Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

ISSN: 1369-183X (Print) 1469-9451 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cjms20

International Organisations and the Politics of

Migration

Martin Geiger & Antoine Pécoud

To cite this article: Martin Geiger & Antoine Pécoud (2014) International Organisations
and the Politics of Migration, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 40:6, 865-887, DOI:
10.1080/1369183X.2013.855071

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Published online: 17 Dec 2013.

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Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 2014
Vol. 40, No. 6, 865–887, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1369183X.2013.855071

International Organisations and the

Politics of Migration
Martin Geiger and Antoine Pécoud

The last two decades have seen major shifts in the way international organisations (IOs)
address migration. While state sovereignty remains central in the politics of migration,
IOs are increasingly developing their visions regarding how the cross-border movements
of people should be governed (or ‘managed’) and, in some cases, they have become
important actors in the design and implementation of migration policy. Research on the
role and functions of IOs remains scarce, however, and there are major uncertainties,
concerning not only their actual influence, but also the political context in which they
operate and the outcome of their initiatives. According to their advocates, the
involvement of IOs would enable greater international cooperation, which would lead
to policies that pay greater attention to human rights and development imperatives. Yet,
at times, interventions by IOs seem to reinforce existing imbalances, as these
organisations primarily tend to align themselves with the interests and agenda of
developed receiving states. In addition, the work of IOs is embedded in a complex
institutional setting, characterised by sometimes-problematic institutional relations
between them, as well as between IOs and other international cooperation mechanisms.

Keywords: Migration Policy; Internationalisation; International Organisations; Migra-

tion Research; Consultancy

1. Introduction
One of the core trends characterising the last two decades is the regionalisation and
internationalisation of migration-related policy issues. At the regional level, Europe is

Martin Geiger is a Banting Fellow at the Department of Political Science and the Institute of European,
Russian and Eurasian Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. Correspondence to: Martin Geiger,
Department of Political Science and Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies, Carleton University,
B647 Loeb, 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON, K1S 5B6, Canada. E-mail: martin.geiger@carleton.ca. Antoine
Pécoud is a Professor of Sociology, University of Paris. Correspondence to: Antoine Pécoud, Professor of
Sociology, University of Paris 13, 99 av J-B Clément, 93430 Villetaneuse, France. E-mail: antoine.pecoud@
univ-paris13.fr.

© 2013 Taylor & Francis

866 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
particularly concerned with the progressive elaboration of an EU migration regime,
coupled with the increasing cooperation of neighbouring countries; another key
development was the creation, in 1991, of the Budapest Process [which brings
together European Community (EC) and European Free Trade Association (EFTA)
states with the former communist bloc]. Similar regional consultative processes
(RCPs) have been launched in other world regions (Thouez and Channac 2006) and
coexist with one of the first forums of this kind, the Intergovernmental Consultations
(IGC) on Asylum, Refugee and Migration Policies in Europe, North America and
Australia, launched in 1985. Another milestone at the international level was the 1994
Cairo Conference on Population and Development, which was followed by other
similar forums—including, for example, the first United Nations (UN) High-Level
Dialogue on International Migration and Development (HLD, 2006, followed by a
second dialogue in 2013) and the Global Forum on Migration and Development
(GFMD, organised yearly since 2007).
While the interest of international organisations (IOs) in migration is not new,
these regional and international developments have created a favourable context for
them, as one of their main raisons d’être is to support states in their efforts to
establish policy consultations and cooperation. IOs have consequently been able to
increase their role and activities in the field of migration; this includes in particular
the substantial growth of certain agencies like the International Organisation for
Migration (IOM), the establishment of new organisations (e.g., the International
Centre for Migration Policy Development, ICMPD, in 1993), and the creation of
novel patterns of cooperation between agencies, such as through the Global Migration
Group (GMG) which was set up in 2006 (Pécoud 2013).1
The actual role and activities of IOs in the politics of migration remain under-
researched, however. There is a growing body of work on the role of EU institutions
(e.g., Boswell 2008a; Geddes 2001; Guiraudon 2003), but no comparable work on
international institutions. Little is known on the strategies of IOs, on their influence
on policy-making, on the worldviews they promote, or on the nature of their
interventions and their actual contribution to policy implementation. This contrasts
with, for example, finance, security or development studies, which have long been
scrutinising the role of organisations like the UN, the World Bank, the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) or the World Trade Organization (WTO) (e.g., Broome and
Seabrook 2012; Wallach and Woodall 2004).

