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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 10, No. 11
Publication Date: November 25, 2023
DOI:10.14738/assrj.1011.14276.
Afroje, S., & Ashik, S. A. I. (2023). Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome. Advances in Social Sciences Research
Journal, 10(11). 267-276.
Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom
Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome
Sahariya Afroje
Dept. of International Relation
Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia
Syod Ahsanul Islam Ashik
Dept. of International Relation
Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia
ABSTRACT
The world is currently confronted with multidimensional challenges, migration
problem, more specifically, illegal migration, is one of the most remarkable among
them. People are being migrated to relatively safe, secure, and prosperous places
from unsafe, insecure and poorer placeseither for better income, better life, better
education or for security purpose. Whatever reason, migration, mostly the illegal
migration are creation enormous problems in both the home countriesand the host
countries. The aim of the study is to analysis the reasons for the growing rate of
migration, its impacts, and potential ways to overcome the challenges. The study is
mainly based on secondary sources of data and information including scientific and
academic journals, scholar articles, research papers, books, and other relevant
sources to make a deep analysis. The study recommends ‘Absolute Globalization’, an
absolute integration of global economic, education, political, and social institutions
where regionalism will be the cornerstone of the integration, as the way to confront
the challenges.
INTRODUCTION
Migration, mostly the illegal migration has become a sensitive and contentious topic for years.
Toescape from poverty, catastrophes, violence, warfare or environmental disaster, peoples
are beingmigrated worldwide and the rate of illegal migration problem is growing rapidly
globally. As it’sa structural rather than cyclical phenomenon, whatever the method applied,
migration problem can’t be stopped. As of 2021, 281 million people (3.58% of the world’s
population) live outside the country of their birth. In 1970 about 2% of the world’s 3.7 billion
people lived overseas (UNHCR 2017). This figure is incrementally increasing due to a wide
range of reasons including inequality, poverty, climate change, warfare, violence and the
interconnectivity that facilitates themovement of people. Migration problem is the growing
challenges the world is currently confronted with. Its human tangency is to move to relatively
safe, secure, and prosperous places from unsafe, insecure and poorer places. Butthis tendency
has become enormous challenges for the whole world during lastseveral decades. Peoples,
mostly from developing and list developed countries, are being migrating to developed and
industrial countries for various purposes including economic, education, security, and
employment reasons. They are being migrated from one country to other countries in many
ways, sometimes in very risky ways. They are also taking risk of live for this migration practice
in which casualties are common phenomenon.
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The study is to analysis the growing problems of the illegal migration, its reasons, impacts,
and potential ways to overcome the challenges and recommends ‘Absolute Globalization’, an
absoluteintegration of global economic, education, political, and social institutions where
regionalism willbe the cornerstone of the integration, as the way to confront the challenges.
Moreover, co-operationand collaboration between developed and developing countries with
resources, technology, technical, political and policies factors have also been recommended
and a framework and mechanism have been developed regarding this.
OBJECTIVE AND MAIN TASKS OF THE RESEARCH
The main objective of the study is analyzing the main reasons for illegal migration and develop
amechanism and framework to overcome the problem. Taking into account of the above
objectivethe main tasks of the study are the following:
• to examine the migration problem the world is currently confronted with;
• to identify the socio-economic impacts of the migration problem
• to detect the major reasons behind of it
• to develop a mechanism and framework to solve the problem in sustainable way.
RESEARCH HYPOTHESIS
This is the statement that migration problem is one of the most remarkable challenges the
world iscurrently confronted with. The problem is being reasons for more relevant problems
like crime rate acceleration, human trafficking, smuggling etc. The proposed system of
measures is to minimize the irregular migration problem and bring socio-economic
development.
THE STATISTICAL INFORMATION BASE OF THE STUDY
The statistical information base of the study is compiled by official materials of the Agency for
statistics under the Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh; data of international
organizations including World Bank, IMF and ADB, scientific publications and articles,
analyticalmaterials of international expert associations and internet resources.
