1.2 Migration-focused Evidence Cafés

Show description|Hide description

A group of people stood in a circle, each putting their hands in the middle. The image focusses on their hands.

Migration is a major global issue which has an important economic, social and political impact. It affects all countries of the world, though the numbers of people moving in to, and out of, a country are rarely balanced. Migration in and out of countries (in-migration/out-migration) can create both opportunities and challenges. For example, if a country loses a disproportionately large number of skilled people, this can affect that country’s ability to function. We have seen this with trained medical staff leaving developing countries and coming to work in the health systems of more developed economies. This is good for the stretched health systems where these migrants emigrate to, but can be devastating for the even more strained hospitals that they leave behind. Or, if the migrants coming to a country are disproportionately young then this can be good as they are economically active and can contribute to the economy, but they may be more likely to be starting families which can grow the population size. The governments who have to handle these complex inflows and outflows of migrants need to have a sense of who these migrants are, what they are doing or might do, and how their skills can best be harnessed. Such questions are not easy to answer and demand lots of evidence and knowledge, which is where an Evidence Café can help.

Migration is also a socially-differentiated process and engages many different individuals and groups of people who all have different interests in and positions on migration. Some migrants might be ‘super rich’ and come to a capital city to invest in real estate or to start businesses. Other migrants might be fleeing poverty in their home country and have very little money when they arrive. Similarly, women who migrate have very different capabilities and needs compared to some men, so we need to be aware of such differences when trying to plan for migration (Amelina and Lutz, 2019). For example, some women migrate to join a male spouse and so it is assumed that they are relatively ‘passive’ in terms of their impact on the host country. Yet, many of these women are great innovators and are far from passive despite what many people think. Some migrants feel attachment to a particular ethnic group, or are made to feel attached to one as a result of the hostility they encounter in their host country. This feeling of belonging and attachment can be important for a person’s mental wellbeing, but if a migrant’s ethnic affiliation becomes politicised it can lead to social exclusion or even become violent. So, migrant groups are what we call ‘super-diverse’ (Vertovec, 2007) and to understand these complex and intersecting social formations we need to find out about how they see the world as well as how others view them. And it is here that Evidence Cafés can help.

There are also questions about how people acquire evidence on migration. Most of us like to think of ourselves as sensible and rational, and that we base our views on evidence, but where does that evidence come from? It may be based on anecdotes we have heard repeated often. Our opinions might also come from the news, but we know different news outlets have different political bias and levels of detail. Some people may form an opinion based on research, which also has its in-built biases and limitations. None of these sources of information are ‘better’ or ‘worse’ since they all help people form opinions, but it does mean that if we want to discuss different forms of evidence, we need to appreciate this diversity and respect the way that people gain knowledge. These positions and opinions shape the way people behave and respond to migration, which have knock-on effects. As such it is important to unpack the ‘what, who, how and why’ of understanding migration, which is what this course will help you to do.

Now that you’ve considered the value of using Evidence cafés as a process to understand different stakeholder views on migration issues in more detail, have a go at writing a definition for an Evidence Café for your migration topic.