Does anyone care about migrant rights? An analysis of why countries enter the convention on the rights of migrant workers and their families

ABSTRACT

Although the Convention on the Rights of Migrant Workers (CRMW) is a ‘core’ human rights treaty, it is poorly ratified. Previous studies have elucidated the barriers to ratification; in this article we focus on the factors that generate incentives to ratify. We argue that states that ratify this treaty desire to strengthen their relationships with their own emigrants and their citizens at home who advocate for emigrant protections, not to protect the rights of immigrants residing in their own country. The political incentives to strengthen this relationship depend on the costs and benefits that inward migration and outward migration bring to the state. The benefits of emigration are captured by the size of remittance flows, the net immigration position of the country, and by the ratio of unskilled to skilled emigrants, whereas the costs are reflected in the size of the immigrant stock. When the benefits of migration are substantial and the costs of potentially providing rights are small, states will be more likely to ratify this agreement. These determinants are distinctive from the explanations proffered for other human rights treaties. Our statistical analysis is consistent with the theoretical arguments that we make.

KEYWORDS:

• Human rights
• migrant rights
• treaty ratification

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributors

Shaina D. Western, is Lecturer of International Relations and Quantitative Methods at the University of Edinburgh, works on treaty ratification, international institutions, international negotiations, and international cooperation on migration issues. Her work has also been published in the British Journal of Political Science and International Studies Quarterly.

Sarah P. Lockhart, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Fordham University, is the co-author of the book Migration Crises and the Structure of International Cooperation (with Jeannette Money). Her research focuses on migration, international cooperation, civil war processes, and political economy.

Jeannette Money, Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Davis, writes on various dimensions of immigration policy. Her most recent book is entitled Migration Crises and the Structure of International Cooperation (with Sarah Lockhart). This research examines the conditions under which states cooperate to govern international migration flows and the treatment of migrants in host countries. Earlier works include Fences and Neighbors: The Political Geography of Immigration Control, which explores how the geographic concentration of migrants affects local preferences on immigration and how those local preferences are filtered through national political systems to generate immigration policy. Ongoing research focuses on issues of immigrant access to citizenship.

ORCID

Shaina D. Western http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1022-7001

Sarah P. Lockhart http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2569-880X

Jeannette Money http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2390-3125

Notes

1. The CRMW was proposed in 1979, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1990 and entered into force in 2003.

2. Lydia Morris, ‘Managing Contradiction: Civic Stratification and Migrants’ Rights’, International Migration Review 37, no. 1 (2003): 74–100.

3. See Beth Lyon, ‘International Human Rights Norms on Migrants’, The Encyclopedia of Global Human Migration, 2013, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781444351071 (accessed August 20, 2018); Susan Martin, International Migration: Evolving Trends from the Early Twentieth Century to the Present (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014); Bernard F. Ryan, ‘In Defence of the Migrant Workers Convention: Standard-Setting for Contemporary Migration’, in The Ashgate Research Companion to Migration Law, Theory and Policy, ed. Satvinder S. Juss (New York: Routledge, 2013), 491–515. These three authors provide details on the specific rights contained in the treaty. While migrant-sending states have obligations before and after a migrant leaves her state, these requirements largely involve providing emigrants information, promoting cultural links, and establishing political rights for emigrants.

4. We refer to the 2016 New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants and the ensuing negotiations for the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration and the Global Compact on Refugees. The century of failure refers to the creation of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in 1919, which incorporated concerns about workers ‘in countries other than their own’ and includes the ILO migrant conventions agreed in 1949 and 1975. See Jeannette Money and Sarah P. Lockhart, Migration Crises and the Structure of International Cooperation (Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press 2018), Chapter 7.

5. Migrant refers to an individual who moves from one country to another for more than a year. Because our argument depends on the relationship between the state and migrant we use more specific language in this paper. Immigrant refers to foreign-born persons living within the state. Immigration refers to the process through which non-nationals enter the state. Emigrant refers to citizens living outside of the state. Emigration refers to the process through which citizens leave the state.

