One of the original contributions of the Migrant Law Russia project is that it presents new theoretical and empirical insights into scholarly debates on migrants’ legal adaptation and integration. While migration has become an all-important topic of discussion around the globe, mainstream literature on migrant legal adaptation and integration tends to focus on case studies of immigrant communities in Western-style democracies. We know relatively little about how migrants adapt to a new legal environment in the ever-growing hybrid political regimes that are neither clearly democratic nor conventionally authoritarian. Migrant Law Russia project, utilizing the case of Russia – an archetypal hybrid political regime and the third-largest recipients of migrants worldwide – investigated how Central Asian migrant workers produce new forms of informal governance and legal order. By using insights and perspectives from (a) legal pluralism, (b) hybrid political regimes scholarship, informality literature (c) and (d) socio-legal studies of migration, the project put forward a new framework that incorporates “informality and a weak rule-of-law” as key analytical factors to understand migrant legal adaptation in hybrid political regimes. The core argument is that the legal adaptations of migrant workers in hybrid political regimes such as Russia should be understood not only through migrants’ legalization efforts and involvement with state institutions, but also in terms of their knowledge of street law and informal rules, connections to street institutions, and their capacity to integrate into the corrupt and weak rule-of-law environment. Thus, it is suggested that the law and legal adaptation should be defined more broadly, beyond state immigration laws, policies, and institutions, and encompass informal “legal orders”. These informal legal orders include (1) migrants’ agency and their “legal baggage”, i.e. informal (and non-legal) practices, rules, strategies, networks, and structures used by migrants to follow, comply with, avoid, or maneuver around the laws; (2) informal, rent-seeking behaviors and practices among state officials (e.g. immigration officers, policemen, and border guards) in charge of enforcing immigration laws and policies; (3) street institutions (racketeers, intermediaries, and former law enforcement officers) used to enforce contracts and legalization; and (4) transnational networks, interactions, and pressures that shape migrants’ experiences in the host society.
Migrant Law Russia project findings have effects and impact beyond academia. Traditionally, the major emphasis has been placed on formal avenues of migrant integration and adaptation, whereas informal channels of migrant adaptation have been regarded as an abnormal, exception to the rule of law. However, the question lingers as to how we should understand and study migrant adaptation and integration processes in migrant-receiving countries characterized by the weak rule-of-law, dysfunctional institutions and rampant corruption which leave little or no room for formal migrant adaptation. This question has important implications not only for academic circles but also for immigration policymakers and practitioners, both at the national and international level, who are concerned with the dilemma of how to govern labor migration processes. Migrant Law Russia project findings challenge Western-centric understanding and provide a context-sensitive understanding of the interplay between migrant undocumentedness, informality and legal adaptation which will inform different target audiences and thereby advance global discussions on migrant rights in different parts of the world.