2. State Sovereignty, Immigration Policy and IOs: A Short Historical Perspective

The interest of IOs in international migration is far from new. In 1919, upon its
creation, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) mentioned, in its Constitution,
‘the protection of the interests of workers when employed in countries other than
their own’. This resulted in the establishment of international law instruments for the
recruitment and treatment of foreign workers. There was strong resistance, however:
the pre-Second World War context, characterised by economic crises and strong
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 867
nationalist and protectionist tendencies, was unsupportive of the efforts to promote
migrant workers’ rights (Battistella 2009). In the second half of the twentieth century,
the development of human rights, along with the need for foreign labour in booming
Western states, led to renewed interest in norms pertaining to migrants’ rights and to
the adoption of new Conventions by both the ILO and the UN.2 Again, however,
states proved reluctant to ratify and implement these treaties (Cholewinski,
de Guchteneire, and Pécoud 2009), making it difficult to establish the human rights
of migrants as an object of international cooperation (Pécoud 2009).
Today, international migration is commonly represented as an issue that is closely
associated with ‘state sovereignty’. States, the argument goes, would engage in
international cooperation over a wide range of transnational issues but, as Saskia
Sassen writes, ‘when it comes to immigrants and refugees, … the national state claims
all its old splendour in asserting its sovereign right to control its borders’ (Sassen
1996, 59). Even if cooperation were recognised as useful, or even necessary, in
properly ‘managing’ migration, it would face the obstacle of states’ concern over the
sovereign control of human mobility (Martin, Martin, and Weil 2006). States’
unilateral approach to migration would most obviously manifest itself through the
one-sided way they control their borders, and by the persistence of such methods
over time (see e.g., Zolberg 1997). In this view, migration politics is marked by the
‘tyranny of the national’ (Noiriel 1991) and ‘cooperation’ (including the role of IOs)
is something that would have yet to emerge.
Nevertheless, this ignores the fact that, from a functionalist point of view, the
international nature of migration dynamics has long made them amenable for
international cooperation. The longue durée perspective not only shows that ‘the state
monopolisation of the legitimate means of movement’ is the outcome of a long-
standing, sometimes incomplete, and still on-going process, as governments have to
cope with the influence of non-state actors (like corporations) while also struggling to
develop and maintain the bureaucratic and administrative resources to successfully
monitor peoples’ mobility (Torpey 2000; see also Geiger 2013). It also reveals the
permanent tension between sovereignty and cooperation in migration politics.
Indeed, the ILO’s early work did not arise out of nothing, but reflected the political
concerns of the time with regard to the need to foster cooperation between
governments, to strengthen the international legal framework in which labour
migration took place, or to treat foreigners in a way that did not hurt receiving states’
diplomatic interests (Rosental 2006, 2011). Importantly, these concerns were not born
solely out of humanitarian or idealistic preoccupations, but displayed a mix of social,
economic and political imperatives (as, for instance, social rights could help to
monitor foreigners’ presence and activities).
Another object of early international cooperation concerns asylum seekers and
refugees. The position of a High Commissioner for Refugees was first created in 1921
by the League of Nations, which marked the beginning of a process that culminated
in the creation of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in 1950 and
the adoption of the 1951 Geneva Convention (Loescher 2001). This also resulted in
868 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
an institutional fragmentation that exists to this day. For historical and political
reasons (framed by World War II [WWII] and the East–West confrontation),
attention was mostly focused on the creation of a regime for refugee protection. The
ILO nevertheless kept its labour migrants’ rights mandate, which indicated the sharp
discrepancy in the treatment of refugees and (labour) migrants by IOs and
governments. To further complicate the picture, yet another IO was created in
1951, but outside the UN system: what is now the IOM was initially called the
Provisional Intergovernmental Committee for the Movement of Migrants from
Europe (PICMME), designed as a temporary Europe-centred organisation with a
focus on logistics and transportation (rather than on protection). The IOM only
became a permanent organisation in 1989 (Georgi 2010).
These developments resulted in at least three different policy/legal categories,
and in a kind of division of labour between IOs: migrant workers’ rights (promoted
by the ILO and later by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights (OHCHR)), refugees and asylum (through the UNHCR), and logistical and
other practical services to governments (by the PICMME/IOM). This configura-
tion was the object (and result) of much debate. The ILO, as the oldest agency with
experience in migration, was in favour of a comprehensive approach in addressing
the rights and protection of all those on the move. This was to some extent in line
with Europe’s reality in the post-WWII context, which saw a high number of
displaced people—but with no clear distinction between refugees and migrants.
Yet, some influential governments, including those of the USA and the UK,
resisted the idea of giving too much influence to a single institution, particularly in
light of the fears surrounding a ‘communist influence’ in UN institutions that
characterised the Cold War context. This is also why, until today, the IOM
remained outside the UN system. This resulted in a piecemeal approach and a
(deliberately) fragmented situation (Karatani 2005).

