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13 British J. Pol. & Int'l Rel. 1 (2011)

handle is hein.journals/bhjlplcs13 and id is 1 raw text is: doi: 10.1111/j.1467-856X.2010.00435.x BJPIR: 2011 VOL 13, 1-11 The Role of Narratives in Migration Policy-Making: A Research Framework Christina Boswell, Andrew Geddes and Peter Scholten While debates on migration policy often revolve around rival values and interests, they also invoke knowledge claims about the causes, dynamics and impacts of migration. Such claims are best conceptualised as 'policy narratives', setting out beliefs about policy problems and appropriate interventions. Narratives are likely to be more successful where they meet three criteria: they are cognitively plausible, dramatically or morally compelling and, importantly, they chime with perceived interests. Increasingly, such narratives are also expected to draw on expert knowledge, although knowledge is often deployed to legitimise particular actors or preferences rather than to enhance the cognitive plausibility of the narrative. The series of articles in this issue explore how narratives are developed, codified, revised and diffused in policy debates and policy-making. We hope that they contribute not just to understanding migration policy, but also to wider debates on the role of ideas and knowledge in public policy. Keywords: migration policy; policy narratives; expert knowledge; public policy Introduction Those following public debates about migration in Europe will be struck by the range of apparently factual claims put forward by politicians, the media, interest groups, think tanks and academic researchers. Political debate frequently seems to revolve around different empirical assertions about the causes, effects and conse- quences of migration. Such assertions may involve claims about the numbers of immigrants entering or leaving a particular country, how long they are staying, what kind of work they undertake, their impact on the welfare system or the ability of migrants to 'integrate' into the societies in which they live. This implies that a substantial element of discussion and deliberation on migration policy involves rival claims about the causes, dynamics and effects of international migration. The notion that rival claims play a substantial role in policy debates accords with much of the recent literature on public policy. Over the past decade or more, a number of scholars have stressed the role of ideas in shaping policy-making (Gold- stein and Keohane 1993; Berman 2001; Bleich 2002; Schmidt and Radaelli 2004). As part of the 'neo-institutionalist turn', these scholars have explored how different traditions of thought, paradigms or frames have influenced public debates and political decision-making. Such accounts stress that conceptions of policy problems do not simply flow from the objective 'facts' of the situation, nor can policy preferences simply be inferred from objective, rational interests. Instead, both .11• Political Studies © 2011 The Authors. British Journal of Politics an.d Ihternationa Relations © 2011 nsi'q Association Political Studies Association

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