Junior Migration Webinar

A ‘Good Deal’? U.S. Military Aid and Refugee Flows to the United States

Laura Renner, with Eugen Dimant, Tim Krieger and Daniel Meierrieks
 

Abstract

The present paper focuses on U.S. military aid and refugee flows from 187 countries to the U.S. from 1988 to 2017. It addresses the question whether military aid is “a good deal” for the U.S. when it comes to avoiding unwanted refugees coming to the country. That is, we ask whether aid has a stabilizing, emigration-reducing effect on the origin countries of potential refugees. Our results show that this is not the case; rather, there are more refugees coming from countries that receive more U.S. military aid. Addressing the obvious endogeneity in the aid-migration relationship, these results hold after conducting several robustness checks. We show further that the negative total effect runs through a negative effect of U.S. military aid on human rights and other institutional variables. The deterioration of the human rights situation results in a living environment that is sufficiently unfavorable to make people want to leave and can even force some people to flee their home countries, resulting in more refugees coming to the U.S. Hence, if U.S. military aid aims at reducing refugee flows, it is – according to our findings – not successful in doing so.

 

The Decision to Flee: Analyzing Gender-Specific Determinants of International Refugee Migration

Lena Schmid, with Laura Renner
 

Abstract

Using a gravity approach, we explore determinants and dynamics of refugee migration using a gendered cross-national dyadic dataset on refugee movements for the years 2000-2015. Along three dimensions (push, pull and cost factors), we analyze whether there are heterogeneous effects of flight determinants for men and women. Our results suggest that within the push dimension there is only little difference in gender-specific responses. Most prominently, women react relatively stronger to the existence of sexual violence as a conflict strategy. When it comes to dyadic factors, we find that distance is a decisive factor for men and women. The most gender-sensitive dimension appears to be the pull factors: Neighboring countries attract more women in comparison to men as well as to non-neighbors. For non-neighbors, female flows are more sensitive to political stability, women's rights and the economic situation of the destination.

Attend (Zoom)