The International Organization for Migration and New Global Migration Governance

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Chuang, Janie A.
• 署名单位: American University
• 刊物名称: HARVARD INTERNATIONAL LAW JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0017-8063
• 发表日期: 2023
• 关键词: management; WORKER; IOM; RECRUITMENT; MIGRANTS; POLITICS; BENEFIT; RIGHTS

摘要

This Article examines the role of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in global migration governance and its implications for migrant workers' rights and well-being. After 65 years of independent operations, the IOM joined the U.N. system in 2016 and quickly assumed the role of global lead migration agency-a status later affirmed by the 2018 U.N. Global Compact on Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration. In this capacity, the IOM can influence whether and how states address the gaps in international migration law and policy that foster the continued exploitation and abuse of migrant workers worldwide. Critics worry, however, that the IOM's new role as U.N. Migration could enable a blue -washing of its activities-projecting the appearance of humanitarianism while operating to migrants' detriment. After all, before joining the U.N. system, the IOM was widely known as a bureaucratic entrepreneur that served the foreign policy interests of the Global North-and had a checkered human rights record to show for it. Whether the IOM's past presages a future marked by a lackluster commitment to migrants' rights largely remains to be seen. This Article offers some initial insights through close examination of the IOM's efforts to promote ethical recruitment of migrant workers. The IOM's work in this area unfortunately aligns with a trend in transnational labor governance away from binding labor regulations and towards incrementalist, soft law governance. It both legitimates the privatization of migration governance and diminishes state accountability for failing to prevent and address migrant worker abuse. In so doing, the IOM falls short on its promises to transform the recruitment industry and to advance migrant workers' rights and well-being.