6. Jana von Stein, ‘Exploring the Universe of UN Human Rights Agreements’, Journal of Conflict of Resolution 62 no. 4 (2018): 871–899.

7. Shirley Hune and Jan Niessen, ‘Ratifying the UN Migrant Workers Convention: Current Difficulties and Prospects’, Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights 12, no. 4 (1994): 393–404.

8. See Jeannette Money, Sarah P. Lockhart, and Shaina Western, ‘Why Migrant Rights are Different than Human Rights’, in Elgar Handbook on Migration and Social Policy, eds. Gary Freeman and Nikola Mirilovic (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishers Ltd., 2016); Tom Wong, Rights, Deportation, and Detention in the Age of Immigration Control (Stanford: Stanford University Press 2015); Martin Ruhs, ‘The Human Rights of Migrant Workers: Why Do So Few Countries Care?’, American Behavioural Scientist 56, no. 9 (2012): 1277–93; Martin Ruhs, The Price of Rights: Regulating International Labor Migration (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013); Srdjan Vucetic, ‘Democracies and International Human Rights: Why is There No Place for Migrant Workers’, International Journal of Human Rights 11, no. 4 (2007): 403–28.

9. Wong posits that dependence on remittances may explain ratification, yet he lacks a larger argument for why this is the case and his analysis supporting this conclusion is only a bivariate regression of the relationship between remittances and ratification. Thus, we argue that further theorising and analysis is warranted; see Wong, Rights.

10. For instance, Wotipka and Tsutsui and Simmons conduct analyses of core human rights agreements but do not include the CRMW. See Christine Min Wotipka and Kiyoteru Tsutsui, ‘Global Human Rights and State Sovereignty: State Ratification of International Human Rights Treaties, 1965–20011’, Sociological Forum 23, no. 4 (2008): 724–54; Beth Simmons, Mobilizing for Human Rights (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

11. Von Stein, ‘Exploring the Universe’.

12. Von Stein presents a data set of universal human rights agreements numbering 42, only 18 (43%) of which are considered ‘core’ by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. There is also a significant number of regional human rights agreements. See Von Stein, ‘Exploring the Universe’.

13. Simmons, Mobilizing.

14. Heather Smith-Cannoy, Insincere Commitments: Human Rights Treaties, Abusive States and Citizen Activism (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 2012); Karolina M. Milewicz and Manfred Elsig, ‘The Hidden World of Multilateralism: Treaty Commitments of Newly Democratized States in Europe’, International Studies Quarterly 58, no. 2 (2014): 322–35; and Douglas Hamilton Spence, ‘Foreign Aid and Human Rights Treaty Ratification: Moving Beyond the Rewards Thesis’, International Journal of Human Rights 18, no. 4–5 (2014): 414–32.

15. Andrew Moravcsik, ‘The Origins of Human Rights Regimes: Democratic Delegation in Postwar Europe’, International Organization 54, no. 2 (2000): 217–52; Beth A. Simmons and Allison Danner, ‘Credible Commitments and the International Criminal Court’, International Organization 64, no. 2 (2010): 225–56; James Raymond Vreeland, ‘Political Institutions and Human Rights: Why Dictatorships Enter Into the United Nations Convention Against Torture’, International Organization 62, no. 1 (2008): 65–101.

16. Simmons, Mobilizing, 57.

17. Ibid.

18. Wade M. Cole, ‘Sovereignty Relinquished? Explaining Commitment to the International Human Rights Covenants, 1966–1999’, American Sociological Review 70, no. 3 (2005): 472–95; Terrence L. Chapman and Stephen Chaudoin, ‘Ratification Patterns and the International Criminal Court’, International Studies Quarterly 57, no. 2 (2005): 400–9.

19. G-77 states initiated the treaty negotiations. Of the 54 states that have ratified as of December 2018, 49 are members of the G-77.