3. IOs in Migration Politics: The Post-Cold War Context

The post-Cold War period saw a number of changes in the relationship between IOs
and migration politics. There were at least two interrelated dynamics at play: (1) the
end of the East–West conflict raised hopes regarding the emergence of a consensus
on certain transnational issues and the elaboration of new mechanisms to regulate
them at the international level; and (2) the search for these new mechanisms
simultaneously resulted from fears surrounding the decline of states’ influence and
capacities in a world that gradually became understood as a ‘global village’. The
collapse of Communist states, along with the penetration of capitalism and the
intensification of market deregulation, created an environment in which sovereignty
was perceived as under threat—hence the search for solutions to the ‘crisis of the
nation state’ and for new modes of ‘global governance’ that motivated, among other
things, the creation of the Commission on Global Governance in 1995.
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 869
International migration was one of the issues, even if not the focal one, which
exemplified these concerns. It became understood, both by some analysts and by
policy-makers, as a destabilising factor for states and societies. In Europe, fears over
massive East–West migration, along with refugee flows from the Balkans, illustrated
how migration and refugee movements could create security challenges. So-called
‘new’ types of migration emerged in academic and political discourses, including
‘human trafficking’ and the role of smugglers in facilitating irregular migration (e.g.,
Salt 2001), or the impact of climate change in forcing people to migrate (Gemenne
2011). These notions melded with preoccupations over perceived migration or
refugee ‘crises’ (Hoffmann-Nowotny 1992; Loescher and Loescher 1994; Weiner
1995) and in debates regarding the ability of states to control migration (Freeman
1994; Sassen 1996).
International debates on migration started to display a dual and ambivalent nature.
On the one hand, the interest in inter-state cooperation reflected the search for new
strategies to control and limit migration. Mechanisms such as the IGC or new IOs
like the ICMPD were designed for states to exchange information, join forces and
react rapidly to migration challenges. The ‘internationalisation’ of migration politics
was then above all a strategy to preserve national/sovereign control over human
mobility. On the other hand, however, debates were also marked by the felt need to
develop genuinely ‘global’ and concerted migration policies; the intention was to go
beyond narrow, control-oriented concerns and to address broader imperatives (like
the development of sending regions, the need for migrant labour in developed
economies, or the rights of migrants), and therefore to move migration away from the
security/control extent to, eventually, ‘manage’ it in a cooperative and comprehensive
manner. The work of Bimal Ghosh (1993, 2012) for the Commission on Global
Governance was quite influential in promoting such views. Despite (or thanks to) its
ambivalent nature, interest in these issues translated into several major initiatives.
Following the 1994 Cairo Conference, migration became the focus of the Global
Commission on International Migration (GCIM, 2003–2005), while other global
forums were set up (including the UN HLD and the GFMD).
From a neofunctionalist perspective, the ‘problems’ themselves and the interde-
pendencies they create between states do not alone explain why IOs become
legitimate actors; the key point is the extent to which there is an agreement between
states to foster political integration. Thus, international migration may currently be
in the process of turning into a truly ‘global’ issue, not necessarily because it has
become ‘more international’ or because we live in the ‘age of migration’ (Castles and
Miller 2009), but rather because it is being recognised by states as a topic worthy of
attention at the international level. This is why, for example, ‘the UNHCR … grew
much faster than the number of refugees in the world … The UNHCR’s growth …
could not have been fuelled exclusively by the technical demands imposed by a
greater refugee population. It was fuelled as well (perhaps primarily) by an
870 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
increasing political consensus among states that they had an ethical responsibility to
ameliorate the plight of refugees’ (Barkin 2006, 32).
In this respect, the ‘migration crisis’ (whether real or perceived) played a central
role, by highlighting the limits of unilateral state interventions and the necessity
for governments to cooperate in achieving their goals; this prompted a renewed
interest in bilateral agreements (Adepoju, Van Noorloos, and Zoomers 2010) and
in multilateral initiatives, at the regional and international levels. IOs thus became
a more important element in states’ strategies, which in some cases meant
readjusting their mandates: the UNHCR had to address the question of how to
treat not only asylum and refugee resettlement (Garnier 2014), but also migration,
and particularly the so-called ‘mixed’ flows (in which ‘genuine’ refugees are hard
to distinguish from other categories of people on the move); the ILO (and the UN
at large) have also been struggling to adapt their rights-based mandate to a more
governance- and control-oriented context (Pécoud and de Guchteneire 2007).
Yet, such ‘real-world’ developments are only one side of the coin. Nay (2011)
argues that changes within IOs result from both external pressure and from internal
dynamics; in particular, IOs should be seen as ‘bureaucratic entrepreneurs’ capable of
seizing external opportunities and responding innovatively to them. Indeed,
neoinstitutionalist research has long made it clear that one cannot see IOs as static
sets of rules, mandates, bodies, etc., but as actors that can behave in a somewhat
autonomous manner, for instance by expanding in directions that were not initially
expected (or by failing to do what they are tasked to do). This scholarship has also
showed how IOs may be less concerned with their formal mission than with their
own rules – or survival. Thus, both the UNHCR and the IOM were originally
supposed to work within the European context; yet, the scope of their interventions
gradually became global, in a process that had much to do with IOs themselves
looking for work opportunities outside Europe (once this continent became more
peaceful and less ‘promising’ in terms of the ‘problems’ IOs are tasked to address).
This is even more obvious in the case of the IOM, which was not destined to become
a permanent organisation, but nevertheless managed to endure by constantly
reinventing its role and functions—becoming so successful in this endeavour that it
has been growing substantially over the past decade (Georgi 2010; Loescher 2001).3
At a smaller scale, several other IOs whose formal mandate does not explicitly
focus on migration were able to step in, by channelling their field of expertise (like
health, development or transnational crime, etc.) to the cross-border movements of
people; this is the case of most of the agencies that are currently part of the GMG,
and that thereby displayed a certain agency in redefining their activities. As
Kathleen Newland sums up:

attention to international migration in the 1990s was sporadic and largely fruitless…
No UN agency had migrants or migration processes as priorities… All of this changed
quite suddenly around the turn of the millennium. Suddenly, migration was
everywhere one looked in the UN system and beyond. (Newland 2010, 331–332).
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 871
4. Investigating the Role of IOs in the Politics of Migration
According to Michael Barnett and Martha Finnemore, ‘surprisingly few … students
of IOs have been critical of their performance or desirability’ (1999, 701). This lack of
criticism and general ‘optimism’ about IOs might be caused by the widespread
assumption that they do what they are mandated to do, that is, solve problems and
foster cooperation between states–which is arguably preferable to confrontation,
conflict or war. As far as migration is concerned, however, this optimism makes for a
surprising paradox. It is common to criticise certain states for designing inappropri-
ate or unsuccessful migration policies (Castles 2004), but the same criticisms are
hardly applied to IOs. Nonetheless, if the way states deal with migration is open to
critique, and if states are the primary instruction-givers of IOs, it would logically
follow that IOs should also become the focus of criticism, since they must be equally
unsuccessful in their migration initiatives.
Writing about the IOM, Rutvica Andrijasevic and William Walters note that:

despite the fact that [it] has become a major operator in the field of international
borders and migration governance, there is surprisingly very little academic research
that has interrogated this agency. Migration scholars routinely use IOM material as
data, and often participate in IOM research and policy programmes. But rarely has it
been the subject of critical scrutiny itself. … It is high time that the IOM [is] made an
object of inquiry in its own right. (2010, 980)

