Saudi Arabia – an oil-rich rentier state, receives a large number of guest workers, and they were maintained under the controversial Kafala system. Recently, Saudi Arabia announced to abolish this ...system to come into effect in March 2021, but excluded domestic workers. Such observations show that there are political-economic incentives for the authority in abolishment apart from the humanitarian ground. Again, the current regime is willing to reduce its dependency on oil by diversifying its economy. Crown prince Mohammad Bin Salman announced massive reform plan – “Saudi Vision 2030” – to bolster FDIs and develop the public sector and service industries, where they need skilled labourers and experts to run their economy, where Kafala is not suitable. In this context, this paper would like to follow the political economy of migration policy as an analytical framework to provide a political-economic analysis of Kafala abolishment in Saudi Arabia by looking at the current transformation and Kafala abolishment.
To what extent can we infer government objectives from policies on paper? We show that this assumption in migration scholarship is problematic because most states adopt immigration policies that are ...inconsistent, combining or alternating between contradictory objectives. Further, we develop a measure to track how immigration policy inconsistency varies over time. We use these methods to demonstrate that some of the main theories of policy inconsistency, which focus on variables located at the national scale, find limited empirical support. Based on these findings, we make the case for further research into the local scale of politics, focusing on the agency of street-level bureaucrats and migrants. We then discuss the potential for crossing quantitative and qualitative divides in order to further explore the impact of local factors on national immigration policies.
The migration landscape is a dynamic phenomenon shaped by geopolitical shifts, economic transformations, and climate change. North Macedonia, located in the heart of the Balkan Peninsula, serves as a ...critical transit country for significant migration patterns due to its strategic location and political aspirations towards Europe. Facing internal demographic challenges such as population decline and aging, the country is transitioning towards attracting immigration and becoming a destination for migrants. The Mediterranean Crisis of 2015 highlighted North Macedonia's pivotal role in migration routes, with over 800,000 individuals crossing its borders amid Europe's refugee and migrant influx. Despite containment efforts, the country remains part of mixed-movement routes, with significant border crossings observed in subsequent years. The long-term suspicions of brain drain were confirmed when the demographic census of 2021 revealed a startling 10% population decline over nearly two decades, emphasizing persistent outmigration and aging trends. To address migration challenges, North Macedonia adopted the Resolution on Migration Policy 2021-2025, aiming to establish a robust framework for managing both legal and illegal migrations.
Anticipatory governance emerges as a proactive approach to navigating migration complexities, incorporating foresight and policy integration to shape sustainable migration policies in the country. The development of an Anticipatory Migration Governance model that seeks to foster transformative mindset shifts among stakeholders and institutionalize forward-looking planning, ensuring the effectiveness of migration management strategies. Through capacity development, improving of data collection, and decisions based on data, North Macedonia aims to navigate migration dynamics and achieve economic development with future-looking inclusive policies and collaboration.
This article examines the migration policy of the state in the Astrakhan region following its formation from 1944 to May 9, 1945. The study is based on materials from the archives of state and party ...authorities in the State Archive of the Astrakhan Region. The reasons, goals, content, and outcomes of the authorities’ migration policy are identified. The number of migrants is established, showcasing the geography of departure points and migration directions of the population. It is demonstrated that during the final stage of the war (1944 — May 9, 1945), the migration policy aimed to provide labor resources for the fishing industry, new livestock farms, and government initiatives for the development of the Volga-Akhtubinsk floodplain. In the years under consideration, migrations occurred on a voluntary basis and were incentivized by state benefits. In 1945, during the organization of relocations from the Volga-Akhtubinsk floodplain, migrants were recruited from areas with climates and soil conditions similar to those of the Astrakhan region (Kazakhstan). However, the challenging material and living conditions in the settlement areas led to mass return migrations. The Astrakhan region was unprepared to receive and integrate migrants due to insufficient funding for relocations and local authorities’ lack of attention to the needs of newcomers.
The EU has become a powerful player in the area of migration. As a result, European migration policies increasingly conflict with the EU’s commitment to respect Human Rights. The book identifies the ...most pressing challenges, outlines the relevant legal standards, and provides recommendations for reform. Core issues are asylum seekers’ access to protection in the EU, personal liberty and free movement of migrants, safeguarding the rule of law in immigration proceedings, the prohibition of discrimination on any ground, including immigration status, respecting the social and family ties of migrants, guaranteeing minimum social rights for irregular migrants, and the public and private infrastructure necessary for defending the Human Rights of migrants.
Arguably, standardization is a key concept in contemporary global society. Not only has standardization facilitated worldwide trade of goods and services, but it has also made people amenable to ...similar work situations and to the production and consumption of similar products and similar information across countries. Harsh regional and national migration policies negate these effects of globalization and reflect instead a – unrealistic – managerial ideal of order. It is suggested that legislators who seek to transform states into nation states mistake states for organizations. They take an instrumental approach to citizens and migrants and see the declaration of human rights as an insignificant mission statement.
A significant increase of migration flows directed to the Russian Federation from the PostSoviet states makes it possible to consider the modern Russian Federation as one of the main centers of ...migration attraction in the world, namely, the recipient state of external migration. Migration policy of the recipient state has certain features, which is due to the need to differentiate external migration into demanded and undesirable, to ensure a balance between the interests of government and society, to combine aspects of national security of the state and the personality with an economic and demographic approach to migration. Currently, there are several methods for determining the effectiveness of state migration policy developed by various international organizations, but these methods are focused on developing countries, which, as a rule, are the donor states of migration, or consider the effectiveness of individual components. For example, socio-cultural adaptation and integration of migrants into the host society. In this regard, the need to create new approaches of evaluation the set of measures realized by the state in the field of external migration in the context of the recipient state itself is actualized. Effective migration policy of the recipient state combines approaches that ensure the protection of national interests, the security of the state, society and the personality. It closes addressable the temporary needs of the national labor market, which makes it possible to formulate a number of objective criteria for its evaluation.
