Artículos científicos archivos - Cátedra de Migraciones

The short-term effects of visa restrictions on migrants’ legal status and well-being: A difference-in-differences approach on Venezuelan displacement

Most countries across the globe introduce visa restrictions to regulate immigration, yet little is known about their effect on migrants’ decision to migrate and their well-being. I study the mass displacement of Venezuelan nationals, and through a difference-in-differences research design, I compare the effectiveness of introducing visa restrictions in reducing overall migration flows in certain countries across South America. I use a data set of 85,000 migrants and refugees − mostly Venezuelans − surveyed by the UNHCR. Findings suggest that visa restrictions increased the likelihood of irregular entry and irregular visa status for migrants while also leading to changes in their priorities. Unexpectedly, I do not find evidence of increased violence suffered by migrants who switch towards irregular entry channels in specific countries. This research contributes to the academic and policy debate on the effectiveness of visa restrictions on migratory flows, as well the literature on the effects of migration policies on migrants’ well-being.

Unpacking the ideational foundations of South American migration governance: a systematic analysis of the South American conference on migration (SACM)

Is there empirical evidence for a liberal paradigm that informs South American immigration governance? And how does this paradigm relate to other ideas on managing immigration? Based on Pécoud’s (2020) categorization of immigration governance philosophies, and the content analysis of all final declarations of the South American Conference on Migration between 2000 and 2022, we confirm a dominant liberal paradigm in the region. We further find that in South America, Pécoud’s global rights-based philosophy operates as a hinge between three other philosophies: the free (non) governance of migration, anti-migrant governance, and managerial/development global migration governance philosophy.

Through our analysis, we demonstrate the applicability of Pécoud’s (2020) immigration governance philosophies to a major immigrant receiving region in the Global South, and contribute to the ideational literature by showing how paradigms and philosophies represent ideational building blocks that can be combined, merged, and adapted by political actors to different regional contexts.

Unpacking the unintended consequences of European migration governance: the case of South American migration policy liberalization

Research on the external dimension of EU migration governance has focused on the EU’s interests, preferences, and policy efficiency and coherence. Little attention has been paid to the myriad ways both partner and third countries react to the union’s external action. We explore the European influence on immigration and refugee policy liberalisation in South America, a region not directly targeted by extra-regional migration governance.

Based on the analysis of 130 original interviews with government officials and NGO and IO representatives in eight South American countries we show that – although South American policymakers generally regard the EU as a model of ‘efficiency’, in terms of the EU’s intra-regional mobility regime – the remarkable legislative liberalisation in the region took place in the context of both political and moral opposition to restrictive shifts in EU extra-regional migration governance. The paper contributes to the literature on the EU external migration governance, policy diffusion, and Latin American migration policies by uncovering some of the unintended consequences of European migration governance in South America.

Symbolic refugee protection: Explaining Latin America’s liberal refugee laws

What drove an entire region in the Global South to significantly expand refugee protection in the early twenty-first century? In this paper, we test and build on political refugee theory via a mixed-methods approach to explain the liberalization of refugee legislation across Latin America. First, we use data from the new APLA Database, which measures legislative liberalization over a 30-year period, and test both general and region-specific immigration and refugee policy determinants through a series of nested Tobit and linear spatial panel-data regressions.

Our models do not support some consistent predictors of policy liberalization identified by the literature such as immigrant and refugee stocks, democratization, and the number of emigrants, but they offer statistical evidence for the importance of leftist government ideology and regional integration. We then shed light on the causal mechanisms behind these correlations for two extreme but diverse cases: Argentina and Mexico. Based on process tracing and elite interviews, we suggest that the reason that leftist political ideology rather than institutional democratization and number of emigrants matters for policy liberalization is that Latin American executives embarked on symbolic human and migrant’s rights discourses that ultimately enabled legislative change.