It is indeed striking to observe that, despite the influence of this organisation, only a
small number of articles were published on its activities, and only in very recent years
(e.g., Ashutosh and Mountz 2011; Caillaut 2012; Collyer 2012; Felli 2013; Geiger
2010; Georgi 2010; Georgi and Schatral 2012; Pécoud 2010). Oleg Korneev’s analysis
of the IOM’s role in the elaboration and implementation of the EU-Russia
readmission agreement thus clearly stresses the need to acknowledge the importance
of this organisation in brokering and essentially organising international cooperation
in the field of migration (Korneev 2014).
A similar lack of research concerns other important agencies. The work of the ILO,
for instance, seems to be researched mainly from historical or legal perspectives
(Böhning 1991; Haseneau 1991; Rosental 2006). Very little information is also
available on the activities and possible influence of other increasingly important
institutions, like the UN Development Programme (UNDP) or the World Bank (even
if this may be understandable given their recent engagement with migration). Other
regional bodies (like the IGC, the ICMPD, and RCPs) are in the same situation
(Georgi 2007; Hess 2010; Oelgemöller 2011; Thouez and Channac 2006).
The case of the UNHCR is quite different. It has been the object of much more
research, especially on its history and on the political, legal and humanitarian
dilemmas that characterise its agenda. Although there is no room here for an
overview of this literature, one can nevertheless observe that, while the UNHCR is
regularly criticised for failing to protect refugees and for betraying its founding ideal
872 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
in the face of the political pressure put on by developed receiving states, this is usually
interpreted as a ‘challenge’ stemming from the environment in which the UNHCR
operates, and not from the UNHCR itself. The agency tends to be viewed as
inherently well intentioned, as simply trying to do its best in a difficult setting. But
Jennifer Hyndman (2000) provides a critical assessment of the UNHCR’s actual
activities, which leads her to stress the need to ‘study up’ and to complement the
analysis of migrants’ or refugees’ situation with an investigation of the institutions
that govern their lives (see also Agier 2006). Bhupinder Chimni (1998) underlines the
close ties that exist between the UNHCR and the research community, to the extent
that debates on this organisation often take the form of sympathetic comments rather
than of criticism. In this special issue, the need for such a critical approach is made
clear by studies on the UNHCR’s involvement in refugee resettlement (Garnier 2014),
its contribution to ‘migration management’ (Ratfisch and Scheel 2014) and its
cooperation with the IOM in the area of ‘voluntary return’ (Koch 2014).
Discussing the role of IOs is difficult not only because of the general optimism that
surrounds their activities or of the connections between them and researchers, but also
because of their fundamentally ambiguous nature. Indeed, when one speaks of an IO,
what does one refer to? Is it the mandate it receives from its member state, as well as its
resolutions and documents, adopted through consultative or decision-making pro-
cesses? Perhaps, it refers to its role in promoting debates and exchanges between
governments and other actors? Could it be its corporate strategy to convince
governments of its practicality as a means to ensure organisational growth (or
survival)? Or does an IO refer to the projects it manages at the country level and the
goodwill and values of its staff members? Depending on the focus of the research, the
conclusions will be quite different. This is also a methodological issue. Some aspects of
the work of IOs are quite accessible (including official documents and formal
resolutions); in some cases, it may be feasible to speak to staff, even at high levels of
responsibility. Nonetheless on-the-ground projects can be very difficult to investigate
empirically: outside researchers may be welcome at conferences or symposia, but
maybe not where IOs’ ‘real life’ decisions and activities are piloted and implemented.
To some extent, these different takes on IOs in regard to migration politics echo
the controversies that pervade the scholarship on IOs in general. One can look at IOs
as formal institutions and investigate their mandate, constituency, organisational
structure, internal rules, budget, etc. This may be useful in understanding the
specificity of each IO. For example, the IOM is known for being highly decentralised,
and for its so-called ‘projectisation’ system, which means that funding is almost
exclusively dependent upon specific projects.4 This particular style of management is
quite distinct from most UN agencies and confers a strong influence to key donors
and to field offices, which are responsible for attracting financial support. This calls
for a political sociology of IOs, which investigates the on-the-ground strategies
developed by IOs and their relationships to their environment, in a way that (as noted
above) may account for changes over time in their role and functions.
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 873
By contrast, regime theory tends to look at IOs as ‘black boxes’ that constitute
more or less crucial building blocks in international cooperation; the issue then is not
really the services provided by IOs or the projects they implement on the ground, but
rather their function as forums for states to reach multilateral agreements (Krasner
1983). One can then contrast the relatively robust refugee regime, in which the
UNHCR plays a key role, with the much more fragile sets of rules and institutions
that apply to international migration (Betts 2011). One can further discuss the
relationship between IOs as ‘agents’ and their ‘principals’ (namely states): while, in a
realist vein, IOs serve merely as the executor of states’ instructions, other scholars
stress their quest for autonomy (which may enable them to display agency and
promote their own worldviews), as well as their relationships with non-state actors
(like non-governmental organisations, NGOs). Finally, research by international
relations (IR) scholars and political scientists is often marked by a lack of sociological
and anthropological perspectives on IOs as organisations with staff, values, strategies,
culture, internal tensions, etc. (see Cox and Jacobson 1973; Barnett and Finnemore
1999; Ness and Brechin 1988).
A key issue that pervades these different approaches looks at the place of an IO
within the broader environment. Before WWII, the ILO was already struggling to
impose its agenda in the face of competing initiatives, like bilateral agreements and
parallel multilateral processes (Rosental 2006). Today, a body like the IGC represents
the same kind of challenge, as it enables powerful receiving states to exchange and
discuss their strategies outside IOs, in a manner that is characterised by greater
informality and confidentiality (Oelgemöller 2011). While more formal and global,
the GFMD is also situated outside the UN system and keeps IOs in a secondary
position. In addition, IOs do not only coexist with other international processes that
bypass them, but also with each other, in sometimes quite contentious ways.
Formally, competition between IOs makes little sense: if one assumes that they follow
states’ directives, most of them having the same constituency, competition between