20. Juhani Lonnroth, ‘The International Convention on the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families in the Context of International Migration Policies: An Analysis of Ten Years of Negotiation’, International Migration Review 25, no. 4 (1991): 710–36; Roger Böhning, ‘The ILO and the New UN Convention on Migrant Workers: the Past and Future’, International Migration Review 25, no. 4 (1991): 698–709; Martin, International Migration; Money et al., ‘Why Migrant Rights’.

21. Lonnroth, ‘The International Convention’.

22. Oona A. Hathaway, ‘Do Human Rights Treaties Make a Difference?’, The Yale Law Journal 111, no. 8 (2002): 1935–2042; Milewicz and Elsig, ‘The Hidden World’.

23. Aarvind Magesan, ‘Human Rights Treaty Ratification of Aid Receiving Countries’, World Development 45 (2013): 175–88.

24. Spence, ‘Foreign Aid’.

25. Wotipka and Tsutsui, ‘Global Human Rights’.

26. Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, ‘International Norm Dynamics and Political Change’, International Organization 52, no. 4 (1998): 887–917.

27. Christina Boswell, ‘Theorizing Migration Policy: Is There a Third Way?’, International Migration Review 41, no. 1 (2007): 75–100.

28. T. Basok, ‘Counter-Hegemonic Human Rights Discourses and Migrant Rights Activism in the US and Canada’, International Journal of Comparative Sociology 50, no. 2 (2009): 183–205.

29. Moravscik, ‘The Origins’; Simmons and Danner, ‘Credible Commitments’.

30. Emilie M. Hafner-Burton and Kiyoteru Tsutsui, ‘Human Rights in a Globalizing World: The Paradox of Empty Promises’, American Journal of Sociology 110, no. 5 (2005): 1373–411.

31. Vucetic, ‘Democracies’.

32. Lonnroth, ‘The International Convention’.

33. Vucetic, ‘Democracies’.

34. See also Gabriela Díaz and Gretchen Kuhner, ‘Mexico’s Role in Promoting and Implementing the ICRMW’, in Migration and Human Rights: The United Nations Convention on Migrant Workers’ Rights, eds. Ryszard Cholewinski, Paul de Guchteneire, and Antoine Pécoud (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 219–46.

35. Kenneth W. Abbott and Duncan Snidal, ‘Hard and Soft Law in International Governance’, International Organization 54, no. 3 (2000): 421–56.

36. Miles Kahler, ‘Conclusion: The Causes and Consequences of Legalization’, International Organization 54, no. 3 (2000): 661–83; B. Peter Rosendorff and Helen Milner, ‘The Optimal Design of International Trade Institutions: Uncertainty and Escape’, International Organization 55, no. 4 (2001): 829–57.

37. Jana von Stein, ‘Making Promises, Keeping Promises: Democracy, Ratification and Compliance in International Human Rights Law’, British Journal of Political Science 46, no. 3 (2016): 655–79.

38. Simmons, Mobilizing.

39. Nicola Piper, ‘Obstacles to, and Opportunities for, Ratification of the ICRMW in Asia’, in Migration and Human Rights: The United Nations Convention on Migrant Workers’ Rights, eds. Ryszard Cholewinski, Paul de Guchteneire, and Antoine Pécoud (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 219–46.

40. Money et al., ‘Why Migrant Rights’; Wong, Rights.

41. Ruhs, ‘The Human Rights’.

42. The CRMW is 28 pages long, compared to, for example, 9 pages for the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The text is also remarkably specific; Article 48, for example, specifies that immigrants are entitled to the same tax deductions as nationals, and receiving states must avoid double taxation.

43. Vucetic, ‘Democracies’.

44. Ibid.

45. Antoine Pécoud and Paul de Guchteneire, ‘Migration, Human Rights and the United Nations: An Investigation into the Obstacles to the UN Convention on Migrant Workers’ Rights’, Windsor Yearbook of Access to Justice 24 (2006): 241–66.

46. Beth Lyon, ‘The ICRMW and the US: Substantive Overlap, Political Gap’, in Shining New Light on the UN Migrant Workers Convention, ed. Alan Desmond (Pretoria: University of Pretoria Press, 2018).

