With COVID-19 disrupting travel, shutting borders, and redefining what is essential work, Pandemic Borders explores what international migration will look like after the pandemic, in this series titled #MigrantFutures
Companies that profit from selling surveillance technologies and border services to governments are actively lobbying countries to adopt more militaristic approaches to migration. In fact, the border and surveillance industry is now so profitable that it has become a key commodity for major investment companies such as the Vanguard Group, BlackRock, or Capital Research Management, who invest on behalf of pension funds, insurance companies, university endowments or individuals’ savings.
Over the past ten years, the global population of displaced people has grown substantially to at least 79.5 million people, according to the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR. The agency estimates that since 2012, the number of refugees under its mandate has nearly doubled due to conflicts, including the war in Syria and the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar.