IOs would only signal a lack of coordination between states, which would erroneously
give the same task to more than one institution. Of course, this formal perspective is
too narrow and ignores the agency of IOs and their quest for autonomy. Nevertheless,
it points to the role of states: what appears as ‘competition’ from the point of view of
an IO may indeed be a strategy from governments’ standpoint. As noted above, the
way migration was split between agencies after WWII shows how governments
deliberately avoided the creation of a single powerful agency. In this respect, far from
being the consequence of IOs’ conflicting strategies, competition is organised by
governments as a functional dimension of IOs’ working environment (Betts 2011).
In sum, the nature of IOs is complex to capture, which makes an assessment of
their precise role difficult. The structural relation between states and IOs could serve
as a basis for criticising their role as instruments of governments; yet, it is equally
possible to view them as doing ‘good’ work despite a ‘bad’ environment for which
states (and especially Western developed states) would be primarily responsible.
874 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
4.1. Influence of IOs
Overall, IOs’ role and influence are marked by a paradox. On the one hand, they
could (or should) be the building blocks for establishing a new global system, which is
a highly relevant task in an age of globalisation. At the same time, however, there
remains considerable scepticism about their ability to meet the challenges they are
designed to address. Both policy-makers and scholars regularly express concerns
about the capacity of IOs to reform and innovate, which in turns deepens doubts of
their relevance and legitimacy in today’s world (Muldoon 2004). As far as migration
is concerned, the influence of IOs is further debatable, because the issue does not—
with the exception of the IOM—belong to their core fields of competence. Moreover,
IOs and their efforts still coexist with long-standing uni- or bilateral state approaches,
as well as with competing regional/international bodies whose existence indicates the
reluctance of governments to confer too much influence to IOs. The field of
international migration policy is therefore fragmented, which weakens the capacity of
IOs and enables states to go ‘venue-shopping’ and select the IO or forum they wish,
depending on their interests.
The influence of IOs also varies greatly according to agencies and topics; some IOs
are arguably more influential than others, and their influence may be greater in some
areas than in others. While several agencies are active in the field of migration, it is
probably fair to say that they do not all have the same influence; the UNHCR and the
IOM are likely to exert the greatest influence in this respect, while other supposedly
‘strong’ institutions (like the UNDP or the World Bank) are potentially very
influential, but still new players. By contrast, the work of other agencies in migration
may have very little impact, even if these institutions are key actors in other policy
areas [like the World Health Organization (WHO) on health, the UNICEF on
children, the WTO on trade, etc.]. Assessing the influence of IOs points again to the
role of states. Is an IO influential, because it manages to develop sound policy
recommendations and implement useful projects on the ground? Or does its
influence stem from the support it enjoys from powerful governments? Alternatively
put, does their weakness reflect their own organisational shortcomings, or rather a
lack of necessary support from governments?
According to Foucault-inspired analysts (e.g., Larner and Walters 2002; Merlingen
2003), the power of IOs can be interpreted as a form of ‘global governmentality’. By
setting standards, and by monitoring states’ behaviour, their work would amount to the
‘conduct of conduct’ of states. Even without exercising direct coercive power, they
would determine the ‘right’ policies to be implemented by governments and develop
the instruments through which to assess their compliance with these principles.
Governments would not perceive the norms of IOs as imposed on them from more
powerful external actors; on the contrary, they would ‘self-discipline’ themselves,
‘socialise’ with and adhere to these norms, understood as unquestionable universal
values (Ikenberry and Kupchan 1990; Joseph 2009; Manohka 2009; Schimmelpfennig
2000). Moreover, as Stephan Scheel and Philipp Ratfisch describe, in the particular area
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 875
of migration politics, the role of IOs is not limited to ‘disciplining’ the ‘conduct of
conduct’ of states, but also to the influence on individual people and their (migratory)
behaviour (Scheel and Ratfisch 2014, see also Geiger and Pécoud 2013a; Nieuwenhuys
and Pécoud 2007).
This nevertheless leaves the ‘cui bono?’ question somewhat unanswered. The issue
is therefore to assess whether IOs work ‘for the interests of all’ (as their mandate and
rhetoric claim), for their own interests as institutions, for the interest of particular
states to the detriment of others, or for certain interest groups within countries. From
a realist perspective, powerful states exert the greatest influence; IOs are then logically
forced to act in a way that is compatible with these states’ interests and their claimed
‘universality’ is therefore inherently flawed. On the other hand, this universality is
crucial, as it hides the real power relations between states and enables IOs to
intervene in a neutral, technical and (potentially) more efficient manner. According
to Andrijasevic and Walters (2010), the IOM is thus well-adapted to a post-imperial
world, in which states are in principle independent and where dominant governments
are not supposed to impose their views on the rest of the world. Yet, there are many
issues—and the control of borders is one of them—that are characterised by state
interdependency, and for which dominant states feel the need to steer the behaviour
of other states. This is where the IOM’s added value comes in, as this organisation has
the capacity to guide the behaviour of weak states through persuasion, in a manner
that formally respects their sovereignty.
Colleen Thouez and Sarah Rosengartner (2007) provide another example by
looking at the IOM’s role in RCPs. These are designed to enable governments in a
given region to discuss migration; whereas one could expect these exchanges to be
region-specific and to address issues that are most salient in the respective regions,
they seem on the contrary to focus on more or less the same topics—and, what is
more, on precisely those topics that matter most for receiving governments (i.e.,
border control). This paradoxical situation partly has to do with the fact that most
RCPs (like the Puebla Process or the Colombo Process) have the IOM as their
‘secretariat’, meaning that this agency plays a key role in steering discussions and
setting the agenda. This not only enables the IOM to subsequently get involved in the
implementation of the initiatives agreed upon within RCPs, but it also illustrates the
way in which an IO can vehicle the concerns of its most important member states,
even when working ‘for the benefit’ of non-Western countries. Moreover, it shows
how an IO can ‘export’ both concerns and practical ‘solutions’ from one part of the
world to the others (Geiger 2010; see also Korneev 2014).

