Daijiworld Media Network – New Delhi
New Delhi, Jan 1: Migration and mobility have emerged as defining political issues worldwide in 2025, dominating debates around elections, state authority, economic strategy and national identity. Questions over who gets to move, work and settle — and under what conditions — have increasingly become flashpoints where global economic realities clash with assertions of national sovereignty.
In the United States, migration politics have taken an unprecedented enforcement-driven turn following Donald Trump’s return to the presidency in 2025. Campaigning on a promise to carry out the “largest domestic deportation operation” in American history, the administration has rolled out mass deportations, including flights to third countries with no prior links to migrants, stepped-up immigration raids and sweeping executive orders empowering authorities to tighten enforcement.
At the centre of this shift is the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, widely seen as a signal that migration has become a potent tool to mobilise political support. Migration, once largely discussed through economic or humanitarian lenses, is now increasingly framed as a threat to sovereignty and national security — a narrative gaining traction beyond the US.
Similar trends are visible in countries such as the UK and Australia, where offshore detention, stricter asylum regimes and the criminalisation of migrants have long existed. Analysts say these measures reflect a broader global move towards harsher border controls.
Despite tightening borders, labour migration has become one of the most contested aspects of global mobility. In the US, the H-1B visa programme, originally designed to attract high-skilled professionals in sectors such as information technology and engineering, has come under intense scrutiny. Critics argue that the programme allows companies to replace domestic workers with cheaper and more vulnerable foreign labour, turning migration into a proxy for deeper concerns around wage stagnation, outsourcing and corporate cost-cutting.
This contradiction is mirrored across many OECD countries, where economies remain heavily dependent on migrant labour even as political pressure grows to curb migration. Asylum systems are becoming more restrictive, family reunification rules tighter, and international student policies increasingly limited.
India occupies a particularly complex position in this global migration landscape. The number of Indians living abroad has risen sharply from 6.6 million in 1990 to over 18.5 million by 2024. Remittances sent home reached a record $135.46 billion in 2024–25, marking a 14 per cent increase over the previous year and cementing India’s position as the world’s top remittance recipient — far ahead of Mexico and China.
Indian workers form a critical part of labour markets in the Gulf, North America and Europe. However, rising deportations and stricter visa scrutiny have heightened their vulnerability, underscoring a paradox in which migrants are economically indispensable yet politically expendable. A recent reduction in the US remittance tax from 5 per cent to 1 per cent under President Trump’s legislation is expected to provide some relief to Indian migrants.
Within India, migration politics have also intensified. Policies centred on “detect, delete and deport” so-called illegal migrants have tapped into anxieties around demographic change, identity and national security. Observers note that what was once seen as a fluid or shared social space has increasingly become a contested terrain, sharply defining the line between citizens and “outsiders”.
According to the International Migration Outlook 2025, permanent migration to OECD countries declined by 4 per cent in 2024 to 6.2 million people. While family migration remained the primary driver, labour migration fell by 21 per cent. Humanitarian migration, however, rose by 23 per cent, and temporary labour migration stabilised at high levels, with 2.3 million work permits issued.
As nations grapple with economic needs, political pressures and social anxieties, migration continues to sit at the heart of global debates, shaping policies and politics well into 2025.