Misinformation and Irregular Migration in Nigeria
Seminar Series on Displacement, Migration, and Integration:
Misinformation and Irregular Migration in Nigeria
Thursday, April 28 at 8:00AM PT / 11:00AM ET
Irregular migration from sub-Saharan Africa to Europe has been and will continue to be persistent over the coming decades. In response, European countries have invested significantly in information campaigns designed to dissuade irregular migrants. In EGAP’s inaugural event of the Displacement, Migration, and Integration seminar series on April 28th, we shared the results from a field experiment conducted in the Nigerian states of Delta and Edo—epicenters of irregular migration—that provided detailed information about the migration journey to a representative sample of households and measured impacts on actual migration.
Researchers Alexandra Scacco (WZB) and Bernd Beber (RWI), along with Emeka Eluemunor (Country Director) of Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) Nigeria, the research and policy nonprofit that implemented the survey, discussed the insights that emerged from their research and the implications of those insights on European countries’ migration information campaigns. EGAP Member Gareth Nellis moderated the seminar.
Panel: Alexandra Scacco (WZB), Bernd Beber (RWI), Emeka Eluemunor (IPA Nigeria)
Host and Moderator: Gareth Nellis (UCSD)
Watch the full presentation and Q&A below. After viewing the recording, please post a comment or question at the bottom of the page to participate in an ongoing discussion on this topic. If you prefer to download/listen to it as a podcast, click here.
Panelists
Alexandra Scacco is a Senior Research Fellow in the Institutions and Political Inequality unit at the WZB. She received her Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University and previously worked as an Assistant Professor at New York University. Alex’s work focuses on the causes and consequences of individual decisions in conditions of extreme risk, where potential costs are high and benefits uncertain. Her methodological interests focus on improving measurement in field-based research and knowledge aggregation in social science.
Bernd Beber is a Senior Researcher at RWI – Leibniz Institute for Economic Research. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University and has previously held appointments at New York University and the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. His work focuses on the political economy of conflict and development, the role of international institutions in fragile societies, and the causes and consequences of migration, with a focus on causal inference and sub-Saharan Africa.
Emeka Eluemunor is the Country Director for IPA Nigeria. Prior to joining IPA, Emeka worked as a researcher and M&E specialist. He has over 15 years of experience providing research and results measurement support to development programs in Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda. Emeka has conducted research and evaluations across several areas including agriculture, access to finance, micro-enterprises, business environment, women’s economic empowerment, multiple and illegal taxation, and mobile money. He is also experienced in designing and managing the implementation of poverty-reducing interventions.
Moderator
Gareth Nellis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, San Diego. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Yale University and his research focuses on political parties, in particular the origins and persistence of weakly institutionalized party systems, and the extent to which parties matter for key development outcomes. A second strand of work addresses the drivers of discrimination against internal migrants in fast-urbanizing settings.