4.2. Discourses of IOs

IOs produce influential sets of discourses, narratives or ‘scripts’ that then shape the
way issues are framed, apprehended and addressed: ‘even when they lack material
resources, IOs exercise power as they constitute and construct the social world’
(Barnett and Finnemore 1999, 700, see also Merçay 2014). Thanks to their good
876 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
reputation, access to data and information, and universal mandate, IOs are in a
position to influence the understandings of certain ‘challenges’ and to propose
‘adequate’ recommendations on how to address them. Their involvement in
migration policy has thus developed along with the elaboration of discourses on
what migration is and how it should be ‘managed’, contained in a relatively high
number of reports published since approximately 2000 (like the GCIM report, the
World Migration Reports published by the IOM, or the UNDP 2009 Human
Development Report).
Some of the core elements of IOs’ discourses on migration include the construction
of cross-border movements as a ‘global’ issue to be addressed ‘globally’; a positive
appreciation of migration as a ‘normal’ process that should be managed to benefit
sending and receiving societies, and migrants alike (‘triple-win’); an emphasis on
cooperation between states in handling migration, and on the linkages between
migration and other policy fields (like development); an adherence to universal
principles, including human rights, but also to free-market beliefs, through the
recognition of the need to facilitate the ‘circulation’ of labour in a globalising world
(Amaya-Castro 2012; Boucher 2008; Gamlen 2010; Kalm 2010; Levatino and Pécoud
2012). At least three political agendas pervade these discourses: (1) the security
concern with border surveillance and the control of unauthorised migration, (2) the
labour market preoccupation with economic migration and employers’ need for
foreign labour, and (3) the humanitarian imperative to foster development in sending
regions and to protect migrants, ‘victims’ of human trafficking, asylum seekers,
refugees as well as (to a lesser extent) left-behind populations (Geiger and Pécoud
2012; see also Carling and Hernandez-Carretero 2011).
These agendas usually mobilise different actors. The first is associated with home
affairs ministries in receiving countries, while the second is a typical private sector
concern; the third is rather in line with IOs and NGOs, along with sending states and
some segments of receiving societies. Despite these groupings, the boundaries are not
always neat. For example, IOs struggle to incorporate the concerns of both receiving
and sending countries, while the latter sometimes share parts of security-oriented
objectives. These three agendas are therefore not monolithic, but feature internal
debates. There are disagreements on how best to achieve security objectives, between
smart borders policies and opening legal migration channels, for instance. There are
also discussions within the third agenda, such as those that oppose legalistic rights-
based protection and less formal humanitarian interventions.
There are also debates between these different agendas. Control/security policies are
criticised for being unsupportive of economic growth (by the private sector), for leading
to human rights abuses (by NGOs) or for ignoring the development needs of sending
regions (by IOs). Similarly, employers’ needs for foreign labour would jeopardise
development (e.g., in the case of skilled migration), violate migrants’ human and labour
rights (as foreign workers are expected to ‘do the dirty work’), or fuel irregular
migration channels (by attracting undeclared migrant labour). In turn, the protection
agenda, and particularly the right to seek asylum, would enable irregular migrants to
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 877
bypass admission policies, while being ‘economically useless’. The stated purpose of
IOs’ narratives, then, is to fine-tune migration policies and identify the ‘just right’
equilibrium between these different agendas. This is a compromising exercise that,
inevitably, faces criticism from all sides (see Ghosh 2012).
What is special about IOs’ discourses is not, however, that they fail to conciliate
irreconcilable political objectives. It is that they claim to do so by offering a somewhat
totalising policy narrative that transcends political dilemmas and diverging interests.
This is also what makes these narratives relatively new. Indeed, the three political
agendas outlined above are not new in and of themselves; their respective importance
has varied according to times and places, but they have long characterised migration
politics. It is the way IOs re-use and re-frame old arguments that raises a number of
new issues.
One of these is the ‘managerial’ approach to migration. It is clearly an outcome of
the ‘New Public Management’ (NPM) philosophy, which sees public actors develop
market-oriented positions to enhance cost-effectiveness. ‘Migration management’
could also be seen as a reaction to the over-politicisation (or even ‘scandalisation’) of
migration; over-politicisation makes the work of IOs difficult, and the argument
according to which political sensitivity would inhibit the development of econom-
ically ‘sound’ policies is a common one. The issue then is the respective importance of
technical/economic and political concerns; ‘migration management’ is clearly on the
economic side, with the risk of downplaying values, rights and democratic legitimacy
(Pollitt and Bouckaert 2011; Kalm 2010). Another implication of IOs’ narratives is
their comprehensive and holistic nature. Migration policy is traditionally a
fragmented field, as different institutional actors and ministries deal with admission,
integration, asylum, the labour market, international cooperation, human rights,
development, etc. One of the key objectives of IOs in their interventions is—to use
their jargon—to ‘mainstream’ migration and achieve ‘policy coherence’.
Chris Shore and Susan Wright (1997, 8) argue that ‘a key feature of modern power’
is the masking of the political ‘under the cloak of neutrality’. Introducing a
managerial logic, promoting unquestionably ‘good’ objectives (development, good
governance, cooperation, protection of migrants and refugees, ‘policy coherence’,
etc.), and claiming to benefit all parties—are all ways of depoliticising migration. This
enables IOs to appear as ‘impersonal, value-neutral, not self-interested and hence
technocratic actors whose purpose is not the exercise of power but equitable problem-
solving’ (Lavenex 2007, 253).
This calls for critically assessing the actual meanings and implications of even the
most widely accepted objectives of IOs. Their narratives indeed rely upon assumptions
that seem so straightforward that they are hardly questioned. This applies to
‘cooperation’, for example, ‘the sweetest and seemingly entirely unproblematic of
words’ according to Raymond Apthorpe, adding, ‘we should … be suspicious of a term
which is agreed among so many people, which everybody likes, and which everybody is
in favour of’ (Apthorpe 1997, 53). Indeed, there is evidence that ‘cooperation’ may
mean nothing else than the imposition of control/security concerns upon sending
878 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
countries (Pina-Delgado 2013). The same applies to the protection, humanitarian and
development-oriented agendas of IOs, usually presented as a much needed, positive and
human rights-friendly counterpart to securitisation. Yet, Stephen Castles and Nicholas
van Hear (2011) warn that ‘helping’ states to develop or ‘protecting’ deserving migrants
(to the detriment of others) can display patterns of violence and power relations that—
while less direct and visible than border surveillance—are just as real. Parvati Raghuram
(2009) also stresses the normative, and sometimes even coercive, assumptions in the
aspirations to transform migrants into ‘development agents’.

