Migration governance 2050 : Utopia, dystopia, or heterotopia?

What will global migration governance look like in 2050? This chapter examines likely scenarios relating to the trends, governance, and politics that will shape global order in relation to international migration. It argues that migration governance will be shaped against the backdrop of two key disequilibria. First, demographic and economic inequality will generate increasing supply of migrant labor but the receiving country demand for migrant labor will be tempered by structural economic transformation and politics. Second, in the context of climate change and state fragility, an age of displacement will exacerbate the mismatch between people’s mobility and states’ willingness to open their borders. These disequilibria will be reconciled by a proliferation of irregular migration through organized smuggling networks, as states adopt border control practices shaped by extra-territoriality, technology, and capitalism. On current trajectory—holding power, interests, and ideas broadly constant—governance will remain fragmented. Powerful states will jealously guard sovereign discretion on labor migration, entering into bilateral and regional agreements to control irregular migration, using multilateralism as an increasingly marginal source of consensus building and legitimation. Localized sanctuaries offering digitally-connected, offshore opportunities will emerge for the displaced, people with skills and talents who will enjoy freedom of movement, and ever-more elaborate technologies of control will be brought into existence to proscribe illicit onward movement to rich-world countries. Governance will be shaped by the interaction of states, firms, and technology. But none of this is inevitable; our direction of travel will ultimately depend on citizens and voters to determine the values, narratives, and priorities that underlie migration governance.