Migration and security: rhetoric and reality

Along with the increase in focus on the need for policymakers and the community to implement and support initiatives on countering violent extremism, there has been a tendency to put migration high on the agenda too. The phenomenon of foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria – small in number but significant in political impact – is at risk of dominating the migration and security discussion. Recent events in Australia and Europe are causing some to reflect on the apparent failures of integration that have radicalised some immigrants and their descendants. There may be some who are drawing a line uncritically between irregular migration, asylum and the risk of importing terrorism. Each of the links between migration and violent extremism is relevant and needs to be understood and confronted; but to cast migration as only a negative influence would be erroneous. In this talk, Dr Koser will outline key aspects of the broader migration and security discussion and how it is changing as well as discuss some ideas about how migration should be part of the solution. Dr Khalid Koser MBE is Executive Director of the Global Community and Engagement Resilience Fund (GCERF) and Non-Resident Fellow at the Lowy Institute. Dr Koser is also Associate Fellow at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, Non-Resident Senior Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Associate Fellow at Chatham House, Research Associate at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, and extraordinary Professor in Conflict, Peace and Security in the Faculty of Humanities and Sciences at the University of Maastricht. He is also chair of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on Migration, and editor of the Journal of Refugee Studies. Dr Koser is a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).