47. CRMW (International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers and Members of their Families), (1990), http://www.un.org/documents/ga/res/45/a45r158.htm (accessed September 20, 2018).

48. Díaz and Kuhner, ‘Mexico’s Role’.

49. Piper, ‘Obstacles’.

50. Ibid., 179.

51. Ibid.

52. Antje Missbach and Wayne Palmer, ‘A Country Grappling with Migrant Protection at Home and Abroad’, Migration Policy Institute, 2018, https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/indonesia-country-grappling-migrant-protection-home-and-abroad (accessed October 12, 2018).

53. See, for example, Amnesty International’s letter writing campaign that mobilises individuals to pressure both their own governments and foreign governments to ensure human rights.

54. Anne Marie Clark, Diplomacy of Conscience: Amnesty International and Changing Human Rights Norms (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).

55. Again, this benefit is not unique to the CRMW. Hafner-Burton shows that states incorporate human rights in their international trade agreements. See Emilie M. Hafner-Burton, ‘Trading Human Rights: How Preferential Trade Agreements Influence Government Repression’, International Organization 59, no. 3 (2005): 593–629.

56. Money and Lockhart, Migration Crises.

57. Ryan, ‘In Defense’.

58. Human Rights Watch, Stemming the Flow: Abuses against Migrants, Asylum Seekers and Refugees (2006), https://www.hrw.org/report/2006/09/12/stemming-flow/abuses-against-migrants-asylum-seekers-and-refugees (accessed September 18, 2018).

59. Emanuela Paoletti, ‘Power Relations and International Migration: The Case of Italy and Libya’, Political Studies 59, no. 2 (2011): 269–89.

60. Italy was still widely condemned for deporting migrants to Libya; other European governments, IGOs, and NGOs all expressed concerned that migrants were deported to a country that is not party to the Geneva Conventions and absent a formal readmission agreement (Paoletti, ‘Power Relations’). We have not seen the CRMW cited in these critiques.

61. Paoletti, ‘Power Relations’, notes that Libya continued to facilitate illicit smuggling operations even as it collaborated with Italy on anti-smuggling efforts.

62. Paoletti, ‘Power Relations’.

63. Vucetic, ‘Democracies’, 404.

64. Ryan, ‘In Defense’.

65. Wade M. Cole, ‘Sovereignty Relinquished? Explaining Commitment to the International Human Rights Covenants, 1966–1999’, American Sociological Review 70, no. 3 (2005): 472–95.

66. Simmons, Mobilizing.

67. Vreeland, ‘Political Institutions’; von Stein, ‘Making Promises’.

68. Heather Elko McKibben and Shaina D. Western, ‘“Reserved Ratification”: An Analysis of States’ Entry of Reservations Upon Ratification of Human Rights Treaties’, British Journal of Political Science (2018): 1–26. doi:10.1017/s007123417000631.

69. Kahler, ‘Conclusions’.

70. Rosendorff and Milner, ‘The Optimal Design’.

71. Abbott and Snidal contend that sovereignty costs are greatest in areas that concern the state and its citizens; we point out that this should be more clearly specified to include both citizens and resident aliens (denizens). See Abbott and Snidal, ‘Hard and Soft Law’.

72. Kahler, ‘Conclusions’.

73. Claims that focus on the normative underpinnings of ratification rely on arguments about political activists generating political costs to persuade governments to take particular actions. Thus, governments do not ratify because it is the morally right thing to do; rather when we look at the foundations of that logic, we find that such decisions are driven by political benefits.

74. Hafner-Burton and Tsutsui, ‘Human Rights’.

75. Milewicz and Elsig, ‘The Hidden World’.

76. Finnemore and Sikkink, ‘International Norm Dynamics’.

77. Joseph M. Brown and Johannes Urpelainen, ‘Picking Treaties, Picking Winners’, Journal of Conflict Resolution 59, no. 6 (2015): 1043–73.

