Visas reduce immigration… and return

25 April 2014

Mathias Czaika, Hein de Haas
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The effectiveness of migration policy remains a highly contested issue in the media, politics and academia alike. This new working paper from the International Migration Institute, an Oxford Martin School institute, addresses how immigration policies – specifically visa requirements – affect migration. The authors, IMI Co-Director Hein de Haas and Senior Researcher Mathias Czaika, use two new databases compiled as part of the DEMIG (Determinants of International Migration) project to provide evidence that: - Visas reduce immigration and return migration - Visas interrupt circulation of migrants and push them into permanent settlement - Visas make migration less responsive to economic opportunities in origin and destination countries