LITERATURE REVIEW
In order to structure the review of the literature dealing with the causes and drivers of
migration Iapply a theoretical framework proposed by Timmerman, De Clerck, Hemmerechts,
and Willems (2014); and Timmerman et al. (2010). Their framework is inspired by Carling’s
(2002) definitionof the emigration environment, which is influenced by the social, political
and economic context and which sees migration as a socially and culturally constructed
project with micro- and macro- level influences. Timmerman et al. (2010) and Timmerman et
al. (2014) extend these ideas and establish the emigration environment in which perceptions
and the migration aspirations are formed by macro-, meso- and micro-level determinants and
within which the decision to move istaken. Based on this framework, I then study factors
influencing peoples’ decision to move and suggest adding interactions between the three
levels;the importance of a macro-level factor – suchas economic opportunities – is likely to be
sensitive to meso-level factors, such as networks (that can facilitate jobs) or to micro-level
factors, such as educational level (affecting employability). This stresses the complexity of
factors at hand, which cannot be unilaterally linked to the categories ofmigratorymovements.
The interaction of factors subsequently affects the perceptionsand aspirations of a potential
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Afroje, S., & Ashik, S. A. I. (2023). Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 10(11).
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URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.1011.14276
migrant. The macro-level refers to factors that are common to all potential migrants in a
particular country,such as the socio-economic and political context or migration governance
and policies of origin and destination countries, regions or other entities (for instance, EU
mandates). The meso-level encompasses sub-national or local factors, including networks or
cultural reasons. Individual and household characteristics of potential migrants, such as
gender, age, educational level, and socialstatus, as well as behavioral factors, such as risk
aversion, are part of the micro-level. The framework does not suggest a hierarchy between the
three different levels. In the literature, ithas been put forward that macro-level factors play a
dominant role, while meso- and micro-level determinants tend to be seen as intermediaries.
While this review also recognizes that macro-levelfactors are highly important and micro- level factors are less of a cause and rather a mediator, a general hierarchy across levels is,
however, still up to empirics to decide and a systematic assessment thereof might provide an
interesting future research question. Apart from the variety of determinants that influence a
person’s perception and aspirations to migrate, it is also importantto consider their capability
to actually do so. People can only move if they have the appropriate agency and opportunity
structures at their disposal (de Haas et al., 2018; Timmerman et al., 2014).They need to have
access to social, human and financial capital to realize their migration aspirations (de Haas,
2010; de Haas et al., 2018). It has been increasingly noted that, when studyingmigratory
movements, one should consider people’s capabilities and aspirations jointly (Carling, 2002;
de Haas, 2003). These are influenced at the micro-, meso- and macro-levels and only once they
are taken into account might one be able to explain the individual differences seen in the
migration reality. Capabilities and aspirations are not equally distributed across societies and
are subject to change over time and place as they are inter alia influenced by the determinants
at the three different levels, which are not constant (Timmerman et al., 2014; Van Mol, Snel,
Hambrecht’s, & Timmerman, 2018).
GLOBAL MIGRATION PORTAL
As people’s tendency is to move to relatively safe, secure and prosper areas-due to increasing
social-economic and political instability and growing distance between reach and poor
countries,the global migration is accelerating gradually. As of2020 there are about 281 million
migrants globally, representing almost 5% of world’s totalpopulation (7.8 billion). Women
represent 70 million of all international migrate workers, accountfor 42% of the international
migrate workers. On the contrary, nearly 60 million people have been internally migrants.
Much of this happened due to labor or family migration. The share of the total global
population against international migration is also incriminating, stands at 3.6% in 2020, up
from 3.2% a decade earlier and 2.6% in 1960.
Table 1: Statistic for Global Migration
No. Country (Million) % of total
population
Male
(Million)
Female
(Million)
1 Tota migration 281 3.6% 146 136
2 Migrate
workers
169 4.9% (of total
workforces)
58.5% 41.5%
Source: Pew Research Center Analysis of United Nations Economic and Social Affairs 2020 International Migrant
Data
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According to ILO statistic (2019), the total number of migrant workers stood at 169 million
whichrepresent nearly 5% of the global workforce in 2019. Migrant workers usually work in
all areas and sectors but are often involved in low-skilled industries such as agriculture,
construction and tourism. Around 70% of the migrant worker are age from 15 and above.
People usually move to relatively safe, secure and prosper areas with a view to better and
secure life and better future. The table below represents the region-wise migration globally.
