Bridging Migrants’ Social Protection Gap: Understanding The Incomplete Revolution Of International Social Security Coordination

abstract: Recent decades have seen a sharp but regionally imbalanced expansion of bilateral and multilateral social security agreements (ssas), which serve to bridge gaps in migrant workers’ social protection by facilitating international portability of social rights and benefits. However, our knowledge about the factors shaping this remarkable, yet puzzling, development remains scarce. This study integrates literatures on international cooperation and the migration–welfare state nexus to formulate theoretical expectations about how migration patterns interact with democracy, economic development, and social security design to shape countries’ ssa trajectories. The authors analyze a new global dyadic data set that covers almost 1,300 ssa adoptions throughout the post–World War II period. They find that a country-pair’s level of development and similarity with regard to these three factors help to account for the countries’ likelihood of establishing an ssa, with migration working as a demand driver. These findings help to explain gaps in social protection between migrants and native residents worldwide and suggest how those gaps may be bridged.