Leila Simona Talani and Simon McMahon (eds.) Handbook of the International Political Economy of Migration Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2015. viii + 439 p. $225.00.

Abstract

The focus of this book is on the conditions of entry and exit of economic migrants, both legal and illegal. Its perspective is that of international political economy (IPE). In the context of migration, this encompasses the realist tradition in political science in which migration outcomes are governed by states or by interest groups within them, (neo)liberal institutionalism with its emphasis on regulation of migration by international institutions, and the “globalization thesis” that envisages looser controls on mobility as an inevitable accompaniment of an ongoing weakening of state sovereignty and national ties. The first, theoretical section of the volume, although subtitled “Towards an International Political Economy of Migration,” offers a less than cogent account of this territory. Its chapters cover state regulation of migration, transnational migration and global governance, the requirements of an ethical mobility regime, human trafficking, and migration effects of urban transformations. The IPE approach (and a sub-category, critical IPE) seems to be essentially defined by the migration studies of political scientists. A second part, on the economic dimensions of migration, contains more focused essays on international labor migration, guestworker regimes, migration effects on welfare states, migrant remittances, and migration provisions in trade pacts. Finally, a third section consists of case studies of aspects of the political economy of migration in the European Union, the Middle East, North America, and Southeast Asia, with particular attention to regional integration. An outlier in this part is a paper on Cairo, depicted as a global city with a large migrant-swollen informal labor market entrenching a social hierarchy with varying degrees of citizenship. The editors and most of the contributors are from British and other European universities. Chapter bibliographies, index.