Table 2: Region-wise Migration
Regions No. of Migrants Share of International
Migrant Population (%)
The Total International Migrant Population 280,598,105 100%
Europe and North America 145,414,863 52%
Northern Africa and Western Asia 49,767,746 18%
Sub-Sahara Africa 22,221,583 8%
Eastern and Southern Asia 19,591,106 7%
Central and Southern Asia 19,427,567 7%
Latin America and the Caribbean 14,794,623 5%
Australia and New Zealand 9,067,584 3%
Oceania (Excluding Australia and New Zealand) 313,069 0%
Source: MPI Tabulation of Data from UN DESA Population Division International Migration Stock 2000
The table 2 shows that more than half (51%) of the total global migrants resided in North
Americaand Europe followed by North Africa and Western Asia with 18% of the international
migrant stoke while Oceania (Excluding Australia and New Zealand) is the least attractive
migrants’ destination. Migrants move usually from low-income and developing countries to
high-income and industrial countries. Most preferable countries for the international
migrationarehighincome-countries suchas USA and EU for greater income and social stability
as well as oil-producing countries in the gulf countries attract Asian and other migrants.
Table 3: Top 10 Migrant Recipient Countries
No. Country No. of Migrants (Million) % of total migrants
1 USA 50.5 18%
2 Germany 15.8 9%
3 SA 13.1 8%
4 Russia 11.6 6%
5 UK 9.4 4.7%
6 UAE 8.7 3.12%
7 France 8.5 3.1%
8 Canada 8.0 3%
9 Australia 7.7 2.9%
10 Spain 6.8 2.4
Source: Pew Research Center Analysis of United Nations Economic and Social Affairs 2020 International Migrant
Data
The table 3 shows that the world’s top migrant destination is United States which account for
5%of the global population or has been home of 18% of the global migrants. The total number
of migrants of United State (50.6 million) is more than that of the next 4 largest migration
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Afroje, S., & Ashik, S. A. I. (2023). Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 10(11).
267-276.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.1011.14276
receivingcountries, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Russia and UK (50.2 million). Eventually since
1990, Australia, Spain, UAE and the United Kingdom have joined the rank of top 10 migrant’s
destinations.
On the contrary, middle-income countries such as India, Mexico, Russia, China (mainland), and
Syria send the most migrants in absolute numbers, including refugees in the case of Syria.
While nearly all Mexican migrants (97 percent) reside in the United States, international
migrants from Indiaaremore scatteredacross theworld,including intheUnitedArabEmirates,
theUnited States,Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Oman.
Table 4: Top 10 Migration originated Countries.
No. Country No. of Migrants (Million) % of total migrants
1 India 17.9 17%
2 Mexico 11.1 8.5%
3 Russia 10.8 7.5%
4 China 10.5 7.4%
5 Syria 8.5 6%
6 Bangladesh 7.4 5%
7 Pakistan 6.3 4%
8 Ukraine 6.1 3.7%
9 Philippine 6.1 3.7
10 Afghanistan 5.9 3.5%
Source: Pew Research Center Analysis of United Nations Economic and Social Affairs 2020 International Migrant
Data
Table 4 shows the country-wise origination of migrants where India is the single largest
country of origin of migrants accounting for 17.9 million or 17% of the migrants followed by
Mexico 11.1million (8.5%) and Russia 10.8 million (7.5%).
IMPACTS OF MIGRATION
Migration has great impacts in global economy spheres. Migration brings cheap labor forces,
economic and cultural diversity, diversification of economic and entrepreneurship activities
and economic growth in host countries in one hand, on the other hand, they accelerate
remittance which brings economic growth and socio-economic development for the
developing and list developed countries.
The remittance played a great role for the acceleration of GDP, and the primary school
enrollmentrate in developing country like Bangladesh significantly. In FY 2021, remittance
makes up over 6% of GDP in Bangladesh. At the same time, according to Global Economic
Outlook 2020, Bangladesh’s Primary School Enrollment value has been accelerated to 119.6
percent in 2020 from 106.0 percent in 2010. Remittance sent by the migrate workers, mainly
rural section of workforces,played a significant role for the development.
