SECTOR:
Home Affairs & Migration
Efforts to support legal migration and mobility are essential for ensuring that individuals and families have the opportunity to migrate safely and successfully. This requires collaboration among governments, international organizations, civil society, and the private sector to ensure that policies and programs are in place to facilitate legal migration and address the needs of migrants.
Addressing irregular migration is critical to promoting safe and orderly migration. This involves addressing the root causes of irregular migration, such as poverty, lack of economic opportunities, conflict, and persecution, and developing policies and programs to deter irregular migration while protecting the rights of migrants. In responding to forced displacement, it is essential to provide protection and assistance to refugees, asylum-seekers, and internally displaced persons.
Migration can be a powerful driver of development, and efforts to promote migration and development must be inclusive and address the needs of migrants and societies. This involves promoting policies and programs that facilitate the integration of migrants into the host communities, enhance the contribution of migrants to development, and address the root causes of migration.
Gathering, examining, and distributing information related to migration and forced displacement is critical, this requires close collaboration among governments, international organizations, and civil society to ensure that data is collected, analyzed, and disseminated in a timely and accurate manner.
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on legal migration, leading to travel restrictions and border closures. Irregular migration remained a significant challenge in 2020, with many migrants taking dangerous and often deadly routes to reach their destinations. Governments around the world continued to implement policies to deter irregular migration, including increased border security and stricter penalties for smugglers and traffickers.
Forced displacement also continued to be a major issue with conflict, violence, and persecution driving millions of people from their homes. The COVID-19 pandemic further exacerbated the challenges faced by refugees and internally displaced persons, including limited access to healthcare and increased economic hardship.
Moreover, there is increasing recognition of the need to address climate change as a driver of migration and displacement, with some countries developing policies to support climate migrants and provide protection to those affected by environmental disasters.
Home Affairs & Migration facts
- Home Affairs focuses on a range of critical responsibilities that contribute to ensure stability and security. One of its primary functions is the formulation and implementation of immigration policies, encompassing aspects like visa regulations, border control, and the management of refugee populations.
- Integral to ensuring security, Home Affairs plays a pivotal role in law enforcement oversight. This involves coordinating with various law enforcement agencies to maintain public safety, uphold order, and address internal threats.
- Additionally, the department is often at the forefront of counter-radicalization efforts, employing strategies to identify and prevent the spread of extremist ideologies.
- Forced displacement is likely to continue: Wars, conflicts, persecution, and natural disasters are some of the factors that force people to leave their homes and migrate to other countries. Unfortunately, these factors are likely to continue in 2024, leading to more forced migration.
- Climate change will have an impact: As climate change continues to affect the planet, it is expected to lead to more environmental migration. Rising sea levels, droughts, and other environmental factors may force people to leave their homes and move to other regions.
- Migration policies are likely to change: Governments around the world are likely to continue to make changes to their migration policies in response to global events. Some countries may become more welcoming to migrants, while others may tighten their borders.
NTU’s involvement in the migration sector:
At NTU, we believe that migration is a crucial issue that needs to be addressed with respect, equality, and inclusivity. We recognize that legal migration and mobility are essential to support economic development and social stability, while irregular migration and forced displacement can cause significant challenges to communities and countries. Therefore, we are committed to providing high-quality services to address the migration sector's various challenges.
NTU can provide high-quality services in the migration sector. Our multicultural and gender-balanced teams have extensive experience in policy and programming studies on social matters and we have implemented institutional and capacity-building programs in various sectors. Our expertise also includes conducting evaluations and providing concrete recommendations to ensure that projects promote social safeguards.
We are committed to supporting migration governance efforts and providing technical assistance to improve migration management policies and practices. Moreover, we recognize that addressing the root causes of irregular migration and forced displacement is essential to promote sustainable development and peace. NTU underlines the importance of protecting migrants' rights and promoting their well-being, including their access to health and social services. We believe that collecting, analyzing, and disseminating migration/forced displacement-related data are vital to developing evidence-based policies and practices that address the needs of migrants and the host communities.
We will work with governments, communities, civil society, the private sector, and other stakeholders to provide innovative and sustainable solutions that promote social safeguards and support safe, orderly, and regular migration.
Main challenges:
The migration environment is shaped by the continued effects of long-term trends and drivers, increasing economic and demographic imbalances, climate change, growing geopolitical competition and the instrumentalisation of migration as a means of hybrid aggression, characterised by growing levels of mobility, both voluntary and forced, both legal and irregular. Two major developments shaped the European migration debate in 2022: the war in Ukraine followed by the inflow of refugees and the increasing numbers of irregular arrivals and asylum applications by nationals from other world regions which translates into high migration pressure and flows of refugees and irregular migrants.
In 2022, the Western Balkans Route and the Central Mediterranean Route recorded 75% of all detections of irregular border crossings into the EU. This was caused by the growing instability and conflict, the economic fallout from the war in Ukraine, the increasing significance of Tunisia as a point of departure alongside Libya, and visa-free access for important nationalities of origin to neighboring countries and the subsequent attempts to cross into the Schengen Zone.
A key cross-cutting challenge of migration and forced displacement is the lack of legal and policy frameworks and capacity faced by governments. Effective migration governance requires strong and complex frameworks that are in line with international human rights standards, which is often a challenge for countries in development. In addition, these constraints lead to legal and administrative barriers, such as immigration restrictions or bureaucratic processes that can delay or prevent refugees from accessing necessary services and make it difficult for migrants to understand their rights and obligations.
NTU, through its projects in Home Affairs and Migration, contributes to achieving the following SDGs:
