ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2005

In association with Development Policy and Practice and the International Development Centre at the Open University

Milton Keynes, UK
7th-9th September 2005

Connecting people and places: challenges and opportunities for development

SPECIAL PANEL ON “MIGRATION: THE NEXT ECONOMIC JUSTICE CAMPAIGN?”
OUTLINE

Session F: September 9th, 10.15-11.45

The panellists for this session are:

• Hans Timmer, World Bank (Manager, Global Trends Team)
• Jean Foster, UK Department for International Development (Migration Team)
• Catherine Barber, Oxfam GB (Policy Research Team)

Migration has become a hot topic in development circles in recent years. New figures on remittance flows have attracted attention to the economic significance of migration, bringing it to the development agenda as the third element of globalisation along with movements in goods and capital.

Many economists now argue that relaxing restrictions on labour mobility would have greater economic benefits than all the trade liberalisation proposals in the WTO’s “Development Round”. Yet development agencies have hesitated to push this at a policy level, either on the grounds that the evidence on the economic impacts of migration is too incomplete, or that the political environment is too unfavourable for this to be a realistic policy goal.

The panellists will discuss new economic evidence from the World Bank’s forthcoming Global Economic Prospects 2006: Migration and Remittances, and the broader social and political issues addressed by DFID in its forthcoming Moving Out of Poverty - Making Migration Work Better for Poor People, as they discuss the question of whether migration could be the next “economic justice” issue for development agencies.