4.3. Practices of IOs

A strategy to unveil some of the realities behind IOs’ consensual narratives is to
investigate the on-the-ground projects that are put in place under their discursive
umbrella (Caillaut 2012; Geiger 2010, 2011). This is a particularly under-researched
area. Contributions to this special issue examine different examples of such practices,
including readmission, refugee resettlement, the treatment of asylum seekers and
‘voluntary’ return. What can be observed is that most IO practices are situated
somewhere inside the triangle formed by the three policy agendas outlined above.
For example, so-called ‘counter-trafficking’, ‘readmission’ and ‘voluntary return’
initiatives (Korneev 2014; Koch 2014, this issue) lie between security and humanit-
arian concerns, while attempts to foster migration (i.e., ‘circular migration’) try to
conciliate the need for foreign labour with development efforts (Merçay 2014).
Capacity-building would be situated in the middle of the triangle, as it usually aims at
achieving all three objectives (Geiger 2010; Poutignat and Streiff-Fénart 2010). The
treatment of asylum seekers also displays a mix of humanitarian concerns and control
objectives (Ratfisch and Scheel 2014; Garnier 2014). The same would apply to the
information campaigns put in place to prevent migration or trafficking (Nieuwenhuys
and Pécoud 2007). ‘Border management’ initiatives lie in-between the security agenda
and the need to facilitate needed migration.
What is striking is that IOs’ practices are almost never ‘chemically pure’ in terms of
their policy objectives. This has to do with their comprehensive approach defined
above, which aims at satisfying very different interests and partners. The result is
morally and politically confusing situations; practices always seem to combine ‘bad’
(security) measures with ‘good’ (development, protection) initiatives, along with some
‘necessary’ (labour) elements. The typical IO approach would hence be ‘pragmatic’,
attempting to find its way between different imperatives and to do the most out of
inevitable constraints. It follows that criticising IOs’ efforts would amount to sticking
to idealistic assumptions that, by making compromises difficult, would do more harm
than good.
One of the clearest examples of this confusion lies in ‘return’ programmes. As
recent research makes clear, such programmes have become central among IOs’
activities. This is the case of the IOM, but it is not unique in this respect: Anne Koch
(2014) shows, for example, how the IOM’s services are also of indirect use to the
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 879
UNHCR. Such activities highlight the power of words and of labelling; what is
‘voluntary’ about a return may be nothing more than the fact that a number of
influential actors have decided to call it ‘voluntary’. Indeed, as Michael Collyer
euphemistically observes, ‘it is not always clear that the label “voluntary” is entirely
accurate’ (Collyer 2012, 286). They also display the depoliticising tendency discussed
earlier: the same author further observes that the violence of such practices, and the
imbalances of power they are based upon (between governments and migrants as well
as between governments of unequal power), is somewhat neutralised and isolated in a
‘technocratic bubble’ (Collyer 2012, 278).
Investigating the practices of IOs is also a way of assessing their influence. There is
indeed evidence that so-called ‘capacity-building’ activities do have an impact,
especially in less developed countries. Given their political weakness and perceived
lack of experience, these countries are exposed to external interventions seeking to
shape their migration policy, often through IOs’ ‘help’ and ‘expertise’; while this is
formally done for the sake of development and ‘in their interests’, there are obvious—
but often unexplored—hidden agendas at stake in such processes (Caillaut 2012; Geiger
2010; Poutignat and Streiff-Fenart 2010).
What these examples make clear is the disconnection between IO narratives and
practices (Basok and Piper 2012; Geiger and Pécoud 2010). The former envisages a
clear-cut yet imagined ideal ‘migration world’ (Walters 2010) in which people would
move for the benefit of all, while the latter take the form of much more down-to-
earth projects that do not seem to have the potential to transform the world in such a
way—and even seem to reinforce existing trends. This situation can be interpreted as
an indication that IOs are unable to actually do what they claim they want to do; they
would rather talk than act and this gap between narratives and practices demonstrates
their powerlessness. Yet, another interpretation is that the function of IOs is precisely
to provide a new discursive framework for practices that are not in themselves new or
challenging. The apparent dichotomy between narratives and practices would then be
functional and developing and communicating discourses, policy scripts and ‘stories’
would be a kind of practice in its own right.

