Asylum Migration, Borders, and Terrorism in a Structural Gravity Model

Abstract

In this article, we examine the impact of terrorist attacks on asylum-related migration flows. So far, the literature that examines the “push factors” such as terrorism that explain forced migration has omitted the fact that the vast majority of people forced to flee typically do so toward other locations within the country. The novel feature of our research is the estimation of a structural gravity equation that includes both international migration and internally displaced persons (IDP), a theoretically consistent framework that allows us to identify country-specific variables such as terror attacks. For that purpose, we use information on the number of asylum applications, the number of IDP, and the number of terrorist attacks in each country for a sample of 119 origin developing countries and 141 destination countries over 2009–2018. The empirical results reveal several interesting and policy-relevant traits. Firstly, forced migration abroad is still minimal compared to IDP, but globalization forces are pushing up the ratio. Secondly, terror violence has a positive and significant effect on asylum migration flows relative to the number of IDP. Thirdly, omitting internally displaced people biases downward the impact of terrorism on asylum applications. Fourthly, we observe regional heterogeneity in the effect of terrorism on asylum migration flows; in Latin America, terrorist attacks have a much larger impact on the number of asylum applications relative to IDP than in Asia or Africa.

How important are borders for tourism? The case of Europe

“…This is probably due to the greater subjective effect that frontiers have on personal decisions regarding travelling. Therefore, aligned with the previous literature on trade and forced migration (Anderson et al, 2018; Bergstrand et al, 2015; Carril-Caccia et al, 2021; Franco-Bedoya and Frohm, 2021; Head and Mayer, 2021), we also observe a decline over time in the border effect on tourism.…”

“…Therefore, as in the case of the previous literature on trade in merchandise and services, FDI and forced migration (e.g. Anderson et al, 2018; Carril-Caccia et al, 2021; Umber et al, 2014), we expect touristic flows to have a positive border effect. That is to say, after controlling for multiple drivers of international tourism, we expect domestic touristic flows to be greater than international ones.…”

“…Umber et al (2014) conclude that domestic M&A is 6 times greater than cross-border. Carril-Caccia et al (2021) found that domestic forced migration is 42 times greater than international. This is probably due to the greater subjective effect that frontiers have on personal decisions regarding travelling.…”

“…The basic idea that gives meaning to the analysis of the border effect derives from the fact that borders represent a legal, physical, cultural and psychological barrier that hinders the exchange of goods, services, capital and people between countries, so that these exchanges will always be - everything else being equal - more fluid between regions in the same country than between territories in different countries. As in other areas of international economy, the border effect began to be estimated for the trade in merchandise (McCallum, 1995), and was subsequently extended to other areas of international economic relations, such as trade in services (Anderson et al, 2018), foreign investment (Mayer et al, 2010), tourism (Paniagua et al, 2022) and forced migrations (Carril-Caccia et al, 2021).…”