Of prostitutes and thieves: the hyper-sexualisation and criminalisation of Venezuelan migrant women in Peru

Based on 12 months of fieldwork, including 72 in-depth interviews and a survey (N100) in five Peruvian cities, this article discusses the higher rates of nationality-, gender-, and age-based discrimination faced by Venezuelan female migrants in Peru, compared to their male counterparts, as well as their experiences with hyper-sexualisation and/or criminalisation. We suggest that these processes, which are grounded on constructions of moral integrity and identity stereotypes at the intersection of gender, sex appeal, nationality, age, and condition as migrants, contribute to the devaluation of Venezuelan migrant women, thus impacting their integration into the country. First, based on our quantitative data, we discuss Venezuelan migrant women’s experiences with different types of discrimination.

We then move to the qualitative analysis of their devaluation through hyper-sexualisation and/or criminalisation in both public and workspaces, as well as the effects of these complex processes on their socio-economic incorporation. Finally, we discuss our findings and make suggestions for further research. This paper contributes to the literature on female migrant hyper-sexualisation and criminalisation, as well as to research that examines how the intersectionality of stereotypes and social conditions position migrant women in the Global South.

Prevalence of common mental health disorders in forcibly displaced populations versus labor migrants by migration phase: a meta-analysis

Migration is not an event, but an interactive process whereby individuals on the move make decisions in their social and political contexts. As such, one expects migrant mental health to change over time. To examine this relationship, we conducted a meta-analysis, the first to our knowledge, to identify the impact of migration phase and migration type on the prevalence of mental health in migrant populations. We searched PubMed, PsycInfo, and Embase for studies published between January 1, 2010, and January 1, 2020 (Prospero ID: 192751). We included studies with international migrants reporting prevalence rates for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and/or anxiety. The authors extracted data from eligible studies and tabulated mental health prevalence rates, relevant migration condition (e.g., migration type or phase), and methods (e.g., sample size).

Full text review resulted in n = 269 manuscripts included in the meta-analysis examining PTSD (n = 149), depression (n = 218), and anxiety (n = 104). Overall prevalence was estimated for PTSD (30.54 %, I² = 98.94 %, Q = 10,443.6), depression (28.57 %, I² = 99.17 %, Q = 13,844.34), and anxiety (25.30 %, I² = 99.2 %, Q = 10,416.20). We also estimated the effect of methodological and migration factors on prevalence in PTSD, depression, and anxiety. Our findings reveal increased prevalence of mental health due to forced migration and being in the journey phase of migration, even when accounting for the influence of methods.

Family bonds: Kinship reciprocity, female teenage trafficking and domestic labor exploitation in Peru

In this article we share the findings resulting from interviews with 25 female domestic workers in Lima between August and December of 2016. We argue that the experiences of these workers, who migrate from the provinces to the capital city of Lima as minors, frequently qualify them as victims of human trafficking – not because they are forced to move or deceitfully recruited, but due to their exploitation as adolescent domestic workers. We also analyze the drivers behind teenage female migration to Lima to work in the domestic sector under abusive conditions and offer future policy directions.

El elemento situacional de violación masiva de derechos humanos de la definición ampliada de Cartagena: hacia una aplicación en el caso venezolano

En un contexto de liberalización de sus marcos normativos, la mayoría de los países en América Latina han incorporado la definición ampliada de refugiado de la Declaración de Cartagena de 1984 en su legislación doméstica. Sin embargo, esta definición se ha aplicado pocas veces. Frente al éxodo de personas venezolanas, y en un contexto de endurecimiento de las políticas migratorias en general, y hacia la población venezolana en especial, es necesario discutir sobre la posible aplicación de esta definición a dicha población.

Sin negar la importancia de las implicancias políticas de la aplicación de Cartagena, este artículo aborda, desde una mirada jurídica, los retos para conceptualizar sus elementos situacionales, enfocándose en el de violación masiva de derechos humanos. Para ello, el artículo propone desarrollar un marco conceptual de este elemento situacional y su aplicación al caso venezolano.