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Figure 1: Statistic for Remittance Growth Globally 2010-2022
Source: World Bank 2010-2021
The figure 1 shows the gradual acculturation of remittance sent by the migrate workers to
their home countries, mainly from the developed countries to developing and list developed
countries.It’s seen that in 2010 global remittance was around $4.5 billion which has been
accelerated sharplyto $800 billion in 2020.
Figure 2: Top 10 Remittance Earning Countries
Source: World Bank 2010-2022
The figure 2 shows the top 10 remittance earning countries globally. India is the single biggest
remittance earner account for $83.2 billion worth of remittance followed by China $59.5
million, Mexico $42.9 and Philippine $34.9.
It is a matter of fact that the largest number of migrants doesn’t necessarily mean the largest
volume of remittance earner. Remittance earning depends on the quality and skills of the
migrate workers and their country of migration. As a result, China is the 2nd largest remittance
earner though by the number of migrants its rank is world’s 4th largest.Same thing is true with
Philippines and Egypt whose remittance earning ranks are world 4th and 5th largest
respectivelythough in term of the number of migrant workers Philippines is world 6th largest
and Egypt isout of top 10 rank. On the country, Bangladesh is world 8th largest remittance
earners though in term of the number of migrate worker the country is world 6th largest. This
is because, most of the Bangladeshi migrate workers are non-skills and semi-skills and
migrated in low earningmiddle eastern countries.
Global Remitance Inflow
2024
2022
2020
2018
2016
2014
2012
2010
1000
800
600
400
200
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Year $ Billion
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Afroje, S., & Ashik, S. A. I. (2023). Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 10(11).
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URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.1011.14276
Figure 3: Countries-wise Source of Remittances
Source: World Bank 2010-2022
The figure 3 shows the top 10 remittance earning sources and it’s seen that USA is the largest
remittance originated country accounting for $71.6 million worth of remittance, followed by
UAE $45 million and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 31.2 million.
IRREGULAR MIGRATION
On the contrary, growing irregular migration has been cause of concern globally. Due to global
socio-economic and political depression and growing gap between rich and the poor countries
theirregular migration is growing rapidly globally.
Figure 4: Shows the Growing Number of Illegal Migrations from 2010-2020.
Source: IOM 2022
The figure 4 shows the growing number of irregular migrants. It is seen that in 2010 the
irregularmigrants were 300,000 globally which has been accelerated by 3 folds to 900000 in
2020. And it’sa matter of concern that the trend is growing continuously.
Routes of Illegal Migration
The illegal migrants are using various dangerous sea and land routs to be migrated. They are
passing through human traffickers with huge money, selling out their last assets and facing
enormous challenges on the routs even losing their lives by road accident, hunger, diseases,
capsizing boats etc. Migration casualties are very common news in recent years. As illegal
immigration is growing globally the fatality of illegal immigration on routs is accelerating
parallelly. Table 2 shows the fatality of illegal immigration on routes.
REMITTENCE EARNING SOURCES ($
MILLION)
71.6
45
31.2 28.2 24.1 22.2 15.1 15.1 14.8 14.5
USA UAE SA Switz Germany Russia China French Kuwait Neth
Gradual Acceleration of Illegal Migration
2010-2022
2025
2020
2015
2010
2005
2000
1000000
500000
0
1 2 3 4
Years Migrants
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Table 2: Fatalities of Illegal Migration 2010-2010
Year Fatalities
2010 3300
2015 5400
2019 5400
2020 3900
Source: UNESCO 2021
Impacts of Irregular Migration
Illegal migration is growing challenges for both the home countries and the host countries. In
thehome countries they are occurring brain draining, money laundering, crisis of human
resources and hindering development prospect and potentiality. On the contrary they are
creation enormouspressure on economy, infrastructure, social, security and environmental
spheres in host countries.Illegal migration is also accountable for growing crime rate, wage
discrimination, degrading of living standards and many other social-economic problems.
POTENTIAL WAYS TO OVERCOME THE CHALLENGE
Peoples are moving from one place to another place for prosperity, peace, and security.