78. For instance, Beth Simmons argues that democracies have preferences to protect human rights through international treaty law. While this may be true for many human rights agreements, it is not the case for all of them. We argue that democracy, though often a proxy for policy preference, does not capture it for this particular treaty. By providing a more general framework we allow for concepts like preferences to be more accurately captured. See Simmons, Mobilizing.

79. Money et al., ‘Why Migrant Rights’; Wong, Rights.

80. Lyon, ‘International Human Rights’.

81. Faisal Z. Ahmed, ‘The Perils of Unearned Foreign Income: Aid, Remittances, and Government Survival’, American Political Science Review 106, no. 1 (2012): 146–65.

82. Luis Guarnizo, Alejandro Portes, and William Haller, ‘Assimilation and Transnationalism: Determinants of Transnational Political Action among Contemporary Migrants’, American Journal of Sociology 108, no. 6 (2003): 1211–48.

83. Samuel Munzele Maimbo and Dilip Ratha, Remittances: Development Impact and Future Prospects (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2005).

84. Anutechia Simplice Asongu. ‘The Impact of Health Worker Migration on Development Dynamics: Evidence of Wealth-Effects from Africa’, European Journal of Health Economics 15, no. 2 (2014): 187–201.

85. Borja Martinovic, Frank van Tubergen, and Ineke Maas, ‘Changes in Immigrants’ Social Integration during the Stay in the Host Country: The Case of Non-Western Immigrants in the Netherlands’, Social Science Research 38 (2009): 870–82.

86. Ruhs, The Price of Rights.

87. Ibid.

88. Ibid.

89. Regina Branton et al., ‘All Along the Watchtower: Acculturation Fear, Anti-Latino Affect, and Immigration’, The Journal of Politics 73, no. 3 (2011): 664–79; Duncan Lawrence, ‘Immigration Attitudes in Latin America: Culture, Economics, and the Catholic Church’, The Latin Americanist 55, no. 4 (2011): 143–70; Lauren McLaren, ‘Immigration and Trust in Politics in Britain’, British Journal of Political Science 42, no. 1 (2011): 163–85; Ruud Koopmans, Ines Michalowski, and Stine Waibel, ‘Citizenship Rights for Immigrants; National Political Processes and Cross-National Convergence in Western Europe, 1980–2008’, American Journal of Sociology 117, no. 4 (2012): 1202–45.

90. Ted Brader, Nicholas A Valentino, and Elizabeth Suhay, ‘What Triggers Public Opposition to Immigration? Anxiety, Group Cues, and Immigration Threat’, American Journal of Political Science 52, no. 4 (2008): 959–78; Kevin H. O’Rourke and Richard Sinnott, ‘The Determinants of Individual Attitudes towards Immigration’, European Journal of Political Economy 22, no. 4 (2006): 838–61.

91. Asaf Razin, Efryaim Tsadḳah, and Phillip Swagel, ‘Tax Burden and Migration: A Political Economy Theory and Evidence’, Journal of Public Economics 85, no. 2 (2002): 167–90.

92. Timothy J. Hatton, ‘Should We Have a WTO for International Migration?’, Economic Policy April (2007): 339–83.

93. Money et al., ‘Why Migrant Rights’; Wong, Rights.

94. Charles Tilly, ‘Transplanted Networks’, in Immigration Reconsidered: History, Sociology, and Politics, ed. Virginia Yans-McLaughlin (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 79–95; Steven Vertovec, ‘Cheap Calls: The Social Glue of Migrant Transnationalism’, Global Networks 4, no. 2 (2004): 219–24.

95. To clarify the difference between Hypothesis 1 and Hypothesis 4, the latter is associated with the size of the migrant stock whereas the former is associated with the balance between immigrants and emigrants.

96. This hypothesis simplifies a more complex argument about the policy change, uncertainty and sovereignty costs of immigration. However, on a global scale it is impossible to find empirical referents for these theoretical concepts. So we choose to employ an empirical referent that is a component part of the financial, political and sovereignty costs – the size of the immigrant population.

