent research sys-
tematically attempts to highlight the variation of
migration regimes depending on the type of migra-
tion policy. It is argued, for instance, that asym-
metries between sending and receiving countries of
labor migrants reduce the incentives to develop
institutionalized international cooperation, so that
the global regulation of labor immigration is less
developed than the global refugee regime.

Finally, scholars explore to what extent, and
which kind of, migration regulation is desirable.
Cosmopolitan literature advocates the demise of
migration regulations, which impede the develop-
ment of global social justice. Communitarian
authors insist on the necessity to control immigra-
tion to various degrees in the defense of the interests
of states’ inhabitants; states are seen as necessarily
restricted political communities. In recent decades,
several models of international regimes have been
proposed that are meant to advantage sending and
receiving countries of migrants and migrants them-
selves. Among these regimes, a General Agreement
on Movements of People envisages a migrant tax to
be levied by sending countries on each migrant. The
establishment of a New International Regime for
Orderly Movements of People has been discussed as
well. Under such a regime, orderly migration would
be facilitated and a World Migration Organization
would complement the existing multilevel regula-
tion of migration.
The conceptualization of types of migration
policies remains an under-researched area. The
field is characterized by a lack of systematic dia-
logue between approaches. Scholars have pointed
at a number of issues relevant to global studies
which would benefit from further research, in par-
ticular, migration policies of non-Western regions;
the management of emigration and its conse-
quences; institutional competition between gov-
ernment and nongovernmental, private and
supranational actors to gain influence in specific
areas of migration policy; the influence of imple-
mentation processes on the shape of migration
policies; and comparisons of policy types between
migration and other cross-border policy areas
beyond the field of human mobility.
Adèle Garnier
See also Asylum; Borders; Immigration and
Transnationalism; Migration; Migration, Illegal;
Population and Demographic Change; Refugees
Further Readings
Betts, A. (Ed.). (2011). Global migration governance.
Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Castles, S. (2004). Why migration policies fail. Ethnic
and Racial Studies, 27(2), 205–227.
Military 1169
Cornelius, W., Tsuda, T., Martin, P., & Hollifield, J.
(2004). Controlling immigration: A global perspective
(2nd ed.). Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.
Geiger, M., & Pécoud, A. (Eds.). (2010). The politics of
international migration management. Basingstoke,
UK: Palgrave Macmillan.
Ghosh, B. (Ed.). (2000). Managing migration: Time for a
new international regime? Oxford, UK: Oxford
University Press.
Hatton, T., & Williamson, J. G. (2005). Global migration
and the world economy: Two centuries of policy and
performance. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Lahav, G., & Guiraudon, V. (2006). Actors and venues
in immigration control: Closing the gap between
political demands and policy outcomes. West
European Politics, 29(2), 201–223.
Military
Militaries—organizations that conduct warfare—
are found in virtually every society on the planet.
These are institutions designed for, and with
claimed special abilities to use, violence. In the
normal use of the term, militaries are not free-
standing entities but are institutions used by politi-
cal authorities to accomplish their goals. In both
history and contemporary life, there are a broad
array of sizes, structures, and social relations
defining militaries. The common thread linking
these is the professional dedication to the use of
violence and an internal organization based on the
combination of formal rules and hierarchy.
Militaries in Global History
As a specialized institution, a military can exist
only in fairly complex societies able to produce
enough surpluses to allow a significant number
of men to concentrate on war making. (The male
virtual monopoly is geographically and historically
universal, and the roots may lie in pre-Neolithic
sexual specialization.) We do not have many
details, but it appears that the armies of second-
millennia Mesopotamia and Egypt were already
commanded and largely consisted of dedicated
professionals. We may speculate regarding whether
such specialization was functionally rooted in the
complex skills required or had more to do with the