Decentralization and diversification of economic, industrial and entrepreneurship activities,
generation of employment, bringing socio-economic and political stability, alleviation of
povertyand improving standard of living are the most effective and sustainable ways for
potential breakthrough. But the developing and list developed countries neither have
resources nor know how to bring the changes. Rather they are moving to developed and
industrial nations and keeping huge pressure on their economic, infrastructure, social,
political and environment spheres. Nevertheless, they are minimizing their own development
potentiality at the same time. Collectiveefforts and co-operation between developing and
developed countries could bring a potential solution. ‘Absolute Globalization’ based with
regionalism could bring a potential breakthrough.
Absolute Globalization, an Effective Way for Collective Effort and Global Co-operation
‘Absolute Globalization,’ an absolute integration of global economic, education, political, and
social institutions are comprehensive ways to solve the global challenges. Absolute
globalizationcan be shaped and solve the global problems in the following ways:
Regionalism:
Globalization has to be shaped with regionalism. Regionalism is the cooperation,
collaboration and mobilization of policy, resource and human capital of the regional states for
reginal security, peace and prosperity. The regional union’s policy, diplomacy, and
development initiatives are more effective than that of singe states or the global
organizations. E.g., European Union AssociationAgreementis very strategic, effective, andvery
successful to its agendas. The regionalstates’ organization will solve the global problems
through solving the regional problems and securing their own interests.
Moreover, a global organization can be formed with the regional state’s organizations to deal
with the greater global issues like global warming, political unrest, global security and
pollution problems which will solve the migration problem automatically.
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Afroje, S., & Ashik, S. A. I. (2023). Migration Problem: Reasons, Impacts and Way to Overcome. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 10(11).
267-276.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.1011.14276
Globalization of Labour Market and Single Global Currency:
Globalization of labour market and single global currency could be a cornerstone for absolute
globalization. The world commodity market has been globalized by the name of economic
globalization, but the labour market and the production facilities have not been globalized. By
thename of economic globalization, the developed countries are occupying the markets of
developingand least developed countries with their products and services, destroying the
production facilities, industrialization and investment opportunity, diversity, and
development potentiality of their developing and least developed countries counterparts. As
a result, the developing and least developed countries are being poorer and losing their
capability to fight against greater challenges.Labour market globalization and Global single
currency will spread the industrialization globally,generate employment in the most needy
areas and minimize the wage discrimination and the costof products and services and bring a
balance between developed and developing countries to minimize the migration and poverty
problems.
Borderless World:
State border is the cause of conflicts including arm conflicts, resulting massive destruction of
resources, lives and inhabitants and cause ofmass displacement and mass migration.It hinders
theproductivity and growth not only for the conflicted parties rather for the rest of the world
and causeof economic slowdown, financial crisis and inflation. It is the impediment for
international cooperation and development. It prevents the free movement of goods, service,
capital and people.Moreover, a large segment of arable lands is used as no man’s land between
the borders of many countries. The cultivation of that lands can increase the global food
growth and increased the global food security. Nevertheless, a wide portion of global GDP is
spent for military purpose and the most capable human resources and technologies are used
in the area. If the resources and the human capital is utilized in civil purpose it will be well
beings for the entire world and for whole human beings.
Poverty Reduction
As of 2021, 763 million people or 9.4% of the total world population live below the national
poverty line ($1.9/day) while 99% of the global assets is occupied by 10% people. Moreover,
global military spending is 2 trillion, 2.9% of global total GDP. In 2020 US military budget
was $900 billion (3.7% of the total GDP), followed by China $293.35 billion, Russia $65.9
billion andIndia $49.6 billion. If half of the total military budget ($1 trillion) is spending for
poverty and illiteracy reduction purpose, then the problem will be solved permanently, and
we will get a betterworld free from hunger, homeless illiteracy and poverty and illegal
migration problem would be solved permanently. To solve the issue we need absolute
globalization, and proper utilization of assets.
CONCLUSION
To confront the global challenge, we need global integrity and global co-operation. Global
safety,global peace and global prosperity are our common interest. We must have common
mentality, common ethics, common ideology and combined effort to protect it. An effective
action plan andits proper implementation are disposable for these. Absolute globalization, an
integration of global economic, education, political, and social institutions could bring a
potential breakthrough.Regionalism, which is cooperation, collaboration and mobilization of
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policy, resource and humancapital of the regional states for regional safety, security and
prosperity, could be the building block to solve the global migration problem.
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