5. Conclusion: IOs and Critical Migration Studies

The work of IOs, especially as far as the production of ideas and discourses is
concerned, is often done in close cooperation with researchers, experts and
consultants, whether they come from academic or from alternate institutions (e.g.,
think-tanks). Reviewing the 2009 UNDP report on migration, Alan Gamlen observes
that it reads like a ‘who’s who of contemporary migration and development
researchers’ (2010, 415). The same could be said of other influential reports, such
as the seven ‘World Migration Reports’ published by the IOM since 2000. Apart from
these reports, IOs also contribute to knowledge-production by publishing books and
academic journals and, in some cases, by funding research.
880 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
There are many reasons that explain (and sometimes justify) the cooperation
between IOs and researchers. Although with different objectives, both produce
migration narratives. Cooperation with IOs may be crucial for researchers in order to
access data and establish contacts. Moreover, IOs tend to be more open to a wider
range of migration-related issues than, say, governments in receiving countries. They
therefore represent an attractive venue for researchers who believe that non-security
topics such as development, human rights or global governance mechanisms are
important. In a Weberian perspective, IOs as bureaucracies benefit from this access to
specialised knowledge and from the reputation of academics, whose (assumingly)
‘neutral’, ‘objective and ‘scientific’ work confers technical and scientific legitimacy to
IOs (Boswell 2008b; Hatton 2011). In turn, researchers benefit from the easy and
quick dissemination of their research findings through IOs.
This may nevertheless be problematic. IOs indeed remain political (and
sometimes closed) institutions, which may be incompatible with the conduct of
proper research. Analysing the role of the World Bank as a ‘knowledge agency’,
John Toye and Richard Toye (2006) point out the contradictions between
independent and disinterested research and the power games within this organisa-
tion, which include both the influence of wealthy Western states on its agenda and
the necessity for the Bank to remain neutral on non-consensual issues. Second, even
if IOs are not hegemonic actors in knowledge-production, they may nevertheless
exert an influence on the way research is conducted in their field of competence,
with all that this implies in terms of research biases, omission of disturbing issues or
forms of ‘self-discipline’ among academics. As noted above, there is, for example, a
long-standing relationship between the UNHCR and the research community on
refugees and forced migration, which certainly has an impact on the knowledge that
is produced.
The ‘migration and development nexus’ is another example: Maruja Asis, Nicola
Piper, and Parvati Raghuram (2010) argue that IOs influence research in this field,
especially in less developed countries, and that this leads to the omission of
potentially important research fields; for instance, very little is known on the
relationship between migration and development in history or on the impact of
internal migration on development (see also Geiger and Pécoud 2013b). According to
Alan Simmons (2008), the amount of research on remittances has less to do with the
actual impact of remittances on development than with the compatibility of this
argument with the current political and ideological context (especially as far as the
neoliberal representation of migrants as entrepreneurial ‘development agents’ is
concerned). In other words, and as Raymond Apthorpe writes, ‘while policy language
presents policy as being data-driven, complaining at times therefore about “lack of
data”, this masks the extent to which it is data-driving (lack of ‘appropriate’ data),
choosing the data it prefers’ (Apthorpe 1997, 55).
A possible reaction would be to call for scholarly independence and greater
distinction between institutional and academic idea-production. This is sensible, but
probably overly simplistic. Indeed, most researchers are not naïve enough to serve as
 Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 881
the candid instruments in IOs’ quest for scientific legitimacy and technical expertise.
Most of them are aware of the complexity and ambivalence of their cooperation; one
could even argue that they are themselves political actors, as they develop and
promote their own views. François Gemenne thus writes that researchers ‘should be
considered as policy entrepreneurs, whose perception of their research object is
shaped by a series of policy objectives and fundamental values’ (2011, 227).
It follows that researchers may well engage in cooperation with IOs while
remaining critical of their activities (even if not all of them do so). One could even
argue that they should get involved, as knowledge on IOs (and therefore critical
assessment of their role) may require such involvement. Without developing a
sociology of careers in migration research, it is still clear that many people in this field
circulate between different milieus: universities, but also IOs, think tanks, NGOs, etc.
This is not exclusive to migration, as the same types of professional trajectories have
long characterised development practice and thinking, for example. This means that
critical research implies what Jennifer Hyndman (2000) calls ‘duplicity’, that is, the
combination of participation in IOs’ work and the independent criticism of their
activities.
An alternative position has been put forward by Fabian Georgi and Susanne
Schatral (2012), who argue that researchers face a dilemma. One the one hand, many
of them are deeply aware of the shortcomings and dead-ends in contemporary
migration politics; they know that ‘controlling’ or ‘managing’ migration has
disturbing consequences, on migrants themselves and on the moral and political
foundations of receiving societies (see e.g., Anderson 2012). They also know that IOs
are unable to challenge this situation and that some of their activities fuel, rather than
solve, these problems. Nonetheless, very few address these concerns directly by, for
example, engaging in critical discussions on freedom of movement; they would rather
engage in arguably superficial criticisms of some of the most brutal state practices, an
area in which they can find allies among IOs, in a way that makes a radical rethinking
of the premises of migration politics impossible.
This is a delicate issue, on which much remains to be thought and said. It involves
a range of factors, from researchers’ ambitions and quest for funding or reputation, to
their fundamental moral or political reactions in the face of the harsh realities
associated with migration. Analysing the birth of ‘forced migration studies’, Chimni
(2009) reminds us that social sciences are intrinsically connected to history and
politics, but that they can to some extent surmount this through critical self-
reflection; he mentions social anthropology as an example of a discipline that, while
born out of a colonialism, has since managed to reassess its ties to Western power
and global imbalances. There are indications that refugee studies and, more recently,
migration studies have started to engage in such a process. It is nevertheless probably
fair to conclude that, thus far, this is not the dominant approach in the field, and that
time and efforts are still needed to achieve this goal.
Migration has, over the last two decades, become a ‘global’ issue. One of the
consequences of this is that IOs find it easier than ever before to talk about migration
882 M. Geiger & A. Pécoud
and to take initiative in this policy field. To many observers, this may be an
inherently good development, as IOs are traditionally associated with internationally
recognised values (like global justice, development, human rights, inter-state
cooperation), which often seem to be lacking in the current politics of migration.
But as this introductory article has tried to show, the interventions of IOs in the
politics of migration also raise a number of fundamental research issues—hence the
need to critically assess the role and functions of IOs. This is what contributions to
this special issue attempt to do, by exploring their agency, discourses and activities
from a variety of angles, in different contexts and policy fields.

Notes
[1] The GMG currently brings together sixteen agencies: the IOM, the International Labour
Organization (ILO), the OHCHR, the UN Conference on Trade and Development
(UNCTAD), the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), the UN
Development Fund for Women (UN Women), the UNDP, UNESCO, the UN Population
Fund (UNFPA), the UNHCR, UNICEF, the UN Institute for Training and Research
(UNITAR), the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the UN Regional Commissions,
the World Bank and WHO.
[2] These conventions include, in particular, the ILO Conventions 97 and 143, as well as the UN
International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and
Members of Their Families.
[3] The IOM is not the only example. The IMF, for instance, was initially created to manage the
Bretton Woods system. It did not, however, go out of business when this system based on
fixed international exchange rates disappeared, as it successfully created new roles for itself.
[4] At times, the IOM even seems to behave in way that is closer to a multinational corporation
than to a typical UN agency. For example, the IOM is based in Geneva but outsources lower
ranking headquarter functions to new service centres in Manila and Panama, according to
cost-effective logic that is still quite uncommon among national and international
bureaucracies.

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