97. See Jana von Stein, ‘The International Law and Politics of Climate Change: Ratification of the United Nations Framework Convention and the Kyoto Protocol’, Journal of Conflict Resolution 52, no. 2 (2008): 243–68.

98. Cole, ‘Sovereignty Relinquished’; Chapman and Chaudoin, ‘Ratification Patterns’; Oona Hathaway, ‘Why Do Countries Commit to Human Rights Treaties?’, Journal of Conflict Resolution 51, no. 4 (2007): 588–621; Simmons and Danner, ‘Credible Commitments’; Smith-Cannoy, Insincere Commitments.

99. In the web appendix we include an alternative measure that uses net migration totals instead and find results that are consistent with the arguments that we make here.

100. The number of cases we keep by interpolating is fairly substantial given how few countries ratify. The results from the non-interpolated data, presented in the web appendix, are largely consistent with what is presented here.

101. Fréderic Docquier, B. Lindsay Lowell, and Abdeslam Marfouk, ‘A Gendered Assessment of Highly Skilled Emigration’, Population and Development Review 35, no. 2 (2009): 297–321. Approximately 70% of all high-skilled migrants are located in the OECD; see Erhan Artuc et al., ‘A Global Assessment of Human Capital Mobility: The Role of Non-OECD Destinations’, World Development 65 (2015): 6–26.

102. As these data are right skewed we also ran models with logged migrant stocks. The results presented in web appendix are largely consistent with our reported results.

103. Simmons, Mobilizing.

104. Ruhs, The Price of Rights.

105. Carles Boix, Michael Miller, and Sebastian Rosato, ‘A Complete Data Set of Political Regimes, 1800–2007’, Comparative Political Studies 46, no. 12 (2013): 1523–54.

106. By the end of 2015, 47 states ratified the CRMW; thus the models presented in Table 1 capture every state that has ratified at that point in time. As a robustness check, we ran alternative specifications using Polity IV both as a dichotomous measurement and as a continuous measurement. The results of those analyses, presented in the web appendix, are consistent with what we have presented here.

107. Simmons, Mobilizing.

108. Rafael La Porta et al., ‘The Quality of Government’, Journal of Law, Economics and Organization 15, no. 1 (1999): 222–79. Jan Teorell et al., The Quality of Government Standard Dataset, version Jan18 (University of Gothenburg: The Quality of Government Institute, 2018), http://www.qog.pol.gu.se doi:10.18157/QoGStdJan18.

109. Reed M. Wood and Mark Gibney, ‘The Political Terror Scale (PTS): A Re-introduction and a Comparison to CIRI’, Human Rights Quarterly 32, no. 2 (2010): 367–400.

110. We also included global ratification rate as a robustness check. Those models do not indicate a clear relationship in the data.

111. The 95% confidence interval is (1.04–6.27).

112. This move is the equivalent of having remittances at 4.3% of GDP compared to remittances at 0.22% of GDP. The precise hazard ratio for this change is 1.085 (95% confidence interval is 1.01 to 1.16).

113. This move is the equivalent to having remittances at 17.9% of GDP compared to remittances at 4.3% of GDP. The hazard ratio is 1.31 (95% confidence interval is 1.04 to 1.65).

114. This move is the equivalent of having migrants as 1.22% of the population compared to migrants as 10.5% of the population. The hazard ratio for this change is .28 (95% confidence interval is .09 to .92).

115. Böhning, ‘The ILO’.

116. The final vote was 152 countries for, 5 countries against (the U.S., Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Israel) and 12 abstentions, with 24 countries not in attendance (‘General Assembly Officially Adopts Roadmap for Migrants to Improve Safety, Ease Suffering’, UN News, December 19, 2018, https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/12/1028941 (accessed February 12, 2019).

117. Von Stein, ‘Exploring the Universe’.

118. Barabara Koremenos, Charles Lipson, and Duncan Snidal, ‘The Rational Design of International Institutions’, International Organization 55, no. 4 (2001): 761–99.

119. Lonnroth, ‘The International Convention’.