The migration-sustainability paradox: transformations in mobile worlds

Critical social science perspectives on transformations to sustainability

“…Issues of social justice are prominent. Franco Gavonel et al [ 74 •• ], Eppinger et al [ 75 •• ], Beck et al [ 76 •• ], and Porto de Albuquerque et al [ 77 •• ] lean away from a development orientation, framing analysis within a global or sectoral perspective, or according to specific expertise (intellectual property regimes, data innovations).…”

“…Franco Gavonel et al [ 74 •• ] situate global human migration in relation to migration transition dynamics, building on theories of migration as social transformation and as development in research seated within human geography but informed by macroeconomics, demography, development, and migration studies. In contrast, Eppinger et al [ 75 •• ] focus on intellectual property rights (IPR) in manufacturing.…”

“…contrasts with the orientation of other articles. Beck et al [ 76 •• ] and Franco Gavonel et al [ 74 •• ] are illustrative. The STI framework of Beck et al [ 76 •• ] positions science and technology in relation to political power and to governance – with the relationship between knowledge and power played out over what counts as a desirable future and for whom, plus the political choices this entails.…”

“…This helps ‘capture the tensions between alternative visions and contingencies in policy choices, as well as discern the forms of power at work in articulating futures that ‘ought’ to be attained … [raising] … the question whether or not, and to whom, the particular societal futures imaginable through techno scientific changes seem worth attaining’ (p.144). For Franco Gavonel et al [ 74 •• ], their framing calls for conceptualizing transformation processes within a migration – sustainability nexus. They suggest that migration facilitates transformations to sustainability if it simultaneously improves the three dimensions of sustainability: (a) migration increases aggregate wellbeing while lowering environmental burdens; (b) it reduces inequality in multiple spatial, economic, and health dimensions; and, (c) it represents or promotes diversity, political freedom and reduced insecurity.…”

Bridging and breaking silos: Transformational governance of the migration–sustainability nexus

“…Mobile lifestyles and multicultural settings have implications for how countries and cities develop, impacting local and transnational behaviors, practices, and conceptualizations of sustainability. The collision of practices and values can confront and reconfigure socioeconomic patterns including consumption behaviors ( 1 – 3 ). Migrants contribute knowledge, networks, skills, and everyday sustainability practices that are informed by their lived experiences ( 4 , 5 ).…”