Press release: Call for a return to an objective debate

No. 274 - 12.12.2018

Göttingen migration scholars criticise the misleading debate about the UN Global Compact for Migration.

Researchers at the Centre for Global Migration Studies (CeMig) at Göttingen Campus criticise that right-wing populist voices and conspiracy theories now far outweigh any differentiated and objective debate about the opportunities and shortcomings of the UN Global Compact for Migration. Important scientific findings from international migration research are not, or only rarely, being taken into account in the current public discussion.

"For years, the United Nations has been trying to formulate common responses and regulations for the international community of states for this cross-border phenomenon," explains Professor Sabine Hess, Director of CeMig and cultural anthropologist at the University of Göttingen. "From the perspective of empirical migration research, it is very welcome that for the first time all states and representatives of civil society have come together at the negotiating table and tried to balance the interests of sending, transit and receiving countries".

Migration, as shown by CeMig's interdisciplinary and empirical research, is not limited to the integration of immigrants in host countries, but is a global process that spans regions. "The regulation of migration movements at the global level is therefore only logical," says Hess. According to the lawyer Dr Stefan Schlegel of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity in Göttingen, the Global Compact is primarily the basis for a multilateral forum. "The Global Compact creates a framework in which multilateral cooperation on migration can gradually be developed," explains Schlegel. "This is the best hope for being able to regulate migration. Anyone who is against the Compact must either be able to explain how a better multilateral forum could emerge or how a state should regulate migration in the future without multilateral cooperation."

"For the most part, the UN Global Compact for Migration does not formulate new legal obligations or human rights standards," said Hess, adding that "its objectives are based on existing international and European conventions for the protection of fundamental rights. Those who criticise the Compact's human rights-based language are either ignorant of the international and European legal conventions (which signatory states are already obliged to apply; granting rights to migrants is therefore not a question of political expediency) or they do not want to recognize these conventions in the general mood against migration."

More detailed statements by various academics can be found on the CeMig website at www.uni-goettingen.de/de/547763.html.

Note to the editors:

The researchers at the Centre for Global Migration Studies at Göttingen Campus are available for interviews.

Contact:

Professor Sabine Hess (Director)

University of Göttingen

Centre for Global Migration Studies (CeMig)

Phone +49 (0)551 39-25349

Email: shess@uni-goettingen.de

Internet: www.uni-goettingen.de/de/208718.html

Dr Jelka Günther (Coordinator)

University of Göttingen